Re-vive me!

As I was sitting in prayer today for our outreach efforts, my time shifted to the revival we have starting on Tuesday night. Pastor has been saying that this is not going to be a soul-winning revival where people flock in to receive Jesus as Lord, that this is for the church.

As I prayed the words, I stopped in mid-sentence. After all, look at the word, re-vival. Re- is defined as a prefix, originally occuring in loanwords from Latin, used with the meaning 'again' or 'again and again' to indicate repetition. This would imply, by definition, that there had already been a beginning. Re-vival is defined in the following ways: n. the act or an instance of reviving or the state of being revived. 2. An instance of returning to life or consciousness; restoration of vigor or vitality. 3. Renewed use, acceptance of, or interest in. 4. A reawakening of faith or renewal of commitment to religion. 5. An evangelistic meeting or service intended to effect such a reawakening in those present. 

As I sat, listening to what the Lord was speaking to me in that moment, I had a message from sometime last year begin playing in my head. While there was much more to the message, what came to my mind was Acts 20: 9, "And there sat in a window a certain young man named Eutychus, being fallen into a deep sleep: and as Paul was long preaching, he sunk down with sleep, and fell down from the third loft, and was taken up dead."  This young man got so comfortable that it killed him! But how many of us are becoming just as comfortable? We may not be sitting in window-sills in the lofts of our church buildings but we become so comfortable in our services that we are lulled to aleep. We sit in the same spot, singing the same songs, shouting the same shout, dancing the same dance while our spiritual eyes grow heavier and heavier until...Just as the monotonous tune of the baby mobil above a crib lulls a baby into sleep, so too does a monotonous spiritual life.

In 1978, Keith Green wrote a song entitled 'Asleep in the Light.' A portion of the lyrics say "Open up, open up and give yourself away. You see the need, you hear the cries so how can you delay? God's calling and you're the one but like Jonah, you run. He's told you to speak but you keep holding it in. Oh, can't you see it's such sin? The world is sleeping in the dark that the church just can't fight 'cause it's asleep in the light. How can you be so dead when you've been so well fed? Jesus rose from the grave, and you can't even get out of bed. Oh, Jesus rose from the dead, come on, get out of your bed!"

We have to shake ourselves awake. Get up, move, do something. The revival is not for those who need Jesus. Revival is for the church to regenerate and renew, a new beginning. It's the launching pad to propel someone to the next level in Christ. So today, my prayer is revive me oh Lord. Let this moment, this series of meetings, be the first step into the next chapter. Take me to the next level with You. Re-vive me!