Chapter 3, Matthew chapter 3.
As we're getting over there, let me just
remind you of some of the things that
we've laid out so far.
We've seen that revival presupposes declension, that revival
means that some sort of death or backsliding
or complacency or worldliness has set in, that
something is substandard.
If you look at the ministry of Jesus,
there was never a time in his own
personal ministry where revival was needed, because he
was continually, 100% of the time, walking
in the fullness of the Spirit.
He didn't wane, he didn't go up or
down and need to be revived.
There was no spiritual death that ever set
in in his life.
But in terms of the history of the
body, there are times when the glory fades,
there are times when the reality of the
Spirit disappears, there are times of complacency and
lukewarmness.
And in times like that, even when you
begin to experience something real, you share it
with other people and they're like, no, no,
can't be, I don't believe it.
That skepticism is there.
You also remember that revival brings a revelation
of the holiness of God and the sinfulness
of man.
Remember those two things for everything else we're
going to talk about from here on in
tonight.
Remember first that revival presupposes a backslidden, fallen
state, that presupposes a subpar state of some
kind.
We went into that at great length.
And then remember the revelation of God that
comes with revival, the fact that revival sets
things right.
And that's a subject we'll take up at
a later time.
Matthew 3 is the text we're going to
start with, but we're going to talk first
tonight about revival preaching and repentance.
Revival preaching and repentance.
First Matthew chapter 3.
In those days, John the baptizer, the immerser,
came preaching in the desert of Judea and
saying, repent for the kingdom of heaven is
near.
Interestingly, this is the same message that Yeshua
begins with in Mark's gospel.
The kingdom of God is here.
God's power, God's kingdom, God's reign has arrived
in the person of the Messiah.
Repent and believe the good news.
Now speaking of John, this is he who
was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah, a
voice of one calling in the desert, prepare
the way for the Lord, make straight paths
for him.
Now, verse five, people went out to him
from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole
region of the Jordan confessing their sins.
They were baptized by him in the Jordan
River.
But when he saw many of the Pharisees
and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing,
he said to them, you brood of vipers
who warned you to flee from the coming
wrath, produce fruit in keeping with repentance.
And do not think you can say to
yourselves, we have Abraham as our father.
I tell you that out of these stones,
God can raise up children for Abraham.
The axes are ready at the root of
the trees and every tree that does not
produce good fruit will be cut down and
thrown into the fire.
I baptize you with water for repentance, but
after me will come one who is more
powerful than I, whose sandals I am not
fit to carry.
He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit
and with fire.
His winnowing fork is in his hand and
he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his
wheat into the barn and burning up the
chaff with unquenchable fire.
Revival preaching is different than other preaching and
teaching that goes on in the normal life
of a body.
Revival preaching does not consist of building people
up in the area of family life, strengthening
them in terms of general godly behavior and
their witness at work.
It's not dealing with helping them to develop
a regular devotional time and prayer in the
word.
It's not specifically there to get people to
tithe and things.
All these things can be touched on, but
it's not just your regular teaching, building community,
building a vision.
Revival preaching is coming either to bring about
revival.
God is stirring.
God is shaking.
There's been prayer and intercession and travail.
There's been a recognition of the people of
God that something is wrong and God begins
to raise up his messengers to begin to
speak and bring forth that word.
So the word is being addressed to those
who are not in the right state.
And as we saw pretty simply, the whole
American body is not in the right state.
The messianic movement is not in the right
state.
The charismatic movement is not in the right
state.
There's a shaking, a large wholesale shaking that
God is performing and is wanting to bring
on in a greater and greater degree of
intensity.
So revival preaching is addressed to people who
are in that particular state or else revival
preaching is in the midst of revival.
Those people are now being stirred and pushed
and challenged until that thing is taken full
hold.
This message comes forth.
Now John here is preaching to people to
prepare the way for the coming of the
Lord.
Prepare for the Messiah's coming.
Things were not right.
Things needed to get right.
What do you need?
You need a revival preacher.
You need revival preaching.
You need a revival message.
And I want you to understand some of
the aspects of revival preaching.
Why repentance is such a central theme and
as you understand these things, number one, it
will enable you to to let God speak
to you personally in these ways without thinking
that you're some terrible sinner.
It'll enable the Spirit of God to begin
to wake you up and preach to you
individually.
It'll also enable you to receive from people
who have this burning revival fire message because
otherwise you may get scandalized by it.
Otherwise you might have a problem with it.
Otherwise you might judge the messenger or judge
the message.
But when you recognize it's in the heat
of revival flame, all of a sudden you
start to think differently.
And lastly, God may put a word in
your heart to begin to bring and you
can't understand it.
Don't know how you have the right to
bring it forth.
But you realize it's that revival word.
It's that revival fire.
God wants you to share it wherever you
have the opportunity.
Well, let me say some things then about
revival preaching.
Revival preaching is filled with divine fire.
It is God shouting aloud with all his
might.
It's a prophetic cry to repent, revealing sin,
demolishing strongholds, searching out every hiding place and
exposing man's universal guilt in the sight of
a holy God.
Listen to that again.
Revival preaching is filled with divine fire.
It is God shouting aloud with all his
might.
God told the prophet Isaiah chapter 58 verse
1 that he should cry aloud literally with
his throat, with a full throat, not hold
back, lift up his voice like a shofar,
like a trumpet blast and declare to Jacob
his transgression into Israel, his sin.
Micah the third chapter in the eighth verse,
almost the identical words.
The prophet says that he's filled with the
spirit, with power, with the might of the
Lord.
Why?
To declare to Jacob his transgression into Israel,
his sin.
That blast, that explosion, that Amos could say
the lion has roared, who can but fear
the Lord God has spoken, who can but
prophesy, that push, that urgency from God.
God's shouting out a message that must be
heard.
You have to remember when revival comes, it's
coming because there is either an urgent need
or a great blessing on the horizon and
normally a combination of both.
If revival doesn't come, a society will deteriorate
to the point that it'll be utterly wiped
out.
If revival doesn't come in a backslidden state
of the body, more and more reproach will
accrue to the name of the Lord and
unbelief and hardness will settle in among God's
people.
And if a revival does come, the blessing,
eternal blessing that can come to literally millions
of people.
Blessing is more than we could describe.
So there's an urgency, there's an intensity to
revival.
Revival preaching is filled with divine fire.
It is God's shouting aloud with all his
might.
Is it?
It is a prophetic cry to repent.
Why is it a prophetic cry to repent?
Well, I wrote a little question and answer
thing for a new part of Sid Roth
sharing Yeshua Bible.
And the question was, do Jews need to
repent?
And first thing I dealt with the meaning
of the word repent, and I'll talk about
that a little bit more later, to turn
back, to turn away from sin, to turn
back to God.
And I said, well, the prophets always told
Israel to turn back, to repent, but do
Jews need to repent today?
And I said, yes, they do for four
reasons.
And the reasons basically were Jews are members
of the human race, all human beings sin,
sin is turning away from God, whoever turns
away needs to turn back.
So if the state of the body is
that it has turned away from its state
of glory, turned away from holiness, turned away
from devotion to God, turned away from the
supremacy of Jesus in the midst of its
services, turned away for a pure and wholehearted
devotion to souls, turned away from holiness and
all its implications, then it needs to turn
back.
So revival preaching is always going to have
that prophetic word, repent, turn back.
It's going to reveal sin.
It's going to demolish strongholds.
It's going to search out every hiding place
and expose man's universal guilt in the sight
of a holy God.
Now when Finney was telling people how to
preach the gospel, again Finney was someone who
understood how to preach the gospel and he
got results with it.
And bear in mind a lot of the
preaching that we hear today under no circumstances
will do any of the things I just
mentioned.
It will not bring people to repent.
It won't reveal sin.
It won't demolish strongholds.
It won't search out hiding places.
People can come in full of sin, get
blessed and leave full of sin and be
confirmed by the message too.
So Finney says preaching should be direct.
In his revival lectures, page 223, the gospel
should be preached to men and not about
men.
The minister must address us here is he
must preach to them about themselves and not
leave the impression that he is preaching to
them about others.
He will never do them any good further
than he succeeds in convincing each individual that
he is the person in question.
Another very important thing to be regarded in
preaching is that the minister should hunt after
sinners and Christians wherever they may have entrenched
themselves in inaction.
It is not the design of preaching to
make men easy and quiet but to make
them act.
One revival preacher last century would never close
his meetings with a hymn because he felt
that it took the cutting edge of the
word off.
And how many times has there been the
divine sword?
I mean as if the hand of God
reached down and took that sword and pierced
into your heart and you knew you had
to go out of there and you couldn't
eat lunch and you couldn't eat dinner and
you had to fast and pray or you
knew you had to go out of there
and you had to make things right with
your brother who you hadn't talked to in
ten years or you knew that you had
to go out of there and confront your
boss at work and tell him to take
down the porno stuff from off the wall.
You knew I mean there was conviction and
that sword was right in there and then
someone either came along with a comforting assuring
word about the goodness of God and how
blessed he is just where we are or
else closed with a song that just lifted
all convictions so everybody could leave happy.
Well we always leave happy we do we
leave most all of our meetings happy unless
you're my wife she leaves almost every meeting
on the verge of total breakdown and tears
because of being grieved for how much more
God wants to do and never seems to
get to do so many times.
But I mean most time we leave happy
we leave up we leave cheered we leave
encouraged well where is the conviction that was
supposed to drive us to our knees well
we had to lift the people so we
can have the same big crowd back next
time and have someone to keep ministering to.
Let me just give you another word from
Finney here he says it is of great
importance that the sinner he's talking about the
unsaved person primarily here that the sinner should
be made to feel his guilt and not
left to the impression that he is unfortunate.
I think this is a very prevalent fault
particularly in books on the subject they are
calculated to make the sinner think more of
his sorrows than of his sins and feel
that his state is rather unfortunate than criminal
a prime object which with the preacher must
be to make present obligation felt the impression
is not commonly made by ministers in their
preaching that sinners are expected to repent now
does the Holy Spirit when striving with the
sinner make the impression upon his mind that
he is not expected to obey now.
Of course not.
Sinners ought to be made to feel that
they have something to do and that is
to repent that it is something which no
other being can do for them either God
or man and something which they can do
and do now ministers should never rest satisfied
until they have annihilated every excuse of sinners
make the sinner see that all please an
excuse for not submitting to God are acts
of rebellion against him.
Tear away the last lie which he grasped
in his hand and make him feel that
he is absolutely condemned before God.
Sinners should be made to feel that if
they now grieve away the spirit of God
it is very probable they will be lost
forever.
There is infinite danger of this.
Well you understand how some of these revivals
tens of thousands of people got saved a
week because they knew they had to be
saved now and if they didn't get saved
now they'd be lost forever because he confronted
them.
That's a very definite aspect of revival preaching.
Revival preaching is not skin deep.
A lot of times we like things superficial
as long as they don't affect our lives.
When's the last time that God challenged your
whole overall orientation in God?
Something he's been bringing to my attention recently.
When I was first saved it was absolute
total complete upheaval of everything from outward appearance
to habits to inward attitudes to speech.
Everything had to be turned topsy-turvy upside
down right side out inside whatever was you
know just turn around I didn't know what
was going on it was just so massive
one thing after another after another.
Then we're saved for a period of time
and we just kind of bottom out.
Now listen the challenge to change to conform
to grow to repent to get right to
be holy should be just as intense now
as when we were first saved and I
can't believe that most children of God have
been moving so aggressively so persistently so doggedly
forward in God that God does not have
to challenge them and shake them periodically.
In other words I don't believe that people
have been running their fastest their hardest all
along that all God's saying is keep it
up keep it up.
Whitfield who was known to be a ceaseless
laborer he preached 40 to 60 hours a
week for something like 30 straight years.
I mean phenomenal types of figures.
The fact is that Whitfield wrote to his
friends and said please don't write me and
say slow down.
He says don't write to a vile sluggard
like me and say slow down he says
write to me and say wake up for
your soul's sake man wake up and get
on with the work.
What I'm saying is when's the last time
you were challenged by God your whole orientation
in God.
When's the last time you were challenged to
put the flesh down.
When's the last time you were challenged I
mean consistently and called into something.
See we've gotten at ease in Zion we've
become at home and serving God.
Something's wrong something's off something's funny they're serving
God's never convenient.
Revival preaching comes and it stirs the heart.
It challenges people what are you doing with
all your finances while people are dying.
When's the last time we thought of that.
What are you doing eating every day.
You know what are you doing watching television.
You can be on your face praying.
What are you doing with neighbors next to
you that haven't heard the gospel yet and
you're going out to play golf.
I mean that's the type of challenge that
we'd be hearing as God's revival fires burn.
Revival preaching is not skin deep rather it
pierces to the heart leaving man nowhere to
go but to his knees.
I had an experience several years ago in
intercession where I was confronted with what I
thought was such a horrible horrible burden that
I tried to just back out of it
because I felt that this couldn't be the
leading of the spirit.
The thing that was going on was too
intense too overwhelming.
I thought it couldn't be the leading of
the spirit and the whole scenario that God
laid out why I had to pray like
this.
I couldn't believe that it was God.
So what exactly do you mean.
There was a man that God had me
praying for and God told me that this
man was sinning for this and such reasons
and because of that I had to take
on this burden of intercession that was just
overwhelming and frightening and I was trying to
argue it out with God at two or
three in the morning.
This long ordeal in prayer trying to argue
it out and say but it can't be
Lord this can't be you it can't be
right because thus and such because of this
because I tried to argue with God the
only time in my life ever did that
and every argument I would bring to God
there was just an overwhelming shoot a door
shut in my face the answer of God
came whatever whatever I finally standing by my
bookcases about 315 in the morning I finally
had my ultimate flaw and what God was
saying I finally found where what he said
was wrong and I said this man is
not a disobedience because you're the one that
told them that he was supposed to be
moving in this direction it was my last
way out and I remember when the Spirit
just said so clearly I never told him
to leave he wanted out I said you
want to go go but it wasn't my
will and I was just confronted I mean
there was nowhere to go it was it
was a it was an overwhelming experience there
was no way out I was arguing against
God you know the kind of way that
Job felt with everything he came there was
an answer there was an answer there was
an answer and you see most of the
time we have a way out somewhere in
our theology there's a loophole when conviction really
gets hot and heavy when it feels like
the way it didn't we were first saved
by all man I blew it or all
I've got to change that radically Lord yes
somehow we've made a little theological loophole that
can just get us out the back door
before the conviction gets too overwhelming you follow
what I'm saying if you like what I'm
saying see when that word comes in the
midst of the flames of revival people either
have to repent or disobey but there's no
way out anymore revival preaching hurts before it
heals quote I had read a couple of
classes back but I want to read it
again winky Pratt and he refers to the
words of James Burns says revival is not
the easy and glorious thing many think it
to be who imagine it fills the pews
and reinstates the church in power and authority
it comes to scorch before it heals it
comes to condemn ministers and people for their
unfaithful witness for their selfish living for their
neglect of the cross and to call them
to daily renunciation to an evangelical poverty into
a deep and daily consecration then on the
heels of that you see the glory of
God Jeremiah wept cried was burdened was overwhelmed
because he said in Jeremiah 614 and then
repeated it in the eighth chapter that the
false prophets superficially treated the fracture of his
people the most literal way to translate it
they superficially treated the fracture of his people
saying all is well all is well when
nothing was well revival preaching says you're going
to die without major surgery you're going to
die without a heart transplant but you see
if the people will put themselves under God's
knife they'll live if they'll put themselves under
God's life they'll be healed and they'll live
for years they'll live for decades and the
work will live for centuries and the reason
we don't see a deeper lasting change in
people is because they aren't willing to totally
submit to the divine knife that's what happens
in revival God gets deeper the sword pierces
harder the conviction gets more intense you get
cornered there's no way out and real true
lasting repentance comes as a result of that
so the preaching will hurt before it heals
but the results will last a lifetime people
who have been changed have been changed to
the core they have been changed to the
gut there is something so deep that is
shaken in them that it's very difficult to
get them off course for the rest of
their lives now let me say this on
the flip side revival preaching is not merely
bringing a hard or negative message there are
plenty of people that love to preach a
hard message and it's just because they're hard
people or they preach hard messages because they
think it's more anointed or they do it
because they have a chip on their shoulder
just preaching a hard message or a negative
message does not necessarily have anything to do
with the Spirit of God nor anything at
all to do with revival there was a
fellow one time that I was talking to
and he he had spoken at some women's
meeting and a couple of my friends had
heard him and they were saying to me
boy he just really seems like a prophet
and I just got the sense I just
think he's negative maybe there's some prophetic call
on him but the real sense I have
is he's just primarily negative well when he
came over to talk to me we started
sharing some things and you know he said
that his message was not being heard in
the churches as he told people to throw
out their televisions and things like that and
I said well does God's life come with
your message what happens as a result of
your preaching well not much was happening as
a result of it God's power was not
changing people's lives well for good reason his
message wasn't being accepted even if it was
a good thing for a lot of the
people to throw out their televisions that wasn't
the issue the issue was it was just
a negative message I mean anybody could get
up any time and have an altar full
of condemned people I mean it's easy just
show how off course we are just show
what it means just show how Paul lived
and compare our lives to it it's easy
to point out people's sins and false doing
that is not in and of itself revival
preaching or helpful or good or of the
Spirit anymore than telling people how great they
are as of the Spirit so it's not
merely bringing a hard or negative message there
there are some qualifications for it in fact
let me give you four qualifications I said
it's not merely bringing a hard and negative
message but it must have four specific qualities
first it must be divinely empowered it must
be divinely empowered there must be an anointing
on the word there's a tremendous difference between
getting up I take your notes the Spirit
of God's on you but I get up
and I take your notes and I preach
them verbatim with your same articulation and with
your same body motions and with your same
emphasis and everything else and nothing happens and
then you get up and preach that same
message and everyone's on their faces crying and
weeping because the anointing was on you there
must be a divine empowering if it's really
revival preaching it means it's heaven-sent it
means it's in dude with the life of
God it means it's God's Word soaring on
to meet God's destiny it's being brought to
a powerful fulfillment in the Spirit there must
be a divine empowerment there's no logical way
to explain why some revival preaching had such
stirring shaking overwhelming effects on the ears of
the hearers on the hearts of the hearers
there's no logical explanation you read some of
the messages and I'd get up and preaching
some of them are you have the whole
thing written out and there's just no explanation
why did it bring people to their knees
sure it was a good word sure it
was a direct word sure it was a
clear word but what was it it was
the power of God upon that message there's
something different yes there's a general quality of
revival preaching Finney walked in that general quality
all his life because he was a revivalist
he had that anointing others may have that
anointing to bring that stirring shaking word on
fire but it's when it's in the midst
of revival or or coming to the birthing
of a real revival there's that added intensity
and that added urgency because the person has
heard that blast from heaven and it's it's
raging in their ears and all they can
do is proclaim the word and it's been
bathed in hours and hours of prayer and
weeping before God there must be a divine
empowering and second the message must be motivated
by passion for the glory of God and
compassion for a hurting world the message must
be motivated by passion for the glory of
God and compassion for a hurting world a
lot of times things are just harsh I
don't mean the tone of voice because tone
of voices that's a subjective thing there are
some people I've heard on tape and it's
like oh you cringe and then you see
him in person and when the voice is
put with the with the vessel it's like
oh it's fine and you remember boy they
said it's so harsh and here they're just
like a friendly little guy or sweet woman
so tone of voice you can't really tell
and mannerisms but sometimes it's just a harshness
it just doesn't ring true because the heart
is not really desperate for the glory of
God because the heart is is not crying
out for the lostness of this race so
there's got to be that heart passion for
the Lord and that that heart filled with
compassion for hurting world and three that'll produce
a condition in someone which is a broken
heart the message must come out of a
broken heart I said the heart has to
be filled for the glory of God filled
for the lost and died but what that's
going to produce in someone is brokenness brokenness
brokenness because you'll just see how far off
course we are because you'll just see that
we're not getting the job done we'll just
see that people are being born and living
their lives and dying without God and that
thing will overwhelm us and we'll see how
God's name is being blasphemed and how much
reproach is coming to him and it'll produce
a broken heart so there must be divine
empowering the message must be motivated by passion
for the glory of God and compassion for
hurting world and it must come out of
a broken heart and then for it must
be experiential it must be experiential in other
words you can't give what you don't have
you can't call people to enter into an
experience that you yourself have not experienced that's
why I'm skeptical of people prophesying all wonderful
things over other people that they themselves have
never experienced you're going to raise the dead
you're going to preach to 50,000 at
one time you're going to meet with presidents
and kings and on and on you say
well have you ever done any of those
things no well maybe you can't prophesy over
somebody something you don't have yourself or experience
your touch or glimpse or interact with you
can call you can call the whole world
to repent nothing's going to happen if you
haven't experienced it