What is Christian revival?
Revival is a word people attach to crowded meetings and stirring preachers, but the writers in this collection consistently look for it somewhere quieter — in the state of God's own people. Their question is not "how do we get a revival going?" but "what does God actually do when He revives, and what does He look for first?"
Reviving What Already Lives
Revival works on life that is already there. One writer draws the line sharply between reviving the church and rebuilding it:
J Wilson SmithThat saints who already possess life may receive fresh energy, so that they detach themselves from ways and habits and associations unworthy of Christ, and, under the influence of the Word and Spirit of God, gain further light and a clearer understanding of the mind of the Lord, with conduct to match — this is easily understood. This is true revival; but not reconstruction. Such revival draws hearts and souls together in the name of the Lord, and, in true testimony to Him, as a mere construction or reconstruction never could.
It Starts With the Saints
If revival is renewed life in believers, then that is also where it begins — not with the crowd outside:
A J PollockThere is a great cry in these last days for revival. I am certain of this: revival begins not among the sinners, but among the saints, and when we rise up out of worldliness and earthly mindedness, and we get Christ before us and live with a single eye for His glory, then the revival will come.
The Word Recovered
Josiah's reformation began when a lost book of the law was found in the temple and read aloud. One writer draws the lesson for any age:
Norman AndersonThe moral of this great revival was that it flowed from the reading and application of the Word of God. What is needed before revival in any day is a whole-hearted acceptance of that Word, shown by unqualified obedience to it. We can only affect others to the degree that we ourselves are recovered to God. The measure of our obedience to the Word of God will be the measure of our moral power with others.
Grace Rediscovered, Not Resolutions Made
What gets rediscovered matters. Looking at Israel's renewed promises under Nehemiah, one writer notes that the church's revivals have run in the opposite direction:
F. B. HoleThere have been moments of revival in the history of the church, graciously granted by God, but what has marked them has been some fresh recovery — not of what we ought to do for God, but of what He has done for us. Some fresh understanding and realisation of the fullness of the grace into which we have been brought by the gospel, and of the place of favour and heavenly relationship which is the church's portion.
Its Sound Is Confession, Not Celebration
That leads to an unexpected test for whether a movement is of God — its volume:
Hamilton SmithWell for God's people if every gracious revival among them were made an occasion for confession and mourning, remembering that there will be no full and final deliverance until Christ comes. In every true revival the people of God, if led by the Spirit, will be marked by prayer and confession rather than by shouting and celebration. The more noise and display, the less there is of God in any movement among His people.
Earnestness Is Not Excitement
Several writers warn that the machinery of stirred feelings can imitate the real thing:
C. H. MackintoshWhat I understand by excitement is the working up of mere nature, and the putting forth of efforts of nature designed to work on the natural feelings — all high pressure, all merely sensational. This is worthless. It does not last. And more than that, it produces weakness. We never find anything of this in the ministry of our blessed Lord or His apostles — and yet what earnestness!
The same writer refuses to let that warning become an excuse for doing nothing:
C. H. MackintoshIt is perfectly true that "God is sovereign," and this is the very reason why we should wait on Him; perfectly true that "human effort is in vain," and that is the very reason for seeking divine power; perfectly true that "we cannot get up a revival," and that is the very reason for seeking to get it down.
What Revival Will Not Do
Commentators are careful about how much to expect. A refreshing is real, but it is not a return to the beginning:
The Bible TreasuryIt is important to remember that Scripture never assumes a recovery; at any rate, it never anticipates a restoration to the original order and power. There is always a resource for the faithful ones... Christ never fails His own in the very darkest day, but He does not put back in its ancient place the thing that has failed. Those who see the ruin — while owning, as Daniel did, their own share in it — work according to the existing condition of things, and so suffer that much less disappointment.
Summary
- Life, not rebuilding. Revival is fresh energy given to saints who already have life — it is never the reconstruction of a fallen system.
- Inward, then outward. It begins among believers, not sinners; when Christ has the single eye of His people, blessing reaches others.
- Word, then obedience. It flows from Scripture read and applied, and your influence on others matches your own obedience to it.
- Grace, not resolve. Real revivals recover what God has done for us, not fresh promises of what we will do for Him.
- Quiet, not clamour. Its marks are prayer and confession; noise and worked-up feeling are the signs that God is less in it, and no reviving restores the original order — that waits for Christ.