It Begins With Me

Introduction — The Long Wait for Rain

Sometimes revival doesn’t arrive with thunder.

Sometimes it seeps in quietly—like rain through hard, cracked ground.

For years we may live with the crust of complacency, calling it contentment.

We tell ourselves that the season of power is past, that we’ve matured beyond all that emotion. But underneath, the soil of the soul is dry.

Then one day, God lets the sky open.

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The Pond and the Storm

I’ll never forget climbing a ridge with my Uncle Henry one muggy afternoon. Below us lay a small pond—still, stagnant, coated with green scum. Even the frogs sounded tired. “That,” he said, “is what happens when nothing flows.”

Then the clouds rolled in. Lightning split the horizon, thunder shook the ridge, and we huddled under an outcropping as sheets of rain poured down. Within minutes the dry creekbed beside us filled and began to roar. Water rushed downhill, bursting into that motionless pond, stirring, cleansing, driving the old filth away.

When the rain stopped, we leaned out to look. The surface shimmered like glass.

Uncle Henry smiled. “See that? That’s what happens when the Holy Spirit moves into a life. The new water pushes the old out.”

He was right. The pond wasn’t reformed; it was reborn.

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From Pond to Heart

That picture has stayed with me. Because that’s exactly how revival works.

It isn’t an event on a calendar. It isn’t a preacher, or a choir, or a week of meetings. Revival is what happens when living water breaks through the dry beds of the soul and pushes the old away.

And that’s why we’re here today—to ask for rain.

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Why Now

We’re living in an age when religion is often confused with marketing, when worship competes with noise, when many who bear Christ’s name have lost their song. We don’t need another slogan; we need another storm.

Revival doesn’t wait for a perfect generation or a better culture.

It waits for a willing heart.

Hezekiah’s story is proof.

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The Inheritance of Ashes

Hezekiah didn’t inherit a holy nation. He inherited wreckage.

His father Ahaz had polluted everything sacred—idols on every corner, priests of Baal on every payroll, and fires in the valley where children were offered to Molech.

The Bible says: “He made molten images for Baalim… burned incense in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and burnt his children in the fire.”

For sixteen years Judah spiraled downward. The temple doors were locked. The lamps were out. The songs were silent.

If anyone ever had an excuse to give up, it was Hezekiah.

But he refused.

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The Decision of a Lifetime

Scripture records: “In the first month of his reign, Hezekiah opened the doors of the house of the Lord and repaired them.”

First month.

Before building armies. Before fixing budgets. Before dealing with politics.

He started with the presence of God.

That’s where every revival must begin—where worship has been closed, open it again. Where light has gone out, relight the lamps. Where hearts have grown cold, rebuild the altar.

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The Four Turns of Revival

When Hezekiah sent messengers throughout Judah and Israel, he gave them a simple four-fold call (2 Chron 30 : 6-9):

1. Turn to the Lord with trust—for He will turn to you.

2. Submit to the Lord, not to your stubbornness.

3. Come to His sanctuary, which He has consecrated forever.

4. Serve the Lord your God, that His fierce anger may turn away.

Turn. Submit. Come. Serve.

That’s revival in four verbs.

It isn’t complicated. It’s costly.

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The Blame Game

We humans are good at hiding behind “if only.”

If only I’d been raised differently…

If only my spouse supported me…

If only the church weren’t full of hypocrites…

If only the pastor had visited…

But Hezekiah’s life silences every “if only.” He grew up surrounded by wickedness, and yet he chose differently.

Revival doesn’t start when the other person repents. It starts when I do.

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It Begins with Me

Say it softly once.

Then say it again, like you mean it: “It begins with me.”

If revival is to come to this church, this city, this nation—it must begin right here, in my own heart.

Not with policy. Not with programs. Not with better music.

With repentance. With humility. With a willingness to let God change me first.

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A Lesson from Kansas

Years ago a small town in Kansas prided itself on having no liquor stores. Then a businessman built a nightclub right on Main Street. Outraged church members began all-night prayer meetings, pleading for God to remove the “den of iniquity.”

One night lightning struck the club, and it burned to the ground.

The owner sued the church, claiming their prayers had caused the loss. The church hired a lawyer to deny responsibility.