What is Revival
2 Chron 7.14
If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. (2 Chronicles 7:14)
Do you believe that today’s church needs revival?
We saw some Revival after 9/11.
What does revive mean? WE usually hear of it in the context of bringing back from the dead do we not.
It is defined in the following ways:
--To bring back to life
--To give new vigor
--To bring back into use
--To become effective or operative again.
--A return to consciousness
Can we apply each of these definitions to the spiritual realm?
To be revived spiritually—
If you are spiritually dead—you have no real fellowship with God and you get revived then you have been brought back to life spiritually.
You have a new spiritual vigor, you are now useful to God again. You become effective and operative again as a Christian.
You return to a consciousness of Christ. You can feel his presence in your life. You are very aware of His Lordship. You strive to begin pleasing God once again.
The word Revival is made up of 7 letters. The #7 is a Biblical #. It means complete of perfect.
If a puzzle is missing one piece, it is not complete or perfect. The same goes for our life in Christ. If is has unconfessed sin in it, then our fellowship is broken with Christ and we are not complete.
Is your relationship with Christ complete? Is there a piece missing in your relationship with God?
I want to look at the 7 letters that make up Revival and see what they can tell us.
R—Repentance. Revival can only begin in an individual before it can be experienced by the church.
For revival to start we must recognize sin and repent. If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)
God tells us that we must humble ourselves and pray—we must turn from our wicked ways. We must make a 180º turn.
E—Encouragement. God tells us that He will hear from heaven, that should give us all the encouragement that we need, knowing that our God will hear from heaven.
God is on our side. God is watching over us at all times—even during the bad.
Someone may say, if God is watching over me, then why am I going through all this tribulation in my life?
Sometimes we go through things to draw us closer to God. Ask God what He is trying to teach you.
No other God can hear you, no other prophet can hear you. Buddha and Muhammad are dead and gone.
They cannot answer but folks Jesus Christ can and will if you repent, turn to Him and away from the world.
Once we repent of our sin and have the encouragement from God, our lives will begin to have Value once again.
V—Value. You say preacher I never lost my value to God, He sent His Son to die for me. You are right in one respect—You are valuable to God as one of His children.
You are valuable to God because the blood of Jesus has been applied to your soul.
But with sin in your life and being spiritually dead, you loose your value as a Christian witness.
You loose your influence for God. God cannot use you to your full potential with sin in your heart.
So yes, you do lose value to God. But with Revival, you can regain that value.
Once you repent, receive encouragement and regain value, God gives you insight.
I—Insight. He gives you the ability to see the mistakes of the past and the ability to learn from them. Hind sight is 20/20.
Learn from the sins of the past in order to avoid the same pitfalls in the future. And minister to others who may be falling as you once fell.
To help your insight—God gave us the Bible. Study His Holy Word daily so you will grow as a Christian and find strength against temptation.
Once you have repented, received encouragement, regained your value, and gained insight, you are now ready for Vision.
V—Vision. Where do you see yourself and Thompson Creek Baptist Church a year, 3 years, or 5 years from now?
What vision do you have for yourself and your church? Stay true to God, seek His guidance and the vision will come.
Why do we need vision? Because the Bible says, that where there is no vision, the people perish.
Don’t get satisfied or comfortable where you are. When you do, you lose your vision.
This is one reason that I believe Jesus Christ did not have a home, he had no place to lay His head. He knew that if He had a home, then His disciples would grow complacent and satisfied.
They would just want to hangout at home instead of doing for the Lord.
They would lose their vision of what the gospel was all about. They would lose their desire to serve and follow Christ through the hardships to come.
Is the church today, full of those who just want to hangout in the church instead of doing for the Lord?
Don’t be a pew warmer. Folks, most of the pews in here are bolted down, they don’t need you to hold them in place.
Jesus said to Go, He didn’t say sit and stay.
We Christians as the Body of Christ, need to heed this advice. What happens to a body that just lays there? It goes into a vegetative state.
The church will do the same thing. If the church just lays there and does nothing, it goes into a vegetative and catatonic state, that sometimes is impossible to recover from.
That kind of church becomes lukewarm and Jesus said he would spit this kind of church out of His mouth.
Never become satisfied or complacent in God’s house.
The church should never be satisfied, because there is always going to be someone who needs to hear about Jesus Christ.
The Devil is always revising his battle plan and the church should too. What worked to reach others just 10 years ago, doesn’t work so well today.
There is too much out there that is enticing the people of today away from the things of God and it is up to the church to stand up and get into their line of sight and shout, Jesus is Coming Soon. Are you ready?
We must find ways to combat Satan and we can only do this with vision and we can only have vision when we are right with Christ.
Once you have repented, received encouragement, regained value, gained insight, gotten your vision back, comes the anointing.
A—Anointing. Get yourself revived and in the right place with God and He will anoint you to get the job done. Be ready and willing to be used by God.
You know a lot of times we don’t get what we pray for. Why is that? One reason is God said no, another is wait.
But have you ever thought about this, are you willing to be used by God to help answer your own prayer?
How many of you have prayed for Thompson Creek Baptist Church to grow?
Are you willing to let God use you to answer that prayer? If you are not willing to visit and witness, why do you expect God to answer your prayer.
How many of you have lost friends or family members? How many of you pray for their salvation? Are you willing to be used by God to plant those seeds?
Be willing to be used by God and receive the anointing for the work He has called you to do. God will provide, He will accomplish His will through you if you are willing.
Once you have repented, received encouragement, regained your value, gained insight, regained your vision, gotten and anointing, you can truly enjoy life.
L—Life. I don’t know of any other life that I would like to be living other than the one I have right now.
I thought I was happy before I became a preacher. I thought that I knew the peace that life could give through position and $.
I did not know anything. I got my life revived, I became willing to be used by God and found that Isaiah 26.3 is so true.
Thou shalt give him perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee because He trusteth in thee.
Perfect peace. How many of you know this perfect peace? You can if you answer God’s call to revival.
Repentance.
Encouragement.
Value.
Insight.
Vision.
Anointing.
Life.
If you are not experiencing all the peace and happiness of the Christian life, then please
Answer God’s call to Revival today.
