Roy Hession’s profoundly simple little book, The Calvary Road, is evidence that great power can be contained in small packages. Mr. Hession writes about revival, especially continuous, personal revival, in a style that even a child can understand; yet his simple message contains truth to challenge the most mature believer. The victorious Christian life is described in such simple terms, it makes the reader quite sure that such a life is attainable. At the same time, the standard of holiness and consistent victory is raised so high, it makes anyone despair of attaining it in his own strength. But the very positive nature of this little book’s message then helps the reader look beyond his own inadequate strength to the abundant provision of the heavenly Father. Consider these lines from the very first chapter, titled Brokenness: We want to be very simple in this matter of revival. Revival is just the life of the Lord Jesus poured into human hearts…the first thing we must learn is that our wills must be broken to His will. To be broken is the beginning of revival…Being broken is both God’s work and ours. He brings His pressure to bear, but we have to make the choice…All day long the choice will be before us in a thousand ways. It will mean no plans, no time, no money, and no pleasure of our own. It will mean a constant yielding to those around us, for our yieldedness to God is measured by our yieldedness to man…You see, the only life that pleases God and that can be victorious is His life—never our life, no matter how hard we try.
A later chapter uses the simple analogy of the human heart as a cup, which we can continually lift to Jesus for Him to fill with the water of life. In this chapter, Mr. Hession addresses an extremely important but unpopular subject: Only one thing prevents Jesus from filling our cups…and this is sin in one of its thousand forms. The Lord Jesus does not fill dirty cups. Anything that springs from self, however small it may be, is sin (emphasis mine)…Self-pity in trials or difficulties, self-seeking in business…self-defense when we are hurt…self-consciousness, reserve, worry, fear, all spring from self and all are sin and make our cups unclean. In answer to the question whether sin is not too strong a word to apply to such things as self-consciousness, reserve, or fear, the author replies: If these things are not sins, then we must put up with them for the rest of our lives; there is no deliverance. But if these and other things like them are indeed sins, then there is a Fountain for sin, and we may experience cleansing and deliverance from them, if we put them immediately under His precious Blood, the moment we are conscious of them.
This theme of immediately taking a sin to Calvary as soon as we are conscious of it is emphasized throughout the book. And with good reason, for that is the life of revival in its simplicity: no confidence in self, absolute confidence in the power of the blood of Jesus, and no tolerance for revealed sin in one’s life.
[Revival] is not good Christians becoming better Christians—as God sees us there are not any good Christians—but rather Christians honestly confessing that their Christian life is a valley of dry bones and by that very confession qualifying for the grace that flows from the Cross and makes all things new.
How revival affects our human relations is covered in a chapter titled The Way of Fellowship. He writes: The First Epistle of John…insists on testing the depth and reality of a man’s fellowship with God by the depth and reality of his fellowship with his brethren…The only basis for real fellowship with God and man is to live out in the open with both. “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another.”…Such a walk in the light cannot but disclose sin increasingly in our lives, and we shall see things to be sin, which we never thought to be such before. For that reason we might shrink from this walk…But the verse goes on with the precious words, “and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.” Everything that the light of God shows up as sin we can confess and carry to the Fountain of Blood and it is gone, gone from God’s sight and gone from our hearts.
Another chapter says: The message and challenge of revival, which is coming to many of us these days, is searching in its utter simplicity. It is simply that there is only one thing in the world that can hinder the Christian’s walking in victorious fellowship with God and his being filled with the Holy Spirit—and that is sin in one form or another. There is only one thing in the world that can cleanse him from sin with all that that means of liberty and victory—and that is the power of the Blood of the Lord Jesus…the only beautiful thing about the Christian is Jesus Christ. God wants us to recognize that fact…so that in true brokenness…we shall allow Jesus Christ to be our righteousness and holiness and all in all – and that is victory.
The Calvary Road also contains some beautiful insights into the humility of Jesus, taken from Isaiah 53, and explains why our perfect Example was called the meek Lamb of God. You will want to read this life-changing little book for yourself and be blessed by the many inspiring truths that I cannot share here. Prepare to be challenged and humbled as you read the chapters titled The Highway of Holiness, Are You Willing to Be a Servant? and The Power of the Blood of the Lamb, among others. If you sense that God really intended the Christian life to be simple and uncomplicated, and are tired of all the unimportant little issues that distract your focus from Jesus Christ, I urge you to read this book. I believe it will renew your appreciation for the beautiful simplicity of God’s plan for His children, and inspire you to walk with Jesus ‘The Calvary Road’.
