Revival begins in the individual's heart. Let it begin with you on your face alone before God. Turn from every sin that might hinder. Renew yourself to a new devotion to the Saviour.
Author: Lee Roberson
Ok, I admit it. I am slow. Sometimes it takes me years before some simple fact can sink through my thick head bone and reach my brain. For example, I heard the joke “What’s black and white and red all over?” when I was a little kid probably 6 or 7. I never got it. I would laugh because I knew it was a joke, but I had no idea why it was funny. I think I was somewhere in high school before finally it dawned on me. “READ all over.”
I grew up in church. In fact, I grew up in a lot of churches. I think I went to every protestant church in our area at some time in my life. During those years, I would swear I never heard the word “revival”. I don’t think it was even in their vocabulary, so it should be no wonder that no revival of any kind ever happened in them.
My first experience with any kind of revival was when I went to a week of meetings at a church. We sang, prayed, listened to sermons and left revived. We were now ready to go out and do God’s work in our lives. Two days later, we were back to normal and doing the same things we had before.
To me that was a revival. I didn’t know any better, and I dare say neither do most people in churches. The days of Pentecost, as in Acts chapter 2, are past. God does not come down with tongues of fire to alight upon people’s heads. Miracles, tongues, healings, and such things left this world when the last apostle died. The Holy Spirit does not move like that now. He is quiet, dignified and sensible today. He mostly sits back and watches us in this world to see that we are obeying His commandments.
Don’t you believe that? I did. I thought that all my life, until God set me straight. It took me a while to learn it but He is patient and I finally did learn. My first lesson on revival was when I was still a young Christian. He arraigned for my own personal revival. He showed me that He can work in peoples lives today if we will let Him.
I was stationed on the USS Lloyd Thomas, home ported in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. I enjoyed the beautiful island beaches, going swimming in the ocean, and looking at girls in their skimpy bikinis. The list was not necessarily in that order at the time.
In spite of living in paradise, one day I found myself depressed. I had been out on the beach with a friend of mine from the ship, and a couple of girls. We swam, talked and enjoyed the day but afterwards I felt so empty. I had not done anything wrong or sinful, but I still felt like I was somehow missing the whole point of life. I had just had an almost perfect day in paradise and I was depressed? That didn’t make sense.
I had trouble sleeping that night and got up early in the morning to try to figure out what was wrong. I walked around the base looking for an answer. I didn’t know what I was looking for or how to find it, but something inside me moved me to search for an answer. I saw a quonset hut and heard singing coming from it. I had not occurred to me until then that it was Sunday and this was where the base chapel was. I peeked into the window saw people filling the chapel. I didn’t want to go in there. I just wanted to be left alone, so I walked on.
I don’t know how far I walked, but as I was walking back to my ship, I passed that chapel again. It was quiet now so I opened the door and went in. I had been a Christian for a few months at this time, but I had not gone to church since boot camp. Going into the quiet sanctuary I noticed a man on his knees praying. Slowly, I walked over to a pew opposite of him and sat down. I bowed my head and probably for the first time since I had become a Christian, I truly prayed my heart to God.
“God, I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I feel like I am missing something. I accepted you back in boot camp. I know I am saved because you promised to take me to Heaven, and I believe you. You keep your word. I guess I need to be a better Christian, but I don’t know how to do that. I have always been to church but that’s not the same. God you have to show me how to be a Christian.”
I raised my head and noticed that the other guy was gone. I stood up and walked out of the chapel, still not really sure where I should go or what I should do. As I walked out the door, I saw about six guys talking and laughing around the doorway area. I stood there a moment and, being the curious guy that I am, asked “Hi. What you guys doing?”
“Hello.” One of them answered. “We’re having a prayer meeting. You want to join?”
I knew about prayer meetings, and I thought they were boring, boring, boring. Sit there with your head bowed, eyes closed and speak in King James English. “Oh Lord, thy servant cometh before thee to bequest thine assistance to doeth thy will.”
Before I could answer “No” the thought came to mind of what I had just prayed. “God you have to show me how to be a Christian.” I nodded my head. “Yeah, I would like that.”
I found that I actually enjoyed praying with these men. They were doing a discipleship program using the Navigator system. From them, I learned about prayer, bible study, scripture memory, witnessing and having fun with Christian brothers. God had answered my prayer.
Wait a minute. Where were the tongues of fire? Why wasn’t I slain in the Spirit? How can that be a revival? Revival has to be a large movement of God in the world.
The revival we all want to see has God moving in masses of Christians to bring them back into His will, and moving non-Christians to accept Jesus as savior. The details of that movement of God can be different depending on the time, place and need of the revival. There is one thing I think we many times forget when we talk about revival. A mass revival is made up of single people who God has revived individually. God cares about each person and he touches their lives to meet their needs, whatever that might be at the moment.
For me at that time, I needed him to answer that prayer immediately because if He had waited, I might not have seen my need for Him later. I saw the emptiness of my life without Him in control. He had brought me to that emptiness, and once I finally surrendered myself to Him, He could work with me.
In a nutshell, that is revival. Seeing our need for God and surrendering to Him.
Technorati Tags: Revival,, Church,, Christian,, Navigators,, Christ,, Jesus,, Navy,, Prayer
No comments:
Post a Comment