Revival, Rhetoric, and You

Let's pray for a moment. Heavenly Father, as I share this very important message on revival, I pray that you can give any evidence tonight among us, Lord, that it's so easy for the Christian community to close in on itself. I pray, Father, that you would quicken hearts and stir us up to receive what you would speak to us through. Pray for Rhema tonight, Father. And Lord, eliminate me as an obstacle from your word, and let them see the cross, and let this be a message that you use in some fashion in each of our lives. I believe it was last Wednesday morning, we all awakened, every one of us here, to a very eerie sensation that permeated the air in and around our city. It was the very clear smell of smoke and the very visible presence of a hazy, gray cloudiness. Everywhere you went, you couldn't escape it. In some places, it was dense enough to even obstruct vision. As we all quickly learned, this smoky haze was caused by a massive cloud of smoke that had been blown up over our direction from a southeast wind, carrying the forest fire smoke from West Virginia. That huge cloud was created by an enormous brush fire that burned some 250,000 acres in West Virginia, and if you're comparing, that's nearly 100 times the size of North Park. In actuality, that enormous fire was really several hundred individual fires that burned simultaneously over a widespread area in West Virginia. While I was preparing this message, I thought, what a picture of what revival is supposed to be. Not just one fire in one place, but hundreds of small fires all over the place burning together. No one knew who caused it or where it came from. It was intense and relatively uncontrollable, and it affected nearly everyone. That's what a revival does. Much of what has been bantered about over the last several weeks in the recent radio flap has had the name revival attached to it. Pittsburgh needs revival. Our city's finished without revival. My friend Dick Hatch last year turned up the heat for revival, particularly after his heart attack, and even to this day, I met with him today, is still carrying this burning desire to see revival in Pittsburgh. CTV has been calling for revival. Expression newspaper says revival must be on the way. You know all of that. Most of you are familiar with those different media expressions. What you may not know is that over the last 18 months, I have been meeting with a group of six other pastors of similar churches around the city, along with the senior leadership of Pittsburgh Leadership Foundation, to bring about a prayerfully organized attempt to ignite revival in our city. We're calling it Renaissance III, revival of the human spirit. It's a very powerful thing. In coming months, you're going to hear more about it. I believe it's something the Lord is orchestrating for us to participate in. The point is that for many centers, the call is for revival. Some are talking about it, some are praying for it, and some are doing something about it. But what is it that we're all asking for, praying for, hoping for, when we say revival? Do you know what you mean when you say, Lord, bring revival? Now, don't tell me that you've never been tempted, driving down McKnight Road. At least one time, as you went down south McKnight Road, went up a long hill, and saw that enormous new building on the right-hand side, and saw on the little marquee outside the words say, Revival Nightly. You thought to yourself, I wonder what happened here. Come on, let me see. Okay. What do you think they think revival is? Is that what you think it is? All right. It's time for audience participation here. Contain yourself, Gene. Let's take a moment, and since we don't have any visitors, I feel free to go ahead and encourage you to push yourselves a bit. I'm going to give you about a minute each, two minutes total, to share with at least one or two neighbors what you think revival is. Go ahead and do it. What's revival? Describe it. What would it look like? What are the characteristics? Go ahead, what's revival? Sermon is ending, you start. I'll be back to you in a moment. How many think their neighbor's right? Whoa, wow. Okay. Let's see. Let me talk for a few moments about what revival is not. Revival is not a week of meetings when some evangelist or prophet or some particularly gifted individual comes and stirs up a crowd and makes some things happen. That's not revival. That may cause some renewal. It may cause some profound changes in an individual. It may get some things stirred up, but it's not revival. Number two, or letter B, if you're taking notes there, I hope you are, revival was not the charismatic movement of the 60s and 70s. Now, this is a shocking disappointment, maybe not to some of you, but to many people. You see, let's understand that the charismatic movement of which this church really is an outgrowth was a wonderful move of God. The charismatic movement was a time of great personal discovery in the lives of hundreds and hundreds of thousands, and I'd say millions of people in America and around the world. The Holy Spirit blew into town, and the result was fresh worship experiences that people who had sat stone-faced and cold-hearted for years in churches discovered something alive and real and warm in their hearts. An openness to the giftedness of the Holy Spirit turned people from mere spectators to participants in the things of God, and there was a recovery of a quality of love that had not been seen very much, but it wasn't revival. Some of the key characteristics that we'll talk about in a moment were absent. And folks, let me say this again. I've said it before up on this platform, but you may have missed it. The charismatic movement is over. It is history. One of the things that I pick up listening on occasion to these radio and TV shows is that many of the people calling in were very evidently deeply touched 10 years ago, 15 years ago, 20 years ago, and have wandered about trying to find the feeling again, as the song goes, looking for a place where they can plug in where the Spirit's moving. And they're berating churches everywhere because they're not finding what it is that they once had, and the reason is what they once had isn't what's happening. Now, you don't have to agree with me, but, you know, I'm right in this, okay? And I'm speaking to you from what I know is out there and what I've heard other leaders of a whole lot more stature than me talk about. Many of those people are on a quest that they're not going to satisfy because they're looking backwards instead of forward. The third thing that revival is not, and this is going to pop a couple of bubbles, but revival is not a media event. I mean, as wonderful as TV and radio are, they are basically individual events and individualized mediums that communicate to one person at a time. And that violates one of the basic principles of what revival is. Revival has to do with unity, being together, experiencing God in the corporate, not just in the individual. Oh, the media may, may fan the flames, but the media is not where revival's going to happen. So then what is revival? Well, what is revival? What are some of the images that come to your mind when you think revival, okay? You've heard the names thrown around. Maybe one of the images that comes to your mind is Jonathan Edwards, you know, the flamethrowing preacher whose sermon centers in the hand of an angry God is the very sermon you wish you could preach to your boss. Better not be in my staff. Maybe the image of revival is the old country frontier preacher in a camp meeting, you know, whipping the people up to a frenzy and then challenging them to walk down the sawdust trail. Some people have seen the sawdust trail. So maybe for you the image of revival is Charles Finney walking into a textile mill and just his gaze caused people to fall on the floor and weep. Maybe your image of revival is mass crusades, Billy Graham, filling stadiums. It requires things just as I am. People filter down by the... I don't know what your image is. But fundamentally, revival is, letter A, God himself deciding to visit his people. Listen to Isaiah 64, 1 and 2. Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains would tremble before you, as when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil. Come down to make your name known to your enemies and cause the nations to quake before you. See, when this happens, a tremendous awareness. When God chooses to manifest himself, there's a tremendous awareness of the reality of the holiness of God as he falls upon people, sometimes for no apparent reason. Revival is what is described in Acts chapter 4 and verse 31 when the Bible says, After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly. Sometimes revivals start in the strangest moments. During the great Welsh revival of 1904, a small group were praying through the night, asking God for revival, and at 4 a.m., and we've had all-night prayer meetings, and I know where most people are at 4 a.m. They're zoned out. But at 4 a.m. in the Welsh revival, the very first outbreak of the Holy Spirit, 4 a.m., for an unexplained reason, the Holy Spirit fell on people and brought conviction of sin. And the next day, the word began to spread that there was this falling of the Spirit, and from that moment, the next year, the next two years, all of Wales was just transformed by the power of God. It spilled over to Great Britain, and you can read about it. Evan Robertson said it was a tremendous revival. J. Edwin Orr, who's known to be the greatest authority on revivalism in America, and by the way, I was privileged to study under him at Fuller Seminary, defines revival this way. Very simple. I love it. Acts 3.20. It's times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord. What a great definition. That's revival. Times of refreshing that come from the presence of the Lord. By the way, it begins by saying, repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord. Charles Finney, who was the leader of the second Great Awakening, said, revival, first of all, is a renewal of the first love of believers, in which believers are awakened and sinners are converted. And Stephen Oldford, who was one of Billy Graham's mentors, and a very godly man, says this. Revival is a strange and sovereign work of God in which he visits his own people, restoring, reanimating, and releasing them into the fullness of his blessing. Well, the point being, the revival starts in the church amongst God's people. Revival, to make alive again. Now, in American history, and I'm going to do this quickly, there really haven't been too many revivals. There was the first Great Awakening, 1730s and 40s. That was before we were even really formally a nation. A Dutch Reformed preacher by the name of Theodor Frelinghuysen came to America and began to preach a gospel of holiness based on the Puritan ethic. He touched a man by the name of William Tennant and his son Gilbert, and the Tennants became the stalwart revivalists of a denomination that some of you were part of, the Presbyterians. And they preached revival, and they ended up leading what was called the New Side Presbyterian. Fascinating study. It wasn't too long after that, in that same First Great Awakening, that a man by the name of George Whitefield began to preach out in the open air. He was the first open air preacher. Tremendous, tremendous impact. I wanted to bring a quote, I didn't bring the book. But George Whitefield at times, without any microphone, sorry guys, without any amplification, would stand on the steps of a building in a public square and speak to 30 or 40 or 50 thousand people. Two reasons. One, he had a tremendous voice. And number two, people were so spellbound by the quote, anointing, that you could hear, it was then that Jonathan Edwards, who began to systematize what revival was, came on the scene as well. We've already mentioned him. Then there was the Second Great Awakening about 60 years later. The 1850s and so. That's when the whole camp meeting thing came along and Charles Finney came on the scene. And you can read about this. Folks, if you've never read some of this stuff, get some books and read about it. It's just amazing how lives were changed. Finney came in, whereas Jonathan Edwards and so, Wesley and Whitefield tended to be a little bit more of this God's sovereign side. Finney came in and basically said, wait a minute. Yeah, God's sovereign and he's... But the human will is a big deal here. And Finney instituted what he called his new measures. And new measures were the way that Finney brought the will into the whole equation of revival. Some of his new measures were that he became... He got people talking about God in familiar terms so that it was no longer someone way out there, but someone very personal to them. He had, in public meetings, now listen to this. Those of you who listen to the radio, guys say, boy, it would be great to have Finney. Finney used to come to me like this and pull out your name. Kent, and he'd name sin. Like this. This sin is in your life. Jerry, this sin is in your life. Not just like, oh, I have a word for you, brother, can I go out in the back and share it with you? No, no. Right here. And so on. I mean, publicly, name sins. Right in the meetings. Told them they needed to repent. He preached for immediate decisions. I mean, that moment, part of his new measure was right then. And if you, you know, obviously, if he was right, you were down. I mean, that was it. And he instituted what was called the morning seat. Or morning bench. Not M-O-R-N, but M-O-U-R-N, or the anxious seat, it was called in some places, where you'd come up, and the conviction of sin was so great that you'd sit there until you had the breakthrough, until you knew that you had been forgiven. I mean, sometimes you didn't know until the next day, and they mourned all night through that time. Finney, tremendous story. Only a few times like this in all the history of America were these kinds of things noted. Of course, Dwight Moody in the late 1800s was a powerful evangelist, a revivalist. Billy Sunday, Venezuela Street in 1906, the Pentecostal and holiness movement came out of that, and that was a revival in that it affected a broad swath of the culture. We're going to talk about that in just a moment. And the only other ones that even come close were Oral Roberts and Billy Graham. And certainly not since about 1950 has there really been any true revivalism in America. Certainly not the charismatic movement in that sense, and not the televangelists or anyone else that may call themselves a revivalist. Now, it's not to say that the Spirit of God hasn't done some wonderful things. I'm here today to tell you that I believe this whole church is a product of the mercy of God in revivalism, and my own life was greatly affected by the charismatic movement. And it's not to say that there aren't little fires of revival here and there, and you say, well, I knew a church in Ashland, Ohio or Louisville, Kentucky. Well, you know, God has by His grace spotted the countryside with some of that. But not like those days when, for example, churches were packed out in revival every single day. Churches were packed out. Many times spilling out into the streets, people listening through open windows. Every day, businesses were shut down over the noon hours so people could go to church and seek God. Every single day, the bars were closing down and the prostitutes were out of work and the drunks were drying up. And morality was being changed every single day. The poor were helped freely by people. There wasn't like the poor were brought in and cared for and their lives were, their needs were met. Every single day, miracles occurred as a matter of course. Words of deliverance and healing and miracles. In a time of revival, the spiritual hunger multiplied and great joy was evident. Even though there was repentance and sorrow, there was a joy because people knew that they were experiencing the presence of God. And there was power everywhere in a revival. I mean, it was just like a presence. In 1859, a ship had come across the Atlantic full of sailors, of course, and cargo and all. And it pulled into New York Harbor. And as it docked on the side, the side of the ship that faced New York City, that side of the ship and those who were on that side of the boat, experienced the power of God. And some of the sailors began to weep and some couldn't explain why they felt such this power. The ones on the other side of the ship didn't experience anything. In some cases, they walked across the ship and were hit by the power of God. That was revival. And in every case, a bold witness for what Christ was doing who could care less about what the world thought. God was present and people were free to talk about it. Roman numeral three. What are the circumstances that bring revival? Let's start talking about how revival comes, all right? Letter A, the circumstances that bring revival, deadness in the church and coldness in society at large. As Wesley said during the period of his ministry, John Wesley, how dead the time was everywhere before this work began. You're going to hear me say in a few minutes, one of the things that must precede revival is an awareness of how dead people really are. The second thing is response to persecution. That's very easily documented in Pentecost. The first revival was when, you know, the disciples were hiding in fear for their life. The church in Samaria, Acts chapter eight, they scattered because of the persecution and revival came. But more recently, let's talk about current history. Look in Latin America right now. Latin America is experiencing revival. Do you know that right now there's something, I think I read, 60 million evangelicals in Latin America? That's up from 5 million in 1905. Why? Because of tremendous persecution in Honduras and those kind of communist regimes. Or, of course, you know, in China and now in the Soviet Union. All that persecution has caused revival in the church. I mean, the church is breaking loose in those places. By the way, let me just throw in here, revivalists tend to thrive on the persecution rightly or wrongly and even use it to their advantage many times. They like to hear criticism because, in a sense, they feel like it's fanning their flame. Letter C, another part, another circumstance of revival is response to a remnant of prayer. I have great hope in this little phrase that I'm showing you right now. You see, it doesn't take a lot of people praying for revival. It takes some who are dedicated and committed to it. The story is told about Billy Graham's first tent meeting in New York City. By the way, he just had a meeting with a quarter of a million people in Central Park. Did you see that? And powerful. But his first tent revival in New York City which went on for, I think it was, 16 weeks. The secret he shared later of the power behind his meeting were two elderly ladies who prayed and fasted for six weeks prior to that meeting and then during the meeting time itself for those 16 weeks. Billy says to this day that it was their prayers that opened heaven and brought revival through his ministry. What are some of the preliminaries to revival? What's it going to take? Well, I've already mentioned prolonged prayer and I have to say those of you who are newer to us, listen, we have been praying for 10, now 11 years, 11 years for God to bring his spirit through and bring revival. And I'm not saying that we've prayed it perfectly, we've said all the right words, even done all the right things, but I know that the spirit of the people who come here Tuesdays and Fridays, there were times when we came five days a week at six in the morning and the spirit of the people has been for revival. Turn in your Bibles to 1 Kings and take a look at how revival comes. 1 Kings 18, would you? As you know, in this story, there had been no rain, the land was parched, and Elijah has now eradicated the land of the prophets of Baal, the false prophets, and here's what he says. And of course, the dry land is a symbol of the dry and dead hearts. Here's what he says in verse 41. And Elijah said to Ahaz, go eat and drink, for there is the sound of a heavy rain. Now, what kind of a nutcase is going to say that? And so Ahab went off to eat and drink, but Elijah climbed to the top of Carmel and bent down to the ground and put his face between his knees. Now, is that a picture of someone praying? Go and look toward the sea, he told his servant, and he went up and looked, and his servant said, there's nothing there. Seven times, Elijah said, go back. Verse 44, the seventh time the servant reported a cloud as small as a man's hand is rising from the sea. And so Elijah said, go and tell Ahab, hitch up your chariot and go down before the rain stops you. Meanwhile, the sky grew black with clouds, the wind rose, a heavy rain came on, and Ahab rode off to Jezreel. And the power of the Lord came upon Elijah, and tucking his cloak into his belt, he ran ahead of Ahab all the way to Jezreel. You see, the image is very clear. It starts, sometimes, after a prolonged period of nothing, nothing. Have you ever prayed and said nothing? Are you praying about something right now and you're hearing nothing, nothing? Go back and look again. You see, a preliminary to revival is prolonged prayer that leads letter B to expectation. Expectation. There's a certain expectancy. Now I'm going to tell you something very important right now. I think it's important. You can judge for yourself. We have just brought two young men onto our youth staff who firmly believe that God has brought them here to bring revival to our kids. They have a tremendous expectation. And they're not even, you know, they met with the elders last night and I mean, they're not ashamed or embarrassed or even hesitant, I guess, is the word to say. We believe God's going to do something fabulous beyond what we've imagined. They're also quick to say they don't know how it's going to happen. They don't know, you know, what course it's going to take, but they believe it's going to happen. And I want you to believe with them. Parents, I want you to believe with them, members of the church, that God would do a great work in our kids. Can I say this? In my experience, many churches have experienced a mini revival within the camp when it started with the kids. That's where it started. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Okay. Letter C. Another preliminary to revival is humility. Humility. Humility that's born of a certain sense of dependence. You see, revival's not going to come to someone who doesn't need it. People need to be able to say, God, God, we've got to have your touch. We've got to have your spirit's presence with us. And letter D, a preliminary to revival is sacrifice. A willingness to take a risk. Dick Hatch and I were talking about this today. In every one of these cases, when revival came, it was because some people threw it all out there and said, it's got to happen this way. Lord, it's got to happen. And I'm willing to put my personal schedule, my personal comfort, my personal church doctrines and preferences and religious habits and practices on the line and take a lifestyle of sacrifice and unselfishness. You see, in that sense, our brother on the radio this last six or seven weeks is right. He's absolutely right. It takes wholeheartedness. Where it's wrong is that you don't go and tell other people that they're wrong. You just go and God say, God, I'm wrong. And you take care of me, God, and God will take care of the rest of us. He's big enough to do that. Number four, the marks. What are the marks of revival? Is that number five? How do you know if you're really there, you're experiencing? Well, the main thing is this. It's a personal return, a drawing to Jesus. Revelation 2, 4, a very familiar verse. Did I hold this against you? You have forsaken your first love. Remember the height from which you've fallen. Repent and do the things that you did at first. You see, dear ones, fundamentally, revival is simply that your heart's love for Jesus is passionate and alive. The flame of your love is rekindled. Sometimes this happens because of prophetic movement in your life. It may happen because someone helps bring you to a place of confronting your coldness with a word or with some sort of an exhortation. Oftentimes, revival begins with a public confession. I wonder what would happen tonight. I thought about this when I was preparing the message. If I just, you know, I stop now and I spent the next half hour before we left here tonight and said, let's just come and publicly confess our sin. We don't do that. The marker of revival is that your heart is softened and you realize that you're not what you want to be in God. There's a certain brokenness that begins to come upon you and that brokenness, letter B, leads to unity. John 17, 21, Jesus said, O God, Father, that they would all be one even as you and I are one. You see, as pride melts and bitternesses begin to be healed, the marker of revival is that love emerges within the church. And let's be honest, dear ones, we, this body is large and kind of sprawling and we don't even know each other in many cases. But we know enough about each other in some cases that we have some bitternesses and we have some, like, resentments and some problems. You see, when revival breaks out, love begins to just come on the scene and that's why you hear things like where people don't want to leave, you know? They come to me and they just do not want to leave. It's so powerful. They want to stay there because the atmosphere of love invites them and you've heard of people, you know, praying all night and those kinds of things. And then fruits of repentance begin to shine forth. You know, a desire to pray, a hunger for the word of God, a spirit of giving. Those are all internal things. Externally, letter D, then true revival spills outside of the congregation. It starts to spill over into the community, into other churches. Word spreads. People are drawn. Other churches begin to have similar kinds of meetings. Prodigals begin to come back into the fold and realize that they've wandered from God and they bring unsaved people with them and it starts to be stirred up. Back in 1830 and 31 in Rochester, New York, in one church, revival started. Over the next 20 months, that revival spread to something like 150 churches. The whole city was turned around. And those other characteristics that I described for you began to take place. Some of you may remember, I was told that in Billy Graham's early years, 1949 and 1950, about six, nine months in there, there was an awareness throughout the nation of something powerful happening through him. And there was a stirring up in churches and all. Letter E, another external mark, is a harvest in the growth of the church. And people start committing their lives. Not just, quote, making a decision. But they begin to get their lives in order and plug in together. Social reform begins. As someone said, reformation of the soul is the soul of reformation. You want to change the abortion industry? Change the abortions. And when God begins to be turned loose in the classrooms and boardrooms and courtrooms, lives change. That's a mark of revival. Let me end with this. Why no revival then? Why is it that revival, even on a small scale, has been so limited? A couple of things I'll suggest to you. Number six here. First of all, the pride of man, or a personality cult, is so easy to fall into. The minute a man or a woman begins to see God use them, their vulnerability to the lies of the enemy, that they are important and special, even when they say to the contrary, I would never believe God would use me, and yet they do believe it. You see, it's a very rare person that God can trust enough to use them without them getting puffed up. I believe almost invariably it comes after much brokenness in that person's life. Letter B, there's so much subtle division and so much sectarianism that seems to attend this. Folks, one of the things that I've experienced, one of the reasons why this whole episode was very discomforting to me was I've seen other circumstances where people start delivering a certain message about, this is the way to holiness and this is the way you need to do it, and all that stuff, and they end up just further separating themselves. And then pretty soon someone within the group says, no, but really, this is what you need to do, and then this is what you need to do, and pretty soon there's no one that's living up to the standard except maybe the one apostle or the one true leader, and that's how divisions and sects are born, and those breakaway movements tend to just eventually disintegrate in time. But the last two are the main two that I want to leave you with, and I think letter C, lack of hunger, we're really not all that hungry, we're just really kind of happy with the way things are, really no great need here, we're secure, I know I'm going to heaven, I like you, you like me, we're content, we see enough to believe that God's alive, and well, you know, prayer, we have prayer going on, and I guess part of it for me too is that I don't know that one can really sustain that hunger short of God's, this is where sovereignty comes in. I don't think you walk around and just beat yourself, I think God puts it on a man's heart, a woman's heart, to have a burden, but I fear that we're far too comfortable, and letter D, and this may be the main reason, lack of readiness, what if God did what we want Him to do? What if God started to fill the place up with people who were coming to Christ? What if there was such a brokenness and such a flow of power that people poured into this place and came to Christ? What would we do with them? Fight with them for their parking spot? You have no idea how difficult it is to have people sustain a commitment here in this church to do little simple servant jobs. I mean just the smallest things to help make room for the ones God is sending us according to His prophetic word. And so our nurseries are overflowing with kids and barely having enough people to keep them going. Sometimes we don't even have enough people. We don't have enough group leaders. We don't have enough people who are extending mutual care to one another. Just taking up the time when someone is in need to give themselves to them and say hey I'll walk with you. I'll help you grow. So we have seven year olds in the parking lot. I don't know. Training and instruction and some sense of preparation, some sense of being equipped to do evangelism in a way that's not just going to get a person into the kingdom and then see them get snatched back out. We need to see a readiness and I have to tell you I'm devoting a lot of my energies these days to trying to set up a structure whereby anyone who really has a heart to be involved in preparing for what I believe will be an up point from God. Make no mistake, if there's any reason why this church is where it is today it's because God knows and I agree with Pat Robertson and all the other people who are saying there's going to be a last outpouring. I want to be prepared. I want the church to be ready. The only reason I even care at all about sweating through the building program that's coming, I can be happy here. I don't care if there's brown chairs and blue carpet but my heart starts to pump when we literally have people standing back here and over here and people, 15 people responding to a simple, not even an evangelistic message for heaven sakes and I know what God could do if we combine together and make room and we are trained and we're prepared and we're ready. Let's stand together. Would you, in these closing moments, just go ahead and seal this last 40 minutes or whatever I've talked here, 35 minutes, by praying with a couple of people. You don't need to just stand there and listen. Pray with somebody. Pray with your spouse if you'd like or a couple of your friends. Turn in a group of two or three and just pray for what has to happen in your heart. If one thing I said tonight may struck a chord, pray for that. Would you go ahead, take five minutes and we'll be.