Satan is the Father of lies (John 8:44) and as the prince of this world, he rules a world of lies.  The lies fool most of the people almost all of the time.  It’s worse than ever.

Someone hacked the emails of the Democrat National Committee (DNC), gave them to Wikileaks, who dropped them on the first day of the Democrat National Convention.  The emails revealed at least a DNC conspiracy against Bernie Sanders, rigging the primary against him, and then collusion of the mainstream media with the Democrat Party.  Anyone who cared already knew the reality of both the conspiracy and the collusion — facts however denied by the type of people who wrote the emails.  To start, Democrats already lie about the conspiracy and collusion like much of everything else they lie about, so they got caught, right?

As soon as Wikileaks published the emails, the spin from Clinton campaign manager, Robby Mook, was that the Russians hacked and then leaked the emails because they want Trump to win, another lie.  When asked how he knew this, Mook said “experts” were saying that.  He was just repeating the experts.  When asked who those experts were, he gave no answer.  More lies.  The media colluded with the Clintons by continuing the story of a Russian conspiracy.  This is has been the talking point in the media since then, turning the story from a DNC conspiracy and collusion to the Russians messing with a U.S. election [the latest:  Trump jokes about Russia finding Hillary’s 30,000 emails, and CNN reports that Trump is encouraging Russia to hack Hillary Clinton — speaking of a clown car].

Julian Assange laughed at the Russian conspiracy theory.  He said that the DNC has admitted they’ve been hacked many times.  No one needed the Russians for that.  As an aside, why would anyone think now that Hillary Clinton’s personal server wasn’t hacked if the DNC had been hacked?  Wikileaks published the emails, not Russia. The leaker himself, Julian Assange, professes the leak.  Everyone know he’s the leak.  Nothing is more patently obvious than Wikileaks leaking.  Professional leakers at Wikileaks leaked.  The DNC says it’s the Russians and they keep repeating this lie.  They know their audience — extremely gullible.

I had never ever listened to one Bernie Sanders speech, not even a small percentage of one.  On Monday night, I listened to about half of Elizabeth Warren’s speech and then half of Bernie’s.  Warren wrote a speech that anticipated a supportive crowd and without that, it was painful.  She herself is painful to watch.  I had never heard a speech from her, and I really don’t get her popularity.  I do know she herself lied at least half a dozen times in the short time I watched her.  She lies with tremendous ease.   Incidentally, she looks nothing like an American Indian, one of her claims, another lie.  I started watching Bernie’s speech because after watching part of Warren’s, I was wondering how or if he could bring the convention back from a dangerous precipice.

As rigged as the election has been against Bernie Sanders, his entire worldview is an elaborate lie. What he spews forth could never work.  Like Margaret Thatcher famously said, ‘he would soon run out of other people’s money.’  Sanders is a liar of the Henry Hill variety, who is selling everyone on a boys band, yet he doesn’t know a lick of music.  He offers everyone about everything they would ever want with no possible way of accomplishing it.  He did it again in his speech and said that Hillary is the best possibility left to redistribute all the free handouts.

In the midst of his speech, Sanders said that Hillary Clinton believes the scientists on climate change. No one needs a scientist to observe climate change.  Climate changes.  However, the scientists she believes, as is so often the case, start with a false presupposition and then rig the “evidence” to bolster that presupposition, actually sounding very much like the nomination of Hillary Clinton.  Most of what every speaker says to promote her is lying.

Most churches in the world play the same type of charade that the DNC is doing at its convention. Bernie Sanders in his speech touted Clinton as a champion of diversity.  The DNC divides Americans with identity politics and calls it diversity.  Most churches pander to members and constituents by accepting diversity in belief and practice.  Come how you are.  Worship how you feel.  Almost everything is tolerated.

What’s wrong with the United States?   The gospel must be freely offered, attempted to be preached, to everyone.  The gospel is the solution.  It must be the gospel though.  The gospel isn’t being preached much.  Believers are often ashamed of the gospel, the actual gospel.  I’m not saying they aren’t ashamed of their successful church growth methods.  They love those.

After the obvious first explanation, the gospel, the problem, as I see it, is the inability to point out what’s wrong.  There is so much toleration of error, because men are uncertain about absolute truth. You can’t tell anyone they’re wrong today.  They don’t want to hear it.  They don’t think you should be saying it, because no one can really know for sure.  This is diversity, by the way.  You accept it.  It’s diverse.  We need diversity.  No, it’s wrong.  It’s sin.  It’s ungodly.  If people aren’t sure about the Bible, which they’re not, not sure they can know it or apply it, then no one can or should be judged.

The only acceptable truth is that everyone is accepted, everyone except the intolerant.  I think the North Carolina bathroom law is insufficient. However, look how serious professional basketball is about it.  They removed the NBA all star game from Charlotte because of the intolerance of transgender bathrooms in the state of North Carolina.

The message to police today is that you must tolerate certain behavior.  If you live in an urban area, like I do, and you get out every day, which I do, then you see bad behavior every day.  I could write a very thick book on it.  Anyone who lives in a place like I do, knows this.  If you say anything, you’re in trouble.  You’re the one in the wrong.  People are afraid to say or do anything, except for people with bad behavior.  The people with the bad behavior are more and more bold, because they feel less threatened than ever for behaving like they do.  This started with churches who won’t tell people that they’re wrong. It’s antithetical to church growth.  If the churches won’t stand, then no one should expect anyone to stand, especially the Democrat National Committee.

Three words came out of the Republican National Convention the most memorable and controversial: “Vote Your Conscience.”  I’m sure that I’ve never heard those three words used more.  I became curious to their usage and meaning.  At Google books, “vote your conscience” occurs 2,810 times. Before the year 2000, “vote your conscience” appears there 15 times.  That leaves 2,795 times the year 2000 up until today.  This phrase was not in popular usage until after 2000.  Why wasn’t it used before?  More than ever, people don’t understand the conscience.  When they did, they didn’t say “vote your conscience.”  In a day when the conscience means the least, it is used the most.

From Kent Brandenburg:  Our other pastor, Dave Sutton, and one other man who also teaches in our school, Bethel Christian Academy, traveled to Moscow, Idaho last week to attend the Annual Summer Training of the Logos School, the school founded by Douglas Wilson, whom some call the father of modern Christian classical education.  I asked Pastor Sutton if he wouldn’t mind giving a critique or review of the time there, because I thought it would be of interest to our readers.  By the way, although this is unusual for us, we don’t view attending a conference such as this to be scriptural fellowship.  We are not working or cooperating with Logos or Christ Church in church ministry.  Dave Sutton said there seemed to be about 200 in attendance.  There is a lot someone could get from what Wilson and the Logos School do there, but I asked Dave if he would especially focus on what he mainly saw was different from us.

By Pastor David Sutton

Last week I attended the teacher’s and administrator’s conference hosted by the Logos School in Moscow, Idaho.  I am sure most people who read this blog recognize the name Douglas Wilson, who was one of the founders of this school.  It is a classical Christian school.  I have read Wilson’s books on classical Christian education, and several years ago a friend invited me to spend several days observing the content and teaching methods of his Christian school, which is also classical in its approach

I have to admit that I am impressed with the thinking and reasoning skills of students who are classically trained.  So one of our teachers and I went to the conference to glean from what Logos does.  The conference was extremely organized; and the speakers were thoughtful, helpful, and obviously intelligent.  They do a lot well, and I learned things both educationally and administratively from them.

I went to the conference knowing that our church is very different from the beliefs and practices that Douglas Wilson and those around him have.  However, I do know they are thinking people, and I figured I would benefit from their insight into education.  At the same time, I wanted to get a better grasp on classical education, and identify what really makes it tick.  What I gleaned from my conversations with the school leadership is that worldview is essential.  I know how I look at the world and how a Christian is to think and what life is to be based on; so okay, let me see your worldview.  I’m ready.   Here’s my observation:

First, they spend more time quoting C.S. Lewis, Herodotus, or some other classical scholar than they do Jesus, Paul, or anybody else in Scripture.  I’m not saying that they used zero Scripture: they did use Scripture; but the Bible was not the focus of their system.  They use the Trivium model of instruction as outlined by Dorothy Sayers in her article The Lost Tools of Learning.  (The three stages of learning are the grammar stage, the logic stage, and the rhetoric stage.)  These stages correspond to the learning sequence of knowledge, understanding, and wisdom found in Proverbs 2:1-6 and 4:5-7.  Dorothy Sayers may have recognized through observation the sequence Solomon wrote of.  But if I am going to incorporate a style of pedagogy, I want to do it because the Bible says it, not because Dorothy Sayers says it.  At the conference, Sayers was mentioned more than Solomon.  What does this say about worldview?  The Bible takes a back seat to the experts.  This undermines the teaching that the Bible is our sole authority for faith and practice.

Second, when they did use Scripture, it was often with a glancing blow.  If they read a verse to make a point, they did not comment on the verse, did not drill down on it; they just moved on (the plenary sessions were better).  Logos School does a sterling job getting students to think logically and deeply and to speak persuasively.  But think about what? Speak about what?  Ultimately, isn’t our thinking to be based on the specifics of what Scripture says?  I mean chapter and verse, so that our students are settled on doctrine and practice.  Jesus said that we are to live by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.  If what I observed is the modus operandi  for a conference for academic leaders, what is happening day by day at Logos, and what are they promoting to the schools attending the conference?  To me it is a worldview that is very general in nature.  They say they want to influence society for Christ, but if we don’t teach our children carefully and thoroughly from the Scriptures, they will be drawn away, despite any logical and rhetorical skills (cf. Eph. 4:11-14).

Finally, their application of Christian worldview is inconsistent and pragmatic.  What I mean is this: they teach their students to identify virtuous character traits in a given piece of literature, because who can argue against such behavior.  Parents want this.  On the other hand, when it comes to the age of the earth, they do not take a position.  Why?  They can’t get away with taking a side.  The issue is too controversial, and they risk losing students.  They are not neutral on alcohol, though.  But that one, they can get away with (unfortunately).   Kind of reminds me of the time Jesus asked the religious leaders if John’s baptism was from heaven or of men.  After mulling over their quandary, they said, “We cannot tell” (Mt. 21:25-27).  They were plenty bold, when they thought they had the upper hand; but when an honest answer would hurt them, they went PC.   Not a very good worldview.

Again, Logos School does a lot of things well, and I am glad I picked some of those things up.  But their worldview is not as Bible-centered as they think.

What do churches and pastors do with members of other churches who come to them?  Our church has nothing to do with this subject right this moment, so this isn’t personal.  It is a regular issue all over the country and I think pastors should consider their policy, whether they are handling this occasion in a scriptural way.

I have never had a pastor call me about a former church member.  I’m telling you, I’ve been pastoring for thirty years, and I’ve never had another pastor call me about a church member who has left our church.  When I say “left our church,” I mean of all types of leaving, including church discipline.  On the other hand, I have called other pastors about members who have left their churches every single time — every time.  How could I pastor for thirty years and never have another pastor call me about someone who has left our church?  Hopefully that sounds really bad to you.  It’s true though.  What is with men who practice this way?  Do pastors and churches even care?

Other churches have taken in our disciplined members.  One lady who was a member of our church had committed adultery, so we disciplined her, she was unrepentant, so we removed her from our church.  She went to a local evangelical church, called a “Bible church.” She told them she was from our church.  They were fine with her being there.  She told them she had committed adultery and had been disciplined out, and that was fine too.

Our church disciplined a man from the church and he went to another independent Baptist church about thirty minutes away.  That church accepted him in.  Our church sent a letter to that church and offered them the opportunity to reconcile with us, because they had taken in a disciplined member. That was our attempt to remain in fellowship.  They rejected even having that meeting.

When people talk about unity and fellowship, very often they mean “putting up with false doctrine and bad behavior.”  If you are not willing to put up with false doctrine and bad behavior, you are causing disunity.  If you were to join a group of churches in a meeting, and there you saw your disciplined member, the right behavior is to keep your mouth shut and act like nothing happened. This is called fellowship.  The one who opens his mouth would be called divisive, a harm to unity. I’m not kidding.

Several years ago, the closest church in doctrine and practice in our area got a new pastor.  I called him and invited him to lunch, mainly to talk about this very subject.   We both agreed that if someone from his church came to ours, I would give him a call.  If someone came from our church to his, he would give us a call.  In the years following, we had one person come from his church to ours, and I called him.  We had three different people go their church and I never received a call, not one time.

Later I saw the pastor of the previous paragraph at an event and I asked him why he went ahead and took in our members without a call.  He said he didn’t think it would matter since our church separates over certain doctrine, so that we weren’t in fellowship anyway, so he didn’t think it mattered if he called or not.  I have found this typical of fundamentalism.

Even if two churches are not in fellowship, they should not allow members to hop from church to church without a call.  It’s possible that people have a good reason for leaving a church.  Perhaps they should be in your church.  You should still call the other church for many reasons.

One, a church deserves respect even if it isn’t doing right.  Two, churches shouldn’t allow people to run from unrepentant sin.  That’s about God — He should be respected.  Three, nothing tests fellowship like what churches do with members of another church.  If churches really are about fellowship or unity, they have to try to unify where it really counts, not in the sentimental fake unity. Four, pride is involved with the thinking that you can take someone and work them into your church, who has left another church.  Five, people need to be taught to deal with their problems correctly even if they should have left the other church.

No pastor or his church wants other pastors and churches believing lies about them.  When a person comes to your church from another church and says the former church stunk, that could be a lie. The former church deserves due process. We want due process, so we should give due process to others too. Believing whatever someone else tells you about another person is not a biblical or godly practice.  We should give someone else or another church an opportunity to defend themselves.  Even if we wouldn’t fellowship with that church, we don’t have the right to believe a lie about it.

I get what happens.  Your church member goes to another church.  That church sees a new member. You know, who doesn’t want a new member?  If you get a new member, your church gets bigger. Getting bigger is good, is the reasoning.  If you behave like you are going to call the former church and maybe believe that church, you may lose a new member.  Instead of risking the loss of a new member, you do not make the call.  I think that’s what happens.  This is a faithless lack of trusting God.  It’s many more other things, but faithlessness is a start.  It might be just be putting your head in the sand.  If you find out the bad news, then it means you are responsible for that bad news.  The truth is that you are still responsible because you wouldn’t even call to find out.

We had a man come to our church from an American Baptist Church.  Many of the American Baptists are liberal.  It’s the right thing to call and find out what’s up before someone can be considered for joining.  Why should an unscriptural church start having respect for scripture if the so-called scriptural church doesn’t have respect for scripture?  Scriptural churches should handle things scripturally.

I understand people’s desire for what I think they consider to be revival.  It’s convenient really.  First, you have a building or a tent, then people come to the building or tent, someone preaches, and multitudes of people actually get saved, truly converted.  There are lots of great things about that described scenario, even if it isn’t actually happening — the thought of it sounds great.  Many, many people came to hear preaching, for one.  They wanted to come to hear it.  Wow. Several of them believe it.  Who wouldn’t want that?  I would.  Is it even something that we should expect though?

If you told people, the Bible will be preached, you could hear it, find out who Jesus is, and then be saved from sin and Hell, and they said, I want that — that would be wonderful.  Let’s say it isn’t happening, even as I’ve noticed it isn’t.  However, let’s also say that it could be happening if we prayed for it to happen, so we started praying.  What do we pray?  How long do we pray?

It would seem that you would pray, “Father, cause people to come in great numbers to gather together to hear the preaching of the gospel.”  How long do you pray that?  How many do you need praying for that for it to work?  Let’s just say you prayed it every day several times and you got everyone praying it at least in your church several times a day.  Is there a basis for believing that you would get what you were praying for?  I’m talking just from two things, inviting people only on those terms with no hopes of anything else, and then praying that prayer.  Would you get that outcome?  If you were to get that, why not invite every single person in your entire region to come and then pray for every single person to come to that meeting, even by using the phone book to mention everyone by name? (Even though God knows everyone’s name, you would pray for everyone by name just to be sure God knows you mean every single person.)  Do we have a biblical basis for believing that would work?

“Revival,” when you look at the Hebrew and even Greek words of the Old and New Testaments, is about people who are dead then being made alive.  Speaking about spiritual revival, people must be spiritually dead, who are then made alive spiritually, that is, they are converted.  A revival, however, seems to be when this being made alive experience occurs with a lot of people.  If it were, let’s say, two or three, I’m thinking that isn’t revival.  I have no reason to think just two or three being saved is revival, but my opinion is that “revival” (if what people called revival was actually something real) is seeing a whole lot of people actually get saved — not just make professions, but for them to become new creatures in Christ, just because you wanted that a lot and a lot of people prayed for it a lot of time.  People, who didn’t even want the Bible or Jesus, suddenly now want both because they are overcome by some kind of supernatural coercion as a response to praying for this to occur.

I know in the history of mankind, there have been times where a relatively lot of people have been converted upon hearing gospel preaching.  We see some of these times in Acts.  One was on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2.  We see one of these times in the colonial period of the United States under the preaching of George Whitefield.  I accept that this has occurred.  The Acts event is not a normative event, because it was accompanied by actual signs and wonders, but many did believe.  However, compared to the number of people who did not believe, there were still far more who did not believe than who did believe.  It was still a major threat to be a Christian in Jerusalem as seen in the resulting persecution.  Then you can read in books about the Great Awakening and what happened there.  I think it did happen.

I can admire and appreciate and enjoy reading about the times when many, many people were saved in a very short period of time.  I’m glad for those occasions.  I’m very, very happy that Jesus did miracles that indicated He was the Messiah.  I don’t expect those signs today, but I’m happy He and the Apostles did them.   As for me, I can still be fulfilled without seeing a lot of people saved in a very short period of time. Would I like it to occur?  I would. However, I’m satisfied with preaching the gospel to as many people as possible and then seeing whoever wants to receive it, even if it is a small number.  I don’t believe that I’m a lesser person or even a less powerful person because I don’t see one of these times of multitudes being saved like Acts 2 or the Great Awakening.

Remember what the psalmist prayed in Psalm 85:6?  He was asking God if He would bring Israel back to life.  I believe the answer to that question was, “Yes.”  Paul wrote in Romans 11:26, “so all Israel shall be saved.”  Let’s say that we asked the same question in a prayer?  It’s not asking for revival, but we asked this question:  “Wilt thou not revive us again: that thy people may rejoice in thee?”  “Us” is the United States.  Answer:  I don’t know.  “Us” is El Sobrante where I live.  Answer:  I don’t know.

The best way to find out whether people are going to be made alive is by preaching the gospel to them.  Instead of praying for revival, we should obey the Great Commission.  Instead of praying for power, we should assume we have enough.  We should pray for boldness.  We should pray that God would send out laborers.  We should pray that we would have doors of opportunity open.  That would be to do our job.

It seems to me that men are less interested in doing their job, and more interested in some big event that God doesn’t promise.  Why do they want the big event?   I believe that what God said to Baruch in Jeremiah 45:5 is apropros here:  “And seekest thou great things for thyself? seek them not.”  Men are seeking great things for themselves.  They seek after signs.  They seek after great numbers of conversions.  They should obey and be content with the results.  If they did obey and were content with the results, we would not be in the mess we are in today.  We wouldn’t be.

The gospel is the power of God unto salvation, but people are actually ashamed of the gospel.  They preach something other than the gospel in order to attain “revival.”  They leave out unpopular features of the gospel to get results and then call it the gospel being preached.  It isn’t and it wasn’t.  The gospel is enough, but it is the part that is perverted.  The necessary part for the revivalists is the emotion and the tent and the excitement and the music and the hollering and the momentum. These are attributed to the Holy Spirit, even though they are just fleshly means.

Think about this “revival” in Burlington, NC.  They set up a tent.  Why a tent?  The “revivals” of Finney and the other 19th century revivalists were in tents.  What does a “tent” have to do with it?  It looks like what happened then.  It seems like one of the conditions.  The tent impersonates what happened then to align itself with what occurred with the thought that this was a necessary condition. It is parallel with the temples of Christendom, the ornate buildings that attracted men in the medieval period.

The hoe-down music and the physical incantations and shouting and emotionalism, what is stirred up by fleshly means, is not the Holy Spirit.  The preacher is not so much interested in exposition of scripture, depending on its authority, as he is putting on a show.  Part of preaching, it seems, is jumping up on one leg with the other lifted high in the air, and shouting into a portable microphone. Actually, it’s a similar activity as giving an inspirational speech at a pep rally in order to “fire everyone up.”  One of the ways you act like you’ve got the Holy Spirit is lifting up your hands or your Bible, staring skyward with a glassy gaze, or shouting.  The entire purpose of setting a date, picking a place with a lot of seating, packing a crowd in through promotion, and then manipulating an event has no scriptural parallel.

Anybody who is in his right mind should think that this stuff they are witnessing is crazy.   The point is not to be in your right mind though.  The entire production is to disengage from the mind and allow yourself to be manipulated.  The emphasis is on the experience you’ll have, which is caused to make you feel the Holy Spirit is doing something.

The Burlington, NC meeting postponed for a week so that the speaker could move to a Carolina Youth Camp.  The revival moves to camp and then back to the tent the next week.  At the end of the session, the number of results are declared with the names of the decision makers, for instance with such-and-such teenage boy “asking Jesus into his heart” and this girl “asking God to save her” and “another boy asking Jesus into his heart.”  This is not a biblical doctrine of salvation. This is not how you see people saved in scripture.

I’ve met men who say they were saved while hearing the preaching of Oral Roberts.  Others testify to salvation in the ecumenical preaching of Billy Graham.  I hope they are saved.  I would compare it somewhat to someone throwing up the full court shot.  You hope he makes the shot.  If he does make it, you don’t want him to keep shooting full court shots.  If the ball goes in, you are happy about that, but that doesn’t justify the strategy of shooting full court shots.  I said “compare it somewhat” because the methodology of revivalism is worse.  It is permissible to shoot full court shots in basketball.  It isn’t permissible to function in an unscriptural way for evangelism.  You still rejoice in the salvation of souls, but that doesn’t justify what those people are doing.  In the long run, less people will be saved the wrong way. What I’m describing is a matter of discernment.  You don’t accept the method while rejoicing in the soul saved.

In response to my first post of last week, entitled, “Reports of Revival in America,” someone wrote, who was critical of this one question, “Can we stop looking for revival across America?”  The critic thought that question or statement to be very, very bad, not good at all, terrible.  So the question follows, should believers be praying for revival?  And perhaps previous to that question, one must answer, what is revival?

For revival being such a big deal according to many for those in the church, the New Testament doesn’t once use the word “revival.”  Actually, the English word “revival” doesn’t occur once in the King James Version of the entire Bible.  If “revival” were so important for Christians, and something they should expect and be praying for, one would think, it seems, that it would appear in the Bible one time.

On the other hand, the English verb “revive” (revive, revived, and reviving) does appear in both the Old and New Testaments.  Here are the usages:

“Revive”

Nehemiah 4:2, And he spake before his brethren and the army of Samaria, and said, What do these feeble Jews? will they fortify themselves? will they sacrifice? will they make an end in a day? will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burned?
Psalm 85:6, Wilt thou not revive us again: that thy people may rejoice in thee?
Psalm 138:7, Though I walk in the midst of trouble, thou wilt revive me: thou shalt stretch forth thine hand against the wrath of mine enemies, and thy right hand shall save me.
Isaiah 57:15, For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.
Hosea 6:2, After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.
Hosea 14:7, They that dwell under his shadow shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and grow as the vine: the scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon.
Habakkuk 3:2, O LORD, I have heard thy speech, and was afraid: O LORD, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy.

“Revived”

Genesis 45:27, And they told him all the words of Joseph, which he had said unto them: and when he saw the wagons which Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father revived:
Judges 15:19, But God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came water thereout; and when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived: wherefore he called the name thereof Enhakkore, which is in Lehi unto this day.
1 Kings 17:22, And the LORD heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him again, and he revived.
2 Kings 13:21, And it came to pass, as they were burying a man, that, behold, they spied a band of men; and they cast the man into the sepulchre of Elisha: and when the man was let down, and touched the bones of Elisha, he revived, and stood up on his feet.
Romans 7:9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.
Romans 14:9, For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living.

“Reviving”

Ezra 9:8-9, And now for a little space grace hath been shewed from the LORD our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage.  For we were bondmen; yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage, but hath extended mercy unto us in the sight of the kings of Persia, to give us a reviving, to set up the house of our God, and to repair the desolations thereof, and to give us a wall in Judah and in Jerusalem.

The only time any form of “revive occurs in the New Testament is in Romans 7:9 and Romans 14:9, the Greek word anazao, which means, “to come back to life.”  That Greek word is also found in Luke 15:24, 32 and Revelation 20:5.  Here are those usages:

Luke 15:24, For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry.
Luke 15:32, It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.
Revelation 20:5, But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection.

The Hebrew word translated “revive and revived” is always the verb, hayah.  It is very common, found 357 times in the Old Testament, translated first “living” in Genesis 1:24, and then “beast” in Genesis 1:25 (living thing).  Sometimes it is translated “lived,” as in Genesis 5:3, “And Adam lived.”

In the few times the King James Version translates hayah, “revive,” it is found in each instance the piel, except for Isaiah 57:15, where it is in the hiphil.  The qal form of hayah translates “revived” in all four instances.  Hayah means “to be alive” in the qal, the piel is “to cause to be alive,” and the hiphil is “to cause to live.”

The two usages of “reviving,” both in Ezra 9:8-9 translate a different Hebrew term, mihyah.  It is not a very often used word, only eight times in the entire Old Testament, always a noun and in addition to “reviving” translated “preserve life,” “quick,” “sustenance,” “victuals,” and “recover” in those instances in the King James Version.

I want to look just at the English usages, because those are the ones from which the critics are receiving their doctrine.  The only times the word surely means something spiritual, whether “revive,” “revived,” or “reviving” are in Psalm 85:6, Isaiah 57:15, Habakkuk 3:2, Ezra 9:8-9.  Neither of the two in the New Testament are a spiritual reviving.  Two of the four in total are in prayers, both of course in the Old Testament.

First, of the two that are not prayers, God speaks in Isaiah 57:15 and promises that He will preserve the humble and contrite, as Matthew Henry writes,

He will give them reviving joys and hopes sufficient to counterbalance all the griefs and
fears that break their spirits. He dwells with them, and his presence is reviving.

Second, Ezra 9:8-9 do not use the same Hebrew word, as I referenced above.  Nonetheless, the “reviving” is encouragement from the Lord to keep going, despite their opposition to completing the task God has them to do as returning captives.  Neither these first and second examples correlate to the almost exclusive idea of revival especially promoted by revivalists.

The two classic “revival” texts, to which are most commonly referred, come from Psalm 85:6 and Habbakkuk 3:2.  They are both prayers, the former the request of God to revive people and the second to revive God’s work.  They are quoted above, but here are the two again:

Psalm 85:6, Wilt thou not revive us again: that thy people may rejoice in thee?
Habakkuk 3:2, O LORD, I have heard thy speech, and was afraid: O LORD, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy.

It is important not to superimpose over these two usages what someone already thinks or perceives about revival.  The wording of Psalm 85:6 reads as lamenting a condition.  It is a request, but spoken in a negative way:  “Wilt thou not revive us again?”  Is this the state in which we will be left?  Do we have no hope?  It is not so much a prayer for revival as it is a prayer to be informed as to whether this present state is going to end.  Yes or no, are things going to end this way or are You going to give us some hope that would bring us joy in this desolation and discouragement?

Psalm 85 looks to have been written concerning an exilic or post-exilic Israel, who seemed herself to have been left for dead with no hope of future restoration either to the land or to her former state. Israel was under God’s wrath and was looking to be returned to her former condition. This psalm could allude to any period where Israel would be brought back to the place of God’s original intention for her.  No doubt, Israel’s poor state as a nation related to her faithless departure from following the Lord.  She suffered under God’s chastisement and she cried to God to return her to her former condition.

Israel had a basis for a prayer of restoration.  At the dedication of the temple, Solomon prayed to God in 2 Chronicles 6 for the right or privilege to pray to God during times of judgment or chastisement. He asked God if Israel could pray toward this temple with hope of restoration.  In answer to this prayer, God gave him the familiar promise of 2 Chronicles 7:14:  “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”  The United States of America does not have the same promise given to it.

Habbakuk 3:2 is similar except for the obvious.  Habbakuk does not pray for the reviving of the nation itself, but of God’s work.  If you consider the model prayer of Jesus in Matthew 6 and Luke 11, you read the request, “Thy will be done.”  If you replaced “will” with “work,” it would read, “Thy work be done.”  Men need and desire the work of God.  Israel was defined by the work of God. Without the work of God, she was nothing.  God had promised Israel a future, so Habbakuk had a biblical basis for praying it.  God’s desire for Israel was also Habbakuk’s desire.

I don’t see a New Testament equivalent to the above mentioned prayers in the Old Testament.  God gave certain promises to Israel and the psalmist and Habakkuk prayed according to those promises. God would return Israel to its former place.  God had promised.  They were requesting according to the will of God, which is what every believer should do when he prays, that is, pray for the will of God.

Believers should not be praying, like revivalists, for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit or that the Holy Spirit would come down and meet with them in a special way — those types of prayers.  They are praying for some event accompanied by some indication that something amazing is occurring, a quasi-sign of some sort.  Then they produce the cause for the effect with the music and the style of speaking.  This was nothing like the great awakening with Whitefield in the colonial period.

No one should pray for the Spirit to come, since He’s already here.  No one should pray for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, because He has already been poured out.  These are second blessing prayers.  These are Keswick prayers.  They are actually faithless prayers.  Why would someone pray for something that already occurred?  Why not just believe that it occurred?  They want more of these events, these signs, these occurrences as a validation.  They are seeking after signs.

God’s Word is powerful.  The Holy Spirit will work through God’s Word.  God has promised.  We should, like the apostles, pray for boldness in preaching the Word of God.  Pray for doors of opportunity.  Are these two prayers, boldness and opportunity, big events?  They are obedience to God.  We should look at obedience to God as a big enough event for us.  God is already working providentially all around and all over.  God’s power is immense and He wants us already to acknowledge it, not seek for more.

Instead of praying what the revivalists pray, believers should pray like what the Apostle Paul did for the church at Ephesus in Ephesians 3:16:  “that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man.”  Believers have all the power of the universe within them in the Person of the Holy Spirit.  However, there is still the struggle to sin that Paul reveals at the end of Romans 7.  Believers have the Holy Spirit, but they need to be strengthened by the Spirit in their struggle over sin.  Prayer is one of the ways they have that victory not to sin.  This is parallel with the request in the model prayer in Matthew 6:13 and Luke 11:4:  “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever.”  This is a prayer believers ought to pray for themselves and for others.