The Legacy and the Destiny of the Church

Bob Mumford was a well-known teacher during the Charismatic Renewal. One time at a conference someone asked him why God will pour out His Spirit in renewal and sometime later withdraw the sense of His Spirit. After forty years or so I have never forgotten Mumford's reply. He said God simply cannot approve of all the things men do. During a revival new ministries are born and some existing ministries are revived. But human nature seems to always result in institutionalizing our Christian organizations. Someone recently published a book, "Jesus Didn't Come to Earth to Start a Religion." That sums things up quite well! The legacy of the Latter Rain Movement of 1948-1952 is an "end-run" around the establishment Full-Gospel Churches which had metastasized around their erroneous Pre-Tribulation Rapture theory of the End Times. The Latter Rain teachers simply taught the historic Post-Tribulation view the mainstay of the Church had believed for a very long time. Their big "sin" was teaching a victorious eschatology! Don't be too confident that our God won't do an "end-run" again if we don't do those things that promote the Kingdom here in the Earth.

The destiny of the Latter Rain Movement is to facilitate the fullness of the Kingdom of God in the earth. This is shone to us in Acts 15:16-18. The restoration of the Tabernacle of David. Our destiny will be realized when the Body of Christ grows up, matures and takes responsibility for the cultural mandate of our God. This will take training in what maturity looks like and acts like. See Ephesians 4:11-16.