I came to faith in Christ during the Jesus Movement. Almost from the first day of my radical conversion, I realized that many people actually opposed the way it happened! They didn’t like the music, the style, the interruption of the norm, and were filled with skepticism. It was very hard to understand, since Jesus was in the process of totally transforming my life! It was one thing that not everyone experienced what I was experiencing. But it was a whole different magnitude, and very disorienting to a teenager, that many people actually opposed it!
In 1995 I was a part of what has come to be known as the Brownwood revival. It started in Brownwood, Tx, at Coggin Avenue Baptist Church and Howard Payne University. But it then spread across the country to universities and churches. It was a movement of repentance, and became highly missional with many who were a part of that movement on the mission field today.
But the criticism was intense! So many critics and so much skepticism: There wasn’t enough leadership. There was too much leadership, and maybe manipulation. It was all emotionalism. There wasn’t enough preaching. Public confession of sin was dangerous. And even complete confusion between what began in Brownwood and something else happening in a place called Brownsville.
God moved powerfully in the Jesus movement and the Brownwood revival. In our book Revival Revived, we documented the effect on the lives of many of those involved in the Brownwood movement 20 years later. The impact was profound and has led to mission movements taking place even now around the world!
And yet many people not only missed what God did in both of those movements, they stood in the way of it!
For the first time in history, there is a revival movement going on with the opportunity for leaders to step up and challenge this kind of skepticism. Social media has many negative and dangerous aspects, but it has allowed instant input to what is happening in the world. I believe it is critical right now that leaders use that opportunity and speak out concerning those who seem to be constantly skeptical that God might actually work in the world in a way that looks different from the norm.
After all who is the God that we say we believe in? Is he distant and uninvolved? Are we Deists who believe He created the world and just took His hand off of it and let it go its own way? Should we not EXPECT the God of the Bible to move!? Why are so many people consistently shocked when He does?
I believe we have already been in the greatest spiritual awakening the world has ever seen for quite some time now. Millions are coming to Christ in places like Iran! Across the world, God is moving so powerfully in the persecuted church that neither governments nor Satan himself can stop it.
Asbury is not new. Many of us have seen prayer meetings that go on for hours or days. We have seen unexplainable miracles. We have seen people come to Christ, in ways that cause us to weep. We have seen deep emotion and unusual worship and brokenness. What we have not seen is much of this in America!
And now that this may very well be changing, it is time to reject skepticism, and walk into the movement of God. It is time for God’s people, by faith, to actually expect Him to work! To no longer be shocked when He does things that are different from what we have grown accustomed to. After all what we have grown accustomed to in our churches is just about to kill us! If we continue the path we are on there won’t be much left of the American church in a few decades.
Isn’t it time for revival?
Isn’t it time for reformation in the American church?
I hear many say, "Lets wait and see what comes of Asbury.” Really? Is that the way God’s people responded at Pentecost? Did they say "God we will get back to you in a few years when we see the results of this?” "God, we will sit on the sidelines and pontificate and criticize in case there is something wrong with all this?”
Is that the way Peter and Cornelius responded in Acts 10? Did they say "God, these visions are very unusual. They are so different from what we normally experience and quite emotional. We will get back to you in a few years after we see what happens. Time will tell.” If they had responded that way, the Gentile world would not have been opened to the gospel and many of us might’ve never heard it! I’m glad they didn’t sit on the sidelines and wait a few years.
We really don’t respond to God in other areas of our spiritual life like this. For instance, we don’t think that repentance only matters after we wait and see what comes of it. Or that forgiving those who have sinned against us doesn’t matter until we see what comes of it. This is an unbiblical kind of pragmatism and faithlessness.
Revival that draws us into the presence of Jesus matters IN THE MOMENT, and not just in the future. Which means each of us has to decide if we are willing to miss what God is doing in the world. Right now.
There is a truth behind the skeptics’ position. It’s actually one of our primary messages at Life Action Ministries. Kingdom-first living IS to be the result of revival. We teach that in every single thing we do in our ministry. Isaiah‘s encounter with God resulted in "Here I am. Send me!”
We do need a revival that reforms. We desperately need it. We do need a revival that has legs, that doesn’t only bless us, but sends us into the great commission and the great commandment with Jesus. This is patently obvious in the American church.
BUT - many skeptics want the reformation without the revival!
And that’s nothing but flesh. It can come from our fear of our own emotions. Or intellectual pride. Or any number of reasons. But it never works. There’s a reason why the vast majority of the American church has nothing to do with the mission of Jesus.
Because we have no fire!
We have forgotten the power of the Holy Spirit!
We fear gathering together in the unexplainable power of God.
And yet that is the only way we will ever join the mission of Jesus and make a difference in this world:
"And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.”
””Acts”¬ ”4”¬:”31”¬ ”
We don’t get to skip this part!
In the verses after this, God’s people begin to live in ways that eventually changed the entire Roman empire! But they didn’t just decide to do it one day. The fire of God fell upon them when they gathered together and THEN everything changed.
Critics of revival often say that they want to see other people doing evangelism, justice and mission before they will accept revival as legitimate. But through more than 40 years of ministry, I have rarely seen these kind of critics do a whole lot of evangelism, justice and mission themselves.
And where will the skeptics be when reformation actually does happen through a movement like Asbury? When revived students do live transformed lives, take the gospel to the broken, and become missional? Will the skeptics then repent and fall on their faces beside students the next time God begins to move? Call ME a skeptic, but I doubt it.
In all my years of ministry, I just haven’t seen skeptics repent and change like that very often.
It is truly not my desire to offend or oppose anyone skeptical of what is happening in Asbury and other places. It IS my intention to encourage every skeptic to stop and ask - why are you skeptical? Could it be more about yourself than others? Every revival comes with excesses and issues that need to be addressed. But which is the greater danger? Finding yourself in the middle of a movement which has some problems that must be addressed? Or the possibility of standing on the sidelines and missing the work of the Holy Spirit of God in our day? Or worst of all finding that you have opposed God?!
When it comes to the emotion and the form of what is happening in Asbury and other places - seriously now, why should anyone be surprised when there are deep emotions, brokenness, crying, and on-our-face amazement when God moves. If He is really who we believe He is, maybe we should be ashamed of ourselves if that does NOT happen in US! If we are not astonished off our feet by God himself? How is that anything other than our own flesh and pride?
I don’t know what will come from Asbury and the other places God is at work. I don’t know what the future holds. But I have seen and heard enough to know that God has lit a fire.And in the words of one of my mentors, Dr. Roy Fish, "when there is a fire, expect people to gather to get warm!”
I’m headed to the fire! I know there’s a possibility that I may be burned. I’ll risk it.
I don’t want to be cold anymore. And the possibility that this fire could spread? That it could warm the world? I just can’t risk missing that!
So I’m not headed to Asbury. I’m headed to Oklahoma Baptist University, where this Monday I will serve alongside a Life Action team as we come together with students, faculty and administration to seek God for revival. Pray for us, that we will do nothing to either manipulate or hinder, and that we will simply join God in what HE sees fit to do.
In conclusion, would you simply read this passage, pray and talk with God about it? Peter has just been miraculously freed from prison. The Church is gathering and praying- for him to be released from prison!
"… He went to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose other name was Mark, where many were gathered together and were praying. And when he knocked at the door of the gateway, a servant girl named Rhoda came to answer. Recognizing Peter’s voice, in her joy she did not open the gate but ran in and reported that Peter was standing at the gate. They said to her, "You are out of your mind.” But she kept insisting that it was so, and they kept saying, "It is his angel!” But Peter continued knocking, and when they opened, they saw him and were amazed.” Acts”¬ ”12”¬:”12”¬-”16”¬ ”
We have prayed for revival. For so long. Let’s not be afraid to open the door!