{"id":7479,"date":"2023-02-22T12:13:31","date_gmt":"2023-02-22T19:13:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/?p=7479"},"modified":"2023-02-22T16:37:45","modified_gmt":"2023-02-22T23:37:45","slug":"asbury-revival-dissipates-energies-of-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/2023\/02\/asbury-revival-dissipates-energies-of-change.html","title":{"rendered":"Asbury Revival Dissipates Energies of Change"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

<\/a>

The 2023 Asbury revival will likely be the release valve that dissipates the energies of change created by Black Lives Matter, Me Too, Trumpism, and Christian Nationalism.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The 2023 Asbury revival will likely become the release valve that dissipates the energies of change created by Black Lives Matter and Me Too movements, as well as the tensions arising from white evangelicalism\u2019s brazen embrace of Trumpism and Christian Nationalism.<\/p>\n

The last major Asbury revival was in 1970. At the time, the Civil Rights movement and Sexual Revolution had created so much tension and pressure that white evangelicalism seemed poised to heed its own prophetic arm and embrace real change. What they did instead is have a revival. The 1970 Asbury revival spread throughout evangelicalism, acting as a release valve, lowering the tension and pressure so white evangelicalism could ignore its prophetic voices.<\/p>\n

As a result, evangelicalism\u2019s issues with systemic racism and patriarchy were never faced. White evangelicalism spent the 1970s decrying the Social Gospel, while beneath the surface it was consolidating its strength and organizing for the culture wars of the 1980s.<\/p>\n

Asbury Revival 2023<\/b><\/h3>\n American evangelicalism sits at an inflection point. Prophetic voices calling for a confession of systemic racism, patriarchy, and Christian Nationalism are creating the kinds of pressures and tensions that often give rise to reform. The church could use this energy to foster prophetic renewal. If history is our teacher, what the church will do instead is have a revival, dissipate the energies of change<\/a>, and continue down the road to self-destruction<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This dissipation of the energies required for systemic change may be why American revivals exist at all. The morbid symptom of this would be that, as an institution, Asbury points to<\/span><\/a> more than a 100 year history of 9 different revivals. Why the constant need for revival? Could it be revivals actually reinforce the status quo instead of challenging it? Historically, it\u2019s possible to argue that part of the role Asbury plays in white evangelicalism is that\u2014through its own history of revivalism\u2014Asbury is the release valve to dissipates the energies of genuine prophetic renewal.<\/p>\n Any revival Christians could trust in 2023 would be rooted in the confession<\/a> of white evangelicalism\u2019s systemic racism, patriarchy, nationalism, and consumerism. Revival would center on repentance for the mistreatment of people of color, women, and the LGBTQ community. It would be about turning from the evil embrace of Christian Nationalism and Donald Trump. It would confess the church\u2019s idolatry and obeisance to predatory capitalism despite its horrific impact on the poor and the planet.<\/p>\n The Danger of the Spectacle<\/b><\/h3>\n**** ** Americans have a tendency to convince themselves they can only see God in the earthquake, wind, and fire, and not the still small voice. The American God comes as the Spectacle<\/em>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n ** The danger of the Spectacle (and I\u2019m cribbing Guy Debord) is that it opposes genuine social action. Debord once wrote, \u201cSpectacle is the sun that never sets over the empire of modern passivity.\u201d Revival breeds passivity. It becomes the spectacle that deflates real action, replacing it with a consumer event.<\/p>\n ** Revival is the Spectacle that short-circuits the boring, un-sexy, day-to-day, soul-grinding work of systemic change. It does so by turning well-meaning people\u2014would-be activists who long for genuine renewal\u2014into passive consumers of the Spectacle instead of workers for change.<\/p>\n ** Once an event becomes a Spectacle it can no longer icon. It cannot image anything universal because it has become about itself. In this way the Spectacle is the representation of change and not real change itself. My sense is that this is how American revivalism functions. If true, this means the further the Asbury Revival spreads, the less likely it becomes that American evangelicalism will ever face its darkest impulses and change.<\/p>\n ** Is the Asbury Revival Legit?<\/b><\/h3>\n ** Are there voices within the 2023 Asbury revival that could lead the church toward the embrace of prophetic change? I don\u2019t know. I guess time will tell. I think it\u2019s important to judge any revival the way Jesus judged most actions: according to how they impact those on the margins. If a revival isn\u2019t good news for the marginalized, then it\u2019s not good news, and it\u2019s not reviving anything worth keeping.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n ** What I do know is that American Christianity doesn\u2019t need another spectacle. American evangelicalism doesn\u2019t need a revival to warm the hearts of individuals, it needs a smack upside the head. It needs to hold the tension of its own troubling past and present instead of dissipating the tension and pressure necessary to foment true reform. What it will likely choose instead, is another Spectacle to convert would-be agents of change into spiritual consumers.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n ** Follow Me on Twitter: @Tim_Suttle<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ** ****The 2023 Asbury revival will likely become the release valve that dissipates the energies of change created by Black Lives Matter and Me Too movements, as well as the tensions arising from white evangelicalism\u2019s brazen embrace of Trumpism and Christian Nationalism. The last major Asbury revival was in 1970. At the time, the Civil Rights […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1118,"featured_media":7482,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2133,2118,1984,485,2121,2130,2127,2124],"class_list":["post-7479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-asbury-2023","tag-asbury-revival","tag-black-lives-matter","tag-evangelicalism","tag-guy-debord","tag-lgbtq","tag-me-too","tag-spectacle"],"yoast_head":"\nAsbury Revival Dissipates Energies of Change Is Asbury Revival Legit?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The 2023 Asbury revival will likely become the release valve that dissipates the energies of change created by Black Lives Matter and Me Too movements, as The Asbury revival will likely be a release valve dissipating the tension created by the BLM, Met Too, Trumpism, & Christian Nationalism.\" \/>\n<meta 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