A church in Virginia Beach held a 10-hour consecration service on Sunday, during which attendees prayed for "a transformational revival" across the world.
A church in Virginia Beach held a 10-hour consecration service on Sunday, during which attendees prayed for "a transformational revival" across the world.
Instead of looking at the world around us and lamenting at how lost they seem to be, what if we shifted our focus instead to asking God how we can best bless the lives of those around us?
We hold religiously to the written Word because it is our guide—to test what is being said: “The spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets” (1 Corinthians 14:32). The speaker should be careful since his words must be under, or subject to, God’s Word. If those who look to the Word are accused of quenching and grieving the Spirit, we are reminded that Jesus used the Word of God for finality, discernment, and power. We must do the same.
Why would we fear encountering God in powerful and profound ways? To be stoic and stiff is fine for a graveyard but not for a dynamic worship service. I wonder if those who criticize charismatic moves of the spirit would be embarrassed if they were in the upper room when the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples in Acts 2?
Let me be brutally honest: many who show contempt for profoundly deep and moving experiences with God have never experienced them for themselves. If they avoid prayer meetings, complain about extended and emotional worship, never miss a meal for God, are unaffected by the depravity around them, and are too mature to go to the altar, are these people truly filled with God’s Spirit?
If you avoid emotional worship, extended prayer, times at the altar, and fasting for spiritual renewal, then you are not running on all eight spiritual cylinders. All these things are marks of Christians throughout the ages.
According to the Scriptures, there are five spiritual principles that often spark a spiritual awakening and keep it going. Prayer and fasting ignite the fire, but the following scriptural truths fan the flames:
Do we really believe that all the evil in this world will simply reverse itself? No, it's only going to get worse unless God's people pull down heaven. It's time to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted. We must cry out, "Oh God, would you rip heaven open and come down?" We must wait on God and seek Him like never before because He "acts for the one who waits for Him" (Isaiah 64:4).
Don't let feelings of unworthiness keep you from surrendering and submitting your life to Jesus. Paraphrasing C.H. Spurgeon, "When Satan tells me I am unworthy, I remind Him that I've always been unworthy, and yet, God still loves me."
Yesterday was Pentecost. Held fifty days after Easter each year, the Sunday marks the day God's Spirit-filled people in Jerusalem, igniting the mightiest spiritual movement the world has ever seen (Acts 2). If we will do what the first Christians did, we will experience what they experienced.
