Getting Ready for Revival

For a long time I’ve been personally praying and asking God to send revival to our city and nation. I’ve been asking Jesus about it for 5-6 years, watching and waiting to see if others were also feeling stirred. Recently I’ve noticed others beginning to share an excitement about God readying a move of the spirit. I’ve now felt Jesus give me permission to begin to write to others to cast vision for what is coming and how we can be getting ready.

What is Revival?

Revival can mean different things to different people and if you are not a Christian this word may not make much sense to you. When I speak of praying and asking God to send Revival this is what I mean – a time where God’s spirit particularly starts moving in a specific location and many people are changed and affected in a lasting way by this. It often begins within a group of Christians but for it to be true Revival, it will spill out of the church and begin to effect those that don’t know Jesus – bringing many, many of them into a saving relationship with Him.

“God hath it much on His heart from all eternity to glorfity His dear and only begotten Son: and there are some special seasons that he appoints to that end, wherein He comes forth with omnipotent power to fulfil His promise and oath to Him. And these times are times of remarkable pouring out of His spirit to advance His kingdom. Such a day is a day of His power.”

Jonathan Edwards

Put simply, Father God wants to ‘big-up’ His Son Jesus and wants everyone to have an opportunity to make a decision about Him. In times of Revival the Father sends the Holy Spirit to move the hearts of mankind to suddenly be open to spiritual realities that were previously unaware of or completely closed off to.

Why We Need Revival.

If you’re unfamiliar with Christianity it might seem arrogant to claim that the Christian faith has the answers to the worlds most broken problems. But that, of course, is what the Bible has asserted as THE truth for millenia. God prescribes HIMSELF, his very presence as the cure to the worlds ailments. If God IS real and the claims of the Bible are true (not just true for a few quaint individuals, but universally true for all mankind) then a society or nation that has slid further and further away from these truths needs to be drawn back again.

God is always at work in the world through his people; the church. Yet during a time of revival this work is supernaturally quickened. What may have taken decades to achieve by a faithful group of Jesus followers, can take mere moments when the Spirit Himself is the initiator.

We have started two wonderful churches in the last 15 years, we’ve worked faithfully and followed the leading of the Holy Spirit, I am grateful to have many stories of what God has done in the lives of many people I have seen Him change. Yet, when I reflect on the fruit we have from the last 15 years, I have to be honest that we’ve probably only affected the lives of a few hundred people. There are over 260,000 people in the city of Hull where we live. The vast majority (99%) remain unreached by the Good news about Jesus. I am so grateful for the fruit I have seen God produce through my life but I am increasingly discontent with leaving 99% of my city unmoved by the Gospel. As Arthur Wallis says “It is time to cease from our endeavours and enlist the powerful intervention of God”.

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So how about you? Do you find yourself increasingly frustrated and discontent with the spiritual winter we’re living through in this nation? Let me know in the comments.