Revival

Sermon  •  Submitted
0 ratings
· 8 views
Notes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
View more →

Revival

August 13, 2006

Luke 24:36-43

Is there anyone here who doesn’t want to experience revival here in Millet, in Alberta, in Canada, and/or worldwide? If any of you don’t want to experience revival, please put up your hands.

OK, so am I safe in presuming that we all want revival? We want it, but do we even know what it is? Do we know what price we each have o pay in order to see it come? I hope this message will give you some clear answers to these difficult questions.

Revival is nothing more nor nothing less than the return of the life and the presence of God, or the establishing of a fresh, personal relationship to God. When God thoroughly touches a life, the full measure of the life of the Lord becomes ours. You may have a desire in your heart for a fresh touch of God. For some reason, however, you have allowed your circumstances to change your relationship to God. He hasn’t changed, but you need His life to become your life one more time.

As I was thinking about our time together this morning, I thought back to the first great revival in the New Testament: Pentecost. Pentecost was the conclusion; what preceded it? Pentecost came after the disciples did what Jesus told them to do. In other words, revival came after the disciples were obedient to what Christ had taught them! We now to see from God’s perspective how He prepared for that moment of revival. What did He do in the lives of the disciples? How did He prepare them? Revival waits on the preparation of God’s people in their relationship with God. I see that all through history but especially as I look at the New Testament.

There was a process that Jesus took the disciples through until they came to the point of total release of their lives to His right to be Lord. They had a long way to go from the first time He called them up until Pentecost. First, God seemed to prepare the disciples, and then they obeyed, and them came the outpouring of His power at Pentecost, followed by the preaching which brought about thousands of professions of faith. But first it had to take hold of the disciples.

The end of the book of Luke, chapter 24, contains some very special instructions from our Lord that had to be in place before Pentecost came about. As we read, beginning with Luke 24:36, I want you to identify what things Jesus said are absolutely essential to be in the hearts and lives of the disciples so that He could pour out His Spirit upon them. This was not a minor moment.

Earlier in Luke 24, we read about two disciples walking on the road to Emmaus, following the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus made a full disclosure of His presence to the men, and He did it in an incredible way so that when it was over, they said, “Did not our hearts burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?”  Jesus deeply touched their hearts, but in a very simple way. He didn’t overwhelm them. There began to be a stirring in the hearts of the disciples in a way that God chose, and He let these men bear witness. The reality of the living Lord was so real they had to go and tell the rest. These two men came back to the other disciples who had come together, and the two bore witness to what they had encountered. God intended the two to stir the hearts of all the rest. God created us to be interdependent. He has not created us to be independent. Revival happens this way. God chooses whose heart He is going to touch.

When the two disciples began to bear witness to what they had experienced, the Lord appeared to all of them (please turn in your Bibles to Luke Chapter 24 and we’ll read verses 36 to 43) :” As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, "Peace to you!"
But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit.
And he said to them, "Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts?
See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have."
And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet.
And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, "Have you anything here to eat?"
They gave him a piece of broiled fish,
and he took it and ate before them. “

 

Isn’t that a beautiful picture? That is how God prepares for revival. Someone needs to bear witness to an encounter with the living Lord. Don’t get discouraged when you give a testimony and the hearers all get scared. God is preparing them, and He is taking them to the point where they release everything to His right to be Lord. When I am in meetings where people are praying for revival, I see some whose hearts are troubled and doubts appear. The Lord who walked into the midst of the disciples and began to prepare them for the moment of Pentecost, is doing the same things with us. It looks very ordinary, but God uses ordinary people.

Reading on in verses 44 through 49, : “Then he said to them, "These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled."
Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,
and said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead,
and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.
You are witnesses of these things.
And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high."  

How many years had Jesus been speaking to His disciples? About three and a half. Intimacy with Jesus is a pre-requisite for revival. You have to go through the process of the Father bring­ing you to be so intimate with the living Christ that you can say from your soul, "This is the Christ, the Son of the living God" and know that He has then com­mitted to you the keys to the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 16:16).

I am finding in my own life that by the time I come to a great moment when God releases His presence and lets me be there, I can look back and say, "What I am hearing and experiencing is what He already told me. I just didn't pay atten­tion when He did." It is critically impor­tant that you listen to what Jesus says to the disciples. The disciples were in the middle of things that Jesus had already told them about.

Did the Old Testament Scriptures thor­oughly and completely describe the com­ing, the life, the death, and the resurrec­tion of Jesus? Did they give a clear pic­ture? Incredibly clear. Did the disciples all get it? Not at all! How could they have missed it? They were not living in the light of the clear Scriptures, so He had to open their understanding to all the Scriptures, because this was the prereq­uisite. The full Scriptures also spoke about Pentecost and about everything that was about to happen.

We are in the middle of another situa­tion. The Scriptures have clearly, unmis­takably shown us about the return of Jesus. The average person is no more attentive to what the Scripture is saying about the signs of His coming again than they were about the signs of His first com­ing. But make no mistake about it. The same Lord has given us all the evidence we need to prepare for His final return. But how many of us are living in the light of those Scriptures? How many of us are searching the Scriptures to know the signs of the times in which we live?

It has been a passion in my heart to say, "Lord, these men and others missed the first coming of Christ, but it wasn't because they didn't have the Scriptures, and it wasn't because they couldn't have known. And Lord, what about us?" Would it not be an utter tragedy for our Lord to say, "I told you all of these things. Why are you behaving the way you are? Why aren't you living out what the same Scriptures are saying to you?"

(REPEAT)

And it is the same when it comes to revival. Our Lord could say, "I told you about the conditions. Why are you just crying for revival and ignoring all of the conditions that I laid out for you?" It's not that we don't know; it's that we are not paying attention. We don't want to go through the process. We want the ex­citement of revival, but we don't want the prerequisites. But if we are going to be the ones upon whom He pours out His Spirit, we had better understand what the prerequisites are.

The first prerequisite is an intimate relationship with the Lord. The disciples spent three years in intimate relationship with our Lord. Some church members don't respond correctly to Christ because they were not introduced to Him in the way they ought to have been. We have a huge dysfunction at the point of evangelism. Jesus came to Peter and the others, each in a unique way, and He basically said, "Why don't you leave everything and follow Me?" I believe that is the essence of salvation. We have to leave the old life and become immersed in the person of Jesus Christ. You shouldn't have to persuade anyone to surrender to the Lordship of Christ after they have made a pro­fession of faith. I believe the surrender – the release of your life to Christ's right to be Lord – is what it means to be saved, because the essence of lostness is the refusal to acknowledge that He has the right to be Lord. The essence of salvation is the release of your life totally to Jesus Christ as Lord. We are leading people to believe that they may be saved simply because they made a profession of faith. The question is not, "Did you accept Jesus?" but "Did He accept you?" At the moment of judgment, some are going to say, "Lord, didn't we do all of these things in Your name?" And He is going to say, "Depart from Me. I never knew you" (Matt. 7:22-23). The key is not whether you can say you know Him; the key is whether He can say He knows you. That means He must have a response from you that releases everything in you to Him.

Then there began the disciples' pil­grimage with Jesus, and the moment of the outpouring of Pentecost followed that journey of three and a half years. During that pilgrimage, the Father was convinc­ing the disciples of who Jesus is. Keep in mind that the ones that Jesus poured out the Spirit upon were those totally com­mitted and released to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. We are asking God to bring revival to churches where most of the members have never heard about that. He can't trust a first rate kind of revival to those who have not responded to Him as Lord.

Luke says, "Now it happened that as he was praying alone, the disciples were with him. And he asked them, "Who do the crowds say that I am?"
And they answered, "John the Baptist. But others say, Elijah, and others, that one of the prophets of old has risen."
Then he said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" And Peter answered, "The Christ of God."
And he strictly charged and commanded them to tell this to no one,
saying, "The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised."
(9:18-22).

I believe the Father was saying something like this: "Son, I have convinced these men that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. Now you can move on to the cross because I have done a work in their hearts. And beyond the cross is Pentecost. I have convinced them that You are the Christ."

In Matthew's account (16:13-21), we read that immediately following Peter's profession, Jesus shared that He would build His Church on this rock. He had just acknowledged to them that flesh and blood had not revealed that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. He said that this revelation was given to them by the Father. I believe He was saying something like this: "On the basis of My Father's activity in the heart of His own, convincing them that I am the Christ, the Son of the living God — on that kind of people, I will build My Church."

Do you know what will happen when He builds His Church on those who be­lieve that He is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and who because of that have released everything to Him? The gates of hell will not prevail against it. There are a lot of people in our churches that have not been convinced. They have not been responding because the gates of hell are prevailing all around us. Jesus went on to say, "I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven." He entrusts the keys of the kingdom to His Church!

Everything was not yet in place. Some things still had to happen before the out-pouring of the Spirit upon the disciples' lives. As Jesus made His way toward the cross, the disciples were bewildered. Jesus took them through Gethsemane with Him. There He said, "Then he said to them, "My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me."

 (Matt. 26:38). The whole essence of His being was standing on the edge of death. He was broken. His soul was full of ut­ter, total sorrow, for He thought He would die, and maybe at that point where He could have, the Father sent the angel to minister to Him. Then Jesus took the disciples through the cross and to the resur­rection.

The greatest revival, Pentecost, had to have these prerequisites. I believe often the reason revival tarries is we have none of these prerequisites in place!

Following the resurrection, Jesus opened the Scriptures to His disciples (Luke 24:45). He literally touched their minds and hearts and put in place all of the Scriptures that were required for them to be able to handle what was going to happen next. Those Scriptures became the guideline for what God was about to do. He said, "it was necessary" — all they had been going through was already laid out and had to take place. Then He made this tremendous statement. He said, in my own words, "Of all the people on the face of the earth, you are witnesses of these things." Preceding Pentecost came that witness from the Father.

"You are witnesses of these things." Could you describe your life that way right now? You and I are praying for revival. Are these prerequisites in place in our lives? Do we have sufficient rela­tionship to the living Christ and -to the Scriptures that we have a passionate, ur­gent, immediate witness to these things? Are we in continued obedience until God chooses to pour out His Spirit?

After Jesus had said that they were witnesses to all of these things, He said, "I send the Promise of My Father upon you" — in other words, "I am now going to pour out My Spirit. I am going to ask My Father to release the same Holy Spirit that was upon Me to be upon you" And then comes that prerequisite to all revival: He said, "but tarry" (v. 49). They tarried in prayer together in one place until God chose to release His Spirit on the whole group. He did not release His Spirit indi­vidually, although every individual exper­ienced the fullness of the Spirit.

God has a covenant people. When Jesus sat at the Lord's Supper, He said in effect: "I am introducing you to a com­pletely new covenant. You are a covenant people. I called you to be a kingdom of priests, a holy nation, a people belonging to Me." God chose to pour out His Spirit corporately as the people gathered to­gether in one place in prayer waiting for God to do whatever He chose to do. They had no reference point to Pentecost. But they did have a reference to the Scrip­tures. And they did have a reference to being together in one place.

We have lost the corporate life of the people of God, and we have become so self-centered that we want everything to happen to us individually. God could come specifically to individuals. But when God is about to bring revival, it comes on the corporate gathering of the people of God. Many pastors do not have any time in their life where they are pray­ing with other pastors or praying with others on a regular basis. We want to casually and carelessly cry out for revival once in a while, hoping that God hears us, and that seems to satisfy. But when you go to the prerequisites that precede revival, there comes a moment where you, along with others, release everything in your life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and you stand together, you pray together, and you wait together and you ask God to pour out His presence among you and to fill your lives with His presence, even the Holy Spirit.

Before the Canadian revival, the first thing that happened was for other pastors to come alongside Pastor Bill McLeod and several other leaders. They made a covenant that they would pray together every week, and they did. How long did Jesus ask the disciples to pray?

 
”And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high." (Luke 24:49). Wait on the Lord until He chooses to pour out His presence upon you.

Bill had been praying that long before the others joined him. They then prayed together for a year and a half. As Bill said later, what a glorious time it was! He still remembers calling others with excite­ment in his heart and saying, "That for which we have been praying hap­pened on Sunday!" And that set in mo­tion the moving from Ebenezer Baptist to St. Timothy's Anglican to University Drive Alliance and then to Third Avenue United. God chose to pour out His pres­ence upon us.

Looking back upon that, we see that in addition to their praying, there was a good foundation of Scripture. Bill McLeod, greatly used of God in the revival, has a good grasp of Scripture. It is very simi­lar to what we read in Luke 24:45: “Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,” Then Jesus said, "You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high." (vv. 48-49).

Did God know when He was going to bring that moment of Pentecost? Did He know how long it was going to be? He certainly did. Acts 2:1 tells us, "When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place." Somehow the entire group had released themselves totally to Jesus Christ as Lord. They were now simply doing what He asked. They were ready to be witnesses. Was Peter ready? Listen to him in Acts 2:14-39. In that sermon he was bearing witness to the Scriptures. Where did he get the understanding of those Scriptures? Jesus had given it to him. I believe Peter took everything that Jesus had opened to his understanding and just poured it out. And the sharing of the Scriptures that had been poured into him, now being touched by the power of the Spirit of God, began to turn lives upside down.

Can you say without a question of a doubt that you have released everything in you totally to Jesus Christ as Lord? Have you released everything in your life, in your marriage, in your church? Have you ever met Him sufficiently to be able to say by the heavenly Father's activity in your heart, “Jesus is the Christ; He is God’s only provision as Savior for a whole world”?

Jesus Christ is indeed the Son of God and He has a right to receive from you the only kind of response that is worthy of Him, and that is, “Lord Jesus, I release everything in me to everything in You.” That is an absolute prerequisite to whatever God does next. Do you want to see a complete change in how God uses you? Do you want to see the outpouring of the Spirit of God in your church or in your home? Out of your response to Him, with what you have seen God do in your heart, have you heard Him say, “You are now witnesses of these things, but you still lack something. You need to take time with my people until I pour out my Spirit upon you.

What happened when the Spirit of God immediately came upon the disciples? They were ready. His Lordship was undisputed. The moment that He released His Spirit upon the disciples they began to preach the Good News. What happened then? Thousands began to come under the impact of disciples who were now filled with God's Spirit. Revival is what God does to His people. Once God  has His people where He had these disciples – when the Spirit of God is so real and personal and powerful – when they is speak, people are saved. You can see the multitudes beginning to be stirred by the presence of God in the life of His people.

Henry Blackaby was pasturing in Saskatoon at the time of this revival. He says now, “As I look back over those ten years that followed revival in Saskatoon, I am thrilled that not only was I there praying        before, and not only did I have the privi­lege of going through those times, but I was around for ten years after that to see  what God was going to do next. It was like Pentecost! Once we were in the relationship with God, we then had the thrill  of proceeding to share the Good News. The first place I went, the town drunk got saved and that turned the little town around. Every place we went, people were saved and would cry out for a church.

Later people asked, "Henry, how large do you have to be before you can start a mission church?" I said, "You are asking the wrong question. The question you ought to ask is, how large do you have to be as a church to be obedient?" The key is obedience – not size, not funding, not personnel – it's obedience. Those disciples who had been with Jesus for three and a half years had been through the essence of God's plan to redeem; they had upon been obedient to wait until the outpouring of the Spirit of God had come upon all them. Then that little group began to see God bring thousands of people to faith in be Christ. By the end of the fourth chapter of Acts that early church in Jerusalem may have had 25,000 members. How could that ever happen?”

Those of us who are praying for revival should keep in mind that God has a pattern. He says there are some prerequisites that need to be in place. You need to have a significant relationship with the living Christ You have to walk with Him significantly enough until God has convinced you that He is the Christ the Son of the living God. Then you have to let Him help you understand that you have to learn how to deny self and pick up a real cross and follow Him. That will take you through a Gethsemane experience. That will take you through Galatians 2:20: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”   And read the first phrase of the next verse: "I do not nullify the grace of God." I don't receive all of this and then set it aside and try to do the work of God in my own strength.

Revival is a moment when God has prepared you concerning Jesus, and you have released everything in your life to His right to be Lord, and He has begun to entrust you to be a witness unto Him. Then He says, "Now get with the rest of My people, and pray, and be together in one place with one heart and one mind until I pour out My Spirit upon you."

Would to God that there would be a great number of us who will be waiting before God with His people until He pours out His Spirit. I don't believe God is going to disappoint us. You need to understand that all God's preparation is for global redemption. It's going to take you to the ends of the earth. It's going to take you discipling the people of God, leading them to the same kind of encoun­ter.

There are some of you who have con­ditions in your own personal life that are there because you have not yet surren­dered every ounce of your being to Jesus Christ as Lord. But God has begun to draw you to Himself. He's trying to get us ready. Where are you in that process? Are you at a point in your life where you need to say, "The Father is convincing me that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and that being so, I now know how to release all my life to Him in my ministry, in my family, and in my church" You may be ready to pray, "Father, with all of my heart I want You to know I am releasing everything there is in me to Jesus Christ's right to be Lord in my life, and I know where it may lead. The Scrip­tures are going to open. You're going to confirm that I am a witness of all of these things in my life, and I will wait with Your people until You pour out of Your Spirit upon me and upon Your people." Or you may have to say, "Father, I don't know all that I need to do, but I know I don't want to stay where I've been. I want to be different, and so I come to You and ask You to do a work in me to change my life."

The first sample of revival had prereq­uisites to it. Are they in place in your heart? As a couple, are they in place in your home? As a couple, are you ready to take one another's hand, and one of you pray, "Oh, Lord, we yield uncondi­tionally our home to You. You have the right to be Lord. There is something You are about to do, and we yield our home to you."

The outpouring of His presence comes after He touches us and we obey Him. The Lord was taking His disciples to a whole new relationship with Himself. It began with His Lordship, and the release of their lives to Him, and He took them to a whole new level of relationship. That is what revival is. It is a whole new level of relationship with your Lord. Little did those disciples know that when they re-leased their lives to the Lordship of Christ that it was going to take them from one level to another until they were ready to receive an outpouring of God's Spirit. And the world would feel the impact of the revived people of God.



 

 



 

Related Media
See more
Related Sermons
See more