Revival Hurts — E.A. Johnston

Lost Gospel Doctrines and Historical Revival

You can study historical revivals and see very plainly that when a man, or a group of men, start preaching a doctrine of the gospel that has become lost, then God will attend that message, bless that preaching, and shake things up like a mighty earthquake in revival after revival.

Whitefield held up the lost doctrine of regeneration and proclaimed, you must be born again, and God shook two continents under his preaching. Charles Finney and Sam Jones preached, unless you repent, you shall surely perish, and they blazed a path of revival throughout America in the 19th century.

When Charles Finney was in Antwerp, New York in 1827, he preached, you must repent and surrender to God with such power. People felt like there was electricity in the atmosphere. They fell off their chairs so fast.

He said it was as if he'd held a broadsword in both hands. He couldn't have cut them down as quick to where they were lying in the aisle, groaning and crying out to God for mercy. In cities all across America, Sam Jones would preach to 10 ,000 people night after night for a month at a time with his message of repentance.

Revival Transforms Communities

Entire cities were completely transformed. There's a city today in Alabama called Reform, Alabama, and it was named after an evangelist had visited the city. Well, Sam Jones was that evangelist who conducted revival meetings there.

Sam Jones came into town and preached for eight weeks, and when he left town, there was nobody in the jail. The theaters had closed. Nobody played cards, and the liquor stores were run out of business.

There wasn't anything questionable left. And when men would curse in the streets, they would lower their voices so nobody could hear them. When Sam Jones was preaching in Nashville in 1885, one of the biggest sinners in town came to hear him to disrupt the meeting and beat him up.

But instead, the man got saved, surrendered his life to Christ. His name was Captain Tom Ryman. He owned a fleet of steamboats. There were gambling vessels on the Cumberland River. And after he got saved, he had his men pour out all the booze into the river, and he turned those steamboats into floating gospel preaching.

He built an auditorium in Nashville just for Sam Jones to preach in. Today, it's still there. It's called the Ryman Auditorium. Along came Mordecai Ham, a man so mightily used to God, and his number one message was the missing doctrine of the lordship of Christ.

Entire communities were transformed by God and the gospel that Ham preached. He'd set up a tent in the red-light district of a town and go to preaching. And soon, they'd have to shut down all the brothels there because all the girls got saved.

One time, a young Billy Graham came to a Mordecai Ham message meeting, and Billy Graham came to that meeting as a clean 16-year-old church member, and he got mad at the preacher for pointing him out and calling him a sinner.

Later, Mordecai Ham would say, I never pointed at him and called him a sinner, but the Holy Spirit sure did. All these men were mightily used of God because they were holy men on fire for God, preaching what others would not.

As they proclaimed these missing doctrines of the gospel, revival would follow them wherever they went. Let me tell you, friend, you go to preaching on man's duty of repentance and his necessity of regeneration, and that men and women and boys and girls must bow to the lordship of Christ in their daily living, and you have a fight on your hands.

Preaching Christ’s Lordship Provokes Opposition

You have a fight from lost religious folks. You start preaching that Jesus is Lord, and you cannot have him as Savior without him being your Lord, and why the good deacons will take off their freshly shined shoes and throw them at you.

All hell will begin to pop if you appoint guilty sinners to a bloodstained Christ who has rights and claims on all followers of his. But Jesus said, unless a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Jesus said, unless ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish, and that means you, friend, even if you are the chairman of the deacons. Did these men like Wesley and Whitefield face persecution for the message they preached?

Persecution of Revival Preachers

You bet they did. Charles Wesley recorded in his journal that today my brother John was dragged through a town by his hair by an angry mob, and when Whitefield preached in the open air, he was pelted with rotten eggs and pieces of dead cats.

One time while he was preaching in Ireland, an angry mob stoned him, and he received a gash on his head that almost killed him. Years later in Boston, he was introduced to a minister from Ireland, and Whitefield bowed, and removing his beaver cap, he pointed to a large scar on his forehead with the remark, This wound, sir, I received for preaching Christ in your country.

Mordecai Ham was dragged from a meeting in Texas by an angry mob who carried a bucket of tar, a sack of feathers, and a rope to hang him. He was saved only when the mayor called in the Calvary troops to rescue him.

One time Mordecai Ham was leaving his hotel to go preach at a meeting, and a man attacked him from behind and pistol-whipped him. One time he was purposely run over by a car while crossing the street that put him in a coma in the hospital for the next six weeks.

Sam Jones was waiting at a train station when the mayor of the city approached him and asked him if he was Sam Jones. And when Sam Jones replied yes, the man took his cane and violently began to beat him across the face.

But Sam wrestled the cane away from the man and gave him a licking with his own cane until a newspaper reporter wrote that the mayor's face ended up looking like a pound of raw hamburger meat. And every time, friends, the vital truths of God are held up and proclaimed, it will drive lost religious men wild and the rocks will begin to fly.

I've stood face to face in sanctuaries with angry deacons with fire in their eyes and hatred in their hearts for me because I said, unless you repent, you'll surely bust hell wide open when you die. I'm telling you, friend, revival hurts.

Revival Hurts the Preacher Too

Vance Havener was preaching at a pastor's conference in South Carolina when God moved in and revival broke out to where pastors began to come forward to the platform without an invitation to kneel and weep and confess their sins.

One minister approached Vance Havener when it was over and he said, Brother Havener, your preaching is just tearing me up. To which Vance Havener replied, if it's having that effect on you, what do you think it's doing to me?

I'm telling you, friends, I've preached revival for years and I've got my scars to prove it, but revival hurts. When a God-called preacher starts messing with men's dirty pig pens and smashing their idols, they will organize a mob to run you clear out of town.

Mordecai Ham was run out of town by a mob in Texas one year and the local police had to hold the rifles on the mob while Ham boarded the train. A detective was assigned to travel with him to the next town for the evangelist's safety.

Halfway there, the detective asked Ham what he could do to be saved because he said, any man who can face danger like you faced with that mob with the calmness you did, there must be some truth to the gospel you preach and the Christ you hold up.

Salvation Requires Surrender to Christ’s Lordship

And as I'm preaching to you now, friends, in complete honesty, as I care about your soul, I don't care how long you've been a member of a church unless Christ is your Lord, who of your daily living, you're dead in your sins and as blind as a goose lost in a snowstorm.

God Almighty will never, ever run the white flag of peace upon your soul while you still point a shotgun at Him. If Jesus, listen to me, if Jesus is not your Lord, then you've never been saved. A self must be dethroned and another enthroned there.

The Lord Jesus Christ, a thrice holy God, will not allow any rebels into His kingdom. You must come to a bloodstained Christ as a needy, guilty sinner and throw down and stack arms and throw your shotgun of rebellion.

It is now pierced feast. Feet of salvation is absolute surrender to a living Lord. I'm going to tell you something, friend. You can put it down big, plain, and straight, and I'll see you at the judgment where Christ Himself will back up my words to you now.

Listen to me. There is therefore no way of salvation open for men apart from unconditional surrender to Christ as Lord. He is Lord. You better bow to Him now before He makes you bow to Him when a sovereign puts his foot on your neck, when the Lord makes His enemies His footstool.

A Prayer for National Revival

Oh, great God in heaven, send a revival to this nation. Send revival to your sleeping churches across this land until men and women and boys and girls are crying out in repentance, Oh, what must I do to be saved?