...earlier on here, and he calls on the
Jewish people in the regions of Judea to
come and repent.
And what does it say in verse 5
of Matthew 3?
People went out to him from Jerusalem and
all Judea and the whole region of the
Jordan.
They came from everywhere because he was broken,
because he had repented, because God had put
him through the mill.
Just think, just think of knowing that your
whole mission in life is to announce the
coming of your younger cousin, and then as
soon as everybody follows him, you're a done.
You tell me there's not some flesh that
has to die in the process of that?
Whatever else it took for John to just
have no fear of man and confronts it
head on and realize it might cost him
his life.
God purged him, prepared him supernaturally all those
years.
So John gave what he had, and when
he gave it, he had mass results.
Again, as Wigglesworth said, there's a sense where
there's a price to pay for every gift
from God.
Where if you are not motivated by compassion
to heal the sick, you will never get
to the point of perseverance to see him
really break through.
See, the real things, the crucial things, the
things of great eternal consequence don't just drop
off trees and hit you on the head.
No, glory to God, I just got this.
I just got that.
The real, weighty, life-changing things have to
be poured into lives that have been prepared
and purged and shaken so that the flesh
isn't glorying and raising its head anymore.
So revival preaching must be experiential.
You say, well, what does revival preaching sound
like, or what are some examples, or how
did it affect the hearers?
Well, there was a 15th century Italian priest
who was kind of a pre-reformer.
In other words, he was involved in Reformation
a little bit before the Reformation, called Savonarola.
Listen to a description of his preaching.
The mere sound of Savonarola's voice, I'm reading
from Winky Pratt in page 26.
The mere sound of Savonarola's voice was as
a clap of doom.
A cold shiver ran through the marrow of
his bones.
The hairs of his head stood on end
as he listened.
Another tells how his sermons caused such terror
and alarm, such sobbing and tears, that people
passed through the streets without speaking, more dead
than alive, as he prophesied coming judgment on
the church and the country.
I mean, you just think of how many
unsaved people put on television and radio and
listened to our so-called evangelists preach.
Some of them are genuine evangelists, some are
just names that they were given, okay?
Evangelists, so-and-so, just a title that
you get in churches.
But just think of how many people listen
to those things.
I know a woman very well, related to
someone very close to me.
And she, for years, would pray, go gambling
in Atlantic City, and then take a tithe
of her earnings and send them to one
of the leading televangelists of our day.
And one who seemed to have the strongest
message of repentance, too.
Something doesn't compute there.
Something's funny there.
Listen to this description of Finney.
And I'm going to give you a couple
of descriptions of what people felt like when
Finney preached.
In the back of a book about Finney,
it says, When he opened his mouth, he
was aiming a gun.
When he spoke, bombardment began.
And listen to some eyewitness accounts and some
people who were exposed to his ministry and
how they described it.
Just try and picture this, all right?
Remember, Finney's about 6'2", maybe 175 pounds,
sharp eye, shrill voice.
One said of Finney that his words were
logic on fire, crashing through his listeners like
cannonballs through a basket of eggs.
Another description.
Finney is talking about one time as he
was preaching.
There'd been much prayer that prepared the atmosphere
of the Holy Spirit.
He said, For more than an hour, and
perhaps for an hour and a half, the
Word of God came through me to them
in a manner that I could see was
carrying all before it.
It was a fire and a hammer breaking
the rock, and as the sword that was
piercing to the dividing asunder of soul and
spirit.
Listen to what Finney's wife said.
She said, Oh, my dear, though I know
you love me, yet you are terrifying when
the power of God comes upon you.
You stand there like a mighty angel shouting
the gospel and wielding the flashing sword of
judgment.
Revival preaching is God's Word on fire, piercing
hearts, shaking things up, setting things right, opening
eyes, demolishing excuses, and endued with such an
anointing that it not only brings the conviction,
but it brings into people's hearts the power
to repent and turn and get right with
God.
Now, the central theme of the message is
always going to be repentance.
And if there's any message that's going to
get you in trouble, if you want an
unpopular ministry, then get a word from heaven
called repent and bring it and see what
happens.
Again, assuming you've met those first four conditions,
that there's a divine empowering, your message is
motivated by all these things we mentioned coming
out of a broken heart, and you've experienced
the reality of it.
Listen, so you understand something.
I can preach a message with force because
it gets nailed on me first.
I carry the thing around on the inside
burning and exploding.
It's flattened before God.
By the time I bring it to you,
I'm just telling you what's been burning in
me for days or weeks or sometimes months.
And then when I'm done preaching God says,
well, you're going to preach that and not
step up a little higher the way you
live?
You're going to preach that and not move
even further?
I figure, well, I just incorporate it into
my life.
He says, well, if you challenge them, you've
got to go further.
I'm not claiming to have all these things
working in my life.
All I'm saying is, if you're getting it
from me now, it's because I've gotten it
because it's burning in me because it's part
of me.
I've talked for years about the difference between
truth regurgitated and truth digested.
Most of our truth that we hear in
pulpits and that comes forth in prophetic words
and services is regurgitated truth.
The moment you get it, you just shoot
it right back out.
You hear a teaching and now you regurgitate
it.
You read something in a book, now you
get up and share it with others.
You can't do that.
I don't want to read a book about
how to move in the gifts of the
Spirit and then share that with my group.
But once you've learned how to do it
and experienced it and that truth has been
digested and it's become part of you and
now been incorporated into who you are, now
you can share it.
Until then, you've got no business sharing it.
Unless you're saying, this is what other people
say, let me tell you what they say,
here's the teaching.
But revival preaching's got to be truth digested
and burned deeply into the heart.
So what about this word repent?
Well, who would want to preach the message
repentance if you know that what it means
is it's going to come to you first
and you're going to get purged and shaken
to a deeper dimension than you thought you
needed to be.
But yet the message of repentance is central,
absolutely central to the whole heart of revival
preaching.
Let me give you some reasons why and
give you some perspective on principles of repentance
and revival.
Again, understand that the basic concept is a
Hebraic concept.
The meaning of shuv is to turn, turn
back.
It can mean turn away from your sin.
When God would say to the people, shuvah
adai, turn to Me, He meant turn away
from your sins and turn back to Me.
And then He would say, I will turn
to you.
What did He mean?
I will turn away from my anger and
I will turn back to you in mercy.
The simple way to say it is when
man repents, God relents.
When man repents, God relents.
That's the heart of the message.
But the preaching of repentance prepares the way
of the Lord.
That's why it's essential in revival to have
the message of repentance.
The preaching of repentance prepares the way of
the Lord.
Isaiah 40 is what's quoted here in Matthew
3 and the other Gospels in terms of
John's ministry.
A voice of one calling in the desert,
prepare the way for the Lord, make straight
paths for Him.
It's joined together also with Malachi, the third
chapter.
We're going to look at both of those
passages in a moment.
So Mark's Gospel starts off in verse 2.
It's written in Isaiah the prophet.
And now he quotes Malachi first.
I will send My messenger ahead of you
who will prepare your way.
And then Isaiah.
A voice of one calling in the desert,
prepare the way for the Lord, make straight
paths for Him.
What does the passage say in Isaiah?
That every valley is going to be lifted
up.
That the mountains are going to be flattened.
That the rough places are going to be
made smooth.
And there's going to be a way for
the Lord to walk through.
What does it say in Malachi?
That the Lord will come suddenly to His
temple.
The messenger of the covenant whom they're seeking.
And He's going to come and sit like
a refining fire and purify the sons of
Levi.
So that they can offer an acceptable sacrifice
to the Lord.
He's going to come and purge and purify.
And sit there with that fire.
God gave me a message for a church
some years ago.
Back in 85.
About a shaking, a purging that was coming
there.
And He basically made plain that Malachi 3
was going to be in operation that night.
The purging, shaking word.
Are you ready for revival?
Is Jesus welcome in your church?
And there was a shaking that was prophesied.
A shaking that was going to take place.
A purging that was going to come.
And then if the people would go with
God.
And following on the heels of that would
be revival.
Some months later when I heard about all
the people that had left.
So quickly.
When I heard about sin being exposed to
the point of in leadership.
One man's wife having an affair with another
woman.
Then I understood the reality of that message.
And the shaking has never stopped since then.
So the preaching of repentance prepares the way
of the Lord.
How so?
Well, it humbles the proud.
It humbles the proud.
Just picture if God is going to walk
right through the center aisle.
And you've got things, obstacles standing in the
way.
We've got to clear it out.
He's got to come through this way.
What if you've got deep holes?
We've got to fill them up.
What if you've got all types of little
obstacles?
What if it's all rough and needs to
be smooth?
We've got to make the way ready.
That's what repentance does.
And if you really want God, you have
to have repentance.
It's that simple.
If you really want God, you have to
have repentance.
And in the words of Frank Bartleman, every
revival is determined by the depth of repentance
to which it reaches.
Let me just give you two exact quotes
from Frank Bartleman.
The depth of any revival will be determined
exactly by the spirit of repentance that it
obtained.
In fact, this is the key.
Emphasis.
The key to every true revival born of
God.
And then he says it again.
The depth of revival will be determined exactly
by the depth of the spirit of repentance.
And this will hold true for all people
at all times.
If you want God, you've got to prepare
the way.
Repentance prepares the way.
It humbles the proud.
It reveals their sin.
It cuts down their haughtiness and gets them
on their knees.
And now they're in a position where they
can receive from God.
Repentance prepares the way for the Lord by
exposing man-made religion.
You come in with that word of repentance
into religious circles and everything goes crazy.
Why?
Because man-made religion is idolatry.
What is idolatry?
Idolatry is when you make anything and then
worship it.
Anything that man makes that he turns around
and worships is an idol.
And most religious systems are idols.
They're made by man.
Because of that, when the word of repentance
comes in, turn back to God.
Let God be God.
Let Him be the Lord of all.
Everything starts to go crazy.
That's the most hated word in the religious
world.
Repent.
Turn back.
Get right with God.
So it humbles the proud.
It exposes man-made religion.
It removes the presence of willful or chronic
sin.
How is God going to come and dwell
in the midst of a sinful people?
Well, what's going to clear it out?
Repent.
Get rid of it.
Turn.
Enough is enough.
What would happen?
What would happen if next week God said,
I am coming in full power to your
service.
Make all things ready.
Don't you think people would just go crazy
that whole week, set accounts right, go ask
forgiveness one of another, clear things out of
their house that didn't belong, fast, you know,
and clear their system out of junk that
shouldn't be here, and just do everything they
had to do.
All of a sudden they'd be running around
like chickens with their heads cut off because
they said, oh no, if God's coming, I'm
in deep trouble.
Well, revival is preparing the way for His
coming.
And it's got to expose all the sin
and the junk.
It also prepares the way by exalting the
humble, brokenhearted ones.
Every valley has to be lifted up.
When the word of repentance comes, those who
just want God, they don't really care about
what others say.
They don't really care about the religious system.
They don't really care about how it looks
on the outside.
They just want God.
And now God can lift up those that
are truly servants and truly desires of His
righteousness.
The question that you have to ask yourself
is how deep will you let revival go?
You've got to understand, once you hear the
message of repentance once or twice, you think
you're done with it.
And when next week someone prophesies it, it
comes out again, you say, oh, come on,
man, we repented last week.
You may think I'm joking, but I'm telling
you.
When God says, you have to repent this
week because the sin from last week is
still there, or you may have repented, but
the 30 people next to you still haven't,
and they need to hear it again, it
gets old.
You don't want to hear it.
It sounds like a downer kind of message.
But until that willful sin is broken, until
that religious pride is humble, until the way
is made clear, the message is going to
come again, and you have to say, how
badly do I want it?
How much am I willing to let God
search me and scrutinize me and flatten me?
If it's true, and I'm sure it is,
that the depth of revival is determined by
the depth of the spirit of repentance it
obtains, then that's the question.
How deep are you willing to let that
knife cut?
I remember at a service, just reminiscing with
a friend about this, he brought a message
at this church that was in the midst
of a real outpouring of the Spirit.
He brought a prophetic word one Sunday morning,
and somebody got so mad he was ready
to punch him in the face, and finally
they calmed the guy down.
And I said to this fellow, when I
saw him a few weeks ago, I said,
what was it that you said?
I really forgot.
I remember the instance.
Yeah, that's right, that's right.
I was glad it was you that day
and not me.
I mean, we were kind of joking.
I said, but what was it you said?
He said, well, we had a guest speaker
that day, and everyone was worshiping and praising
the Lord and singing.
He said, and God just showed me that
they were all doing it to put on
a show for the guest speaker.
And God had this brother bring forth the
word that the Lord was not pleased with
our worship.
Tell us you are pleased.
We don't want to hear that you're not
pleased.
Tell us nice things, prophesize smooth things.
That's what they always told the prophets.
Tell us we can go to war and
we're going to win, not we're going to
go to war and lose.
Jeremiah, tell us that we're going to crush
the Babylonians, not that they're going to crush
us.
Nobody likes to hear it.
I said to some brothers recently, I said,
look, if I told you what God said,
then don't get mad at me.
You know, why did you have to burst
our bubble?
Why did you have to tell us the
truth?
Well, do you want to live or you
want to die?
Do you want to go to heaven or
you want to go to hell?
Do you want to see the power of
God or do you want to see works
of man?
The message is never popular, but the fact
is, without it, God will never come.
But we can't repent of this.
The people will be upset with us.
Well, are you going to fear God or
are you going to fear man?
Now, there's a wonderful quote, just a wonderful,
wonderful quote that I often think about from
Joseph Parker.
And it's such a wonderful quote that it's
written on the piece of paper that I
left at home.
But what he says is this.
In essence, and you've heard it sung in
a song by Keith Green, Leonard Ravenhill popularized
the quote by having it in his book,
Why Revival Tarries.
What he said was real simple.
He said, the man whose little messages repent
sets himself against this age.
And he will be mercilessly battered by the
ones whose moral climate he's challenging.
And then the famous words, you'd better pledge
your head to heaven before you preach that
message.
And you can preach on anything.
Listen, I've been involved in controversy.
But God has shown me real clearly that
the heart reason for the controversy was the
message of repentance, not the other stuff.
I mean, look, you get up and preach
and you can say God loves you.
God's pleased with you.
God's happy with you.
He's good.
And He's so happy with you, He's just
going to give you every blessing you could
ask for.
And to confirm it, to confirm it, there's
going to be a lightning bolt right now
and more rain outside than we've ever had
in the last 10 years.
And, you know, 30 miles away you hear
a little thunder and maybe a flash of
lightning and it starts to rain.
Well, nobody would kick that guy out of
the church.
Nobody would wring his neck.
Nobody would call him a false prophet.
Nobody would be out to do him in
over that because they liked his message.
So they'll be sympathetic with him.
But if you do the same thing following
a message to repent, they'd have you strung
up, you know, by the top of the
rafters before the meeting was over.
It's the message of repentance that's going to
bring the persecution, going to bring the opposition,
going to bring the resentment.
And without that, we'll have no revival.
We were at a service, New Year's Day
of 1983, and after the Spirit was terribly
quenched, God began to speak.
Someone finally stopped and waited instead of going
on with the show.
And a message came forth from a brother
during the service.
We're going to take communion that day.
Do not partake of communion.
There is sin in your midst.
I forget if it was labeled or not
as bitterness and gossip or other things.
There's sin in your midst.
If you partake of communion, some of you
will get sick and others will die.
He said, well, Lord, we won't partake of
communion.
It was a thoroughly scriptural message.
Couldn't get away from the fact that it
was Bible.
Well, do you want to hear a message
like that?
Why spoil our fun?
We wanted that.
We were looking forward to communion, brother.
Well, do you want the truth or not?
When God's really going to come, a lot
of people who thought they were really doing
great are going to be on their faces
in front of the whole body saying, oh,
man, I failed.
And you sit there and say, I always
knew they were kind of subpar spiritually.
Next week, it'll be you up there if
it's real revival.
Again, you read through.
I don't have time to do it.
I'm not teaching on the prophets or anything
like that.
But you read through the Hebrew Scriptures and
you'll see over and over and over that
people wanted to hear every message but the
truth.
They did not want to be told you
were dying without major heart surgery.
They wanted to be told good things, happy
things, encouraging things.
It's like, listen, if you'll submit to the
surgery, then I can tell you good, happy,
encouraging, wonderful things because it's God's desire to
bless and not curse.
But you're going to have to submit to
the knife first.
Again, just another quote from Frank Bartleman.
When the religious condition of the times called
for men who were willing to sacrifice all
for Messiah, the demand created the supply, and
there have always been found a few who
were willing to be regarded reckless for the
Lord.
And utter recklessness concerning men's opinions and other
consequences is the only attitude that can meet
the needs of the present times.
He's actually quoting another writer there.
But there's a holy recklessness, a holy abandonment
that's absolutely necessary and an absolute dying to
the praise of men and a desire to
please men or be accepted by men.
All those things have to happen first.
You have to know that you belong to
God and then you can get up and
preach that message.
Because sure enough, as long as there are
religious people in the world, as long as
there are hypocrites who don't want their sin
exposed, as long as there are other people
who've got their vested interest in the religious
system going on the way it is, of
course God raises up bodies and fellowships and
brings people together.
I'm not saying anything that's organized is not
of God.
But when people put their salary before the
call of God, well, if I repent, then
I'm going to have to get up and
confess publicly, and if I do that, I'm
going to be booted out.
I'm going to lose my salary.
I can't do that.
Or I'm going to lose the esteem of
the people, or this or that.
If they'll put that first, they'll never go
on with God.
And I've seen people do it.
I've seen people turn back for a paycheck.
I've seen people turn back for family.
I've seen people turn back instead of moving
on with God out of convenience or because
it was just too hard to go the
other way.
How deep are we willing to let revival
go when it comes?
Are we willing to say, Praise the Lord,
bring the flames down, and keep them burning
until there's no flesh left on the altar?
Or after the first burn, are we going
to say, Well, praise the Lord for that
revival meeting.
Now let's get on with the show.
In future classes, we're going to look at
hindrances to revival and denominationalism and sectarianism and
just various things once they are erected to
the point that they will not move with
God.
We'll see how those things can be hindrances.
But let's just understand that revival preaching is
going to come.
It's going to scorch.
It's going to burn.
It's going to transform.
It's going to shake.
It's going to empower.
But it's going to hurt.
But it's going to hurt because it's the
loving hand of God reaching down and touching.
And those whose hearts are open and ripe
to the Lord will be transformed and will
never be the same.
And those who will hear can be taken
out of their lethargy and out of their
sin and out of their hopelessness and out
of their bondage and put into a position
of spiritual power and life to change this
world.
Father, we thank You for Your Spirit, for
Your life, for Your Word, for Your truth,
for Your reality, for Your fire.
We open our hearts to You and we
lay ourselves on the altar.
Show us the meaning of being living sacrifices.
Lord, that means we're on the altar perpetually.
That means that Your flames are continually upon
us.
That means that the work is Yours.
The power is Yours.
The excellency is Yours.
And we are going about doing Your will
in the life of Your Spirit.
Thank You, Father, in Jesus' name.
Amen.