WE NEED REVIVAL...

by N.L.DeMoss

-when we do not love Him as we once did.

-when earthly interest and occupations are more important to us than eternal ones.

-when we would rather watch TV and read secular books and magazines than read the Bible and pray.

-when church dinners are better attended than prayer meetings.

-when concerts draw bigger crowds than prayer meetings.

-when we have little time or no desire for prayer.

-when we would rather make money than give money.

-when we put people into leadership positions in our churches who do not meet scriptual qualifications.

-when our Christianity is joyless and passionless.

-when we know truth in our heads that we are not practicing in our lives.

-when we make little effort to win the lost.

-when we have time for sports, recreation, and entertainment, but not for Bible study and prayer.

-when we do not tremble at the Word of God.

-when preaching lacks conviction, confrontation
and divine fire and anointing.

-when we seldom think thoughts of eternity.

-when God's people are more concerned about their jobs and their careers, than about the kingdom of Christ and the salvation of the lost.

-when God's people get together with other believers and the conversation is primarily about the news, weather, and sports, rather than the Lord.

-when church services are predictable and 'business as usual'.

-when believers can be at odds with each other and not feel complelled to pursue reconciliation.

-when husbands and wives are not praying together.

-when our marriages are co-existing rather than full of the love of Christ.

-when our children are growing up to adopt worldly values, secular philsophies, and ungodly lifestyles.

-when we are more concerned about our children's education and their athletic activities than about the condition of their souls.

-when sin in the church is pushed under the carpet.

-when known sin is not dealt with through the biblical process of discipline and restoration.

-when we tolerate 'little' sins of gossip, a critical spirit, and lack of love.

-when we will watch things on television and movies that are not holy.

-when our singing is half-hearted and our worship lifeless.

-when our prayers are empty words designed to impress others.

-when our prayers lack fervency.

-when our hearts are cold and our eyes dry.

-when we aren't seeing regular evidence of the supernatural power of God.

-when we have ceased to weep and mourn and grieve over our own sin and the sin of others.

-when we are content to live with explainable, ordinary Christianity and church services.

-we are bored with worship.

-when people have to be entertained to be drawn to church.

-when our music and dress become patterned after the world.

-when we start fitting into and adapting to the world, rather than calling the world to adpat to God's standards of holiness.

-when we don't long for the company and fellowship of God's people.

-when people have to be begged to give and to serve in the church.

-when our giving is measured and calculated, rather than extravagant and sacrificial.

-when we aren't seeing lost people drawn to Jesus on a regular basis.

-when we aren't excercising faith and believing God for the impossible.

-when we are more concerned about what others think about us rather than what God thinks about us.

-when we are unmoved by the fact that 2.5 billion people in this world have never heared the name of Jesus.

-when we are unmoved by the thought of neighbours, business associates, and acquaintances who are lost and without Christ.

-when the lost world around us doesn't know or care that we exist.

-when we are making little or no difference in the secular world around us.

-when the fire has gone out in our hearts, our marriages, and the church.

-when we are blind to the extent of our need and don't think we need a revival.

Every one of those describes an aspect of today's church, and i can see myself in some of them. We need revival.

It's threads like this that really make this website community dear to me. Thank God for all the precious eyes and hearts that find their way to the list below. We are blessed to have been given a place to share the fire with each other.

Dear Lord that list is so convicting... because of your great mercy bring revival to us.

Blessings all,

MC

As I was doing this thread, I found it heartbreaking. If only it wasn't true.

2.5 people have yet to hear the name of Jesus, how can we be so apathetic about that, so indifferent? It just makes you weep.

We are so godlessly comfortable! It's sinful!

If God spares us, it won't be because of anything we have done, it will be for His glory only.

Repentance is the only way out of this.

We need to do it now. God bless.

I have quoted this statement before from Ravenhill that made a point what would happen if we met together for a entire month everynight to seek the Lord and didn't sit infront of our tv's and computers and sought the Lord together as a local church? what would happen?

It is in my heart to do this, and where do you find those who will do likewise? There are many excuses. Therefore if one has the burden to do this then that one person must do it. I gave up my TV over 2 years ago and have not missed it one bit, but having read this quote I now see it is up to me even if none will join me.

Linda

Linda
I know what you mean about finding those who are like minded. It's nearly impossible. But that does not stop the individual taking a step in the right direction.

God is faithful. If we are faithless He remains faithful, He cannot deny Himself. (2 Tim 2)

Thank God that we can trust Him, no matter what.

Our feelings change moment by moment, but the word of the Lord abides forever.

We will see revival. Pray, God will answer.

God bless.

Enid, I don't see where God has promised revival. I have just listened to David Wilkerson's sermon "A Call to Anguish". It is very powerful and speaks to the situation of revival and knowing God's heart. I don't know how to get the link onto this page, but it's on this site.

Linda

Quote Ormly:

[i]James says in 4:3 (KJV)
"Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts."
Orm: "So it is not that someone else needs revival or that we even need revival. The fact is we need to be obedient to the Holy Spirit; make ourselves sensitive to His promptings"[/i]

Indeed I carry the same 'sentiment' or at least understand similarly. At most, if I were to exhort brethren towards revival, I'd just use words such as repentance or obedience in accordance to Scriptures instead of ' revival '.

When the apostle Paul said
" For to me to live is Christ.." , we ought to just live as Christ lived, live out Christ, live in Christ..but to go back to the Lord and ask Him to revive those whom He had supposedly already saved alive ??

True believers live in Christ moment by moment,(24/7), so we just live our life in Him daily, we might stumble into sins sometimes, and are restored upon repentance with forgiveness and cleansing through the effacaious Blood; no less, we [i]ARE [/i]every bit alive, why do we need to be revived? To keep praying for revival for those that are already living in Christ, does seem to be ''asking amiss'', shouldn't we pray for conviction, repentance and forgiveness instead?

As for the lost, they need to be saved by Grace through faith, to be born again in the Holy Spirit, mmm, is that revival, or simply re-birth.

However, I fully understand and appreciate those who are zealous over revival, but only for their zeal's sake.

Perplexed. No, not "I" but HIM !! Perhaps the doubt I have is over the term "revival" but not the content of revival.

YES, God is faithful, let's praise Him for the Finished work of Christ ! We NEED CHRIST and CHRIST ALONE.

sermonindex wrote:

Oh how we need revival. Really Christians, pastors, etc don't you feel the need? the burden? When will we say: God we give up playing church we want to be the Church!

1. When we acquire an appetite for God - "As the deer pants for the water brooks, so my soul [i]pants for You, O God.[/i]" (Psalm 42:1)

2. When we accept no alternatives - "My soul thirsts for God, [i]for the living God[/i]; when shall I come and appear before God?" (Psalm 42:2) Greg mentioned this in his post - "methods and technology" which are alternatives to the living God not to mention all other idols we may have set up such as love of self, love of money, and love of pleasure rather than love of God.

3. When we anguish over God's absence - "My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all day long, '[i]Where is your God?[/i]'" (Psalm 42:3) We must recognize our pitiful, powerless condition as proof of God's absence and mourn for His presence.

4. When we ask for an encore - "[i]These things I remembered and I pour out my soul within me.[/i] For I used to go along with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God, with the voice of joy and thanksgiving, [i]a multitude keeping festival[/i]." (Psalm 42:4). "O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, the work that Thou didst in their days, in the days of Old" (Psalm 44:1).

5. When we anticipate the answer - "Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me? [i]Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him for the help of His presence[/i]" (Psalm 42:5). God has His requirements for revival and when we meet them He will answer (2 Chronicles 7:14).

Grace and peace
Olan

Concerning revival, people interpret that word in different ways.

For some it means the church needs to be revived, the world needs salvation, the unsaved masses come to Christ in droves, etc.

In Psalm 119 the psalmist asks God to revive him 7 times.

He must have recognised a lack in his walk with God that needed to be repaired. Only God could do that.

Hence, we come again to James 4 where it says you ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.

How on earth can asking God to revive you, or other Christians, be wrong?

How does God get the glory when satan's influence in the world is so apparent, and effective, though it behooves me to say it, and the church, by and large, can be easily ignored by the world because it is so like the world?

Again, in Psalm 119v126 it says 'It is time for You to act, O Lord, for they have regarded Your law as void.

One looks at that scripture and think it applies to the world. It does. But it can also apply to the church.

In the same psalm in verse 136 it says 'Rivers of water run down from my eyes, because men do not keep Your laws.

If that doesn't speak of grief, I don't know what does.

Where is the glory that is due our Lord and Saviour?

It will happen. God wants it to, even if we don't. God bless.

sermonindex wrote:

[b]Why No Revival[/b]

"Why aren;t we having revival in this land? Why is the fresh fire of God not coming to renew us in the Spirit, to enjoy a dose of heaven? Two reasons: BECAUSE THE CHURCH REFUSES TO CALL SIN, SIN. AND THE CHURCH WANTS ITS WORDLY ENTERTAINMENTS MORE THEN IT WANTS GOD AND REVIVAL."
-Paula Leanues

It goes much deeper than that. We don't have revival because we're looking for someone else to bring it. Revival is not a many membered church service, it's the move of the Holy Spirit on the heart of an individual. Revival can break out in your home tomorrow morning during prayer! You can be infused with power from God, a passion to win the lost in your neighborhood and community and many will be ushered into the kingdom and no one would know ANYTHING about it, if you started praying instead of playing. Does your revival have to come with a big name evangelist? A band? A particular church or setting? Why is everyone always "looking" for revival? The Kingdom of God is WITHIN YOU! Let the Holy Spirit burn your self-sufficiency out of you and you WILL see greater revival than all the others put together.

You know, Jesus wasn't much to look at, and he was a complete UNKNOWN! but He brought the greatest revival the world had ever seen.

Let's forget about what we "expect" revival to be, and get alone with God in secret prayer and let Him do in us and through us ANYTHING He wants — even if that means spending the rest of our lives as a complete "unknown" — and win His heart and His mind.

If we get to THAT point, then you will have revivial.

The thing that made the mighty men and women of God on your website so powerful is because they spent more time in the presence of God than they did talking about it. Let's stop looking for reasons a corporate revival hasn't happened and start pressing into God's presence. Do THAT and YOU WILL see true revival!

[i]The only important thing is, "What does God think?" [/i] Al Whittinghill

[url=https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=12309&forum=40&0]Why Is There No Revival?[/url]

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An awakening has its roots in sacrifice; routines and complacency are constantly challenged by its existence. Revival includes change; what seems to guarantee our security and identity is often marked for destruction. This little word tells us that we, in our modern brightness and alertness, are still asleep, deprived of sensitivity concerning those things and values which nobody can properly describe, those heavenly values. Who wants to hear about such things?

Who dares to challenge an ear which is deliberately shut? Who wants to be dismissed as one who does not align, who is not approved and applauded as one supporting general tendencies and the contemporary outlook.

[url=https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=10150&forum=40&7]Revival, a subject avoided and rejected - by Lars Widerberg[/url]

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God has set a limit upon the defection of His Church; when the night is at its darkest the dawn is on the way. The inner history of revivals is characterized by a profound sense of dissatisfaction awaking in many hearts. A period of gloom sets in, a weariness and exhaustion invade the heart, the pleasures of the world no longer satisfy. Sick in soul, men turn with a sigh to God; dimly they awake to the consciousness that, in trading heavenly for earthly joys, they have encountered great loss; that in the decay of spiritual vision the world has lost its soul of loveliness. Slowly this aching grows, the heart of man begins to cry out for God, for spiritual certainties, for fresh visions. From a faint desire this multiplies as it widens, until it becomes a vast human need; until in its urgency it seems to beat with violence at the very gates of Heaven.

[url=https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=11960&forum=40&0]Dissatisfaction -The Forerunner Of Revival[/url]

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"Sandstorms in the desert, tornadoes, earthquakes! Really Mr. Stead, your metaphors would imply that your experiences in South Wales have been pretty bad? "

"No," said Mr. Stead. "Not bad at all. Do you remember what the little Quaker child said, when the Scottish express rushed at full speed through the station on the platform on which he was standing? 'Were you not frightened, my boy?' said his father. 'Oh, no,' said the little chap, 'a feeling of sweet peace stole into my mind.' I felt like that rather. But the thing is awesome. You don't believe in ghosts? "

"Not much. I'll believe them when I see one."

"Well, you have read ghost stories, and can imagine what you would feel if you were alone at midnight in the haunted chamber of some old castle, and you heard slow and stealthy steps stealing along the corridor where the visitant from the other world was said to walk. If you go to South Wales and watch the Revival you will feel pretty much like that. There is something there from the Other World. You cannot say whence it came or whither it was going, but it moves and lives and reaches for you all the time. You see men and women go down in sobbing agony before your eyes as the invisible Hand clutches at their heart. And you shudder. It's pretty grim, I tell yon. If you are afraid of strong emotions you'd better give the Revival a wide berth."

[url=https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?viewmode=flat&order=0&topic_id=11541&forum=40&post_id=&refresh=Go]What I saw in Wales -W.T. Stead[/url]

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Edwards wrote that 'a great and earnest concern about the great things of religion and the eternal world, became universal in all parts of the town, and among persons of all degrees and all ages; the noise among the dry bones waxed louder and louder; all other talk but about spiritual and eternal things, was soon thrown by.

The minds of people were wonderfully taken off from the world; it was treated among us as a thing of very little consequence. They seemed to follow their worldly business more as a part of their duty, than from any disposition they had to it.

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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.

Over a period of some years I was a frequent visitor in the home of a leading theological bookseller in the United Kingdom whom I had taken to be a very placid man. Then one day he called me indicating he was going to visit the United States and would like to spend some time with us in our home. We were delighted to be a part of his American itinerary. Upon my next visit to his home in England, I inquired concerning his impressions of this first visit to America. I was astonished at the vehemence of his response. In no uncertain terms he declared his great disappointment in not hearing a single preacher in American, albeit he had visited numerous churches in widely scattered areas. While he acknowledged hearing many teachers, he adamantly insisted he had not heard a single preacher. When I quietly asked, "What, in your opinion, is the difference between teaching and preaching?" I was amazed at the vigor with which he insisted, "It is not a matter of my opinion! It is a well established fact! To teach is to inform! To preach is to move! I heard all kinds of teaching in America but I was never moved from where I am to where I ought to be!"

[url=http://www.intl-awaken.com/HTMS/preaching.htm]Preaching That Hinders Revival [/url] [i]Richard Owen Roberts[/i]

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What more could a saved soul desire than to be in the Lords Presence, what more a magnificent, pure Holy being than the Lord, where else but Heaven, what more indescribable and welcoming that Gods manifest Presence, terrible and awesome, beyond beauty and unspeakable glory? All of truth, pure joy, real peace, the desire of the nations a respite of the groanings of the creature and the creation...

Life is difficult, more so for the saints, temptation is nothing until it is resisted I read the other day. Who more tempted than those who love God, who recognize that no dishonesty may be tolerated in themselves are at avarice to the world and perplexed at the madness of men taken up with the creation while denying the creator? Precious souls persecuted in foreign lands, what a relief revival would bring to the long suffering.
So many things...

Driving home from a long day at work earlier this week something very powerful came to mind. Try as I might [i]Practicing The Presence of God[/i], that great exhortation from Brother Lawrence, is often far more fleeting in concentration than I could wish otherwise. But the soul returns to God at the quiet moment, after the days work ends, [i]Oh Lord[/i] the delightful sigh, sometimes weary... On this particular day, a rather 'good' day, productive, the sense of accomplishment, thanks giving to God... and suddenly;

[i]It is the Lord![/i]

Dropped into the thoughts. Why yes, of course! Someday, someday this will be true and real and finished, physically, bodily, spiritualy... permanently. Of all the great moments in this poor life, the few golden treasures have been those times of Gods felt manifest Presence even if but slightly, even if but on the dawning of such a revelation as this. Times of great surpassing peace, times of refreshing as mentioned. How can a saint not long for revival, for that dramatic change in the very atmosphere ... [i]God with us[/i]. His Glory, His surpassing greatness, His drawing nearer ...

Himself

The thing that made the mighty men and women of God on your website so powerful is because they spent more time in the presence of God than they did talking about it. Let's stop looking for reasons a corporate revival hasn't happened and start pressing into God's presence. Do THAT and YOU WILL see true revival!

This is a very good point. Constant focus on revival may actually be a way of avoiding personal responsibility. Our longing for something to change outside of ourselves may have become an idol to us. We assume that we aren’t better Christians because our churches are dead, playing worldly music, not calling out the sins, or whatever. And so we focus on the troubles, and crave for change outside of ourselves rather than accept our situation and see that we can be fully satisfied in God. We fail to see that we are avoiding him and running after something else. That in itself is sin.

That reminds me of the wife who is unhappily married. She longs for a “revived” marriage so that she can be a better wife/Christian/mother or whatever. She reads volumes about the ideal marriage. She shares her troubles with other discontent wives. They discuss the sad plight of our modern-day marriages. They march in "save the marriage" campaigns.

But she fails to see that her longing is self-centered. Really she doesn’t need anything outside of herself to change in order for her to be fully satisfied. She needs to return to her true and eternal Husband – God himself.

I wonder if talk about revival exceeds the amount of revival-talk you find in the Bible. That should raise some red flags. There is the risk of swinging too far off center. That is dangerous territory to wander into. We could end up running after a lot of bunny trials. After all, it is our desires that set us up to fall into temptation. The devil knows what we want, and he is all too eager to oblige.

"Each one is tempted when by his own evil desire he is dragged away... " James 1:13

Illegitimate longings must be distinquished from legitimate longings. There is a fine line between the two - like a watershed mark. You can't see the line when it is covered with snow, but in the spring it makes a world of difference which side the snowflake fell on.

Since God knows our hearts, he knows how to change them. It is not unlike him to put the whole thing to death before birthing legitimate longings within us. He sends his own into the wilderness in order to perform many deaths. It is our challenge to learn to value the wilderness - when everything around us looks dead and chaotic. The seeds of new life always develop in the hidden places.

I wonder if the signs of spirirual death that we see and experience, while troublesome, are very much a part of God's divine work.

Diane

they spent more time in the presence of God than they did talking about it.

Maybe I'm missing something here but it seems to me that the assumption is that whoever is talking about revival today isn't spending much time in the presence of God - they are only talking about revival! Leonard Ravenhill talked about revival so much and wrote about revival so much that he said that he was tired of talking about and writing about revival, do we assume that he wasn't in God's presence because of all the "talk"?

Constant focus on revival may actually be a way of avoiding personal responsibility. Our longing for something to change outside of ourselves may have become an idol to us.

And so we focus on the troubles, and crave for change outside of ourselves rather than accept our situation and see that we can be fully satisfied in God.

But she fails to see that her longing is self-centered

Grace and peace
Olan

Find it a bit ironic that just as often this can amount to so much nay-saying,

they spent more time in the presence of God than they did talking about it.

For a site birthed and driven, characterized towards revival most of the 'talk' of it is largely ignored in favor of the controversies over the flavor of the month or redefined to mean something of a personal sort.

After all, it is our desires that set us up to fall into temptation.

Can always appreciate a balance and largely grasp the sentiments expressed and bounced off;

The thing that made the mighty men and women of God on your website so powerful is because they spent more time in the presence of God than they did talking about it. Let's stop looking for reasons a corporate revival hasn't happened and start pressing into God's presence. Do THAT and YOU WILL see true revival!

But am still reminded of the same undergirding from;

[i]How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things![/i] Rom 10:14,15

Maybe a taller order and one strangely set aside in the rush to do Gods bidding without Gods bearing;

[i]Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.[/i] Mat 9:38

Perhaps it's my own fault for expressing a desire to be in the Lords Manifest Presence as a entirely selfish one and it would dishonest to deny that in part, but hardly in entirety. It seems often times the definition becomes mis-characterized and why the out takes from various articles.

I also do not think this is merely a matter of romancing the past as it is learning from it. Look at our world today and look at the growth of this brand of Christianity that is producing ... what? Is it not by definition [i]lacking[/i]? Is it not primarily something [i]other[/i]? What is the bearing on society? In America and beyond we have grown fat and [i]are in need of nothing[/i], that is the prevailing and underlying attitude despite what might be said otherwise. We can get along just fine doing all things in the Name of the Lord and the results are just a replication of a product, of a 'teaching', of another construct of ideals and oughts and should's, text book style, how-to-do-it Christianity.

Where are the birth's, the new birth's, the re-arranged, self denying, cross-carrying, radically altered dispositions ... [i]Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.[/i] There are no exceptions and yet the wisdom of this age would have it quite otherwise, compromised ... it's full of exception clauses and pronouncements and man made stamps of approval.

I wonder why it is that what often goes quite unnoticed is just how alone we might be ...
[i]Then the LORD said unto me, The prophets prophesy lies in my name: I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, neither spake unto them...[/i]

Even our Lord sent His [i]disciples[/i], telling them to reproduce the same and what do we have but the opposite, an inverted form, out of place, out of order, without even the very means and anointing, the orders to go and do so.

To back up a second,

[i]Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that [b]he[/b] will send forth labourers[/i]

What of this admonishen? To pray in this manner?
What of a soul such as this great saint [url=https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=12480&forum=40&0]A Tribute to Father Nash[/url] and the bearing his praying had. It is there I would wholeheartedly agree with the statement of [i]pressing into God Presence[/i] but not at the expense of discouraging discussion on the matter of revival.

I said:

After all, it is our desires that set us up to fall into temptation.

Desires for God Himself? Surely that is not what is meant but this all gives off the same odor of dismissal.

I’m not being critical per se. After all, we’re dealing with something that is outside of our experience. For the most part, we’re not accustomed to deferring our will to God in many matters of life, especially when it comes to our expectations. Like young colts each one of us needs to be harnessed in by our Master. I don’t know how God did that in past revivals, but I’m sure he did it. After all, without brokenness and humility, I doubt that there would not have been revival.

I speak merely from personal experience, rather than from the words of our learned men and women. (not to say I don’t value them immensely) I’ve been in many situations where there has indeed been fervent prayer, fasting, praising, etc. I do not criticize any of that or anyone’s motives. I believe that back then we really cared for the things of God. Yet, we all needed a lot of refining. God scattered us, and brought us though various trials. Some even endured broken marriages in subsequent years. Some just got religous and others strayed away all together. Were our prayers faulty? Not necessarily. I believe that God is using life situations to break down strongholds, illusions, faulty thinking, faulty trusts - and mainly to “harness in the frisky colts”. That is the answer to our prayers - just not the way we expected. It is part of the process.

I still recall so many times of disappointments back during those years –I’d see so many flickers of revival, and then soon came the quenching – time after time after time….all kinds of potential awakenings that didn’t get off the ground. SI is no different – the need for brokenness is ever apparent.

So now, here I am, still waiting for the answers to many, many prayers. I believe that God will bring his glory, and indeed, he is shining his glory – in one heart here, and one heart there. Maybe that wouldn’t be considered revival, and likely most Christians would not even recognize it, but I view it as a most legitimate work of God, nevertheless.

Diane