Reflections on protests and riots

This morning in my prayer time I reflected on and prayed 1 Timothy 2

1 I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men;
2 For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.
3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour;
4 Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

As I was praying, I thought about a revolution that happened 50 years ago and I asked God to do it again. I also asked Him to reveal what He is doing now in all this. A little later in the morning I read this article Divine perspective on protests and riots I don’t know if that was the complete answer to my prayer, but Dr. Brown and I are on the same wavelength here.

Political turmoil, a pandemic, a lockdown of society, and now riots in the streets. Has there ever been a worse time in our history? Yes, and I lived through it.

I’m talking about the 60s and 70s. Vietnam. Protests. Riots. Marches. People burning draft cards. Women burning bras. Hippies. What? How do hippies fit into this? They were part of a counter-cultural revolution. We have a tendency to look back and think the 60s and 70s was all about funny clothes and groovy music. I’m telling you, this was revolution. A whole society revolution. Don’t believe me? Listen to Bob Dylan’s clarion call:

Come senators, congressmen, please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway, don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
The battle outside ragin'
Will soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin'

Come mothers and fathers throughout the land
And don’t criticize what you can’t understand
Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command
Your old road is rapidly aging
Please get outta' the new one if you can’t lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin'

And Vietnam? This was a very unpopular war. There were marches, protests, rioting in the streets. Here’s the chorus of a song from Woodstock by Country Joe and the Fish:

And it's one, two, three,
What are we fighting for ?
Don't ask me, I don't give a damn,
Next stop is Vietnam;
And it's five, six, seven,
Open up the pearly gates,
Well there ain't no time to wonder why,
Whoopee! we're all gonna die.

There were riots, protests, sit-ins, students taking over college campuses. There was a riot at Kent State in Ohio where the National Guard shot four students!

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming
We're finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
Four dead in Ohio

Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?
(Crosby, Still, Nash, and Young)

And politics? President Nixon resigned in 1974 in the middle of his second term because of Watergate. There were assassinations: 1963 John F. Kennedy; 1968 Martin Luther King, Jr; 1968 Bobby Kennedy.

Despite the ads on late night TV for all “that wonderful music from the 60s”, this was a tumultuous time. The world was being turned upside down. And what wouldn’t turn was burned.

Ahh, and this is where I’m going. There was another revolution that took place, the Jesus Revolution

Suddenly multitudes of hippies who had followed Timothy Leary’s advice to “Turn on, tune in, drop out” were coming to Jesus! “Sex, drugs and rock & roll” gave way to “One Way Jesus!”

Chuck Smith was a leading figure in what has become known as the “Jesus Movement.” He became pastor of a little church in Costa Mesa, CA in 1965. They had 25 people when he arrived. “California was a Mecca for longhaired hippies. It was a scene that was volatile, sensual, and psychedelic. Chuck and his wife Kay would drive down to the Huntington Pier and watch the hippies tune in, turn on, and trip out. They began to pray for that lost generation. As a result of their prayers the Jesus Movement took off – a generation of hippies were delivered from drugs and deception to devotion to God.”* Counter-cultural hippies by the thousands were being born again, baptized with the Holy Spirit, and built up on the Word of God!

Praise God! I became a Christian in 1973. I’m the fruit of the Jesus Revolution and the accompanying Charismatic Renewal! And that is what I began to pray as I prayed for our own turbulent times, “Oh God, do it again! Let there be another Jesus Revolution.” Surely the times are different, the kids are different, the felt needs are different, but Jesus is the same! He still saves, sets free, satisfies the empty, hungry heart.

Everybody everywhere is talking politics; blaming this one or that one; hating this one or the other one. Won’t you join me as I seek to obey the call of the Holy Spirit and pray for our nation during this time, asking God not only for peace, but for harvest, another Jesus Revolution!



* Pathway to God’s Treasure: Ephesians, by Lenya Heitzig & Penny Pierce Rose, p 259