“Show me a people on their faces before God – gripped in the unction of prayer and I show you a people ready for revival.” Duncan Campbell, 26-year old leader of the Hebrides revival in 1950
As part of my Lenten devotional time this year, I have been reading a daily meditation on revivals throughout the history of the church. Inevitably, I have been struck by a seemingly undeniable fact – without prayer there is no revival.
It’s not the first time that I have read about revival through the course of my ministry, but this time it has not been out of curiosity or a deeper understanding of church history. Rather, it has been a time of serious contemplation and, indeed, repentance, as I have struggled with the pervading question – do I really want revival in my church, my city, my nation and in my generation? I say I do; I’ve always said that I do, but how badly do I really want to see a move of God radically alter the decaying spiritual and social fabrics of our 21st century culture?
Many of us may have seen signs posted on churches that proclaim, “Revival – Every Thursday Night” as we have driven through the southern US. Or perhaps we’ve read a newspaper ad that promised a week’s worth of “revival” meetings because a certain famous evangelist was coming to town. True revival, I believe, has nothing to do with schedules, programs or eloquent oratory from visiting preachers. No, it is a sovereign act of God that completely resists our desire to package and control. We cannot make it happen, and yet it does seem historically that God desires us to ask Him for it.
In speaking about his experience in the famous outpouring in the Hebrides Islands in Scotland during the early 1950’s, Duncan Campbell wrote:
“In speaking about the revival in the Hebrides, I would like to make it perfectly clear what I understand to be real revival. When I speak of revival, I am not thinking of high-pressure evangelism. I am not thinking of crusades or of special efforts convened and organized by people. That is not in my mind at all. Revival is far beyond evangelism at its highest level. It is a moving of God whereby the whole community suddenly becomes God-conscious before anyone says a word about God.”
Perhaps you know the story of what happened on the Isle of Lewis in the Scottish Outer Hebrides. Two elderly sisters began to fervently pray because there were no young people attending church. Peggy Smith was 84 and completely blind. Christine, her younger sister by two years, could hardly walk and was severely bent over with arthritis. God had given them a simple promise from Scripture: I will pour water on him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground (Isa. 44:3, KJV). Here is an account of what happened:
“With a deep burden in their hearts, they began praying. Twice a week for many months, they went down on feeble knees at 10:00 at night and did not rise until 3 or 4:00 in the morning. In the midst of their prayers, God gave them a vision of a man they had never met, a man who would be used by God to change the island. The man’s name was Duncan Campbell. During his time on the Island, revival broke out and hundreds of people came to know Christ. On the first day of the revival, 122 young people were saved.
“People were inexplicably drawn to Christ. Without publicity, telephones, or Internet, they were awakened in the middle of the night and drawn to gather in a farmer’s field or at a local parish church. Sometimes they did not make it – and instead simply fell by the side of the road confessing their sins to God.”
Evan Roberts, who was mightily used in the Welsh revival almost 50 years earlier, recounted his own experience in praying for revival:
“Through all weather, and in spite of all difficulties, I went to the prayer meetings. Many times, on seeing other boys with the boats on the tide, I was tempted to turn back and join them. But, no. Then I said to myself: ‘Remember your resolve to be faithful,’ and on I went. Prayer meeting Monday evening at the chapel; prayer meeting Tuesday evening at Pisgah (Sunday School branch); Church meeting Wednesday evening; Band of Hope Thursday; class Friday evening – to these I went faithfully throughout the years. For ten or eleven years I have prayed for a revival. I could sit up all night to read or talk about revivals. It was the Spirit that moved me to think about a revival.”
In 1904, Wales saw more than 100,000 people come to know Christ in under six months in a revival characterised by prayer, praise, joy, victory and the re-discovery of the Holy Spirit. The East African revival in 1929 began with two men praying together for two days in Uganda. The effects of that revival are still felt powerfully today in the African Church.
Do you see it, dear St. Georges? Are we having trouble getting young people into our churches? Are our prayer meetings growing in attendance or is it just the usual few? Is there a real spiritual impact being made on our communities and neighbourhoods or is the Gospel being “safely confined” within the four walls of churches? Are we satisfied with our current level of revival experience?
I am fully aware that the question that I am asking risks the danger of us falling into two potential snares. The one is the rationale that says, “If God is totally sovereign, he is going to do it, whatever and whenever he pleases, and it doesn’t matter whether we pray or not”. The other says, “If we would just fast long enough, pray long enough, repent long enough (although no one seems to know exactly how long ‘long enough’ is), then God HAS to do what he has promised!” To my mind, the first snare is irresponsibly fatalistic, ignoring the numerous scriptural exhortations that we should “pray without ceasing” and “let our requests be known to God.” The other snare is an attempt to put God in a box, to control him, to make a formula out of prayer such that if we do all the right things then God is compelled to comply with our requests.
And yet . . . Jesus told the story of the persistent widow in Luke 18 precisely so that they would see “that they ought always to pray and not lose heart.” But at some level, we have lost heart when it comes to praying and believing for revival, haven’t we.
During this Lenten season, I have come to see three things more clearly:
- A supernatural outpouring of the Spirit upon our church and nation that brings about life-altering repentance is the only thing that can make any lasting change.
- We do not need to wonder whether this is the will of God or not. It is always his will that humanity would turn to him in humility and repentance.
- There is no formula whereby we can make God do this, but he does want us to share his burden for the lost, and cry out to him on their behalf. What his response looks like, and when it happens, we must leave with him. But we must not grow weary in the asking!
St.Georges, will you join me in a renewed commitment to seek the Lord’s face for revival? Will you look to find even two or three others who agree in the Spirit and together begin to ask the Lord for an outpouring such as has not been seen in generations in our land?
Please let me know your reaction to what I have written. If it has touched your heart such as to create a response of action, please let me know what that is, too. Would the Lord create a small army of ANiC intercessors who would commit to asking our loving Father for the gift of revival?
O Lord, may it be so! Amen!
Garth V. Hunt+
