Revival in the Psalms

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Good morning.
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If you have your Bibles and you would, turn to what Brother Keith just mentioned, Psalm 138.
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We're gonna read the Psalm together as we begin and then there's God's blessing on us.
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For those who don't know, I read from the New King James, so if it's a little different in your translation, you need to get a New King James Bible.
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So, Psalm 138, I will praise you with my whole heart before the gods, I will sing praise to you.
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I will worship towards your holy temple and praise your name for your loving kindness and your truth, for you have magnified your word above all your name.
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In the day when I cried out, you answered me, made me bold with strength in my soul.
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And all the kings of the earth shall praise you, O Lord, when they hear the words of your mouth.
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Yes, they shall sing of the ways of the Lord, for great is the glory of the Lord.
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Though the Lord is on high, yet he regards the lowly, but the proud he knows from afar.
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And though I walk in the midst of trouble, you will revive me.
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You will stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies and your right hand will save me.
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The Lord will perfect that which concerns me.
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Your mercy, O Lord, endures forever.
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Do not forsake the works of your hands.
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Let's pray.
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Our Father and our God, again, we come to you in Jesus' name.
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Lord, that we have access to you through our Lord Jesus Christ, who so loved us that he gave himself for us.
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Lord, as we come to your word, we pray, Holy Spirit, that you would open our hearts and our minds and that as we hear your word, it would be effectual, that we would hear it in truth as it is the word of God.
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Be with our thoughts, be with our minds.
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Lord, be with our lives.
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May our lives be transformed by your word.
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May you come and do what only you can do, and that is to make your word real and that it would transform us more into the image, again, of the Lord Jesus Christ, who so loved us that he gave himself for us.
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Bless us now, we pray in his name, amen.
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So this morning, as we continue on thoughts of revival, my approach to the subject of revival is not gonna deal so much with it, so much from a historical aspect.
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Certainly, Brother Mike so clearly set it forth last night from the Old Testament, from the Exodus all the way through to the exile, and we saw the work of God through history and through time and through many means, both his people and even those that weren't his people, because God uses everything.
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So I'm not gonna look at it so much from an Old Testament standpoint, nor am I gonna deal with it from a New Testament standpoint, because I know Brother Aaron is gonna address that, and we look forward to that.
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And I'm not even gonna consider revival from a church history standpoint.
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I mean, we certainly could spend some time, and Brother Mike and I were just talking a moment ago, we could spend some time talking about both the Reformation and the things that took place then, and then also the Great Awakening, and the Second Great Awakening that took place in our own country in the 1700s, and then again in the 1800s.
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What I wanna do this morning is to take the thought of revival mostly from an individual standpoint, to take the thought of how God revives each one of us, every one of us that are his, and that God uses that revival of his people to prepare the way for revival as it goes out into the community, into a nation, wherever you wanna take it, but I wanna look at it from an individual standpoint and a body of believers, as a body of believers.
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And I hope you would agree with me that if we have revival in our own individual souls, I would hope you would agree that that experience, that work of God in our own hearts would be used by God, not only in individuals, but in the body of believers that are gathered in a local assembly, and then on out into the community, and then on out, again, through ultimately, hopefully, the ends of the earth, but that you and I would see it, and that we would begin to understand this work of revival is not only to have the thought of, as Brother Keith mentioned last night, of the tent that's sitting there today in Callahan with the sign that says revival, but that you and I would begin to understand more and more that we, as God's people, we need to be revived continually, because if not, then our witness will become ineffectual.
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And so as you think about that, and again, from the standpoint of a body of believers, it is so essential.
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And I hope to make that apparent as we go through this.
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Now, because we are considering a topic and a theme, rather than looking at a portion of scriptures and opening up a whole portion of scriptures, our thoughts this morning, again, will focus or come out of what he says in verse seven.
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"'Though I walk in the midst of trouble, "'you will revive me.
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"'You will stretch out your hand "'against the wrath of my enemies, "'and your right hand will save me.'" And I would say that although I'm not intended on looking at the whole psalm, I wanna make just one or two quick points before we move any further.
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And the first point is this.
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As you read this psalm, and although our focus is going to be on revival, I would say that if you read this psalm and just consider it, you will see that the thoughts that the psalmist has from verse seven is saturated, if you will, in this psalm with praise and worship to God.
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And that you and I would consider revival in that light.
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That revival is a work of God in our hearts that ought to rebound and redound to the glory of God.
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And that you and I would understand that, and it's not something that we just desire for ourselves, but we desire that God would be honored.
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And so again, as you read the psalm, it's filled with praise, it's filled with worship, it's filled with adoration for the God of heaven.
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The other thing I want to mention is this.
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If you read through this psalm, and as we begin to unfold this thought of revival, that the psalm is saturated and it's encased, if you will, in the reality that God is sovereign.
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That God does whatsoever he pleases to do in the armies of heaven and earth, and there's none that can stay his hand, there's none that can say to him, what are you doing? And that those two thoughts are essential for us to understand the work of revival, whether we consider it from the standpoint of regeneration to those that are lost, or, if you will, as it begins to unfold in the Christian life, over the period of time, and certainly, that is something that is important for us to understand.
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I read something the other day, and it just stuck in my mind, and it's, pretty much remembered exactly as it was said.
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It said that omnipotence can afford to take its time because omnipotence is assured of victory.
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I thought it was pretty cool.
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Omnipotence can afford to take its time because omnipotence is assured of victory.
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And so as we consider these thoughts this morning, I ask you to keep those two thoughts in mind, that this whole thought of revival is to be thought of in the roots of glory and honor to God, and also in the thought that God is the absolute sovereign one, he is the true God, the living God, and the everlasting king.
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So I wanna start this way and say this, and again, I'm not going to say anything I think that will astound you, although I hope it would, but the very basic truths need to be set forth in light of not only what a revival is, but how a revival unfolds, and so I'll start it this way.
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As we think about revival, salvation is of the Lord, amen? Revival is of the Lord.
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And as sure as Jonah made that statement out of the belly of the whale, so you and I should always understand that not only is God the God of salvation, but God is the God of revival.
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And it doesn't matter how we see it, whether it's in the life of one's soul, or the life of a church, or the life of a state, or the life of a country, or in whatever way you want to consider it, it must be understood.
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It is of grace, all of grace, and nothing but grace.
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And any thought less than that is not only dishonoring to God, but I believe is a hindrance to the reality of the workings of a true revival of any magnitude of any size.
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As Paul puts it so clearly for us, for of him, through him, and to him are what? All things.
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So this thought of revival has to be understood that as sure as salvation comes from the hand of God by the mercy and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, so does revival.
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The word for revival that's used in the 138th Psalm, I found out from the original language, it's not always translated revive.
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As a matter of fact, if I remember correctly, it's the word in the original language is used 270 something times in the scriptures.
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270 times, and only 12 times is it translated as revive.
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So that means there's a whole lot of other words that are out there that are translated from the same original word.
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And so just to help us understand that, it's translated 150 times, 153 times to be exact, as live.
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The same word that's translated by in the New King James where it says revive is translated 14 times as quicken.
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It's translated eight times with the word life.
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It's translated 34 times as the word alive.
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I thought that's something to consider.
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And then there are some miscellaneous translations of the word, but those are the predominant ones.
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And so as we begin to think about revival or being revived, we have to begin to try to understand that.
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Why is it translated as live and quicken and alive and also revive? As best as I can understand, that revival is, and you could define it many different ways.
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Brother Mike defined it last night, and I'm sure Brother Aaron will as he comes up.
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But I understand it in part is that revival is the imparting of life from God to us.
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And that you can take it from the standpoint of an unbeliever, or you could take it from the standpoint of a believer, but it's the imparting of life with a continuous result.
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That it is not something that just comes and goes, but that being revived is a work of God imparting life as only he can, and that that life continues on.
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As I said, you can apply it to either the unbeliever or the believer.
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Let's think about it for a moment from the standpoint of an unbeliever.
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Because I think it's applicable to both.
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If I'm even close, and that revival and being revived means life, then as you consider it from an unbeliever standpoint, that a work of revival is God quickening sinners who are dead in their sins and trespasses, giving them life and a new heart.
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And I would add, because of the workings of the new covenant, sealed by the blood of Christ.
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So that's how it would manifest itself in an unbeliever.
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But consider it from a believer standpoint, and I believe it's the quickening of our lives in a way that helps us further to not only honor God, but to live as God would have us to live.
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So that's why I say, you can make that application to both the unbeliever and the believer.
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Although I would add this, that concerning a believer, a work of revival many times will have a freshness to it, a vitality to it that perhaps was not there before.
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Now, I wanna say something as we move forward.
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I will admit that what I'm going to try to set forth to us, I'm trying to skate on a sharp edge, I guess.
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Because this might sound like a message about progressive sanctification as concerns a believer, which we would all understand to be the continuation of the work of the Spirit of God in us to conform us more and more into the image of Christ.
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And I do think that revival in part could be included in that, in progressive sanctification, particularly as it pertains to the believer, right? The unbeliever, he's dead, he's Lazarus in the grave.
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He's raised to newness as Lazarus.
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An unbeliever is raised to newness of life.
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In essence, he experiences a revival that he never possessed before.
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But as it pertains to a child of God, I do think it could be viewed and rightfully viewed as a demonstration.
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And again, I wanna emphasize a newness in our sanctification that moves us further along in understanding the Lord of glory.
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I also wanna add this to it, concerning a revival.
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True revival comes down from above.
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And you know what, friends, and I hope you would agree with me, sometimes it comes like a whirlwind as it took place in the great awakenings in our own country.
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So it could come as a whirlwind, but let us not forget, it can also come as a still small voice.
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And I think many times we have this thought of revival, even as Brother Keat again mentioned it, that you come to an event, and at this event, there's this great expectation, rightfully so, we should have a great expectation, but we have this expectation that angels are gonna start to fall out of the sky.
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And people are gonna be enraptured in the glory of God.
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And again, that would be a good expectation, but it doesn't always come that way.
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Sometimes, especially through the preparation of time, it does come in a still, small voice.
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It may come in the twinkling of an eye, or again, it might come over a long period of time.
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I remember a story that was told to me of a man, I think he was a Scottish man.
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And he was a young man, he had heard the gospel like many other kids, and that he went off and he lived his life the way he wanted to live, and at the age of 99, he was sitting under a tree, and the truths that he heard as a little child became so real to him that he was born again at the age of 99.
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Well, that's a bit of time in that revival.
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So revival can come in the twinkling of an eye, revival can come over a long, protracted time, and obviously, as we look at church history, even from the New Testament age on, much preparation goes into a revival, and rightfully so.
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But let me caution us, and again, I know Brother Mike had mentioned it.
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I hope you understand, I'm gonna step on some of the things that were said, because there's only certain truths that need to be told, right? I mean, we're not trying to invent new things.
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But I want us to think about, and caution us, not to try to limit the way and the means that God brings revival.
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If it is a work of God, and God takes counsel from no one, then you and I should not try to seek to coach, maneuver, or cause God to do anything except what he's pleased to do.
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So, in one sense, it's good to see revivals take place.
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But I would caution, I always, I'm troubled in my mind when you drive past a church, or a tent, or a building, or whatever, and there's a sign on a billboard that says revival, August 2nd to August 5th, from six to nine.
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Did the Spirit of God give them those dates? You see, again, that's where we sometimes try to put God in a box, and my friends, God cannot be held in a box.
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Not the God that we worship.
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Not the God who is the only true God.
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So, we do need caution in trying to get too far down in the weeds, as far as to understand how, and when, and even why God causes a revival.
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Even as it says that God causes it to rain in one city, and another city is what? Dry.
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And then God moves it from one city to another city, and one place to another place.
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You see, again, that's why I say to you, this whole thought of revival has to be understood in the light of the sovereignty of God.
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The sovereignty of God is not tulip.
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The sovereignty of God is that God is the one who does, again, whatever he pleases to do.
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And that we are the recipients of his graciousness and his mercy.
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And that you and I would, again, be careful in our own minds and in our own lives to how God does what he's pleased to do.
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How the spirit moves, and again, as was said before, and will continue to be said, as the wind moves where it wills, and you feel the effects of it, you can't tell where it comes from, and you certainly can't tell where it's going.
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I also wanna state this, and I think this is an important point.
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I wanna state that the greatest evidence of a true revival of any sort is newness of life, and manifestation of godly fruit.
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That a true revival, a true work of revival is a manifestation of, and production of godly fruit.
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And that it is not something that is driven by emotions.
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It is not something that's solely driven by experience.
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Now, I'm not going to say that emotions and experience don't enter into it, but the reality is, the evidence of a true work of revival is the reality of us becoming more and more like the savior.
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And if that evidence is not there, then I believe you have very good grounds to doubt a work of revival.
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Again, many of the revivals that have taken place, or so-called revivals, are those meetings and gatherings where people are, again, enthralled and all emotional and all caught up in an experience.
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We probably spent some time talking about the Asbury supposed revival that took place not too long ago.
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And I know we've talked about it.
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You know one of the things that was missing in that whole gathering? Was the preaching of the word of God.
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Was a lot of emotions, was a lot of singing, there was a lot of clapping of hands, there were people flying from all over the world to come there.
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And as far as I know, and I don't know all the details, but I know this, that there seemed to be a great deal of emotion and a great deal of experience and minimal preaching of the word of God.
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And I wanna emphasize that as we go through this.
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Because true revival in a person is affected, I believe, by three things.
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Now there are, I'm sure there are others, but I do believe that true revival in a person, or persons, is really affected by spiritual means, and I want to give them to you to think about.
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And I would say this, true revival is characterized by the preaching of the word of God, amen? And true revival is characterized by the very word of God itself.
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It's the word of God, and it's the word of God as God has declared to be preached.
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And I would also say a third is prayer.
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And if I had to add a fourth, I would say patience.
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But really, a worker revival is not mere emotionals, not mere experience, it's the word of God being preached by the man of God, and it's being received, and it's being sought by careful, diligent prayer.
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And even as Brother Mike brought up, that certainly was, thinking about what he said last night, you talked about the three nines, didn't you? You talked about chapter nine in Ezra, chapter nine in Nehemiah, chapter nine in Daniel.
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So I always remembered that, the three nines.
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But there was a great deal of prayer that went on through hundreds of years.
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And so that you and I would begin to understand, and one writer put it this way, and I thought it was so good, he said this, about seeking spiritual means to accomplish spiritual work.
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And he said this, he said that if we look for revival in any other means than God has ordained, we will be led where we ought not to go.
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Now, some people might say, well, that's a little narrow.
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Well, say what you want.
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The word of God being preached by men of God, being received and prayed about and prayed over is the means that God has been pleased to bring a work of revival.
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Now, I also wanna mention, and we're gonna get a little more into detail, I wanna try to make this practical this morning.
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So, a few more remarks, and then I'm gonna look at some specific things.
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But I wanna mention this, that there is a difference between revival and revivalism.
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There's a distinct difference between revival and revivalism.
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Some might think they're the same things.
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I would say they are not.
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Revival is the work of the Holy Spirit on the hearts of men.
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Now, I don't wanna give Brother Mike an allergic reaction, because he says he has an allergic reaction to Charles Finney.
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But revivalism is a term that men developed.
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Revivalism is a term that men put in place, and what revivalism really is, if you think about how they implement it, it's the mechanics of men.
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It's when men think that true revival is the outworking of a process.
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And again, one of the biggest proponents of that was Charles Finney.
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Revival and revivalism are not the same.
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Revival, true revival is the work of God.
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Revivalism is nothing more than the mechanics of men, which basically stipulates this.
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If you do certain things in a certain order, you're guaranteed a certain result.
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Again, are we going to put the Spirit of God in a box and say, this is how it works? I don't know, God revived Jonah with a whale.
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I don't know if that fits into the process of men.
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Apart from the work of the Spirit of God, friends, we could no longer bring revival than we could change the color of our own skin, or a leopard changes spots.
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How's that? It is of God, only of God, always of God.
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So you and I need to make sure that we're not led astray with these actions of men.
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Now, that doesn't mean that God doesn't revive.
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Again, I don't wanna put, we can't put God in a box.
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It doesn't mean God doesn't revive in the midst of even error, but that's by grace, friends.
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That's by mercy, and that's not where we ought to go.
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We ought to seek revival according to God's word.
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As I said, I wanna try to make this practical.
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So I wanna use the rest of our time this morning, and I think we started a few minutes late.
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Brother Mike was gonna go for 12 hours last night, but, and I know Brother Aaron has time after me.
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But I wanna try to make this practical, and I wanna use the rest of our time.
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I wanna make five points concerning revival.
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Five points concerning revival, and you can consider them as positives or things that aid revival, or you can think of them as a negative of things that hinder revival.
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Now, we've just said that revival is a work of God, solely a work of God, always a work of God.
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However, God uses means, doesn't he? And that you and I, as we consider this, I want us to look at five either positives or negatives, if you will, of quenching a revival or of aiding in the bringing of revival.
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And I wanna mention them to you, and then we'll go through each one of them briefly.
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First one is worldliness, worldliness.
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And then I want us to consider revival in the light of personal responsibility.
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Worldliness, personal responsibility, love for God and love for man, gross offenses, and I hope to explain that, and finally, doctrinal purity.
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Five things that we should consider as either aids to revival, and again, whether it's towards those that are without Christ or those that have Christ, and that those very things, if neglected, will lead to hindering the work of revival.
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Now, I wanna acknowledge that I'm just not smart enough to come up with everything by myself, matter of fact.
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So I wanna acknowledge William Sprague, because I did use some of the thoughts of William Sprague, and he lived in the late 1700s, early 1800s, and he was an eyewitness.
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Even his brother Mike mentioned some of those that were eyewitnesses to revival.
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He was in the midst of it.
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Wasn't a fairy tale to him, he lived through it.
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And so some of the thoughts are his thoughts, and I've used some of those thoughts to help to lay out these five different things.
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With that, let me begin with the thought of worldliness.
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You and I need to understand, and what I mean by worldliness is when anything, anything of this world becomes more important to us than the glory and honor of God, then we are a hindrance to the work of revival.
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Now, I wanna be clear, not saying that we ought not to work hard in this world.
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I'm not saying that we ought not to enjoy the things of this world.
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I'm not even saying that you and I ought to not make as much of ourselves as we can.
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What I am saying, and what I think is essential to the work of revival, is that when anything, whether it's wealth, position, prosperity, power, peace, you ever hear that saying, better to have truth without peace than peace without truth? But when anything, even peace, even that thought of peace, when that becomes the driving force of our life, then I would say we are being worldly.
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And that even our own families, if need be, when anything and everything in this world becomes more important to us than to see, listen, to see God do a great work amongst us and amongst the lost, then you and I are being, this is the way I thought of it myself.
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Do we really expect a true revival where God bears his arm, because that's what the prophet says, God will bear his arm, and our arms are still folded or fixed on worldly things? Do we really expect God to revive the new man when we are unwilling to let go of the old man? See, I wonder sometimes, we think, we form thoughts in our mind of certain things, of just about everything, we take thoughts in and then we put them together in our hearts and our minds as best we can and we formulate an understanding.
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And especially in the work of revival.
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Revival in the heart of a child of God is that very thing that I just said.
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It's the old man dying and the new man growing.
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Again, you can look at that from a sanctification standpoint, but do we really expect a revival where we desire to see God work, but we're too occupied in our own lives to do anything? Remember in the gospels when Jesus said, follow me? Remember some of the excuses? Hey, I just got a new set of oxen.
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I gotta go check them out in the field.
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And I just got this land and I gotta go take care of my father.
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Hey, I just got married.
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That was pretty neat in the Old Testament, right? If you got married, you didn't have to go to war.
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You don't have to do much for a whole year.
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Pretty cool.
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That's maternity leave.
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But please understand that worldliness is a great hindrance to revival.
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When we worship and serve the creature rather than the creator, which we are told is blessed forever.
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So we have to ask ourselves, where are we in that? Where are we in our thoughts about the things of this life? Where are we when we begin to think of what's important, what's essential, what's honoring to God? When others see in us that we say one thing and yet we're not much different in the world, we just throw a Christian blanket over it.
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Worldliness, my friends, is a great hindrance to the work of revival.
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And even again, I keep saying, Brother Mike said this, because he did.
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But you think about the men that God raised up.
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What was the distinctive character of the men that God raised up at certain times to accomplish his purpose, apart from the fact that God used unbelievers? They were men who had a zeal for God.
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They were men who cared not for self-esteem, for power, position, for wealth, or any of those things.
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So consider that, that an ingredient for a true work of revival is the removal in our own lives of worldliness.
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And that's not easy in this day and age.
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That is not easy in this day.
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I was telling my wife this morning, I got up at one o'clock this morning, because I just don't sleep no more.
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Now that I'm retired, I sleep whenever I want anyway.
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But I got up at one o'clock this morning, my grandsons are with us, and they were both on the couch.
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And one of my grandsons, it was one o'clock in the morning, he's still doing this with his phone.
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And I just, I went up to him, I said, Lucas, go to sleep.
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But I say that because it's a demonstration to me of how this world has such a possessive grip on us.
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I would have been so much happier if I woke up at one o'clock this morning and he was reading the Bible.
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So think about it, friends.
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Think about worldliness as it pertains to revival.
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The second thing that I mentioned to you, and I want to just briefly consider, is personal responsibility.
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I remember what I said.
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We insist, we insist that a true revival is the work of the sovereign spirit of God in the soul of man, men, churches, nations.
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We insist that it is all of God and only of God.
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Well, let me ask you to think about this.
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We insist that the work of revival is the responsibility of every one of us, that there is a reality of human responsibility in seeking to bring revival.
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How can I say that? I just said that it's all of God and nothing of God.
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And again, it's because God uses means, and God has given those means, and God has given us responsibility.
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It's the same thought that we take when it comes to salvation.
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God is absolutely sovereign, and guess what? We're absolutely responsible.
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How, where do they meet? I don't know, but it's true.
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God has ordained the means.
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And so let me ask us to think about this.
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In order for there to be a work of revival, we must ask, we must seek, and we must knock.
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What Jesus said.
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Ask, seek, and knock.
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I've used this example before, and I'm just gonna mention it again.
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I've been in churches for 50 years.
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In my experience, I have, at least for now, formulated in my mind that there's basically three kinds of people in the church.
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And I've always thought of the church as a boat.
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There's three kinds of people in the church.
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And there's one group who are in the boat, and they're on the ocean, and they pick up the oar, and they're rowing.
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They're asking, they're seeking, they're knocking.
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And there's no deterring them.
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That's the first group.
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And then there's this second group that I have formulated in my mind, and they are also in the boat.
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And guess what? They're glad that they're in the boat.
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And guess what? They're glad that the others are rowing in the boat.
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But they themselves don't wanna row.
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They don't wanna ask.
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They don't wanna seek.
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They don't wanna knock.
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And then I find a third group, and those are the ones who, they're in the boat for the wrong reason.
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And not only are they in the boat for the wrong reason, they're rowing in the wrong direction.
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And they become a hindrance to those that are asking, seeking, and knocking.
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Now you might think that's not a valid example.
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Well, what can I tell you? I'm a wretched old man.
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But we must understand our responsibility.
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Remember what Jeremiah said? He said, break up your fallow ground.
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Sow not among the thorns.
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Break up whose fallow ground? Your fallow ground.
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Whose responsibility is it? Mine, yours.
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Are we asking for revival? Are we seeking to see God's glory spread? Are we seeking to see God honored? Are we seeking to honor God? Are we asking? Are we seeking? Then this might step on a few toes.
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We've been talking about this conference for months.
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Talking about the thoughts of revival.
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We've been discussing it for months and giving information.
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I wanna ask you to think about it in our own responsibility.
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How much time has each of us given to asking, seeking, and knocking that God would do a great work? Oh, we want others to roam.
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But how much time have we really spent in seeking God to bless it? Both to the lost and the found.
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Is there anyone here that wants to see their loved ones lost? I think not.
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How often do we in our own responsibility pray for revival? See, that hurts, right? Because that cuts us in the heart.
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We don't wanna see people lost and we don't wanna knock and ask God to do something that only he could do.
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Save dead, lost, hell-bound sinners.
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What are we doing to bring it to pass? How many of us wanna see more of the glory of God? I hope all of us.
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That's one of those, I raise two hands.
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What are we doing to make it come to pass? See, these are questions that only we can answer.
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Because God already knows the answer anyway.
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How much do we ask? How much do we seek? How much do we knock? Are we like the hyper-Calvinist? Eh, God's gonna save.
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I have nothing to worry about.
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You see, friends, personal responsibility is enormous.
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We ought to keep our hearts with what? Come on, I know you know the scriptures.
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Keep our hearts with all diligence for out of it flows the issues of what? Life, that's what revival is, life.
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Or you can consider from this standpoint.
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If we desire to reap, shouldn't we sow? Oh, I don't wanna see my loved ones lost.
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Well, what are you doing about it? Oh, if God's gonna save them, he'll save them.
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How many nights do we spend crying out to God to do something that only he could do, to give life out of death, to make the dry bones alive? Whoa, I put him on the prayer list.
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That really is great.
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God has given each one of us a life to live.
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And we ought to take that responsibility seriously.
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And again, I say to you, do we expect the work of revival where God bears his arms when we're too busy? With our arms folded? Oh Lord, you're doing good, keep on going.
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Let me just end this thought with this point.
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Wouldn't we not consider someone who wants to have a garden or a field, a crop, wouldn't we consider them a fool? And one with a lack of responsibility if his desire is one thing and his actions are another.
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He gets up every morning, has his cup of Starbucks, looks out the window and says, Lord, please bring the crops.
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Never goes out to cultivate the earth, never goes out to seek to pull the weeds, never goes out to fertilize, never goes out to work, never does anything.
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You and I have this great responsibility, friends, every one of us.
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I don't care where you are.
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I don't care if you're a man or a woman.
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I don't care if you're young or old.
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I don't care if you have two good working guys or one cockeyed eye.
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We are responsible for the work of revival.
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The third point is one of the things that aids revival or if it's missing, hinders revival, is what I said when I said the love of God.
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And not only the love of God, love for God and love for man made in the image of God.
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So let's take a bit from a marriage standpoint.
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Can a marriage thrive where there is no love? Can there be expectation of greater things? There is no love.
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Does not God love us with an everlasting love? He says, right? No misunderstanding there.
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I have loved you with an everlasting love.
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Are we not told and do we not comprehend that we love him, why? Because he first loved us.
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Well, where's our love in return for him? Are we too busy being worthy? Are we too busy just sitting on the sidelines hoping God will do something great? Or is that love for God burning in us, driving us? Do we expect a revival to come when our love for the souls of men is missing? Do we expect a revival when the love for the brethren is missing? Do we expect God to come and warm us with his presence when our love for him has really no depth at all? Hurts, doesn't it? That he so loved us, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
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Where's our love for him? I remind you of this psalm.
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And if you read this psalm again, I will say it to you that you can't miss how the psalmist is captivated in praise and worship of God.
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Why? Because he loves him.
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That's why.
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Why? Who we love, we will serve.
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Remember what Jesus said? You shall know, they shall know, you're my disciples.
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Why? Because you love the brethren.
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Doesn't mean you always understand the brethren.
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I thought it was funny.
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Yesterday, Brother Keith had, I don't know, he had some special, looked like, I don't know, Star Wars white headphones on.
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And as he walked by, I laughed, and he said, that's my fishing, because I love to fish.
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And he's into it.
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I mean, if this is a gidget or a gadget, he got it, or he's gonna get it.
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You come in my garage, I got 10 fishing poles hanging.
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I enjoy it, because it brings me pleasure, because in a sense, I love it.
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But new headphones? Where's our love for God? Where's our love for man? Where's our love to see men and women and tribes and nations that have never heard of Jesus? Why is Scott Phillips in Indonesia? He loves God, and he loves men.
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I'm not saying we all have to run to Indonesia.
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And what I am saying is that a great help or a great hindrance to revival is a lack of love for God and for other men.
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Worldliness, human responsibility, love for God.
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The fourth one I just want to mention as our time begins to run out, is gross offenses, gross offenses.
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Or, if you will, gross sins.
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What I mean by that is that when an individual or a body of believers, remember I said my intent was to look at this and try to look at it from the standpoint of us individually and as a body of believers, as the light of the world going out into the community.
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But gross offenses or gross sins, and what I mean by that, again, is not dealing with sin.
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You remember Paul's instructions to the church of Corinth? Man sleeping with his father's wife? Gross offense! What was Paul's exhortation? Yeah, don't worry about it, boys.
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God will take care of it.
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Cut him off! Why? Because it's offensive! It's offensive to God, it's offensive to those that name the name of Christ to allow such things.
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Do you remember what Jesus said? He said, if your hand offend you, what? Cut it off.
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If your eye offend you, pluck it out.
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Gross offenses, gross sins.
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Those who seek revival need to be careful, to make no provision for the flesh, to fill the lust thereof.
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I guess what you can probably put this under one umbrella, and that umbrella is follow peace with all men and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.
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Should we expect revival, friends, when we are seeing how much sin we can still maintain? And still be in the camp of Christ? And you could consider this externally or internally, and the internal one is probably more difficult.
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When there's lust, when there's envy, when there's jealousy, when there's wrath, when there's lack of personal responsibility, when we allow these things to not only affect us, but hinder us, and we don't deal with sin.
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You know that's why many people won't join a church, right? They don't want to be put under the Word of God.
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They don't want to be put under the body of believers.
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They don't want to be watched.
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Again, how could we expect the light of Christ to shine in our hearts when we harbor the things of darkness? That's my greatest anxiety.
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Oh, I've got a lot of them.
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You ask my wife, she'll probably two or three pages of issues that I deal with.
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But you know what really disturbs me? It's my sin! I can't get rid of it! It's always there, it's always, and I have to seek to, and you and I all have to seek, fight, put it to death.
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You see, true revival, being a work of God is a holy work, right? Isn't that what we should expect? Shouldn't we expect people to have a changed life, to press on in this what? Most holy faith.
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The last thing I want to mention, you know what's interesting, I can't see the clock.
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I can't see up there, so I don't, I think I have an idea of what time it is, but must be getting close.
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The last thing I want to mention is this thought of doctrinal purity.
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This was something that Brother Mike highlighted in his message, doctrinal purity.
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And this to me is perhaps the greatest ingredient in either aiding revival or hindering revival.
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And what I mean by that is that, again, as I said in the beginning, that revival is built on God's, that revival is built on God's truth.
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One of the greatest ways to have a revival is to pursue, listen, to pursue the truth of God.
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And that ain't easy.
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You know what really, to me, and I've been in that situation, you know what really is the mark of a faithful ministry to me? Is longevity.
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Is longevity, is, how many years you been here? Man behind a computer? 17.
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I remember I was at the previous church that we were at before we came here.
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And they asked me to fill in, I filled in for 12 years.
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But you see, my friends, it has to be, longevity in the truth.
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Why have books stood the test of time that we all hold so dear? It's because they spoke the truth.
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You can go and you could buy a book that has a Christian title, a Christian premise, a Christian this or a Christian that.
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You could buy Christian socks, a Christian umbrella.
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You could buy anything Christian.
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But guess what? Much of that stuff and much of the books and much of the teaching that has captivated people will be gone in such a short period of time.
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Why do you think Amazing Grace is still sung the way it's sung? Because it speaks about the truth.
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The truth.
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The truth ultimately is Christ, isn't it? Not what we believe to be true.
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Not what other men tell us is true.
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Not what false teachers teaches is true.
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But the truth, and isn't it great? Revival is life.
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Revival is a quickening.
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Revival is newness of life.
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And remember what Jesus said? The what will set us free? The truth.
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The truth will set us free.
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And again, I'm not saying God doesn't bring revival amongst error and prayers.
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God, he does.
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But what I am saying is that truth, biblical truth, God's truth, faithful preaching, faithful hearing, faithful prayer based on the truth will be a great aid to revival.
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I just mentioned, when I came here in 2016, many of you were running around with T-shirts.
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Actually, Jerry, you had one on two weeks ago.
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I saw it.
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Theology matters.
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Friends, theology matters.
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Not your theology or my theology, God's theology.
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We who desire revival ought to desire to seek to rightly divide the word of truth.
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That doesn't mean we're not gonna have differences.
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That doesn't mean we're not gonna have disagreements.
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If you wanna be a dispensational pre-Millennials, I guess God bless you.
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But we ought to seek to rightly divide the word of truth.
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And God honors his word.
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Remember when Brother Mike teached in 2 1 Samuel? Remember what Samuel said in chapter two? He said, God says, those that honor me, I will honor.
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And those that despise me shall be lightly esteemed.
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How do we honor God? Honoring his truth.
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Seeking his truth.
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Again, you can go back to personal responsibility.
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Ask, seek, and knock.
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Let me just end it this way.
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I'm pretty sure my time is over.
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As we seek to see others come to saving knowledge of Christ, never, never, never water down the truth.
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Solomon said, let not mercy and truth forsake you.
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Bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart, and so find favor and high esteem in the sight of God, amen.
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I pray God will bless our lives, bless our desire to see him glorified, and that God, the Holy Spirit, would be pleased to help us in these areas of worldliness, personal responsibility, love for God, to cut off sin in our own lives, and to maintain doctrinal purity.
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May God bless us.
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Let's pray.
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Our Father in God, again, we thank you for who you are.
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Oh, God, forgive us for our sins.
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Forgive us for being so stiff-necked, and so hard-headed, and so cold, and so uncaring.
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Oh, God, revive us.
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In the midst of the years, revive us, Lord.
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Cause us to see you high and lifted up.
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Cause us to see you as the Lord of glory, and may that truth transform us.
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May we become less like this world, and more like the Lord Jesus Christ, for he has gone to prepare a place for us that he will come again, and he will receive us to himself.
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Until that day, Lord, help us to press on in this most holy faith.
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In Jesus' name, amen.