When Revival Comes — Brad Whitt

If you've got your Bibles with you this morning, turn to Acts chapter 2 really quickly, and we've been in a series of studies. We're finishing up this morning on revival, and you'll see that we've entitled this series of studies, it's real novel, just revival.

What it is, why it matters, and how to have it. And as you're finding your way there to Acts chapter 2, this past Thursday, I drove up to Spartanburg, you really can't get there from here, and I drove up to Spartanburg to preach in an evangelism and a discipleship conference there in the upstate where I served for almost 11 years.

And I was preaching for my friend Tom Tucker, and he was working, I think, with the South Carolina Baptist Convention, because I saw Bryant Sims there as well, who's a friend of mine. And there was a guy that preached first.

Now he wasn't on, he was not on the flyer, and I'm Baptist enough that I don't like you messing with my order, which really goes against everything I'm about to say, but anyway. There was this guy, it was supposed to be David Gallimore from Rock Springs, and then Bryant Sims with the state convention there, and then me at the end, that's what it was supposed to be.

And so I get there and they add this guy. And I've got to be very honest with you, my attitude wasn't the best, because I was ready to get home, I'd driven in early, and I wanted to go home. And this guy named Tom Phillips, who's been the director of Crusades for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association for years and years and years, decades and decades even, he began to preach on revival.

And I mean, he just, he blessed my heart, he got a hold of me, I mean, he just really blessed me. And so I'm listening to him there, and he didn't just say it once, he said it at least twice. He said that Billy Graham would often pray for an old-fashioned, Holy Ghost, heaven-sent movement, that was, he said, was Billy Graham's favorite word, movement of God across America that would sweep from coast to coast.

And I began to think about that over the weekend, man, that's what I want. If there's anything that our world needs, if there's anything that our church needs, it is a movement of God. We desperately need it.

We need it immediately. We need it personally. As Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones, that famous preacher from Wells and the pastor of Westminster Chapel said so many years ago, he said, I am profoundly convinced that the greatest need in the world today is a revival in the church of God.

And so I got to thinking about, if that was true more than a half a century ago, how much more true must it be today? The modern church, the American church, this church desperately needs revival. We need a fresh touch from God.

We need a fresh outpouring of the spirit of God. We need a holy fire started that would consume this place and spread to our homes, our neighborhoods, our schools, our city, our state, our nation, and ultimately the world.

We desperately need revival. We need a movement of God. During my first trip to Romania, I'm trying to put together a trip to go back there this fall. And when we do, I want you to go with me. Come on in, guys.

You can sit down. When we do, I want you to go with me. Now, the trip to Romania is a perfect trip for those of us who are near and over 50, because it's not too hard. And my very first trip to Romania, I had spent looking at churches.

We were kind of touring. So in the morning, we would teach in the church, and we would do leadership development, and women would work, our ladies would work with the women and encourage them and bless them and do Bible studies with them.

And then we would have the afternoon kind of free, and it was kind of that day we were kind of traveling around and looking. And one of the things that I noticed is when you go around Romania, there are churches everywhere.

Big churches, little churches, I mean, there are just churches everywhere. And we had a little extra time, and I was in Cluj-Napoca streets, it's in the northern part of Romania, and there was this big old church building.

I mean, a beautiful, beautiful church building. I mean, tall steeples and spires and stained glass and beautiful architecture. I mean, an absolutely beautiful, beautiful building. And so maybe in the history buff that I am, I said, I want to take a tour of this thing.

And so I'm going through it, I'm looking at it, I'm walking through it, I'm walking around the grounds, and I'm taking pictures of it, that sort of thing. And I'm talking about how beautiful this building is.

And then it hit me. It's just a building. It's dry and dead and old and cold. Beautiful architecture, steeples and spires and stained glass. But it's empty, there's no life in it, there's nothing there.

And then we load up in the van, and if you have never driven, or ridden rather, with a gypsy driver, your faith needs it. And so this gypsy driver drove us across the mountain over into Nassau. We went down this little gravel road that turned into a dirt road, we pulled up in front of a little gypsy house, not like the ones across the river, but a little gypsy house.

And we went in to this little gypsy house, and they pulled the food out, and they started feeding us, giving us Coca-Cola and that kind of stuff, which is a real treat over there. And then we began to pray, we began to read the Bible, we began to preach, we began to sing, and I mean just the Spirit of God came down in that little gypsy house.

And when we left, I began to think about the difference between those great big magnificent buildings that we'd been in earlier that day, and this little bitty gypsy house where we're praising God. And so on one hand you have these massive buildings and extravagant wealth, and millions of people down through the years, and on the other hand you've got this little bitty home, barely enough money to put on the table, put any food on the table, and yet there are ten or twelve or fifteen people that are in that house praising God and praying together and those sorts of things.

Over here you have all the power and influence and position of the state, and on this side you have the power and the presence of God, and that is exactly what we find here in Acts chapter two this morning.

Listen to what the Word of God says. The Bible says there on the day of Pentecost when it had fully come, they were all in one accord. By the way, they were all in one accord at one place. So this is where I tell my really bad preacher joke, and you guys are just not going to like it, it's okay.

Because for one thing, you don't even know what it means, but look here guys. Do you know that the disciples, they drove Hondas because they were all in one accord? Yeah, I know it's really bad, but I like telling it.

When the day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all in one accord and one place, and suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.

Then there appeared to them divided tongues as of fire, and one sat upon each of them. They looked like human candles, look down at verse four. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.

I absolutely love that. Fire to burn, wind to spread it, and tongues to talk and tell about it. This was a church on fire. It was a church that was set on fire by the Holy Spirit of God. And what you have here is one of the greatest pictures in all of the Bible that shows us what happens when revival comes.

Fire burns, fire consumes, fire attracts, fire transforms, and that's exactly what happens when real revival comes. Ravenhill put it this way, he said, revival is when God gets so tired of being misrepresented that he shows himself.

Vance Havner said, we're not going to move this world by criticism of it or conformity to it, but by combustion within it of lives ignited by the Spirit of God. And I'm just going to tell you right now up front, I told the other two services this, that I've been praying for a while now that God would do something different.

And I've almost gotten to the point where I really don't care what it is, I just want to be different. Because I'm so tired of church as usual, I want to be a part of an unusual church. I'm so tired of an ordinary church, I want to be a part of an extraordinary church.

I want God to change us from the monotonous to the miraculous. I want him to start a fire in this pulpit and move to the pew. I want him to change his pastor and then change his people. Because listen, if God were to set this church on fire, it will touch and transform this entire town.

The church sadly caught on fire one day, literally, like physical fire. Everybody rushed to look at it, folks trying to put the fire out, and there's this guy standing on the sidewalk and he's just watching this church burn.

And there's a guy who walked up next to him, obviously a church member, and the church member looked over to this other guy and he said, I've never seen you here before. And he said, your church has never been on fire before.

Something very much like that happened at my previous church. And so Temple Baptist Church in Simpsonville, South Carolina had worked and saved and served for years and years and years, during the Depression even, to build a new building.

And they'd just gotten into this little white board wooden structure building. They hadn't been there very long, six months or so, something like that. They'd already had church there that morning, they'd gone home for lunch.

Somebody had left the stove on or something, the fire going. They began to see smoke, everybody rushes out, see the smoke's coming from where the church is, everybody rushes there, they're trying to put the fire out.

Two men go into the church, carry the piano out of a burning church, which by the way, years later, John, it's out of tune, it can't be fixed, but do you think we could ever get rid of that piano? No, because two men had carried it out of a burning building.

And so, if you were to go back to Simpsonville right now, and if you were to ask people who were alive back then, Mr. P and others, hey, where were you? They can tell you exactly where they were, what they were doing when the church caught fire.

It has impacted them then, and it still impacts them to this day. Now, if a real physical fire can have that impact on a church, imagine what a spiritual church fire could do. I'm just telling you, when real revival comes, it attracts, it affects, it changes, it convicts, it converts, and nobody near it or around it will ever be the same.

That's what happens when revival comes. So you've got your Bibles open there this morning, real quickly. As we kind of wrap it up this morning, as we pray for God just to send revival, and students, I'm praying that He sends it in your generation, on you, specifically.

When God pours out revival fire on His church, because remember, it's not my church, it's not your church, it's His church. What happened back then? Number one, notice down there in Acts 2. Notice first of all that Peter preached Jesus boldly.

So get the picture. The Holy Spirit of God moved in the upper room, and then the people of God moved out from the upper room, and as they began to speak, the people on the street began to hear them in their own language.

It's very important. I've got buddies of mine, Charismatics, Pentecostals, the Sims of God, those kind of guys, and they'll say, Pastor Bram, do you believe in the gift of tongues? I said, no, I believe more in the gift of ears.

Because in Acts chapter 2, you're going to see here in a minute that they're just speaking in their language, and the Holy Spirit's doing the translating, and everybody's hearing in their language. Look at it.

They were all amazed and marveled, saying to one another, look, are not all these who speak Galileans? And how is it that we hear each in our own language in which we were born? Those from Egypt, they heard Egyptian.

Those from Arabia heard Arabic. Those from Asia, they heard in their own language. And the people began to ask the question, what in the world is going on here? And this is the intellectual answer from the people on the street, and here's what they said.

Oh, they drunk. They are drunk. That was the answer. And I'll go ahead and warn you, students, I'll go ahead and warn you. If God does something supernatural in your life, in this church, you'll have people who will say very much the same thing.

They'll say something like this. Oh, that's just emotion. That's just emotion. Or that's manipulation. There's really nothing to it. That's what they said a couple of weeks ago when Revival broke out at Asbury University.

You saw it all online. You saw, oh, it's just emotionalism, it's just manipulation, it's just the songs and those sorts of things. I know people who got saved there. I heard even reports about it this past week.

The guy that I mentioned to you a few moments ago, Tom Phillips with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association was there preaching. He knows the people. He's got granddaughters who were students there who know people who got saved.

But whenever God begins to move and do something a little bit different, people are going to say, well, that's just emotionalism, that's just manipulation, that doesn't really mean anything. Look, you'd better be very, very careful downplaying or denigrating the presence and the movement of God.

So what did Peter do? He began to preach. And as a matter of fact, what you have in these next few verses is the very first Christian sermon. Now, I'm going to tell you in a few moments what he did preach, because it's a great sermon.

But let me just talk to you for a moment real quickly here today, and this is again, students, I'm really glad that you're right down front this morning. We are living in a day and an age where many people, even pastors, they are trying to do away with or they're downplaying the primacy of the place of preaching.

Some churches emphasize their home groups. Other churches emphasize their drama ministry. They emphasize their children ministry or their music ministry or their homeless ministry or some other ministry.

And look, all these things are fine and good. I believe in them, that these things do a great job in helping mentor those within the church or even reach those who are lost outside the church. But these things must never, can never replace the man of God standing up in the power of the Spirit of God, preaching the Word of God to the people of God for the glory of God.

Can never take—by the way, Paul ends the argument, in case you're out somewhere in some other church and says, well, no, we just—Paul ended the argument in 1 Corinthians 1 when he wrote, for since in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of preaching to save those who believe.

For Jews request a sign and Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness. We preach Christ crucified. There was a church that built them a new building.

And over the front of the door, they put those words, we preach Christ crucified. Etched in stone, we preach Christ crucified. And you know how things go, things begin to grow in a vine, ivy begin to grow up the side of that church, which we all think is real pretty.

And that ivy begin to spread out and a little while later, it covered up some of the words and all you saw was we preach Christ. And the vine began to grow and grow and grow and it covered some more and all you could see was we preach.

And it grew and grew and grew until ultimately all you saw was we, we. And that's where a lot of our churches are today. The ivy branches of apathy and indifference, they have dulled our senses, they have darkened our eyes, they have desensitized our hearts.

And you can mark it down that when a Christian in a class or a church even begins to focus on we, it's because they've lost sight of Jesus Christ crucified. When revival comes, Jesus won't just be a word in our songs and he won't even be just a character in our children's church.

He will be exclaimed and embraced and exalted as the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the founder and the foundation of our faith, the church, the author and the finisher of our faith. And the reason why, and you may have asked yourself this question, the reason why that pulpit sits front and center in this church building and not off to the side like you find it in some other churches, is because the proclamation of the word of God is the center and the circumference of everything we do.

The first event in human, in church history was the preaching of Peter, which by the way led to more than, led to 3 ,000 people getting saved and then the church getting sent out to the entire world. By the way, you talk about results, that's results.

People will say, well, I don't know that I like you talking so much about numbers. Why not? Luke did. Luke numbered and counted and then he began adding and then multiplication and all sorts of things.

Why? Because every single number is a person. Every single number is a person. And every single person mattered. And so what did he preach? It's one of the, if not the greatest sermons ever preached in all the history of the church.

Let me show you what he preached. Number one, quickly. Look down there. Number one, he preached Jesus's crucifixion, verse 22 and 23. He said, men of Israel, hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs, which God did through him in your midst.

As you yourselves also know, him being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified and put to death. Peter stood up in the power of the Holy Spirit in front of everybody and he preached Jesus Christ crucified.

But then number two, he preached the resurrection, verse 24 and 32, whom God raised up, having loosed the pains of death because it was not possible that he should be held by it. This Jesus, God has raised up of which we are all witnesses.

And so Peter stands up, he preaches the crucifixion of Jesus. He preaches the resurrection of Jesus. And then he preaches the exaltation of Jesus, 33, therefore being exalted to the right hand of God and having received from the father, the promise of the Holy Spirit, he poured out this, which you now see in here, verse 36, therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.

He preached the crucifixion of Jesus. He preached the resurrection of Jesus. He preached the exaltation of Jesus. And then he invited them to come to Jesus. Now when they had heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do?

Then Peter said to them, repent and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the, literally as a result of the remission of sins. And you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit for the promise is to you and to your children and to all who are far off as many as the Lord, our God will call.

And with many other words, he testified and exhorted them saying, be saved from this perverse generation. He preached the crucifixion of Jesus and he preached the resurrection of Jesus and he preached the exaltation of Jesus.

And then he gave an invitation for them to come to Jesus. I wrote 361 pages on the invitation. I just want to throw that out. You want to hold this? And here's what I'm going to tell you. Peter on the day of Pentecost is the prime example of what you do at the end of preaching.

You proclaim the good news of the gospel. You ask people to respond in repentance and faith. And then when they do, you invite them to make it public. And that's what I do every single week. In just a few minutes at the end of this sermon, I'm going to go back through the good news of the gospel and I'm going to ask you if you've never done that, to give your life to Jesus, to repent.

And then once you do that, to let us know. Because that's what Peter did on Pentecost, right? How did they know? How did they know who to baptize? They said they added about 3 ,000 souls. How did they know who to do that?

Repent and be baptized. How did they know who to baptize? Because after they trusted Jesus and they repented, so they went, I did that. I did that. Or maybe there's some guy over on the side going, hey, over here's the baptistry.

Hey, we're going to, we're going to baptize. You said they didn't have baptistries all over the Temple Mount. Ritual baths all over the Temple Mount. Baptistries everywhere. How do you have, how do you think you're going to baptize 3 ,000 people at just that quick a time?

Because there's baptistries everywhere. And so he preaches the good news of the gospel. People respond in repentance and faith. And then they go, I need to be baptized. That's the invitation. Peter preached Jesus boldly, number two, that people receive the word gladly.

What you have in these following verses are the eight characteristics of a revived church. So the last couple of weeks, if you're new this morning or a guest, we've been talking about the biblical meaning of revival and the practical steps of revival and the spiritual means of revival.

And what you have right here in Acts chapter two are the wonderful marks of revival. This is what happens when real revival comes. This is the kind of church that this church will become when we are purged and purified by revival fire.

Let me give you real quickly, eight characteristics. I may come back at a later time and preach a more developed sermon on this. But if you're taking notes this morning, write down just these eight characteristics.

Let me just show you what kind of church this was. Number one, it was an obedient church. You say, why do you say that? Because the very first thing that they did after they received the word and were saved was to obey the Lord Jesus' command to be baptized.

Baptism is the first step of obedience. After you come to faith in Christ, the very first thing that you're supposed to do is to go public through believer's baptism. And I'm going to tell you again this morning that you will never grow in your faith.

You will never mature as a Christian if you are refusing to do the very first thing that Jesus told you to do at the very first command. Remember, Jesus said in Luke 8, 6, 46, but why do you call me Lord and do not do the things which I say?

The very first thing that will happen in a church when revival falls is that people will obey the word of God. They won't try to debate it. They won't try to dilute it. They won't try to argue with it.

They would just simply and gladly say, like Peter said when Jesus told him to go out and cast his nets deeper, he said, we've toiled all night and caught nothing. Nevertheless, at your word, I will let down the net.

It's an obedient church. Number two, it's a committed church, verse 42. And they continued steadfastly in the apostle's doctrine and fellowship. In other words, they had a steady commitment and I'm really glad that you're here this morning and I want you to come back because I'm going to make a lot of you mad right now.

So just kind of buckle your pew belt. And it's all right because my mama always said you could get glad in the same pants you got mad in. But the one thing that I find right here in this revived church is that they weren't hot one week and cold the next week, in one week and out the next week, on one week and off the next week, up one week and down the next week.

They were steady. They were steadfast and you could count on them. But here's the question. All right, pastor, what were they committed to? Well, Luke tells us right off the bat that they were committed to the apostle's teaching.

They loved to hear the Bible taught and preached. And then they were committed to fellowship. Let me make it, put it in layman's terminology for you here this morning. They showed up weekly, eagerly and gladly for Sunday school.

Now they didn't call it Sunday school and I don't care what you call it, Sunday school, life groups, I don't care what you call it. But you didn't have to call them or coax them. You didn't have to write them letters and remind them to show up.

You didn't have to promise them donuts and coffee in order to get them there. They were going to beat the teacher there, even if they hadn't gotten a call, even if they hadn't got a coupon for some Krispy Kreme or Dunkin' Donut.

And the reason why was, is because they realized how important it was for them and to those around them to be committed to a time of fellowship around the word of God. And I've told you for years, if you had to make a choice between coming in here for worship or going to Sunday school, I'd rather you go to Sunday school.

I'd rather you go to Sunday school. Because that's where you're going to have life together. That's where you're going to have community together. That's where we're going to minister to you. You're not just sitting in rows.

You're sitting in circles. You're living life together. And so they were, they were, they continue steadfastly in the apostle's doctrine and in fellowship. It was a committed church. Number C, it was a Christ-centered church.

That's what the Bible literally is talking about here when it talks about the breaking of bread. It's talking about the Lord's Supper like we're going to do tonight. Christ, it was the center and the circumference.

He was the foundation and the focus of this church. This was a Jesus church. And I can see y 'all got really excited about that. It's a praying church. They not only believed in the power of prayer, they actually prayed.

They prayed corporately. They prayed individually. They prayed daily. They prayed fervently. It was a praying church. Also, it was an empowered church. Verse 43, look at it. Then fair care came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles.

Same trip to Romania. I'm coming back, flying back. And there's this older English, British-English Baptist couple who's flying back there with us and we get talking. They've been over to Romania for a wedding or something.

And we began talking about revival. And I began to say that I've been studying the Welsh revival, Evan Roberts and the Welsh revival. And this guy, he said, I'm a grandson of the Welsh revival. And he told me a story about Evan Roberts that I had never heard before.

He's about empowered. He told the story, he said his grandfather had told it to him, that Evan Roberts was preaching in a town and there was a guy there in town, lost his ball in high weeds. I mean, wouldn't know Jesus if he met him in a 10-acre field.

And he has just lost, but he's got a wife who's a Christian who has been bedridden for years. She's getting weaker and weaker and weaker. She's about to die. They've tried everything they know to do to get her up and healthy and to heal her.

Nothing has worked. And so finally, in desperation, this guy goes down to the services where Evan Roberts is preaching. He begs Evan Roberts to come and pray for his wife. After the service, Evan Roberts and some of the men, they come there to that house.

They go upstairs. They go into that little room where that little frail woman is laying there in bed. She's been there for years and years and years and years. She's about to die. They lay hands on her.

They pray for her. And guess what happens right then and there, right? Nothing. Nothing but the next morning, she wakes up. She gets up. She puts on her clothes. She goes down the stairs. She walks out her front door for the first time in years and years and years.

And she walks down through the middle of town, I guess going to the grocery store or something or going to get her hair done. I don't have a clue. And half of the town is following behind her, watching this woman who just got healed.

You say, surely you don't still believe that God still heals. Why not? He's still God, right? God still heals. This is an empowered church. And then F, real quickly, it was in a giving church, verse 44 and 45.

Now, all who believe were together and had all things in common and sold their possessions and goods and divided them among all as anyone had a need. Unlike a lot of church members that I know, they not only given their heart to Jesus, they given him everything.

Charles Finney, the great revivalist, said, if you want to know how mean a man really is, come at him with an offering plate. Of course, I was always told if you want to know where a person is spiritually, just check out their bank account or their checkbook.

I don't have time for this really, but I'm going to tell it anyway. Thirsty at Spartanburg. Billy Graham Association guy, Tom Phillips, is telling this story I never heard before. I knew that Billy Graham's daddy and other men were meeting on the Graham farm to pray for another movement of God in Charlotte.

They had contacted a man named Mordecai Ham to come and preach. They were also praying for a young boy named Billy Graham to be saved, because evidently he was kind of a handful. And they were also praying that out of that crusade in Charlotte, that the next preacher would come who would reach the world with the good news of the gospel.

Mordecai Ham is over in Jackson, Tennessee, and he tells a businessman by the name of E .B. Cox, he said, I don't think I'm going to be able to go to Charlotte and preach. And E .B. Cox, not a pastor or businessman, he said, well, why can't you go to Charlotte?

He said, I don't have the money. I can't afford to go to preach in Charlotte. And E .B. Cox said, I'll pay for you to go preach in Charlotte. E .B. Cox, a businessman, paid for Mordecai Ham to go preach in Charlotte.

And at that Charlotte crusade quote revival, Billy Graham came to know Jesus Christ. And you may be here this morning and you're not a preacher, you're not a pastor, but you're a businessman, you're a business woman, and you have the ability to underwrite getting the good news of the gospel to the far ends of the world.

Where would we be today without Billy Graham? And we would not have Billy Graham today likely if it weren't for an E .B. Cox. It was a giving church. And it was a happy church. Some of y 'all need to read this verse like 15 times a day, verse 46.

So continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart. They were just satisfied with Jesus. Then lastly, it was a respected church, verse 47, and having favor with all the people.

It just meant that everybody respected this church, everybody respected these folks. They saw something different, something good, something powerful about this church. They saw the hand of God upon these people, and as a result, it was a respected church.

And here's the result, number three, the Lord added to the church daily. Think about it. What did revival do in their lives? What did revival do in the church? The Bible says that it turned a cowardly Peter into a courageous preacher.

The Bible says it took a group of folks who were huddled upstairs in an upper room, afraid of their own shadow, and it turned them into those who turned the entire world upside down. And there were sovereign additions.

Look at that. And the Lord added. Peter preached the gospel. He pleaded for souls. And people responded. But the whole time, it's the Lord doing the work. It was a systematic addition, daily, it says there, daily.

When the church is truly revived, we're gonna see people saved on a regular, weekly, even daily basis. Did you know that? If God were to sit down here today and begin to work like I'm praying that He does, we wouldn't go a service without people coming forward and saying, hey, I came to know Jesus Christ.

Hey, Pastor, hey, this is Bob. Bob's my coworker. And last week during lunch, I led Bob to the Lord. Hey, Pastor, this is Sarah. We go to school together. And last week after track practice, I shared the gospel with her, and she came to know Jesus Christ.

Hey, Pastor, last Sunday, I got so convicted that I went home and I began to pray for my lost loved ones. And my neighbor, or rather my uncle, came to my mind. I went over to the house after lunch that afternoon, and I shared the good news of the gospel with him, and he got saved.

That's what happens, the Lord added, daily. And then they were saved. That's a pretty neat word, right? Lives transformed, marriages renewed, homes restored, and eternal destiny is changed forever by the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

I got in trouble for admitting this earlier, that sometimes I drive fast. And getting back and forth, boy, last week was rough. Today was like a vacation. It was awesome. But let's suppose that next Sunday, coming back from West, I'm late.

I'm later than normal. So when I leave out at West, I send an ETA to the guys, and so they know kind of where I'm at. And let's suppose I'm running 15 minutes late. I mean, and Blair's got to just extend and extend and extend, and Josh is afraid he's going to have to come preach some sermon that he's got in the front of his Bible.

I told those guys, always be ready. Always have one in the front of your Bible. And I come in 15 minutes late, and I look like this. I say, guys, you're never going to believe it. I got hit by a Mack truck.

I got hit by a Mack truck. How many of y 'all would believe that? No? You know why? Because I don't look like I got hit by a Mack truck, right? You get hit by a Mack truck, you're going to have the marks of getting hit by a Mack truck.

And I'm going to tell you this morning, when revival falls, it will have lasting effects. You will have the marks, visible, prominent, long-lasting effects. And that's what happens when revival comes.