UNBLOCKING THE WELL OF THE LIVING WORD

Each daily devotional below begins with an excerpt from a transcript of Duncan Campbell telling the story of how the 1949 Hebridean revival began. (1)

Duncan Campbell said:-

“But in revival the community suddenly becomes conscious of the movings of God, beginning among his own people. So that in a matter of hours, not days…in a matter of hours churches become crowded no intimation of any special meeting but something happening that moves men and women to the house of God, and you will find within hours, scores of men and women crying to God for mercy before they went near a church. You have read the history of revivals, the Jonathan Edwards revival in America, that was what happened.. the Welsh revival …that is what happened… and the more recent Lewis revival …that is what happened. When God stepped down, suddenly men and women all over the parish were gripped by the fear of God.”

‘Pentecost was intensely personal. The wind bore down upon the disciples filling the house where they were, the tongues of fire sat upon each of them. It was more than God manifesting His power and purity to men; He was coming upon them to make them powerful and pure. Significantly, it was in the semblance of a dove that the spirit came upon the sinless Son. But now God was dealing with his imperfect followers. Though they had prepared themselves in those ten days of waiting, they still needed the purging flame.’(2)

‘Men are only made conscious of God by the display of His attributes. They feel God when they sense His greatness, His love or His wisdom. But in times of revival it is especially His power and His holiness that are in evidence. It is these that bring deep conviction of sin among believing and unbelieving alike. In times of revival a man is not only made conscious that God is there, but often it will seem to him that He is there to deal with him alone. He becomes oblivious of everyone but himself in the agonising grip of a holy God.’(3)

Luke writes in Acts 2:37 ‘When the people heard this they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” We see this response in the response to ‘the ruthless logic of Jonathan Edwards’ famous sermon, ‘Sinners in the hands of an angry God’, that he preached in his usual undemonstrative manner during the New England revival of 1741 (which) could never have produced the effect it did, had it not been for the consciousness of God that gripped the hearers. When they went into the meeting house, wrote Turnbull, ‘the appearance of the assembly was thoughtless and vain; the people scarcely conducted themselves with common decency’, but when it came to the sermon, ‘The assembly appeared bowed with an awful conviction of their sin and danger. There was such a breathing of distress and weeping, that the preacher was obliged to speak to the people, and desire silence that he might be heard’(4)

‘Similar is the scene described by Charles Finney, when he preached in the village schoolhouse near Antwerp, New York: ‘An awful solemnity seemed to settle upon the people; the congregation began to fall from their seats in every direction and cry for mercy. If I had a sword in each hand, I could not have cut them down as fast as they fell. I was obliged to stop preaching.’ Though the measure of the Spirit’s conviction will vary from occasion to occasion, and even from person to person, the explanation is always the same, the manifestation of God in holiness and power.’(5)

Lord, purge us, and cut us to the heart with the conviction of your powerful, yet personal Holy Spirit. Give us that God-consciousness that grips us, and apprehends us, and transforms us that we might never be the same again. Lord, manifest yourself in your holiness and your power; that your Holy Spirit might flow through us again and touch, heal and save a lost and needy world.

References

(1) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXIZOSWvXaE
(2) A.Wallis, Rain from heaven, 49
(3) A.Wallis, Rain from heaven, 49
(4) A.Wallis, Rain from heaven, 50
(5) A.Wallis, Rain from heaven, 50