Revival series part 4

 by Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D., Revival Historian

Keys for Stewarding Personal Revival, Encounter, Awakening (taken from Jen’s book SustaiN the Flame)

When the fires of revival get ignited, then what? The Moravians knew that it was important to then steward the flames of revival to keep the oil burning and thus they cultivated the new wine skin of 24-7 prayer. Though the wineskins for how to steward the fires of revival may look different, we can learn from the Moravian’s example that unity in prayer is a key for stewarding corporate revival.

And when revival comes to us personally or God meets us in a profound way, it is also important to steward those encounters to keep the oil burning. Cultivating family around the fireplace of revival, stewarding a heart of worship in all circumstances, and praying in tongues regularly are keys that can profoundly shape our spirituality and keep us focused on the face of Jesus. In addition to these, the following are some rhythms and pathways to greater intimacy with Jesus and stewarding the fire that I have found helpful in my life.

1. Stay Full of the Oil of Intimacy

In Matthew 25:1-12, we see the story of the wise and foolish virgins. This parable is symbolic of making sure we steward the oil of intimacy in our lives to keep the fire burning. If we try to rely upon other’s secret place encounters and stewardship of their relationship with Christ, it won’t get us to where we need to go. We must personally make sure to invest time in the secret place with Jesus, getting filled up by Him with the Holy Spirit and fire. There is no shortcut to building intimacy with Jesus, it requires time and an open and vulnerable heart. In John 15:1-8, we see that all fruitfulness flows from intimacy with Christ. We must stay connected to our Source. Read Walking on Water: Experiencing a Life of Miracles, Courageous Faith, and Union with God to go deeper in this area.

2. Consume the Word of God

We must be a people who know the truth deeply, especially in the midst of the increasing delusions, lies, and deceptions of the enemy. People who work at banks know when there is a counterfeit bill because they handle so much real money. When we are saturated in the truth, we will know when something is off. The shaking in our world will only increase. We must stand strong on the Word of God which is a solid rock. We must read it, eat it, breathe it, meditate on it, memorize it, and make declarations with it. Audio versions of the Bible are also a good way to get the Word hidden in our hearts.

3. Steward Encounters and God’s voice

We must learn to discern and steward the voice of God through His Word, encounters, as well trusted prophetic voices in speaking into our lives. If God marks you, linger in that space. Don’t shift or transition too quickly out of an encounter with God. Don’t jump right into a conversation with someone or look on social media or get distracted another way. Allow what He has just blessed you with to permeate to the deepest levels. Meditate on what it good and it will have a greater effect on you. Journal what He has shown you. When God speaks to you, obey Him immediately and keep your heart tender toward Him. Steward prophetic words over your life. Make sure to audio record them, and then listen to them, write them out, and pray over them until they become a reality.

4. Fast

Develop a rhythm of weekly or regularly fasting to keep the fire burning. You would be surprised at the radical shift that regular fasting can have in your life. Jesus regularly fasted and we must learn how to walk in His footsteps. Many revivals, encounters, or defining moments in revivalists’ lives were birthed while on a fast. See my book Fasting for Fire: Igniting Fresh Hunger to Feast Upon God for more on this with practical tools to help get you started or a reframing of what it really is to re-ignite you.

5. Learn to Wait on the Holy Spirit

Psalm 46:10 says “Be still, and know that I am God.” How many times do we stop talking, moving, planning, to simply just be with God and sit in His presence?[ii] Too many of us think we have to strive, contend, push to see God move. But what if rather than trying to make things happen on our own, we instead spent time with the Holy Spirit, listened to what is on God’s heart, were fully yielded, and simply responded to where He was leading? What if like Moses, we weren’t going to go anywhere, even into revival or into our destinies, if He didn’t go with us? What if we became a people that was led by fire in the night and cloud in the day? Or a people who wouldn’t move anywhere without His presence (Exodus 33)?

 6. Embrace Rhythms of Run, Rest, Release

It is important to discern what season you are in so you can steward it well in preparation for the upcoming season. Many times in life, there are seasons where you run hard, rest, then release or birth new things. This is cyclical in nature. During times of revival, things accelerate, people are running fast, it’s time to push. But it is also important to embrace the Sabbath. Recognize what season you are in and adjust to make sure you get what is needed in that time. The sabbath is not only Biblical, it is also a key for unlocking greater creativity in our lives. Embracing the sabbath, having fun, eat healthy, exercising regularly, and stewarding our bodies which are temple of the Holy Ghost are essential to run hard and finishing well. We don’t want to be a people who burn and then burn out. We need the sustaining burn.

7. Surround yourself with other Burning Ones

A single flame alone might burn for a little while, but for that flame to increase and not die out, it is important to unite with other flames. The more flames come together, the greater the fire and likelihood that your flame will not whither. I’ve seen too many people be a part of a great culture, environment, or ministry school for a season, get radically impacted, and then back to their homelands without being intentional to find and run with other sold-out burning ones. Soon, their fire wanes or even worse, they go back to a lifestyle they had before God encountered them powerfully. We must find other passionate Jesus lovers wherever God places us. The great thing now is that even if you can’t find any in your hometown, you can run with other burning ones in online communities for support to keep the fire burning. Ask God to surround you with spiritual mothers and fathers, kindred-spirited burning friends, and others you can encourage.

 8. Steward the Power of the Testimony

Another way to build up your faith and keep the fire burning is to recount and thank God for the testimonies of His faithfulness in your life and how He’s come through in the past. Whether it is by framing a picture on a wall that reminds you of a breakthrough or of His radical provision, writing down testimonies on a 3x5 card to go over to encourage yourself in, or some other creative way, do it! Steward these stones of remembrances (Joshua 4). By stewarding testimonies of God’s faithfulness in the Bible, in revival history, in the lives of others, and in your own personal history with God, you are prophesying into future breakthroughs and radical acts of faith.

9. Learn how to Deal with Disappointment

One of the greatest things that I’ve noticed takes Christians out or sidelines them is when they fail to deal with disappointment well. Some might suffer loss, have something happen to them they don’t understand, step out in faith for something that doesn’t happen. Rather than learn from it and trust God will turn it around for their good, many get discouraged, disillusioned, build up distrust against God, or condemn themselves as failures. If we really believe all the promises found in Romans 8 and have a healthy perspective on God the Father, we won’t turn to bitterness or embrace disappointment. Instead, we will deepen our connection with the Father and learn to trust Him even more. Memorize and believe Romans 8 and you will not be shaken.

10. Choose Unity and Love

This is both important on a personal and corporate level. Strive to be at peace with all people and take the road of humility again and again (Romans 12:18, Philippians 2). Trust God to vindicate you where you’ve been wronged. And just as Christ forgave you, so you must also do.

11. Don’t be Afraid to Shine

And finally, don’t be afraid to shine (Isaiah 60). God has appointed some to be leaders in our generation. Not everyone has been given the same amount of influence, favor, resources, anointing for leadership upon your life. Be the gift God has called you to be, however that might look. Not everyone was called to lead the Israelites out of Egypt, but Moses was. Then it was Joshua who God appointed to lead them even further into their promised land. Humbly do the assignments God has entrusted to you without making excuses, making yourself look smaller, or sabotaging the call of God on your life (Ephesians 2:10). Give all the glory to God but when the invitation is there, step in while clinging to Him.

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

Hopefully some of the rhythms I have learned in my own life for stewarding the fire will encourage you. There are many more ways to steward the fire that may be unique for you.

• Which of these keys are you already doing well in?

• Which of these keys are highlighted for you to develop further?

• What other keys have you noticed that can help you steward the fire in your heart that may be unique for you in this season?

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These tips were taken from Jen’s book Sustain the Flame.

Revival Series Part 2

by Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D., Revival Historian 

Now that we have explored semantics and some development around the term revival and exploring its meaning, let’s go even deeper to the impact it should have on one’s life and what comes afterwards.

In the natural, if someone is sleeping, barely alive, or has suddenly died, they need to be awakened or revived. Many times, someone will use smelling salts (ammonia inhalants) to awaken a person who has passed out or become unconscious. They put this aroma under the person’s nose to breathe it in. Suddenly, when this happens, the person is revived from their previous unconscious state. Once this person has become revived from their formal sleeping state, they do not need to remain in a state of trying to be revived because they have already come back to life. There is no more need for them to inhale the smelling salts. This person must now begin to live more empowered since their awakening.

This can be a metaphor for revival. Some people have become spiritually unconscious or fallen asleep and they need to be re-awakened. Others have become dead inside and need to be resurrected back to life. Once they have been awakened and brought back to life though, now it’s time to move from the resurrected state to the empowered state of living, being transformed, and stepping into their destiny.

Revival is only just the beginning. Once a person is awakened, then it’s time to fully live.

In Hosea 6:2, it says, “After two days He will revive us; On the third day He will raise us up, That we may live in His sight.” Here we see that revival is not meant to be a continual state as much as what needs to happen whenever our spirits begin to wither away or die on the inside. Once people are revived, they then need to live the abundant life Jesus died for them to have (John 10:10). Transformation, reformation, revolution, and destiny must follow. Once revived, we must learn to live as burning ones on fire for Jesus constantly remaining full of the oil of His presence.

Jesus is Revival

All that said, at the heart of revival is Jesus. Jesus is the truest revival we will ever know. Beyond living for revival, we live for the Reviver. When we become awakened spiritually, we fall more in love with Jesus. When we fall more in love with Jesus, transformation takes place within our hearts, and we impact those around us. Revival is truly just more of Jesus.

We are born to live revived lives in the Spirit of God. We are made to be burning ones who don’t burn out. We are born to live loudly for our King of kings and display His glory through our lives. As we become awakened to King Jesus, our destinies begin to unfold in a greater measure. We step out in faith, hand in hand with our best friend Jesus, and can bring hope to a world that desperately needs it. From a place of intimate union with God, as we yield to and follow the Holy Spirit’s leading, we become agents of revival wherever we go. The burning flame inside spreads and ignites others whose flame has dwindled.

The Reviver by Rolland Baker

Rolland Baker, co-founder with Heidi Baker of Iris Global is a missionary in Mozambique, has experienced revival firsthand. His insights in the epilogue of his book, Keeping the Fire, are worth noting.

“I return at the end to where I began: with the Person of Jesus

Iris is not about us. It is about Jesus.

Revival is not about manifestations or miracles; it is about the Reviver, Jesus our Savior.

We have only one destination, one home, one reality, one resting place, one source, one

motivation, one reward, one possession, one point of contact with God, one source of real

satisfaction – and that is Jesus…

Everything we value has been found in Jesus. The key to our core values is therefore

falling in love with Him. 

Love is a gift of relationship, not just self-sacrifice. The secret place is not necessarily found in a prayer closet or a posture of soaking, or in battling for a just cause, or in a massive prayer and fasting effort. Even the most amazing miracles can leave us lonely and without relationship. We can run out of motivation advancing the noblest ideals and working at all levels to transform society. We can minister until we have no more strength, and still go home and lie in bed without the relationship for which our hearts are made.

Everything is okay with relationship. It is all that Jesus cares about, all that motivates Him. He could do many more amazing miracles to dazzle the world with His powers, but He is interested only in relationship. The entire creation, all the grandeur of the physical world, and all His works are designed to serve one thing: relationship. Revival has no content without it. Renewal and manifestations are pointless apart from it. Miracles only find their meaning it. Joy is shallow and groundless unless rooted in it. Without relationship we are the living dead…

Revival is all about Jesus.[i]

Revival Without God: A Warning

Revival can easily become an idol in our lives and take the place of Jesus. It can possess us and become an obsession. Not that there is anything wrong with desiring revival, but anything that comes before our passionate pursuit of Jesus becomes idolatry. We must always seek Jesus first, yield to the Holy Spirit, and pursue the God of revival. Revival never should become an idol in our lives. Our obsession above all else, including revival, must remain loving Jesus wholeheartedly. As we love God with all our minds, hearts, bodies, and spirits, revival is a natural overflow.

We don’t want to end up one day in front of God sharing how we released “revival” in the world but did it apart from personal and intimate relationship with Him. What would be the point of doing signs and wonders without Him and His presence or without love (1 Corinthians 13)? Moses could have easily had revival, stepped into his destiny, and saw his dreams come true. But without God’s presence, he wasn’t going to move (Exodus 33).

Revival without Jesus is not only empty, it is dangerous. Jesus says in Matthew 7:21-23,

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

Casting out demons, setting the oppressed free, and performing miracles definitely feels like revival and that the kingdom of God has come in people’s lives. The only problem is that doing any of these works of revival is dangerous when not deeply connected to the Source of revival which is Jesus Himself. It appears from this passage that it is quite possible to do the works of revival without being known by God. This is unsafe ground to walk on. We must do the will of the Father and remain connected in relationship with Jesus as we do these works of revival. In their book about revival, Hansen and Woodbridge say, “You can have signs and wonders, but if you don’t have God, you don’t have revival. God-centered revivals withstand the temptation to treasure the blessings of revival over the one who blesses.”[ii]

More than anything, revival needs to be birthed from a place of a deep burning passion for more of God and from an overflowing relationship with Him. As we stay connected to the Source, His steadily burning and increasing flame within us will ignite and awaken many around us, releasing revival wherever we go. As we knit ourselves to other burning ones and learn how to live in the fire of His presence together, we encounter His love and power in a way that radically impacts our world. Let us be a people who burn for revival fire to be ignited in our own hearts and for that to spread to a lost and dying world.

See part one “What is Revival” in this Revival Series HERE

Join our School of Revival family or take a revival history course in our online School of Revival HERE

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NOTES

[i] Rolland Baker, Keeping the Fire: Sustaining Revival Through Love: The Five Core Values of Iris Global (Kent, United Kingdom: River Publishing & Media Ltd, 2015), 141-143 used with permission in an email dated 12/19/2022 from Tim Pettingale, Director of River Publishing & Media Ltd.

[ii] Collin Hansen and John Woodbridge, A God-Sized Vision: Revival Stories that Stretch and Stir (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2010), 25.

Revival Series Part 1

 by Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D. Revival Historian

*This was written before the 2020 lockdown and recent Asbury Revival outbreaks and is now a chapter in my book Sustain the Flame: Secrets to Living Saturated in God’s Presence and Holy Fire.

We hear the word “Revival” thrown around a lot these days, but what really is revival? In part one of these series, we will lay the framework for defining this term before going deeper into the realities that revival is only just the beginning and starting point, not the end all.

Semantics

Looking purely at semantics and the Scriptures to begin with, the term “revive” is used 23 times in the Old Testament in the New King James Version. It comes from the Hebrew word חָיָה châyâh which means “to live, to revive, to keep, leave, or make alive, to give life, quicken, recover, repair, restore to life, save, be whole.”[i] Notice the essence of staying alive once someone has been revived.

The first time the word revive is used in the Bible is in Genesis 45:27 when Jacob, who already grieved the loss of his son Joseph whom he thought was dead, realized that he was alive. It was then that his spirit was revived.[ii] In 1 Kings 17:22, the word goes beyond reviving hope of one’s spirit to mean resurrecting a physical human life. Here we see that Elijah prayed for a dead child who was brought back to life.[iii] Then in 2 Kings 13:21, the word was again used to describe one who was physically dead returning back to life when his body was thrown in Elisha’s grave.[iv]

The word revive is used the most in Psalms at 14 times and especially throughout Psalm 119. The Psalmist cries out for God to revive him according to His Word, His lovingkindness, His justice, and even His judgments. He also asks God to revive him in His way and His righteousness. There is also a turning back to God, deliverance from great troubles, and a hunger to be revived so that God’s people may rejoice in Him once again.[v]

In Isaiah, we discover a God who revives the spirit of the humble and the heart of the contrite ones. In Habakkuk, there is a desire for God to revive and make known His works of old once again.[vi] And don’t forget the revivals that happened under Kings Asa, Hezekiah, and Josiah along with many other personal revivals that took place in people’s lives throughout Scripture.

In the New Testament, in all other translations included, nowhere was there an equivalent of this word used. This could possibly be because the church in the New Testament didn’t need revival because they were already fully alive and living it. Persecution many times proves to help along these lines of staying burning hot in our love for Christ.

Etymology

When we look deeper into the etymology of how this word has developed over the centuries, we see that roots for revive come from the Old French word revivre (10c.) and directly from the Latin word revivere which is translated “to live again.”[vii] By the 1560s, the word revive had the sense of “returning to a flourishing state” or of feelings or activities “beginning to occur again.”[viii] In the 1650s, revival meant the “act of reviving after decline or discontinuance.” At the essence of the word, revival is the call to live again.[ix] What has since died and been forgotten, needs to become awakened once again.  

In the 1660s there was a unique take on this term as it was used for “the bringing back to the stage of a play which has not been presented for a considerable time.”[x] Might it be time for an encore in the platform of Christianity to welcome the Holy Spirit back to take center stage once again? In the early 1700s, it is believed that New England Puritan pastor Cotton Mather was one of the firsts to connect this term to religion. In one of his writings in 1702, he connected the term revival with religious awakening in the community.[xi] By 1818, the term revival was used to describe “enthusiastic religious meetings (often by Methodists) meant to inspire revival.” A few years before this in 1812, the term Revivalist was being used as “one who promotes or leads a religious revival.”[xii]

Exploring Paradigms for Religious Revival

Moving beyond semantics now into the study of revival history, there are various perspectives on religious revivals by both practioners and revival historians. For some, revival only happens within the church, and for others, it’s when the world is awakened to Christ as well. Some see revival as something that we should be living in every second of the day while others see it as episodic moves of God.[xiii] Some see it coming as a result of prayer while others see it only as a sovereign act of God. While there could be a whole separate book on this subject alone, I present a small snapshot of a few of the varying perspectives below.[xiv]

Charles G. Finney (1792-1875), known as the father of modern revivalism, believed that we very much play a role in awakening the church and bringing sinners to repentance as led by God. He saw a need for revival to happen periodically to wake up the church because it so regularly became stagnant. He saw revival as “nothing else than a new beginning of obedience to God.”[xv] He compared revival to a crop of wheat and emphasized that God uses means to cultivate both. Finney believed that if the fire was kept burning in the church, there would have been no need for revival, but unfortunately, he saw that was rarely the case.[xvi] About revival, he wrote:

I AM TO SHOW WHAT A REVIVAL IS. It is the renewal of the first love of Christians, resulting in the awakening and conversion of sinners to God. In the popular sense, a revival of religion in a community is the arousing, quickening, and reclaiming of the more or less backslidden church and the more or less general awakening of all classes, and insuring attention to the claims of God.

It presupposes that the church is sunk down in a backslidden state, and a revival consists in the return of a church from her backslidings, and in the conversion of sinners.[xvii]

Martin Lloyd-Jones described revival as “the outpouring of the Spirit over and above his usual, ordinary work; this amazing, unusual, extraordinary thing, which God in his sovereignty and infinite grace has done to the Church from time to time during the long centuries of her history.” [xviii] Christmas Evans (1766-1838), an influential one-eyed Welsh Baptist preacher said that “Revival is God bending down to the dying embers of a fire that is just about to go out, and breathing into it, until it bursts again into flame.” Duncan Campbell of the Hebrides Revival said that “Revival is a community saturated with God.”[xix]

In his study on Pentecostalism in The Everlasting Gospel, William Faulpel sees revival as having a seven-stage process: conception, gestation, labor, birth, growth, reproduction, and maturity.[xx] He compares it to the life cycle paralleling the birth of a new baby. Mark Stibbe from the U.K. defines revival as “a season ordained by God in which the Holy Spirit awakens the Church to evangelise the lost, and the lost to their dire need of Jesus Christ.”[xxi] He distinguishes renewal as confined to the Church while revival as something that reaches beyond the church and into the world.[xxii] He likens renewal to a stream and revival to that same river becoming a “flood that disturbs boulders and overflows banks.”[xxiii]

Like Stibbe, I would also say there are special seasons, windows of opportunity, or kairos moments, where the Spirit is at work to awaken and revive the Church.[xxiv] At the turn of the twentieth century, revivals were springing up all around the world in this sacred and set apart kairos season of time.[xxv] Revival broke out in Wales in 1904-05, in India in 1905, and then in Los Angeles in 1906 at Azusa Street amongst other worldwide moves near the same time. The early twentieth century was pregnant with revival. There was something anointed, set apart, and special about that kairos moment that these saints were able to recognize and tap into. The result was revival that is still impacting us over a hundred years later.

Defining Revival

As we seek to define revival here, I would say that revival is when the fire of first love for Jesus is re-ignited in the hearts of believers. As a result, their lives are transformed, and the kingdom of God is expanded all around them in various ways that impact, shape, and reform culture and society.

Revival is for Christians whose fire has waned. If someone has never encountered God’s love for themselves, they can’t necessarily be re-awakened to it. It is only when the fire of first love has been snuffed out that one needs revival. Once that original flame is re-ignited, the awakened ones naturally influence those around them, and many times others are brought to salvation as a result.

Ultimately, revival is becoming fully alive to Jesus again. And it’s important to understand that revival is not the end goal. It is only just the beginning.

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P.S. Before you completely disagree with me, wait to read Part 2 of this series “Revival is Just the Beginning.” Both of these pieces have been written before the 2020 lockdown and recent Asbury Revival outbreaks and are featured in chapters of my new Sustain the Flame: Secrets to Living Saturated in God’s Presence and Holy Fire. See Sustain the Flame ecourse for a whole teaching on the topic of what revival is and how to steward it.

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NOTES

[i] Strong's H2421 https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h2421/nkjv/wlc/0-1/ “to live, whether literally or figuratively; causatively, to revive:—keep (leave, make) alive, certainly, give (promise) life, (let, suffer to) live, nourish up, preserve (alive), quicken, recover, repair, restore (to life), revive, (God) save (alive, life, lives), surely, be whole.”

[ii] “But when they told him all the words which Joseph had said to them, and when he saw the carts which Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father revived.” –Genesis 45:27 (NKJV)

[iii] “Then the LORD heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came back to him, and he revived.” –1 Kings 17:22 (NKJV)

[iv] “So it was, as they were burying a man, that suddenly they spied a band of raiders; and they put the man in the tomb of Elisha; and when the man was let down and touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood on his feet.” –2 Kings 13:21.

[v] Psalm 71:20 is a call to be delivered from great troubles.Psalm 80:18 is a reviving in order to turn back to God.

Psalm 85:6 says, “Will You not revive us again, That Your people may rejoice in You?” There is purpose to praise in the reviving work. We see in Psalm 119:25,107, 154 that one can be revived according to His word: “Revive me according to Your word (119:25).” Psalm 119:37 we can be revived in His way: “Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things,  And revive me in Your way.” Psalm 119:40 we can be revived in His righteousness: “Behold, I long for Your precepts; Revive me in Your righteousness.” Psalm 119:88 and 159 we can be revived according to His lovingkindness: “Revive me according to Your lovingkindness, So that I may keep the testimony of Your mouth.” In Psalm 119:149, we can be revived according to His justice: “Hear my voice according to Your lovingkindness; O LORD, revive me according to Your justice.” Psalm 119:156 we can be revived according to His judgments. “Great are Your tender mercies, O LORD; Revive me according to Your judgments.” Psalm 138:7 when in trouble we can be revived: “Though I walk in the midst of trouble, You will revive me; You will stretch out Your hand. Against the wrath of my enemies, And Your right hand will save me.” Psalm 143:11 we can be revived for His name’s sake: “Revive me, O LORD, for Your name's sake! For Your righteousness' sake bring my soul out of trouble.”

[vi] Isaiah 57:15 (NKJV) says, “For thus says the High and Lofty One, Who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, With him who has a contrite and humble spirit, To revive the spirit of the humble, And to revive the heart of the contrite ones.” And then in Habakkuk 3:2, “O LORD, I have heard Your speech and was afraid; O LORD, revive Your work in the midst of the years! In the midst of the years make it known; In wrath remember mercy.”

[vii] https://www.etymonline.com/word/revival

[viii] https://www.etymonline.com/word/revival

[ix] According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the word revival can mean: “1: an act or instance of reviving: the state of being revived: such as a: renewed attention to or interest in something b: a new presentation or publication of something old c (1): a period of renewed religious interest (2): an often highly emotional evangelistic meeting or series of meetings 2: restoration of force, validity, or effect (as to a contract).”

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/revival Accessed December 11, 2022

[x] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/revival

[xi] Collin Hansen and John Woodbridge, A God-Sized Vision: Revival Stories that Stretch and Stir (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2010), 31.

[xii] https://www.etymonline.com/word/revival

[xiii] Roger Finke and Rodney Stark, The Churching of America 1776-1990: Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1992), 92. According to Roger Finke and Rodney Starke, while “all organizations need renewals or revivals of member commitment, it is also true that these must be episodic. People can’t stay excited indefinitely.” Most people don’t have the capacity to remain in a heightened state of being revived.

[xiv] Prayer, surrender, consecration, and repentance many times precede personal and corporate revival. In all my research on revival up to this point (over two decades), I have noticed that hunger was the one constant that drew people to seek more of God in desperation, which resulted in revival. Prayer seems to regularly play a pivotal role in this. It’s not ours to determine how God will move, but it is ours to prepare, position, partner, pray, and invite Him to move in and through us as agents of revival. We must be a people who step out in faith to reach the lost as if their salvation depended upon us. We must be a people who immediately respond to the leading of the Holy Spirit and allow Him to use our lives however He wishes because we are motived by love for Jesus.

[xv] Charles Grandison Finney (1835). Lectures on Revivals of Religion p.14

[xvi] “There is so little principle in the church, so little firmness and stability of purpose, that unless the religious feelings are awakened and kept excited, counter worldly feeling and excitement will prevail, and men will not obey God. They have so little knowledge, and their principles are so weak, that unless they are excited, they will go back from the path of duty, and do nothing to promote the glory of God. The state of the world is still such, and probably will be till the millennium is fully come, that religion must be mainly promoted by means of revivals. How long and how often has the experiment been tried, to bring the church to act steadily for God, without these periodical excitements. Many good men have supposed, and still suppose, that the best way to promote religion, is to go along uniformly, and gather in the ungodly gradually, and without excitement. But however sound such reasoning may appear in the abstract, facts demonstrate its futility. If the church were far enough advanced in knowledge, and had stability of principle enough to keep awake, such a course would do; but the church is so little enlightened, and there are so many counteracting causes, that she will not go steadily to work without a special interest being awakened.

As the millennium advances, it is probable that these periodical excitements will be unknown. Then the church will be enlightened, and the counteracting causes removed, and the entire church will be in a state of habitual and steady obedience to God.”

Charles G. Finney, Lectures of Revivals on Religion (New York, NY: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1868), 9

https://www.ccel.org/ccel/f/finney/revivals/cache/revivals.pdf

[xvii] Charles G. Finney, Lectures of Revivals on Religion (New York, NY: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1868), 12

https://www.ccel.org/ccel/f/finney/revivals/cache/revivals.pdf

[xviii] Martin Lloyd-Jones, Revival (Wheaton, Ill: Crossway, 1987), 199 in Collin Hansen and John Woodbridge, A God-Sized Vision: Revival Stories that Stretch and Stir (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2010), 35.

[xix] Duncan Campbell, The Lewis Awakening, p. 14-15

[xx] William Faupel, The Everlasting Gospel: The Significance of Eschatology in the Development of Pentecostal Thought. Journal of Pentecostal Theology Supplement Series, ed. John Christopher Thomas, Rickie D. Moore, and Steven J. Land, vol. 10. (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996).

[xxi] Mark Stibbe, Revival,The Thinking Clear Series, ed. Clive Calver (London: Monarch Books, 1998), 14, 223.

[xxii] Mark Stibbe, Revival,The Thinking Clear Series, ed. Clive Calver (London: Monarch Books, 1998), 17.

[xxiii] Mark Stibbe, Revival,The Thinking Clear Series, ed. Clive Calver (London: Monarch Books, 1998), 49.

[xxiv] Jennifer A. Miskov, “Coloring Outside the Lines: Pentecostal Parallels with Expressionism. The Work of the Spirit in Place, Time, and Secular Society?”, Journal of Pentecostal Theology 19 (2010), 94-117.

[xxv] Additionally, I introduce “sacred time” into this discussion as a “special season when revivals, awakenings, and stirrings of the Holy Spirit are concentrated and occur in higher frequency than in other times… when people all around the world experience heightened manifestations of God’s presence” at the same time. Jennifer A. Miskov, “Coloring Outside the Lines: Pentecostal Parallels with Expressionism. The Work of the Spirit in Place, Time, and Secular Society?”, Journal of Pentecostal Theology 19 (2010), 115.

Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D., taken from Ignite Azusa: Positioning for a New Jesus Revolution

If we have eyes to see, history can prophesy into our future. In a time when we desperately need to SEE MORE of God and understand His heart, learning about the life and legacy of African American, William J. SEYMOUR (pronounced “See” “More”) can open our eyes to give us prophetic vision into rewriting our future narrative. I believe there are keys within the Azusa story that will prophesy into how to navigate through our present storm of racism to unlock a greater destiny.

One of the greatest movements in history was ignited when handful of African Americans met together in a home with their only agenda to encounter more of God. William J. Seymour, son of slaves, blind in one eye, humbly paved the way and was used by God to ignite a revival fire that has since spread around the globe introducing millions of people to Jesus and to the Holy Spirit in a powerful way.

On April 9, 1906, just before leaving for the prayer meeting, Seymour's friend Edward Lee began to speak in tongues after he laid hands on and prayed for him. After this, Lee, Seymour, and the others walked the couple blocks up the street to the Asberry home on Bonnie Brae Street for the 7:30 p.m. prayer meeting. There, a handful of African American saints gathered together because they wanted to encounter God in a greater measure. There were only about fifteen people including children present at the meeting. They had a song, a few prayers, and several testimonies released. Seymour shared the testimony of how Lee spoke in tongues less than two hours before. Even though Seymour had yet to receive the “evidence” of speaking in tongues, he continued to preach about it from Acts 2 that night.

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. Acts 2:1-4 (NIV)

Then something happened that they had all been waiting and longing for. God crashed into that meeting like never before. Ruth Asberry’s cousin Jennie Evans Moore, who lived across the street, was resting on a stool, when she suddenly fell to the ground and began to speak in tongues. She is known as one of the first women in Los Angeles to speak in tongues during this time.

 She recalled that it felt like a vessel broke inside of her and water “surged” through her entire being. When this rush came to her lips, she spoke in six different languages that she had seen earlier in a vision. These tongues were each interpreted in English. Following this release, Jennie, who had never played the piano before, walked over to the piano and played it under the anointing while singing in tongues. She recounted the story in an article called “Music from Heaven” in the Azusa Mission’s newspaper called The Apostolic Faith:

For years before this wonderful experience came to us, we as a family, were seeking to know the fulnes of God, and He was filling us with His presence until we could hardly contain the power… On April 9, 1906, I was praising the Lord from the depths of my heart at home, and when the evening came and we attended the meeting the power of God fell and I was baptized in the Holy Ghost and fire, with the evidence of speaking in tongues…As I thought thereon and looked to God, it seemed as if a vessel broke within me and water surged up through my being, which when it reached my mouth came out in a torrent of speech in the languages which God had given me…I sang under the power of the Spirit in many languages, the interpretation both words and music which I had never before heard, and in the home where the meeting was being held, the Spirit led me to the piano, where I played and sang under inspiration, although I had not learned to play.

-Jennie Moore, The Apostolic Faith 1:8 (312 Azusa Street, Los Angeles, CA: May, 1907), 3.

A few days later on April 12, 1906, Seymour spoke in tongues for the first time after waiting upon the Lord and praying with a white brother, not giving up until he “came through” and spoke in tongues at nearly four o’clock in the morning.

Crowds of both black and white people from different churches in the area came to the house on Bonnie Brae Street to see and partake in what God was doing. At one point, the house swelled with people so much that the front porch caved in. No one was injured, but they realized that they had outgrown the house. Within a week, they moved to a vacant building at 312 Azusa Street. 

During a time of heavy racial segregation, Seymour, the leader of what became known as the Azusa Street Revival, created a place where everyone would be welcome regardless of their skin color or nationality. One of the biggest breakthroughs at the Azusa Street Revival was that the walls of race, gender, and age were broken down. Eyewitness and historian Frank Bartleman observed that “the ‘color line’ was washed away in the blood.” This was in relation to racial divides being abolished by the blood of Jesus.

To have people from different races worshipping alongside one another and praying for each other during a time when lynchings were common and many years before Martin Luther King, Jr. came onto the scene is truly remarkable. Seymour’s early leadership team was racially mixed and also included women. Regular participants of the Azusa Mission in the early years included people from various ethnicities and backgrounds including African-Americans, European Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and more. Visitors would come to Azusa and experience such love and humility present in the people. One person said, “From the first time I entered I was struck by the blessed spirit that prevailed in the meeting, such a feeling of unity and humility among the children of God.”

The early days of the Azusa Street Revival were marked by unity, humility, and love regardless of ethnicity, race, or gender. Seymour emphasized the need to develop the fruit of the Spirit, especially love. In 1908, the leadership at Azusa said, “The Pentecostal power, when you sum it all up, is just more of God’s love.” Love was what was needed for this baptism of the Holy Spirit experience to be sustainable. They realized that love heals, love restores, and love is the way forward.

They also wanted more of God in those days no matter what it looked like. They “did not have a thousand other things” they wanted before Him. Nothing was going to stop them from encountering more of Him. They were all in it together no matter the color of their skin. These early Pentecostal pioneers paved the way for us in such a remarkable way. We are greatly indebted to these beautiful saints who said yes to pursuing Jesus wholeheartedly no matter what the cost. Now it’s our turn build on their breakthroughs.

How will we build on the momentum of William J. Seymour and those at Azusa Street, of Martin Luther King Jr., and of so many others who have gone before us? How will we take what they have done for us and go even further in our day? What will happen in our day when love supersedes all differences and we run toward Jesus together with total abandonment? What does it look like to say yes to radical love today?

To learn how to let your voice of justice, love, and racial reconciliation be heard and to make a difference, join our 5 Day Ignite Azusa Challenge that has now been turned into an Ecourse.

Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D., is a Revival Historian, Author, Teacher, Writing Coach, and Itinerant Minister who loves to lead people into life-changing encounters with Jesus and invite them into the fullness of the Holy Spirit. Jen is the founding director of the School of Revival which focusing on raising up leaders to steward the upcoming billion soul harvest. Jen also facilities Writing in the Glory Workshops around the world to catalyze authors to write their first books. She has supported Bill Johnson in his Defining Moments book as well as authored Walking on Water, Ignite Azusa: Positioning for a New Jesus Revolution, Writing in the Glory, Life on Wings, Spirit Flood, and Silver to Gold. She founded Destiny House (2012-2019) and also taught activation classes at Bethel School of Supernatural Ministries (2014-2020). She currently teaches at her alma mater Vanguard University and also at The King’s University in Texas and recently launched The School of Revival. She is ordained by Heidi Baker with Iris Global and received her Ph.D. in Global Pentecostal and Charismatic Studies from the University of Birmingham, U.K.

by Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D. Excerpt taken from Ignite Azusa: Positioning for a New Jesus Revolution

One of the greatest movements in history that contributed to the rapid spread of Christianity began when God crashed in on a handful of family and friends who were hungry for more of God. The Azusa Street Revival actually began as the “Bonnie Brae Street Revival” before it contributed to the spread of global Pentecostalism. The fruit that was released from this little tribe who gathered together in a home on Bonnie Brae Street is incredible. There is something significant about seeking God together with friends and inviting Him to invade even the intimate spaces of family.

Revival begins and is sustained in family

In this next era, Christianity will burst from the seams of churches, communities, homes, families, and intimate spaces and be carried over into the world. The Sunday morning worship celebrations will be important to testify and share more widely about what God is doing in the city, the region, and the world. The place of intimacy and connection will also need to be cultivated in smaller communities as more people enter into the family of God.

Being intentional with community will be an important factor in stewarding this next move of God like it was for those at Azusa. Doing life together with a small tribe of our people will be an important aspect of stewarding and discipling this incoming harvest. Staying known in a close-knit community with others who burn for Jesus is a key for sustaining revival and finishing well. Evan Roberts, a prominent leader of the Welsh Revival, isolated himself many times from community, and the revival died down shortly after. Healing evangelist Kathryn Kuhlman got herself into some marital trouble when she wouldn’t listen to her friends. Cultivating healthy community is important for continuing to burn—and to not burn out.

Preparing to Steward the Next Great Awakening

In the wild, no matter how strong a zebra is, if it is away from the pack when the lions come, it gets picked off and killed. It’s not the weakest that fall; it’s the ones who stray from their tribe. We need each other to fulfill our truest destiny. We can’t do it alone. There are keys to our destiny that are hidden within the lives and hearts of those whom God has positioned us to run with in each season. The way to access these keys in each other is to intentionally do life together, be vulnerable, love each other well, and go after the things of God together.

As we begin to go after praying for stadiums full of people being saved, at the same time, we need to realize the importance of going deeper with the few. We can only go deep with a handful of people at one time. Jesus had the twelve, but then He also had Peter, James, and John, with John as His most intimate friend. They lived together, traveled together, ate together, ministered together, and did life together.

There is something important about doing life together in God’s presence. Close community was crucial to the beginnings of the Azusa Street Revival just as it was for Jesus in His ministry. Homes represent intimate spaces of family and deep friendships. It’s easy to blend in with the crowd in larger settings and slip out without really letting anyone in. People can’t hide or avoid the deeper things of the heart in a home or small community.

The keys to our destiny are found in intimacy with Jesus and in family

Examples in history of this include the Moravian community in Herrnhut, Germany which started the 24/7 prayer movement and also those in the Jesus People Movement who opened community houses for the new believers to name a few. Family hosts the fire of God in a greater way than an individual can do alone.

I wonder what it would look like to invite God into the home in a greater measure today. What does it look like to cultivate a burning fire within the context of family? And what might be the potential effects for the world when that happens? What does it look like in our ministries or churches to become family, to do life together, to be present in intimate places and spaces with people? How can we cultivate that in this season?

I encourage you to ask God to highlight a few people in your life right now who you can pursue deeper connection with. Then, I challenge you this week to take a risk, be bold and courageous, and pursue deeper connection and vulnerability with at least one person highlighted to you. Watch and see what God wants to do in your midst in and through your community.

As your fire for Jesus burns even brighter, I pray that you would burn with other burning ones and that God would place you in family and in covenant relationships so that you are known, loved, championed, and never alone.

*Copyrighted material, excerpt taken from Ignite Azusa: Positioning for a New Jesus Revolution by Jennifer A. Miskov with Heidi Baker, Lou Engle, and Bill Johnson (2016)

by Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D.

On this significant day in history, I want to introduce you to someone who has impacted my life tremendously. Though I have never personally met her, Carrie Judd Montgomery (1858-1946) has acted as a spiritual mother, kindred spirit, and beautiful pioneering friend along my journey. My life has been radically changed because of her yeses again and again over the years and I would not be where I am today without the deposit I received from Carrie Judd Montgomery.

It is quite fascinating how we met in the first place. Around 2005-2006 I was being drawn to England to pursue deeper studies. I wanted to study revivals and create a theology of living effectively through them. I wanted to learn how to burn for Jesus in all seasons and for that fire to continue burning stronger the older I got without burning out. When I took the leap of faith to move to England in 2007, I remember reading a small paragraph in my professor’s book about a woman I had never heard of before called Carrie Judd Montgomery. As I dug a little deeper, I realized that this pioneering woman preacher who had a powerful healing ministry was never researched beyond a master’s thesis twenty years before. I was drawn to her story any decided to dive in to research and recover it for today doing my entire Ph.D. on her life and ministry. I find it so much like God to send me from California all the way over to England just to discover a forgotten healing revivalist named Carrie Judd Montgomery who opened the earliest healing homes in our nation and made her base in California. I am so thankful that God allowed me to intersect with Carrie because I am forever changed, inspired, and impacted.

Her radical obedience to pioneer one of the first healing homes in our nation in 1882 at 23 years old with only a few month’s rent turned into healing homes being inspired across the nation. Eventually through her move to the West Coast, she also opened The Home of Peace in 1893 which is still there to this day. When God was leading me to a house on Placer street in Redding, California is February of 2012, Carrie’s courage and testimony ignite faith in me to step into birthing what would later become known as Destiny House. I had only one month’s rent to my name and it my situation felt impossible but I was encouraged in the Lord when I remembered Carrie’s testimony. If she could do it, then I believed I could also trust in God in a radical way too.

Carrie taught me how to live above the storms. She taught me the difference between operating in relation to truth versus facts. She taught me how to be led of the Spirit, not by my circumstances. What God begins, He will complete (Philippians 1:6). If God initiates something, He will sort out all of the details as we step out in faith to follow Him. If God calls me to go on a missions’ trip and I have no money in the bank, I learned from Carrie to set my heart on the promises of God and put my feet to stepping out in faith as I am led by the Spirit. Too many times I had made decisions based upon my circumstances. She taught me how to be led of the Spirit, not of circumstances. Carrie taught me to make decisions not based on facts, but upon the truth of God.

Another thing that marks me about Carrie’s life was her sustaining and deepening hunger for more of God. Even after she had a successful healing ministry, at the age of fifty, during the same time as the Azusa Street Revival, Carrie was open and hungry to step into the new move of God in her day. No matter how weird this new move of God looked, she was willing to risk her reputation to take hold of all that God had for her. Even after she was baptized in the Spirit and spoke in tongues, her hunger to encounter God in a deeper measure continued to increase. No matter what experiences or encounters she had in her past, if God was doing a new thing, she was willing to dive in.

She also taught me what it looks like to choose unity and relationships above dividing over minor doctrinal issues. Regardless of whether or not some of her friends spoke in tongues during the rise of early American Pentecostalism, that did not inhibit or deter Carrie from continuing to journey with these friends to advance the kingdom of God together. She chose friendship above denominational lines. She even got kicked out of churches not only because she was a woman preacher but also because she spoke to African Americans as well as spoke the unpopular message of healing at the time.

The reason today February 26, 2020 is so special is because it’s the 141st anniversary of Carrie’s miraculous healing (Feb. 26, 1879). Every year on this day, Carrie would remember and celebrate the anniversary of her healing by recounting the story and giving God thanks. In fact, her stewardship of her testimony was catalytic to shift Evangelicalism from believing God wanted people to endure suffering with a good attitude to the truth that God wants to and heals today. So on this special anniversary of Carrie’s miraculous healing, may you be encouraged to know the goodness of God in a deeper way and may you be inspired, just as I have, by a life well lived in complete surrender to Jesus.

To learn more about Carrie’s story, check out this mini-biography of her life which includes links to other free and original writings by Carrie as well or see the other resources below.

by Jennifer A. Miskov, Ph.D.

Confessions of a Revival Historian

For the last decade, I have heard so many beautiful people talk about how they want a to be a part of a “Nameless Faceless” revival generation. While I love the heart behind this in that everyone gets to do “the stuff” (signs, wonders, and miracles) and that we are all seeking to make the name of Jesus famous, when I read the Bible, I don’t see a nameless faceless revival generation. I read about Moses, Joshua, Caleb, David, Ruth, Naomi, Elijah, Paul, Peter, Mary, and others who have both a name and a face who have answered the call on their lives.

In every move of God I’ve studied from the Reformation to the Great Awakening to the Healing Movement to the Welsh Revival to the Azusa Street Revival, I discover leaders like Martin Luther, John Wesley, Carrie Judd Montgomery, Evan Roberts, William J. Seymour, Aimee Semple McPherson and other heroes of the faith. These are the names of those who were appointed by God to lead their generation into its prophetic destiny. In each revival throughout history I have studied, there are people God raises up and anoints to lead, steward, and inspire a generation to step into their destiny. These leaders have a name and a face.

Each one of these leaders who partnered with seeing revival in their day had to at first say yes to answering His call. Even though they were imperfect, felt unworthy, and many times were afraid to lead, they stepped through their fears to be obedient. Their devotion to God was greater than their fear; they overcame their insecurities to walk in obedience. The fact that we know their stories of both triumphs and failures gives us hope that we too can step into all that God has for us.

In each generation, there are some (though not all) who have a special anointing upon their life for leadership and spiritual mothering and fathering. These are ones that God is entrusting with influencing their generations as they partner with the Holy Spirit to steward the move of God in their day. We need to know these people by name. We need to see their faces and understand their rhythms of life. We need to pray for them. Paul said to imitate him as he imitated Christ. In the same way, we need leaders in our lives that we can learn from (1 Corinthians 11:1; Hebrews 13:7).

One of the reasons I believe the terminology around a Nameless Faceless revival generation can be damaging if not understood in the proper context is because it can hold back born leaders from stepping into the leadership influence they are destined for. This thinking if misunderstood can cripple set apart ones from arising and shining and becoming the people God has intended them to be. If we embrace a nameless and faceless generation terminology without understanding the heart behind it in that everyone gets to do the stuff, it can potentially contribute to absolving the need of leaders to take responsibility. Even though it’s all about Jesus and everyone is carrying the revival together, even in this it’s important for each one to take their place and for some to step into their God ordained leadership influence rather than partner with fear of step on each other’s toes. If there’s hesitation or reluctance of leaders stepping up and being the gift they were born to be we run the risk of losing momentum.

We can’t afford to let fear or false humility hold us back from stepping into what we are born for and our God given assignments. We are called to prepare, position ourselves, partner together, and steward what God pours out in our lives and in our generation for the purpose of making Jesus famous. And some are called by God to lead. Leading is all about laying our lives down in service for the people God has entrusted us to influence. We lead, not to make a name for ourselves, but to partner with Heaven to see God’s kingdom come. I want to see a JESUS REVOLUTION take place in our day where everyone plays their parts all for the glory of King Jesus.

Saying Yes

Personally, I used to struggle to realize that I was a leader because I wanted it to all be about Jesus, not about me. It took years and some friends to speak into my life to help open my eyes to the fact that I was being used by God to help influence many into greater depths of God’s heart.

I didn’t want there to be any attention on myself, only Jesus, so I thought maybe it would be better if I just hid back in some corner and tried to disappear. I worked so hard to be invisible and to not step into the leadership influence entrusted to me. Then I realized that trying to be like Moses by “putting a veil over my face” and hiding the glory upon my life takes a lot of work. Hiding a bright light doesn’t really work and it just gets really awkward to all present. I came to the point in my life where even though I felt insecure, not worthy, and for sure did not feel like the most anointed one to lead, I realized that God had entrusted me with something special that He was appointing me to steward. I realized that whether I felt adequate or not, I needed to trust and obey God more, even if that meant stepping out to lead what I felt so unworthy of.

Sometimes I think that in extreme self-sacrifice where we surrender everything for the sake of trying not to make a name for ourselves, we can sometimes sabotage the influence God’s called us to steward for the sake of His glory. Or at least that’s a struggle I’ve had to face time and time again.

A few years ago, I remember the time I was with a friend in Texas doing a pre-meeting for a small stadium event. During this meeting, several pastors from the region were on the stage preaching their hearts out, very loudly and with great charisma. I was in the back of the room, bombarded with so many lies of the enemy and insecurities. I was questioning what I was doing there and was feeling so small and insignificant. One of the pastors was speaking about how we need to “kill the goliaths” in front of us. I was ready to respond to the call because I felt the “giants” were taking me down and I needed victory. When I went up toward the front for that altar call, the pastor saw that I was there and directed me to pray for those who had come up. Then something immediately shifted. I was awakened to remember who I was and why I was there in the first place. I started praying for people and was reminded that I was a leader who God had entrusted to come on this ministry trip to support what He was doing there. 

Then after several of the leaders had spoken, some even marching around the church waving a flag and “stomping out the devil,” I remember thinking, I really don’t want to speak, I have nothing to say, I am nothing like these crazy Texans (but oh how I love them!). Then one of the leaders invited me to the stage to share. I knew at that moment that I had a decision to make. Would I believe the lies of insignificance or would I say yes to the invitation to speak? I realized in that moment that regardless of how inadequate I felt, it was God who was making space for me and giving me the microphone. So I said yes.  

Then I had another decision to make. Would I try to be like all of the other vibrant preachers who stepped on the stage full of excitement with great charisma, or would I just be the unique gift that I am which I know would look different. I chose in that moment to trust that if they had invited me to the stage, I would just be me. So I took the microphone and walked to the middle of the platform. I got down on my knees and in a gentle way welcomed the Holy Spirit to come. I waited on the Lord and asked for a fresh baptism of the Father’s love to descend upon the people. Then the whole atmosphere shifted. It became silent in the room and people began to weep. There was a beautiful outpouring of God’s deep healing and purifying fire released in the room. God moved in a special and unique way. Even though all of our styles of ministry were so different, because we were unified as the body of Christ, everything flowed and fit together so beautifully.

SHINE
So to my friends and pioneers alike who feel insecure, unworthy, unseen, inadequate, ill-equipped, and afraid to stand out from the crowd to lead, I have a word of encouragement for you. It’s not about you or whether you are good enough or not. It’s about simple obedience to answer the call of God and to trust Him to be your Protector.  

“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.” Matthew 5:14-16 (NIV) 

“Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, ‘children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.’ Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the word of life.” Philippians 2:14-16 (NIV)

You are born to shine. And some of you are born to shine by a being a leader.

God is commissioning some of you reading this right now to be generals and spiritual mothers and fathers in this new wave of revival, not for your own glory but for the glory of King Jesus. If you feel you have an anointing upon your life to lead, don’t be afraid to arise and shine. This generation needs you to be fully consecrated and set apart for every assignment God has commissioned you to step into (Ephesians 2:10). By leading your generation into more of God’s presence and power, many will be inspired to fall more in love with Jesus. By fully being the leader you are destined to be, God gets greater glory.

As you step through fear and focus on His face, I pray you come to realize that you too have a face and a name which are both so significant to God (Exodus 33:7, 1 Samuel 3, Isaiah 43:1, 49:1; John 10:3). The incoming harvest is great and each person needs to take their rightful place to steward what’s coming and already upon us. Life is too short and the price Jesus paid is too costly to not become all that He has created you to be today. You are a unique gift to this world. It’s time to come out of hiding. Now is your time. Shine on!

“Rise up and shine, for your light has come. The shining-greatness of the Lord has risen upon you. For see, darkness will cover the earth. Much darkness will cover the people. But the Lord will rise upon you, and His shining-greatness will be seen upon you.” Isaiah 60:1-2 (NLV) 

Hello, my name is Jen.

I have a face and I am born for revival.

It’s nice to meet you.

What’s your name? and what are you born for?  

*To get equipped, receive impartation, be released into even more of your calling, and partner with stewarding the incoming harvest, check out our School of Pioneering Revival.