“Revival: Precursors to Revival” Rev 2: 1-5

When I say the word “Revival” what comes to your mind? For some folks at Grace it may have been the stories of the Revival pastor who set a goal of having 300 people in worship one Sunday, only to find that he was a few short - so he went out into the street to get folks to come in. For Ohio and Sanborn it may be memories of Revival Services - some that went on for a weekend, some that went on for week, where guest preachers came and proclaimed the word of God.

However, the root of the English word revival comes from the Latin word re-vivere, which translates to something like reinvigorate, restore to life, to become strong and healthy. And  certainly that may happen during a revival service with a guest preacher bringing the word of God in a profound way. And it may happen when new folks come to Jesus Christ, which is beautiful, exciting, and profound all mixed into one. But for the next few weeks I want to talk about the scope of revival, personal revival, revival in our churches, and yes revival that reaches beyond ourselves to bring new people to know and love Jesus. 

Today, I want to start with personal revival. The truth in our lives is that relationships change over time. They wax and wane. They go through seasons of passion and other seasons where we may not be quite as close as we would like. It happens in all relationships - friendships, marriages, parent-child. And yes, even our faith lives. 

Here’s the thing - in order to grow, we need to know two things - where we are and where we want to be. Waxing and waning in themselves aren’t a bad thing. We can’t always be on the highest of high with Jesus. But we need to be able to accurately evaluate how it is with our souls and be able to say if that is really where we want to be.

The Book of Revelations is interesting in that it is written to a group of seven churches in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey) instead of one singular church. These were the churches that were at the center of Christendom. They were known for being vibrant and growing and faithful - and then something happened. Now the author has a message for them, to call them back to revival. 

Today’s scripture passage is directed at the church at Ephesus. Ephesus had a deep, spiritually rich history. It was one of the places that Paul put down his tent the longest, for two whole years. Mary the mother of Jesus lived there in her later years of life. But that richness was being lost. They were focusing on who they once were instead of who they truly were in that current day. So the author of Revelations has a difficult word for them - the charge that he has against them is that they lost their first love. They lost their passion.

The problem in Ephesus wasn’t that they were in a waning time. It was that they lost their love. Lost it. Abandoned it. Made the church about something other then what it was intended to be. 

The modern equivalent to the church in Ephesus would be a church that has a lot going on - a lot of activities, a full calendar. A church that is busy, but is not spiritual. I can hear the arguments now, but Pastor Michelle, what churches do is all for Jesus. And I agree that may be true in philosophy, but not always in practice. Sometimes we can get so caught up in the doing, that we fail to evaluate if we are really bearing fruit or not. If we are having a lot of spiritual activity without much spiritual growth.

This past year I was blessed to be one of nineteen young clergy from around the United States selected for the Lewis Fellowship program through Wesley Seminary. Throughout the year we met three times to learn from skilled teachers, each others, and at particular churches who are faithfully following God. At one of the churches in Washington DC in April I was really struck by the senior pastor and how she talked about her first church as the senior pastor. The church leadership wrote down everything the church did and intentionally prayed over it. They asked God if that activity was still bearing fruit and if it wasn’t, they celebrated what it once had been, blessed it and released it.

Friends, sometimes for revival in our personal lives and the lives of the church we need a little more blessing and releasing and a little less holding on. We can probably think of programs that were incredibly fruitful in the past, bringing folks to Jesus Christ, that just aren’t bearing the same fruit today. Its not because they weren’t good, its because the ways people connect with Jesus may just have changed. The wrappings may need to be changed, but the message remains the same.

Why do folks lose their first love? Why does the passion go away? Honestly, for a lot of Christians its burn out. We are focused on so many things that aren’t the most important thing that we become exhausted. We feel overwhelmed to the point where we lose interest and motivation. And when our motivation falls away, so can our allegiance and devotion to God. 

The tricky thing about being a busy Christian or a busy church or even in the midst of burnout is that we can look good from the outside, but it isn’t reflective of our heart on the inside. Rev. Adam Hamilton describes this phenomenon as “people going through the motions of Christianity but lacking the fruit of the Spirit”.

So how can we experience revival in our spiritual lives instead of burnout? How can we keep first things first? An example of renewing our love of Jesus Christ can be seen in the roots of early Methodism. Methodism actually began as a revival movement of the Church in Britain, but it quickly spread as folks began deeply connecting with Jesus in a way that was meaningful to them. 

At the heat of Methodism we think of folks like John Wesley, the founder of the revival movement, and Charles Wesley, who expressed faith through songs, many of which are still in our hymnals. But I want to lift up someone this morning who sometimes gets left out of the narrative of the revival movement - Susanna Wesley - mother of John and Charles and others. Susanna who taught her children scriptures in the home. Susanna who spent one hour a week with each of her children talking about their hopes, dreams, fears, and faith and asking them how it was going for them spiritually.

In fact, when Charles came to know Christ in college, he claimed that it was the prayers of Susanna that laid the foundation for his conversion. Friends, one of the precursors to revival are the prayers of our elders. Mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, grandparents, who are on their knees for the folks that we love. And staying there until folks come to know the Lord. We need folks of prayer and folks who will mentor our children, youth, and converts. 

A few months ago, as we were beginning to plan for the camping season, I met with the camp dean I work with who also is a school teacher. We were talking about bullying and how tough it is to be a youth today. Somehow we got around to how we can teach our young people hard lessons that go beyond math and reading, lessons around how to treat one another and how to make difficult decisions. And my camp dean laid it out. He said we need more mentors. Mentors who invest in our youth, not out of obligation, but out of concerns and love for them. In the church, such mentoring is rooted in prayer. It is hard to lose our first love when we are connected through a vibrant and persistent prayer life.

Friends, revival starts with us. And it starts with a difficult, personal question - how is it with your soul? Where are you in your faith life and where do you want to be? And how do the ways you invest your time pass on that faith to others? May we be a people of revival. Its our history and it propels us into our future. Amen.