Is Revival in the Air?
Most of us can feel that fall is in the air (and moving forward with great speed)...but guess what else is in the air?? REVIVAL!
What does revival look like and how do we know it’s here?
A few weeks ago, I saw a report on a church in Tennessee that baptized over a thousand people between the week before last Christmas and Easter Sunday. Groundwire, a ministry that leverages technology to share the gospel, – reported over 100,000 people come to Christ in the year 2020.
Sean Feucht, who leads “Let Us Worship” events across the country, saw an estimated 35,000 gathered on the National Mall for prayer and worship this year.
So is revival people getting “saved” or gathering in large groups to worship? Is a revived church just people jumping up and down, shouting loudly, crying and speaking in tongues?
All of these things are good and of course salvation is a necessary part of revival. I believe we are and will see these manifested along with other signs and wonders more and more as revival increases. This has been true historically. However, churches can experience them without ever seeing real change in their lives or hearts, and never have the ability to impact the culture where the fullness of revival is manifested.
When believers begin to understand themselves from the context of their true identity as sons and daughters of God, awakening to God’s original call and design on their lives, that is when true transformation has begun and revival is actually taking place.
In the 40+ yrs Todd and I have been walking with the Lord, we have been a part of a multitude of different churches and denominations. We’ve seen charismatics so heavenly minded they were no earthly good. We’ve seen reformers so centered around doctrine that the spirit of the law killed the LIVING WORD in them, robbing them of abundant relationship with Christ and any hope of true transformation (despite outward displays of their interpretation of morality). We’ve seen evangelicals who LOVE the Lord live like sleeping giants, never fully awakening to the power and authority that are our inheritance in Christ. And Todd and I have lived like all of them as we’ve journeyed through life in these communities in different seasons.
Our hope for revival is strengthened, however, by the people we have met in each tradition of faith who latched on to their true identity in Christ and lived out a life transformed by Him, leading others into abundant life through this transformation. Their marriages were thriving (which is different than just staying married), their children were growing into wholeness, they were unified with their families and the people around them (at least those who were willing to walk in their own true identity in Christ), they were letting His voice guide their decisions at work and using whatever influence they had to point people to the person of Jesus Christ. Their finances were in order. Even in their mistakes and pain they allowed God to give them beauty for ashes.
When we know WHO we are and WHOSE we are, we are no longer intimidated or deceived by the kingdom of the world that is informed by demonic powers and principalities and always ends in some form of death (even while we’re living). We no longer need to escape reality and responsibility under the guise of spiritual encounters with God. We are free to open our hearts fully to the living, loving and deeply personal God instead of hiding behind rules of doctrine. We get to experience what it means to be a co-heir with the person of Jesus Christ and start living in victory over our circumstances instead of playing church. We get to align our will with His, affirming with great joy and confidence that His will for us is abundant life!
When we begin to see abundant life springing up in our culture, we will know the sons and daughters of God are being revealed (Rom. 8:19) and revival is taking place!
