Good morning to you! What a wonderful time again last night in the presence of the Lord! Although it was different than Sunday, it is always wonderful (no matter the style or whose ministering) when God is in the house!!!...and that's what revival is ultimately about...God meeting and tabernacling with His people! He is faithful to inhabit the praises of His people just as he promised He would.
Revival takes place in our lives when we come in contact with God himself. Revival is not an end in itself but just the beginning of something that God wants to do...the meeting itself is not the end but a means to an end! Here's a definition I would like for you to ponder taken from a book I am reading called The Ten Greatest Revivals Since Pentecost by Elmer Towns.
"An evangelical revival is an extraordinary work of God in which Christians repent of their sins as they become intensely aware of HIS presence in their midst, and they manifest a positive response to God in renewed obedience to the known will of God, resulting in both a deepening of their individual and corporate experience with God, and an increased concern to win others for Christ."
So, you see this definition of revival is a little different from what we think of when we talk about revival. The above definition is based on the study of many of the major world revivals that have taken place on the earth from Pentecost to the present. If you want to know what real revival looks like, study the book of Acts and what took place prior to, during, and following Pentecost and then you will begin to see what revival really looks like. I can assure you revival has little to do with a series of meetings and guest speakers (as good as that is). Revival happens when we get a hold of God and God gets a hold of us! The early Christians came together in one accord (unity, love, and fellowship) and they prayed and sought the face of God...and they waited upon the Lord as they drew near...until it happened!
So let me encourage you to not seek a move from God -- don't put God in a box! Simply seek God for Himself as the 120 did in the upper room and all the others throughout history have done who have experienced genuine revival! If you seek a move or try to put God in your little box, you will miss it. If we seek for revival we risk making the "revival experience" an idol. Rather, we seek the God who is able to revive the souls of men.
As worshippers and seekers we need to be continually reminded that the end of worship is God himself, and when we experience God for ourselves we can't help but be REVIVED for in His presence we experience fullness of joy and pleasures at his right hand forevermore!! So let's come ready tonight to magnify, glorify, and offer worship pleasing to GOD himself. HE is our goal...not good music...not excellence...not an outpouring...not a specific kind of move of God...not the people's approval...SIMPLY God Himself! Do we need any other motivation? If we make it our goal to be preoccupied with God alone, all the pressure, apprehension, nervousness, or whatever is swallowed up and melts away in the warmth of His loving presence. Remember, God is love and He is your Heavenly Father....you don't have to perform for Him who already accepts you...just worship and adore Him and experience His joy and favor over you as his child!
Let's come ready to once again draw near into the Holy of Holies. We are invited to come boldly before the throne of God. As you worship Him tonight, see yourself coming before His throne. This holy place is the place of glory that worship theologians call the glory realm of His presence...it is found past the gates of praise into the Holy Place. This is the place of divine encounter with God where our lives are changed. We've already experienced this in this revival...but our hearts cry out for more...more...more of You, O God!!!
The glory realm is the place where we stop talking and begin worshipping and listening to what He is saying to us because what He has to say to us and about us is much more important than anything we have to say to Him. This is the place where we stop singing our song and God begins to sing His song over us. One of the greatest promises and one of the most fantastic invitations given to us in the Bible is when God invites his children to come close to Him. He then promises to draw near to them whose hearts follow closely after Him. (Note: Make sure you are drawing near to Him in your worship!) Make Jesus the end of your worship...not right music or the emotion of the song. God forbid! When we break through the "external trappings of worship" into this realm of experience with God...we experience the glory and power of God in new and fresh ways! So, come as His child who is loved, accepted, and highly favored. Come ready tonight to sing in the presence of the King and turn your eyes upon Jesus looking fully into His wonderful face and I know...the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace. Hallelujah and Amen.
Glory to His Name!
Chad Stafford
Worship Arts Pastor
South Metro Ministries
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