Brogden calls for "Glory Bearers!
By Mel Surface
Hundreds of young people flood the altar in response to missionary Dick Brogden’s
call to be willing to do "something significant" to reach the unengaged, unreached
Muslim peoples of the world.
The 53rd General Council climaxed Friday night with a call from missionary Dick Brogden to bear God’s glory to the neglected places and peoples of the earth. Speaking to a combined youth and adult worship rally, he said Islam will be loved to death.
Brogden drew his message from the Numbers 14 account of Israel’s failure to enter the Promised Land. They refused in fear, but God declared that all the earth still would be filled with His glory.
God still intends that all His earth be filled with glory, Brogden said. The challenge of this generation is to take it to the most inconvenient places and peoples that remain. “It is up to us to be the Glory Generation.”
Seeing this generation of the Assemblies of God on the banks of another Jordan, Brogden pulled no punches. He identified the giant of our generation. “This generation now, and in the decades to come, must stand eyeball to eyeball with the giant of Islam.”
Brogden offered the examples of Caleb, whose name implies “Mad Dog,” and Joshua, from the Hebrew for Jesus. They trusted and obeyed God to the end.
He called “Mad Dog” and Jesus the “only winning combination,” because men and women who will take the glory of God to the darkest corners of the earth must be madly in love with Jesus.
Friday’s service opened with a powerful time of worship leading into a focus on the ministry of Unsion Television and a special Speed the Light offering. Established in 2003 by missionaries Bill and Connie McDonald, Unsion is an award-winning television station based in Ecuador.
Student Missions Director Chet Caudill introduced Bill McDonald who expressed his appreciation for STL support. “Without Speed the Light, Unsion would not be possible,” he said.
AG World Missions recognized Unsion this year as the International Spanish-speaking Station of the Assemblies of God.
Friday’s offering, which totaled $51,000, will help fund time-sensitive transmitters for the cities of Maces and Tulcan along with a satellite uplink to reach 100,000 more Ecuadorians. The youth band from James River Assembly of God, Ozark, Missouri, presented the offertory.
Brogden’s message outlined what it will take to be a glory bearer. It will mean Passion, Pioneering, Perseverance and Power.
The first qualification is loving Jesus above everything. He said glory bearers are passionate for Jesus. They give Him the best part of their day and the strength of their youth, and they are addicted to prayer and the Bible.
Brogden quoted a declaration from the 1921 General Council that committed the Assemblies of God to follow the example of Paul in seeking neglected regions where the gospel has not been preached. He said glory bearers never lose their longing for the mountain God promised.
“You don’t have to be young to be part of this generation,” he insisted. “Age is in your head. Glory is in your heart.” Glory bearers still choose to pioneer.
Brogden said this will be a generation of martyrs. They will bring life to the darkness of Islam at any cost. “Islam will not be fought with guns or intellect. Islam will be loved to death,” he said.
Paraphrasing the words of Jesus, Brogden avowed, “Greater love hath no man than this, that the Assemblies of God lays down its life for Muslim friends.” He said Pentecost helps us die.
More than power to raise our hands or lift our tongues in self-congratulations, he said, “Celebrate your Pentecost by marching with it to the unglorified.” He prayed like Caleb, “Give us the mountain! Give us the unglorified! It may be that God helps. Regardless, because of love, we will live or die trying.”
Finally, Brogden said, glory bearers will be empowered by poverty of spirit. The poor in spirit are entrusted with the power of the Kingdom, he explained. “The Kingdom is meant to be manifest in sign, deed, healing and miracle, but God will not share His glory with another.”
Ultimately, he declared, it will be God’s Word, not man’s ideas; God’s power, not my strength; God’ love, not your compassion; and the power of poverty of spirit that brings God’s glory to the ends of the earth.
In a direct challenge to the youth, he said there is room in the Assemblies of God for modern-day Calebs. There is room for a generation passionate for Jesus, of pioneers, who will persevere to death, and be powered by poverty of spirit.
Our mandate was and is to bear the glory to the neglected, and our Joshuas or leaders, know it, he said. Brogden distinguished unreached peoples from unengaged Muslim people groups. The unreached have some workers among them but not enough indigenous believers to reach their own.
The unengaged have no workers, no light, no missionaries and no hope. “The most pressing need we have is for men and women, young and old, who will answer the call of the Spirit to the unengaged.”
Several hundred young people moved to the altars at Brogden’s invitation, “If you feel the drawing of the Spirit to spend your life doing something of significance for the Kingdom to engage unreached Muslim peoples…would you seal that…by coming to pray?”
On the way to the altars, they received information cards on multinational teams, Muslim peoples, prayer focuses, training and ministry opportunities. Those who completed the cards will receive further details on plans for church planting teams among unengaged peoples.
Brogden asked that they kneel together that “when we rise, we become the generation that takes the glory of God to every people of the earth.”