Revival

Something's breaking.  Something's on the verge of slamming into the reality that is lived and breathed and worshiped at this campus.

You make all things new; yes, You make all things new.  And I will follow You forward...

It's the call to revival...

     REVIVAL- (n) An improvement in the condition or strength of something;
               an instance of becoming active again

It's a call to live again, to become active again.  Again.  Again means that we've been something once but left it.  It's call to return, to rend, to repudiate.  It's a call to come back to the heart of the issue, to the heart of our worship, to the heart of our Lover.

I'm not going back, I'm moving ahead; I'm here to declare to you, my past is over in You.  All things are made new.  I surrender my life to Christ.  I'm moving, moving forward.

The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.  Not only are the workers few-- they're also injured.  They're battered from the constant trials of living in a society that rapes their beliefs.  They're broken from the lukewarm complacency of the Church, who should really be the en-couragement for them, spurring them on to love and good deeds by speaking courage into their lives.  They're blinded by the images of war, destruction, pain, slavery, prostitution, greed that have proven to be a false sense of the condition of God's world.

And so we, as these battered, broken, blinded workers, stumble and crawl onto the field, praying for a revival and armed with the little strength we have-- and in our hearts, oftentimes, we are overwhelmed by the size of the field that spans in front of us.

What a moment, you have brought me to.  Such a freedom I have found in You.  You're a Healer-- You make all things new.

The good thing is that not only do we have a God who's power is made perfect in our weakness but who is also a Healer.  Lord, Love, my prayer is that You heal-- mend our hearts, remind the Body, and open our eyes to the reality of Your providence.

As I pray over this revival-- an anointing by God that has been specifically and, with much weight, placed on my heart in the past few days-- I pray not only over the workers but also over those who will receive the Word and grow!  You have said that the harvest is plentiful, and I can't help but to sit in that... To sit and ponder over this statement that the
harvest....
is....
plentiful!

I give myself away.  I give myself away, so You can use me.

Repeat.

Take my heart.  Take my life as a living sacrifice.

Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God.  This is your spiritual act of worship.  Do not conform any longer to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.  Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is-- His good, pleasing, and perfect will.

God, Your will is ever so clear.  As you prepare my life as a living sacrifice, an offering to You to be used in any way that You need, I pray that You spare no part of me.  Take it all.  Use it all.  Consume it all in the flames of Your refinement.  May my life bring glory and praise to You and You only, and may this desire for a revival to break out across this campus... Lord, may this desire for revival take over and consume my life, my thoughts, my actions.  May lives be changed and the hearts of your children be turned back to You.

My life is not my own; to You I belong.  I give myself, I give myself away.


**The two songs quoted from in italics are:
Israel Houghton's Moving Forward and
William McDowell's I Give Myself Away