Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of
witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily
entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing
our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. Hebrews 12: 1 - 2
Every baton change was secure and it was with great cheers
that the British men’s 4 x 100m relay team brought home the gold medal. It had
been a rather disappointing week of athletics for Britain but on the final
weekend all four relay teams won medals.
Watching relays always reminds me of the analogy of handing
the spiritual baton on as an inheritance to the next generation.
An inheritance is something passed on that we get for
nothing from someone else who has paid for it. It can catapult us up to the
next level. For instance – getting a financial inheritance can help us buy a
house we couldn’t possible afford otherwise. Spiritual inheritances work in the
same way. We inherit a grace for something, for instance healing, that others
have laboured for and may have paid a high price in terms of commitment and
even criticism but it makes us more effective for the kingdom.
A natural inheritance gives us something we did not have
before but a spiritual inheritance reveals to us something that was there all
along but which we had never seen or grasped before. When we realise the
inheritance we have, we receive all the knowledge and experience gained by the
previous generation. We don’t have to find it, earn it, dig for it, battle for
it but just receive and walk in it.
Bill Johnson says that one of the saddest things in the
Church is that one generation has never been able to pass on revival to the
next generation. Revival has become the boost that the Church receives every
few years instead of being the norm. What should be normal is that ‘of the increase of his government and peace
there will be no end’ Isaiah 9: 7.
Going back to the analogy of passing on the baton it is as
if the next runner takes the baton, looks at it and decides that running the
next leg is too hard, demands too much and anyway they are too busy with work
and family. Worse still it when the baton is put in a place of honour and
revered as ‘the baton from the GB and NI team who won the gold medal in 2017.’
This is like honouring Smith Wigglesworth or John G Lake but not trying to run
past them and push into God for the next revelation or grace he wants to
impart.
For me the saddest thing is when the next generation take
the baton and then goes back to the starting blocks and starts the race all
over again, running the same lap as the previous generation. Instead once the
baton has been passed, the next generation must take their inheritance and run hard their own race
into fresh new things of God.
Jesus ran the first lap and he promised we would do greater things than he did (John 14: 12). That’s the
norm. Our forefathers are our example and they are cheering us on the greater deeds,
to greater revelation that the Kingdom of God would advance not stagnate or
repeat.
Have you ever seen how the previous runner at the hand over,
shouts at the next runner exhorting them to run their fastest? May it be the
same in the kingdom. As we pass on all we have laboured and fought for, may we
urge the next generation to catch hold of everything and then run into a fresh season of revelation with faith and anointing
to increase the Kingdom and see Jesus revealed in ever greater measure.
