FREEDOM OF SPEECH

         If you claim to be a Christian and your voice is not being heard, the odds are good that your words have been censored. Your voice has been silenced. Your speech has been imprisoned.

         The first thing the Lord Jesus does with new disciples is free their speech. He encourages people to talk. He did this in His ministry.

         In fact, He chose the freeing of voices as the principal sign of Pentecost.

         Whenever you read a passage in the Gospels about the Lord healing a mute person, it is a sign for all—a Miracle Parable—that reveals His intention to free the voices of His people. The mute people in the Gospels were not only real people in real time, they were also parabolic types of muted people throughout time—those whose voices have been shut down—those whose speaking has been disallowed.

         Now that you know this, look at the real meaning in the following:

         They brought to Him one who was deaf and spoke with difficulty, and they implored Him to lay His hand on him.

         Jesus took him aside from the crowd, by himself, and put His fingers into his ears, and after spitting, He touched his tongue with the saliva; and looking up to heaven with a deep sigh, He said to him, “Ephphatha!” that is, “Be opened!” And his ears were opened, and the impediment of his tongue was removed, and he began speaking plainly.

         And He gave them orders not to tell anyone; but the more He ordered them, the more widely they continued to proclaim it. They were utterly astonished, saying, “He has done all things well; He makes even the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.” [Mark 7:32-37]

YOU ARE WORTHY

         First Amendment rights do not apply in many churches. If one’s mode of Christian congregating disallows for communication and spiritual edification through the use of EVERYONE’S voice, then that mode contains a serious flaw. It is a flaw that results in spiritual problems for the congregation as a whole, because it silences whoever has the anointing of God to speak and be heard but cannot, due only to man-made religious conventions that oppose the will of God.

         It is no secret that the majority of Christian congregation methods disallow anyone from talking except the chosen few—the very few chosen few. We all know this is true. Christians have been conditioned to keep silent in the churches.

         Yet the Lord Jesus says:

         “What I tell you in the darkness, speak in the light; and what you hear whispered in your ear, proclaim upon the housetops.” [Matthew 10:27]

         (“Just don’t say it in church, okay?”)

         One of the reasons Christian blogs have exploded on the internet within the last five or ten years is because many if not most of these Christians had nowhere else to speak. Most were never allowed to speak in church or even in Bible studies. Our entire framework of Christian meetings and congregational gatherings has only ever allowed for the voice of the one percent, which results in religious control rather than free expression, and the consequent dumbing-down of the great majority.

         The greatest evil, however, perpetrated by those who buy into this anti-God system that silences the voices of 99% of all Christians, is making them feel completely unworthy, and thus unworthy of speaking.

SUPERFLUOUS STAGE PLAYERS

         The Lord jumped all over the Pharisees’ case and kept telling them they were nothing but a bunch of evil actors (hypocrites) pretending to be something they were not who gained and kept control over the masses of people by transforming everything into a stage play with themselves as the only participants, and certainly as the only ones with speaking parts.

         So what do many later Christians do? And what do the Christian elite of the present do? They transform everything into a stage play with themselves as the only primary participants, and certainly as the only ones with speaking parts.

         In fact, if one were to remove the stages, platforms, and dual-class seating arrangements which always separate the chosen few occupying their positions of control from everyone else, making real fellowship impossible by forcing the 99 out of 100 to focus on the backs of everyone’s head instead of their faces, there would be little “Christianity” left in America. Almost everyone has been conditioned over long decades and even centuries to adopt these strange formats which were never used as fellowship formats by the Lord Jesus or the early community of believers.

EVERYONE PARTICIPATES

         Yes, whenever the Lord spoke to large numbers of people, all were focused on Him. But whenever He taught His disciples, He sat down among them in a rough circle using an open and organic format, so they could all see one another as well. This format greatly aids in the development of koinonia in which each person is allowed to contribute and thus develop spiritually as a real disciple. Using one’s voice allows one to mature.

         Thus, what they had was dynamic. Everyone was part of the process. Everyone had a voice and was allowed to use it. Real Christianity thus exploded fast and the Gospel traveled fast and MILLIONS ended up in the kingdom of the Lord relatively fast. It happened that way because everyone was being used of God instead of the mere “chosen few” who demand control and their own authority much more than the spiritual interactivity arising from koinonia.

         Those real Christians were allowed to use everything they had for the Lord, especially their voice.

         So there’s your clue: If you are not allowed to speak in your Christian meeting, it is most likely not the Lord Jesus holding you back. He wants you involved. Your input is needed. Nothing can replace your voice.

COME ALIVE: THIS IS THE JESUS GENERATION   

         From this we know it is not the enemy from without that is holding back the Great Awakening, since the Lord has given His people power over such enemies. The real enemy is much closer to home. The real enemy is the power vested in compromised Christian leaders and all those who support them in forcing their own personal agendas in part through silencing the voices of millions of believers, and making them what is essentially a quiet collective supporting without question those in control, and rendering all potential Pentecosts absolutely impossible.

         IT IS OFTEN THE PEOPLE CONTROLLING THE STAGE, PULPITS, SPOTLIGHTS, MICROPHONES, AND TV CAMERAS WHO DISALLOW THE VOICES OF EVERYONE ELSE.

         It is obvious they consider themselves as the only ones worthy and everyone else as unworthy.

         “He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory; but He who is seeking the glory of the One who sent Him, He is true, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.” [John 7:18] [1]

         In order to be the Lord’s celebrity one must be an anti-celebrity.

         This is why the Lord often has to do something outside the scope of ultra-organized religion to get anything done. It is why John the Immerser stayed out in the wilderness. It is the only way to overcome the control of the religious leaders with only their own interests and enterprises at heart and not the Lord’s or those of the majority of the people. Whenever such controllers are in authority it inevitably shuts everyone else out, other than, of course, their hand-picked, sold-out, “safe” ones who only speak what they are allowed to speak. Indeed, that which is allowed by them to be spoken is often not of the Holy Spirit, which proves further the deadness of most church services and why the Lord Jesus is not in charge.

         Before they silenced the majority’s voice, they silenced His voice.

         So again, the Lord’s model for His lively, spiritually-healthy, vibrant, organic Community and also for Great Awakenings involves first the opening of deaf ears and the removing of tongue impediments so that every single one of His people can “begin speaking plainly” as did the mute man, and “speaking the mighty deeds of God,” as did all of those in the Upper Room.

         And since all Great Awakenings begin with Great Repentance, one of the first things everyone must do is repent for allowing their great power of speech to be silenced and not made available for the Lord’s use.

SHOUT TO THE LORD

         Real Christianity involves ALL of His children and ALL of their voices.

         As soon as He was approaching, near the descent of the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the miracles which they had seen, shouting: “BLESSED IS THE KING WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD; Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”

         Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Him, “Teacher, rebuke Your disciples.”

         But Jesus answered, “I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out!” [Luke 19:37-40]

         © 2016 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved.

         Real Christianity—The Nature of the Church

[1] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.