postlaestadianrevival

Like John the Baptist, Laestadius was supposed to be the forerunner of Jesus Christ, this time for his second coming. One of the church books we had was called "The Voice of One Crying in the Wilderness." which is how John the Baptist refers to himself in the new testament. (John 1:23). I believe that the first Laestadians were convinced, as are many today, that the world would end in a very short time. They used to say that the ones who will be alive at the end have already been born. I recall after meetings going home with the belief (and fear) that the end was near. I would like to make two points about this.

1. Obviously it has been over 150 years since Laestadius lived. If we compare Laestadius to John the Baptist, we can see that it is not a good fit, as Jesus appeared in John's lifetime, and the second coming did not occur during Laestadius' time.

2. The second point I want to make is more important, and probably a little more obscure. Laestdius did resemble John the Baptist in his style of preaching, in the way he called for sinners to repent. John said of Jesus that "He must increase and I must decrease." (John 3:30).

In my mind, this means that our repentance becomes less important as our understanding of Jesus grows. Repentance is NOT insignificant, but it pales in comparison to the joy of knowing Jesus. OUR FAITH IS BASED ON JESUS NOT ON OUR OWN REPENTANCE. The more we know about Jesus the stronger our faith becomes.

On the flip side of that:

The more we know of our sinfulness the more wretched we feel. If this is not balanced with a growing awareness of the enormity of the grace of God, we will become weak and discouraged Christians, who run and hide instead of boldly sharing the gospel as we are called to do.

Oh, how I wish that those souls in the OALC could experience the joy of knowing Jesus!