Month: January 2022

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Great Awakening #4

Historians have defined three “Religious Awakenings” that have taken place in America. And while it is true that these awakenings differ in a variety of ways, it is also true that they share five common elements:

  1. Intercession: People of faith unite in-prayer for God to forgive
    sins and to send revival.
  1. Revelation: God responds to reveal Himself in a new or
    forgotten way.
  1. Consecration: God’s response leads people to further devote
    and separate themselves to Him, to one another, and to His
    cause.
  1. Renewal: Dormant faith comes back to life and becomes
    fruitful once again.
  1. Expansion: The reach of the church is expanded, new territory
    is gained, converts are one, and believers have a high impact
    on the surrounding culture.

–The Book On Prayer, Ken Gurley

Our God really does move when people start praying. Our prayers do matter!

The noted Bible commentator, J. Edwin Orr, once said, “Whenever God is ready to do something new with His people, He always sets them to praying.”

History bears this out, as believers begin to unite in prayer, spiritual break-throughs begin to take place.

We need a Great Spiritual Awakening. If that Spiritual Awakening is to take place, then the bottomline is this: We need Prayer Warriors!

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A Great Awakening

In his book entitled, The Book On Prayer,” Ken Gurley defines a great awakening as: “a season of revival that sets aside formal religion in favor of personal experience with God.”

One look at our world today will tell you that we need another great awakening.

Globally, there is world-wide political upheaval, economic chaos, religious unrest, and then there’s the global pandemic. That’s just some of the things our modern society is facing.

We’ve tried everything humanly possible to turn the ship around but it seems those things are not working.

It’s obvious to me that what we need is a mighty and miraculous move of the Spirit of the Almighty God. Yes, we need another “Great Awakening!”— a revival that affects not only a local area but is witnessed on the national and global stages as well.

Awakenings begin when old systems break down, in periods of cultural distortion and grave personal stress, when we lose faith in the legitimacy of our norms, the viability of our institutions, and the authority of our leaders… .”

William McLoughlin
professor, Brown University
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Put On The New Man

“But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.”

Ephesians 4:20-24 (NKJV)
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Unity of the Spirit

I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called,
with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love,
endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

Ephesians 4:1-3 (NKJV)
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Filled With God

“And I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts, living within you as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love; and may you be able to feel and understand, as all God’s children should, how long, how wide, how deep, and how high his love really is; and to experience this love for yourselves, though it is so great that you will never see the end of it or fully know or understand it. And so at last you will be filled up with God himself.”

Ephesians 3:16-18 (TLB)
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The Highest Christian Virtue

When we become believers our priorities are changed. Our inner person desires to be more like Christ–in every aspect of life. The love of God, which is the highest of all Christian virtues, takes up residence in our heart. This type of love is a generous, unselfish, sacrificing type of love. It is a love that is given even if it is undeserved, misunderstood, rejected, trampled on, and not returned.

Garvin R. Alfter

“Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.” –Romans 5:5 (NKJV)

“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” –Romans 5:8 (NKJV)

“But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him?” –1 John 3:17 (NKJV)

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It’s Alive!

The love of God in us is not stagnant. Rather, it is alive and vibrant and stays alive by constantly reaching out to others in love.

Garvin R. Alfter

“And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all men, even as we do toward you: to the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints.” –Thessalonians 3:12-13 (KJV)

“You will find as you look back upon your life that the moments when you have really lived are the moments when you have done things in the spirit of love.”
—Henry Drummond

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Unfeigned Love

Our testimony and our witness are enhanced when we manifest the love of God to our world.

Can you imagine what a difference would be made in our lives, our families, our churches and our communities if we would love as He loved us?

God’s love is what the Apostle Paul described as an unfeigned love; that is a love that is without hypocrisy. (1 Corinthians 6:6 KJV)

Garvin R. Alfter

“Love must be without hypocrisy.” –Romans 12:9 HCSB

“Let love be genuine.” –Romans 6:9 ESV