Let's Pray for Revival

Revival is somewhat of a strange thing for our culture. We associate revival with tents, special speakers and evening services all week. We tend to think revival is planned by us but this is the wrong way to think of it. Revival is something God alone plans! It was Charles Finney in the 19th century who passed down the idea that revival is a science. He believed if you put all the necessary elements together in the right conditions you could have revival on demand! I believe this is the wrong way to think of revival. However, revival IS something that we can and ought to pray for and something that does have vital elements. But first what is revival? Dr. Tim Keller describes revival as when "the ordinary operations of the Holy Spirit are intensified many-fold. “Sleepy” and immature believers become electrified through joyful repentance and put Christ in the center of their lives. Nominal Christians within congregations get converted and testify to the fact, which leads to more sleepy believers waking up. In turn, non-believers are drawn in to the beautified Christian community and begin embracing Christ in numbers that defy normal explanations." Let me add that revival is not what you see on TV. Revival is not about getting he shakes or speaking in funny languages. Revival is about repentance, reformation and restoration. Keller goes on to describe some of the key elements of revival. These are not recipes for revival, but they are elements that we ought to pursue if we want to see revival.

1. Extraordinary prayer

2. Recovery of the Gospel

3. Renewed individuals (leaders especially)

4. Gospel application to individual hearts

5. The ordinary instituted "means of grace" (preaching, shepherding, worship, prayer)

What these elements do is give us a target to aim for. There are no guarantees and no creative methods that must be reproduced. What we have is a list of basic fundamentals for how we live our Christian lives. Too often we neglect the fundamentals of the faith. Prayer is neglected, commitment to the ordinary means of grace is neglected or taken for granted. Application of the gospel to our hearts is neglected. Keller describes this as "cut[ing] away both the moralism and the licentiousness that destroys real spiritual life and power." He also says this takes place one-on-one and in groups. This is key to being renewed as individuals. But so is our own private worship. What this shows me is we have all we need for revival. We just need to so something with it. Berginning in March we are goignt o begin having prayer meetings at YMS  on Fridays once a month. We are going to pray for renewal of our personal lives and for conviction leading to repentance and faith to come upon our community. I ask you to do your part. Do not neglect worship unless you must (due to illness, travel or work). If you can come and pray, please come! Consider your involvement in other ministries as contributing to your own personal renewal and also the personal renewal of your church family members. Join me in praying that we would get very, very serious about this. Our country needs to be revived! The gospel need to be preached and heard. This is more important than voting in the next election! Let's seriously ask the Lord to send us a fresh outpouring of the Spirit of God!