Surprising Revival–3-31-21

Have you ever prayed for revival for a really long time, never expecting to get to be part of the revival? As a minister of the Gospel, I work on my relationship with God every day. But did you know, even if you’re like me, you can become like the older son…in the prodigal story? Kind of close to God…but out in the fields near the house. The Father went to both sons and invited them in to the party. He wanted an amazing, close, in-the-house relationship with him!

So, here comes the confession about our surprising revival–God brought it to us by revealing our sin. Kathy and I had let some sin slip into our lives that we didn’t even notice after a while. It was rudeness and a lack of compassion for people. The problem was, we had let it slip in unnoticed a couple years ago. When we started pulling on the root of this sin to see how far back it went, we had to go to people that we offended more than two years ago. We went to meet with people one-on-one to deal with our sin, it was all people within our home church, even our pastors. But did you know, as soon as we were broken over our sin and we repented together before God–He took it completely out of our lives. He made us brand new!

The biggest lesson I got out of this: There’s a reason God gives us instructions to deal with sin…privately, one-on-one with people…to leave our gift at the altar and go get right with our brother! Because that’s how He works…to bring REVIVAL, REFRESHING & RENEWAL into our lives. You might be surprised to know that we went to more than 20 people in order to make things right. God did His work! And when He does that for YOU–you are experiencing something only God can do–His power, His love…FOR YOU! I am amazed that He allowed me to receive this awesome work that He has done in our lives…this work that we have been praying for for over a year, every day. Praise God! It was the hardest time in our marriage to deal with our sin together…but it turned into the greatest moments of our marriage as God poured out His love and forgiveness!

Thanks for listening! I hope you’ll follow God’s instructions and deal with your sin…and I hope you experience surprising REVIVAL just like we have!