WOODSTOCK, Ga. (BP)–Amid the nation’s turmoil is “an opportunity for a Great Awakening,” two leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention said in an open letter to Southern Baptists Oct. 20.
At “one of the greatest leadership challenges in our history,” there is “plain and simply an opportunity for the church to go to its knees and seek the Lord for revival in our land,” wrote SBC President Johnny Hunt, pastor of the Atlanta-area First Baptist Church in Woodstock. Ed Litton, president of the SBC Pastors’ Conference, also signed the letter. Litton is pastor of North Mobile Baptist Church in Alabama.
“We must do the one thing God requires of His people, which is to seek His face,” Hunt wrote. “Let me encourage pastors and leaders to follow the promptings of the Holy Spirit in the particulars of how your church family chooses to do this. But let us all set aside time to seek His face and repent of our sins, believing God’s Word that He will again come and heal our land.”
The full text of the open letter follows:
October 20, 2008
Dear Southern Baptist,
We are standing at a historic moment in America. This may be one of the greatest leadership challenges in our history and certainly in our lifetime. Every sector of American life is feeling the powerful effect of the breakdown in leadership character. A whirlwind of problems reveals that our moral infrastructure has been taken for granted far too long and now is exposed to be weak and incapable of withstanding the pressures. This is plain and simply an opportunity for the church to go to its knees and seek the Lord for revival in our land. Things are bad and may get worse, yet make no mistake about it; this is an opportunity for a Great Awakening. God created and preserved this nation, and the future is dependent upon a humble church seeking His face for renewal, revival and refreshing. We are not the handmaidens of political forces; we are the people of God. We must do the one thing God requires of His people, which is to seek His face.
Let me encourage pastors and leaders to follow the promptings of the Holy Spirit in the particulars of how your church family chooses to do this. But let us all set aside time to seek His face and repent of our sins, believing God’s Word that He will again come and heal our land.
2 Chronicles 7:14 says that “if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
We stand at the door of a great opportunity! History will one day reveal if we stepped through this great door or not.
Dr. Johnny M. Hunt
President, Southern Baptist Convention
Dr. Ed Litton
President, Southern Baptist Convention Pastors Conference 2009
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