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PATTERNS OF REVIVAL

The Four 'H' s

There are several ingredients I have seen over the years that are vital to Revival! 
Let’s list the four ingredients again:

 

1) Hunger for the Lord
2) Humility and meekness before the Lord
3) Holiness – maintaining a walk of purity
4) Honor – appropriate respect for authority & honorarium

Hunger 

When the revivalist shows up to a church that is not hungry.  Religious demons are going to go berserk.  Religious spirits have great difficulty handling change. They like to stay in the same format all the time.  Many of these churches allow the community to dictate how they set their services in place.  Instead the church should be the ones changing the community.  Remember the last phrase of a dying church is “We always did it this way before!”.  The pastor must build appetite in people to receive fresh new flavor. I like cooking and exploring with spices, we have been able to deliver some tantalizing, tastefully dishes my children love. They always want more.

Humility

I’ve seen many revivalist captivate their audience, stirring up faith and belief for great miracles, signs and wonders. However a jealous pastor or overpowering controlling board , or one board member, can crush and control an atmosphere and cause great damage to the revival God is bringing to the church that God has entrusted him to pastor.  Remember when identity and purpose come together you will discover your destiny. Revival can progress in a limited situation, but then one needs,more meetings.  Prophet Kenneth Hagin encouraged Word of Faith people to be open to long revival when receiving a revivalist. On a personal note I have encountered much resistance and unfounded criticism from certain Word of Faith circles for flowing in supernatural .


I encourage pastors to let the evangelist help you birth revival in the church and function confidently in the purpose God has called you too! Over the past eight years, I believe Pastor John Kilpatrick of the Brownsville Revival in Florida Evangelist Steve Hill, before their transition, showed some great examples of how a revivalist and a senior pastor of a church can work together.  Even today we have now many examples as with Toronto Airport Revival, Revival Ministries in Tampa FL, including Kansas Revival City with Pastor Steve Gray and many others. This shows me that humility will produce a great harvest!

Holiness

Whatever you compromise to gain you will eventually loose. I have personally been in many churches where the pastor made it very clear that he wanted the service to be over at a certain time so he could get home to watch a trashy movie that he did not want to miss. I have even experienced periods in revival when conviction was moving mightily in services for weeks and when it was time to leave the pastor would comment how he can now go back to watching TV and reading the newspaper again. He was implying that during revival there was such a move of holiness and consecration unto God, he had no time to be caught up with things of the world.

 

Let me say again: Holiness = Power


John Wesley’s mother told him one time:
“Anything that impedes the tenderness of your conscious, obscures your senses of God or dulls your deep desire of spiritual things or exalts the will of the soul or flesh above your spirit…that thing to you my boy is sin.” Wow, be imitators of God dear children, act like your father God, talk like your father God, walk like your father God.
John Wesley used to say I can always tell how Holy someone is by their love, therefore we could say Love = Holiness = Power….

 

Honor

Honor can be defined as a keen sense of ethical conduct! There is also a sense of protocol, respect, honesty and truth that are all related to honor. Our conversation needs to be honorable among the Gentiles – 1 Peter 2:17 “Honor all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the King”.
 

 I like this definition .”To honor means to ascribe value to a person without stumbling over who they are not. We celebrate the grace that is on a person without them needing to be something else. We need to celebrate the victory, presence and achievement of another as if it is our very own. It is kin to showing respect. The inability to celebrate another will disqualify you from receiving the very thing that you are praying for.”
 

This is one of the reasons why Oral Roberts would not receive preacher discounts! I believe to really honor people we must do it with a good conscience in total obedience to the Holy Spirit.
 It is also important we become vessels of honor as mentioned in 2 Timothy 2:20-22. We must conduct our lives in honor and humility by fleeing youthful lust and following after righteousness, faith, love and peace with all those who call on the Lord out of a pure and honest heart.
 

On a personal scale, I prefer holding Revivals for pastors who are mature and have been in ministry a long time. I believe spiritual maturity carries strength in showing correct honor in the sense of knowing how to give honor where honor is due!

 Ephesians 6:8 “knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord, whether he is a slave or free.”

 

 Romans 12:10-13 “Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another; not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality.”


 Romans 2:6-7 “who “will render to each one according to his deeds?: eternal life to those who by patient continuance in doing good seek for glory, honor, and immortality;”
 Keep in mind pride has kept many men out of salvation! (John 5:15-18, 37,38, 42, 43)

 

We need to seek God's honor in all we do!
 John 5:44 “How can you believe, who receive honor from one another, and do not seek the honor that comes from the only God?”

 

 There are many scriptures that deal with honor that are important in maintaining correct respect, submission and authority. Remember the anointing flows from the head down (Please see Psalms 133).
 

This leads me to also share on Honorarium.
 

Once while having a crusade in Africa the minister gave me an honorarium of a certain amount, then he asked me what the last minister gave me, when I reluctantly mentioned it, he said “Hold on one second. I think we can fatten the offering.” He came back with almost double. I appreciate his offering but I desired for the blessings to be out of a pure conscience from the Lord.
 

 1 Timothy 1:19 “having faith and a good conscience, which some having rejected, concerning the faith have suffered shipwreck,”
 

 1 Timothy 5:17 “Let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and doctrine.”
 

The word “Elders” speaks of five-fold ministry (presbytery team). The word “well” is a condition laid down for special consideration regarding payment. The word “double” in the strictest sense is speaking of “ample” or “generous”. The Williams’s translation says they are “deserving twice the salary they should get”. If you put this in the traveling minister’s perspective, I have seen much abuse, and manipulation in traveling the globe now for almost 30 years in ministry circles, over who gets the tithe.
 

For some ministries holding a revival and bringing in guest speakers becomes a business circus strategy for the church to make money. This makes me wonder where is the sacrifice like 2 Samuel 23 where David bought the altar,  for 50 shekels of silver and refused to offer the Lord anything unless it cost him something. The sacrificial seed opened the windows and the anointing moved burdens, destroyed yokes and the whole nation of Israel were healed! The greatest results I've ever seen in revivals are when the Revivalist had financial liberty. In many revivals, God has led me to minister messages on tithes, offerings, and first fruits to be a blessing to the church house .
 Honoring other ministry gifts correctly positions us to draw and tap into the very grace and anointings that a ministry stands in ! Much of the miraculous could be opened up to a city and culture when honor is correctly given to a ministry Gifted by God . I am convinced in my spirit this entire region could be aflame in massive revival if people had honored the gift God placed in my life even financially .
When it comes to honor we must be able to look beyond what people do to who they really are, why ?  When one honors a revivalist for who he is then  (identity ) for which God created and ordained them in Christ .

If any man will serve me, Him will My Father honor (John 12:12:26).
Dishonor creates division between people. There are seven things that the Lord hates. The Prophet Solomon declares that one of these seven is “He that sows discord among the brethern” (Proverbs 6:19)

 

Who you honor or dishonor effects your future.
Let’s believe God to help us see each other through the eyes of Jesus.
I am personally praying and believing for God working with God relationships, thank you Jesus.

John Gillies, in his 1795 classic Accounts of Revivals, noted what he perceived as the marks of a revivalist.
Here is a summary of these characteristics:

1. They were earnest about the great work of the ministry on which they had entered. They felt that as ministers of the Gospel they dared not act otherwise. They dared not throw less than their whole soul into the conflict. They dared not take their ease. They dared not be indifferent to the issue when professing to lead the hosts of the living God against the armies of the prince of darkness.
 

2. They were “bent upon success”; to be indifferent to their office would “prove themselves nothing short of traitors to Him and to His cause.” As warriors they set their hearts on victory and fought in faith, anticipating triumph under the guidance of such a Captain.
 

 3. They were men of faith. They ploughed and sought in hope. They knew in due season they would reap if they did not faint. They had confidence in God, in their Savior’s commission, in the promises of Scripture, and in the Holy Spirit’s almighty power and grace.
 

 4. They were men of labor. They bore the burden and the heat of the day as freely offered to the Lord, keeping back nothing, grudging nothing, joyfully, thankfully, surrendering all to Him who loved them. They labored for eternity as men who knew the time was short and the day of recompense was at hand.
 

 5. They were men of patience. They were not discouraged though they had to labor long without seeing all the fruit they desired. They were not soon weary in well-doing.
 

 6. They were men of boldness and determination. Enemies might oppose, timid friends might hesitate, but they pressed forward, in nothing terrified by difficulty or opposition. There is needed not merely natural courage in order to face natural danger and difficulty: There is, in our own day, a still greater need of moral boldness in order to neutralize the fear of man, the dread of public opinion, that god of our idolatry in this last age. Our age boasts of superior enlightenment, but it would bring everything to the test of reason or decide it by the votes of the majority.
 

7. They were men of prayer. It is true they labored much, visited much, and studied much. In this they abounded. They were much alone with God replenishing their own souls. “It was said of Wales in 1904 that you knew revival was on the way when you heard the ‘Oh’ of desperation and urgency in the prayers.”


 8. They were men of most decided doctrine both in law and Gospel. There is a breadth and a power in their preaching-a glow and an energy about their thoughts and words that makes us feel they were “men of might.” Their trumpet gave no feeble, uncertain sound either to saint or sinner, the Church or the world.
 

 9. They were men of solemn deportment and deep spirituality. Their daily work furnished the best illustration of what they preached. No frivolity, flippancy, worldly conviviality, or companionships neutralized their public preaching or marred the work they were seeking to accomplish. They lived what they preached. (Gillies, Historical Collections of Accounts of Revivals, pp. vi-xi).
Interested in birthing revival in your church, city, state?
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In Conclusion

God seeds produce God results. Over the years God has spoken to me concerning God Working With God. God only blesses God. God only anoints God. God only hears God. God only saves God. With over several hundred tapes dealing with this subject we understand very clearly that nothing impresses God but Himself.

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