Ten Characteristics of True Revival

We can explain the characteristic marks of true revival by the acronym G.R.E.A.T.

Why Revival is Personal for Me

I have a personal debt to the reviving work of God. My parents met Jesus in 1983, in the ebbing wake of the Jesus movement that rocked the late 1960s and 1970s. That movement led to thousands (millions?) of people coming to Jesus and becoming “Jesus People” or “Jesus Freaks.” As the wave subsided, in God’s mysterious providence, my parents were invited to a Bible study. My mom stayed home with two-year-old me and my infant sister, but my dad went. He heard the gospel, he came home and told my mom, and God saved them. I was born into a northern California pagan home to wannabe-hippie parents who had grown organic good times in the spare bedroom. But I don’t remember those parents, because I was raised by full-tilt Jesus People. The initial work of God in my parents, that changed the forever of my family, was channeled in part through an Assemblies of God church. The Assemblies of God grew out of the Azusa Street revival in 1906, which birthed modern Pentecostalism. The Azusa Street revival flowed from the Wesleyan-Methodist-Holiness tradition, which traces its origin to the First Great Awakening and the leadership of John Wesley in the 18th century. The Jesus People revival was catalyzed in part by the Asbury Revival of 1970. So I can trace my spiritual story back to the Jesus People, to Asbury, to Azusa Street, to the First Great Awakening.

So, yes, revival matters to me, and I am in debt to the reviving grace of God. Yes, I now have quite different theological convictions in important places from the traditions that birthed these revivals. But I’m still grateful, and I still honor the work of God in those moments. When I was seminary, a class on revival shaped my longing and expectation for an extraordinary movement of God’s grace. I came to believe that God can and does use revival to shape his church for generations. In retrospect, again, I am the product of such shaping.

That’s why I visited Asbury.

I believe the outpouring of God’s grace at Asbury is real. It’s showing up in the amplification of the normal worship of God’s people and the reconciling grace that reunites people to people and people to God. As noted by many, including my own sense, is that joy and peace pervade the moment.

But all of this leads to the continued question that both the skeptical and the sympathetic have asked. What is revival? What are the marks of true revival? It’s an important question, that I want to work to answer. In many ways, my works derives from the landmark reflections of those before, such as Jonathan Edwards. I’m in debt to the work of Collin Hansen and John Woodbridge in A God-Sized Vision. This isn’t a definitive word on revival. It’s my own sense of how to describe true revival in a way that the people of God can grab a hold of. With all of that said, as I reflect on this moment, I think I can explain the characteristic marks of true revival by the acronym G.R.E.A.T.

GREAT: Ten Characteristics of True Revival

God-ward and Gospel-centered

Pastor John Piper coined the term, “Godward” to describe a mindset that sets itself on God in Christ. True revival is Godward, “seek[ing] the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God” (Colossians 3:1). True revival telescopes (another Piper image) the majestic glory of God, so that we see it closer to its real size. True revival will exalt the true and living God, who is the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It will reject false theology and wrong beliefs about God. It will be inherently theological.

At the center of the glory of the triune God in the world is the gospel of Jesus Christ. We see the glory of God in the gospel (Ephesians 1). The glory of the triune God displays in the proclaiming, rehearsing, believing, and spreading of the message that God the Father sent God the Son to become a human being, to live a sinless life, to die a sinner’s death on the cross, to be buried and raised from the dead so that anyone who will turn from their sin (repent) and trust in him (believe) will be forgiven and given eternal life. True revival is not ultimately about our subjective, experience but about the objective reality of God and his gospel.

Repentance and Request

Students have reported that the Asbury outpouring started with 15-20 students staying as the chapel ended on the morning of Wednesday, February 8. Reportedly, one student openly confessed as the Spirit moved. Read stories of historical revivals. They often start with open repentance of sin. Repentance catalyzes revival and revival catalyzes repentance. When people confess their failure and turn toward God’s forgiveness and holiness, you can believe that God’s reviving grace is on the move. When Josiah was the king of Israel, he commanded repairs to be made to God’s temple (2 Kings 22:3-7). In the midst of renovation, the high priest discovered the book of God’s law (22:8). The reading of God’s Word sparked repentance and comprehensive renewal in Israel: “When the king heard the words of the book of the law, he tore his clothes. Then he commanded the priest Hilkiah, Ahikam son of Shaphan, Achbor son of Micaiah, the court secretary Shaphan, and the king’s servant Asaiah, ‘Go and inquire of the LORD for me, for the people, and for all Judah about the words in this book that has been found. For great is the LORD’s wrath that is kindled against us because our ancestors have not obeyed the words of this book in order to do everything written about us’” (22:11-13). Josiah purged Israel of idolatrous centers of worship and restored faithful worship in Israel. Such is true repentance. It includes, as Hansen and Woodbridge note, humility of spirit and putting others ahead of ourselves.

Likewise, revival is marked by a wholehearted requesting of God to revive his people. We see this all over the Bible.

Will you not revive us again
so that your people may rejoice in you?
(Psalm 85:6)

Yahweh, I have heard the report about you;
Yahweh, I stand in awe of your deeds.
Revive your work in these years;
make it known in these years.
In your wrath remember mercy!
(Habakkuk 3:2)

Revival asks God to “tear the heavens open and come down” (Isaiah 64:1). Revival requests the presence and the renewing grace of God. In the late 1850s a revival swept the city of New York and the nation, sparked by a gathering of businessmen to pray. Revival often starts with prayer. Pastor Jon Tyson in New York has done a lot of teaching on revival. He says the common factor in all revival, despite theological, denominational, cultural differences is hunger. A longing for God. A wholehearted requesting of God’s presence and power, like Jacob with the Angel, “I will not let you go unless you bless me” (Genesis 32:26).

Exhortation and Encouragement

The Word of God is central in a true revival. Just as often as prayer, revival is stirred by preaching. God uses his Word by his Spirit. “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). True revival must center on the Bible. Proclaiming and reading Scripture patterns the normal practice of the people of God, and in revival God turns the volume on his Word up to 11. “On the first day of the seventh month, the priest Ezra brought the law before the assembly of men, women, and all who could listen with understanding. While he was facing the square in front of the Water Gate, he read out of it from daybreak until noon before the men, the women, and those who could understand. All the people listened attentively to the book of the law” (Nehemiah 8:2–3). In revival the pastors and the people give themselves wholeheartedly to Scripture. “Now Ezra had determined in his heart to study the law of the Lord, obey it, and teach its statutes and ordinances in Israel” (Ezra 7:10). I watched the sermon preached at the chapel when the revival started, preached by Zach Meerkreebs. (I got a chance to meet and chat with Zach while I was Asbury). I was struck by how Zach said he wanted the Word of God to be the star of his sermon. When the Bible stars, revival might soon follow.

Likewise, revival pours out encouragement on the people of God. It intensifies the normal working of mutual encouragement in faith (Romans 1:12). Faith sparks faith sparks faith. To the church in Thessalonica Paul says, “You became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. For the word of the Lord rang out from you, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but in every place that your faith in God has gone out” (1 Thessalonians 1:7-8). How could you not be encouraged by the reports of the notoriously anxious Generation Z (born from about 1998 to 2012) receiving the peace of God? How could you not be encouraged by reports of the depressed receiving joy? How could you not be encouraged by the lost in sin being found in Christ? How could you not be encouraged by stories of reconciliation between people and people and people and God?

Announcement and Activation

Often, God providentially times his church’s reform and renewal movements with the spread of new forms of communication. The New Testament spread along roads paved by Rome. Martin Luther led the Reformation and the spread of the Bible after the invention of the printing press. The Great Awakenings were catalyzed by correspondence and improved mail service. I’ve heard leaders I respect say that we shouldn’t talk about the Asbury outpouring too much. I don’t agree. Often, God uses news of revival to spread revival. God uses testimony of revival to spark revival. Paul outlines a similar principle when he says, “This is why, since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I never stop giving thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers” (Ephesians 1:15-16).

As the renewing grace of God sweeps through his people, God the Spirit activates his people to “work out their salvation with fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:12). Revival changes hearts and communities. Israel under Josiah’s leadership saved a ton of babies, for example, as he dismantled the places of child sacrifice: “He defiled Topheth, which is in Ben Hinnon Valley, so that no one could sacrifice his son or daughter in the fire to Molech” (2 Kings 23:10). After Pentecost, the church provided for widows and repented of overlooking the widows of an ethnic minority (Acts 6:1-7). The church throughout the New Testament reconciled people across lines of ethnic and socioeconomic division (Galatians 3:28; Ephesians 2:11-22). The second Great Awakening was a factor in the ending of slavery. True revival stirs the love of both God and neighbor, in obedience to Jesus. As Asbury this week, for example, I saw many people respond to a call to confess and repent of the failure to love their neighbors.

Tainted and Temporary

For all of its glory, revival always meets the context of a fallen world yet awaiting the coming of the King and his kingdom. Do I need to cite a Scripture for this point, or can we just think of the entire story of God’s work among his people? Every move of God in small or sweeping ways will only glimpse the glory yet to be revealed. We are a people in process. Every revival has lasted for days, weeks, or sometimes decades has faded into waiting for the King yet again. Every revival has been tainted by human sin, human failure, human ambition, human greed. Every revival has “backsliding” and false conversions. Jesus did tell us that the seed falls on all kinds of soil, after all. So, we shouldn’t dismiss the reality of a reviving work of God because of the taints of sin in its midst. We shouldn’t let the taint or the temporariness discourage us.

Let’s enjoy it while it lasts, and stay with Jesus for the long haul.