I pray that the enemy is saying this about us in these last days.

The heathen spoke these words with an element of fear as they saw the Jews happily rebuilding the walls around Jerusalem. That which they feared came upon them. Those feeble Jews and the God of heaven revived the stones into walls round about the city. These walls became walls of protection from the world around them and their enemies. They became walls of testimony, verifying their presence among the heathen. They became walls of glory, proclaiming the power and mercy of the God of Israel. My heart stirs within me at the thought of what all of this meant to God and His people in that day.

 

A number of years ago in a book entitled Revival I gave the following definition of that term: “Revival is an extraordinary work of the Spirit of God producing extraordinary results.” While that phrase conveys the fundamental concept of revival, over the intervening years I have come to the conviction that one single word describes revival better than any other—that word is “GOD.”

There is a very precious sense in which revival is literally “GOD in the midst of His people.” His manifest presence produces all that is desirable in revival. The absence of His manifest presence accounts for all that is undesirable during the seasons of moral and spiritual decline that precede revivals.

Revival is a time when heaven comes closer to earth than at any other time in the lives of men and women. If one considers the greatest attraction of heaven, is it golden streets? Is it the tree of life? Is it the presence of angels? Is it fellowship with other redeemed? NO! The greatest allure of heaven is the absolutely unbroken presence of God.

In the past two thousand years, the wind of the Spirit has blown over the earth, touching individuals, changing lives, and stirring up the enemy. Many different ethnos or people groups have felt the effects of that wind. At times, it comes in the most unexpected places, such as the obscure village of Oakville, Manitoba.

1790-1875

I recently came across a small, scarce collection of letters written by Charles Finney toward the end of his life. They are exhortations concerning his perspective of the growing superficiality of church life and revival meetings around the year 1870. As I read, I could not help but mourn over the state of the church as we now experience it 130 years later. It takes little imagination to figure what his response would be to the rock bands, comedy routines, T-shirt sales and empty conversions that typify “revival meetings” of our day.

It is my prayer that this timeless reprimand will spur us in returning not only to the revival fire of the 1830’s, but further still, until the Book of Acts becomes our reality in this day. Below is an excerpt from this collection. --Dean Taylor

Of this six-fold commission, four injunctions are destructive and only the latter two are constructive. “To build and to plant” is surely a great work. But it had to be preceded by a rooting-out and a pulling-down, destruction and demolishing. Surely this sounds drastic! Yet it was very necessary, as the historical background shows. The Jewish kingdom had become overgrown with weeds, overbuilt with traditional superstructures. They had to go first. Some iconoclasm was necessary. Some destruction was required.

APOSTOLIC PRAYING

As we look to the biblical account of the book of Acts we see the striking theme of prayer throughout its testimony. We see in it apostolic prayer that depends on God, that is desperate before God. The Church was founded in prayer; it began at a prayer meeting in the upper room in Jerusalem. The Church began in prayer, was sustained in prayer and continues in prayer to this day. If a people are not praying they are straying. If prayer is not paramount and prominent then we are paralyzed and powerless. “We live, move and have our being in God”, in communion and prayer with God. When we begin to see a drift from the success of the book of Acts in our modern day Church attempts we will also see a straying from this foundational principle of prayer.

I put before you now a simple question. Look through the pages of this paper and you will soon see why I ask it. “Are you asleep about your soul?”

There are many who have the name of Christians, but not the character which should go with the name. God is not King of their hearts. They mind earthly things.

Such persons are often quick and clever about the affairs of this life. They are, many of them, good men of business, good at their daily work, good masters, good servants, good neighbors, good subjects of the Queen: all this I fully allow. But it is the eternal part of them that I speak of; it is their never dying souls. And about that, if a man may judge by the little they do for it, they are careless, thoughtless, reckless, and unconcerned. They are asleep.

The moving of the Spirit in revival has been preceded by many prayers from burdened Christians across the Church. There are anxious souls who have prayed long for revival in our time.

Some of these have revealed in tears how they had hoped almost against hope that they might witness mass revival. May the Lord bless and renew all those prayer warriors who are holding on to God for a mighty revival in our time which will sweep the unsaved into the Kingdom and restore or renew those whose first love has been lost.

But there is need also for caution.

It has been rightly said that revivals are dangerous. To deny this is an extreme position as also it is to refuse to recognize the good. For example, there is danger that revival will create or intensify division. The revivals of the last two hundred years, though great sources of blessings, were divisive...but who would therefore conclude that revivals like these of the past were not needed? The churches at that time were due a mighty shaking. Some were willing for it. Others were not. Division was the result.