Revival Lectures Six — E.A. Johnston

Prayer as the Precursor to Revival

When one researches the subject of revival, one quickly learns that most revivals were preceded by prayer. I am reminded of an old painting which hangs in a Spanish gallery. It depicts the following. In the foreground is a peasant farmer who is kneeling in the attitude of prayer.

He has removed his straw hat and it lies beside him. Up behind him is his team of mules and plow which he also has laid aside for a time of prayer. In the background of the painting is a town village with a church in its steeple and a bell tower.

Apparently the bell has rung calling the village to a time of corporate prayer. But if one looks closely at the painting, in the far right hand corner is the form of an angel. The angel has picked up the plow and it seems to be moving the team of mule as if to make a fresh furrow in the field while the man kneels in prayer.

And there is a caption at the bottom of the painting on a brass frame with three words written there. And those three words are no, time, lost. Do you get it? When we pray, it's as if all of heaven's resources are enlisted on our behalf.

We get more done in prayer than we do out of prayer. It's a vital relationship between prayer and revival. And when one studies historical accounts of revivals, one soon learns that God has visited a church with revival because of the burdened, desperate prayers of someone praying, intercessoring for revival.

Historical Revivals Sustained by Intercessory Prayer

This was the case in the Scottish Hebrides in 1949 where two old women, the Smith sisters, had been praying to God to send revival to their village of Lewis. They saw a vision of a man, a stranger, standing at a pulpit.

And when Duncan Campbell finally was sent to the island in answer to their prayer, they recognized the face of that man as the one in their vision. One only has to study the revivals under Charles Finney to find a praying Daniel Nash and an Abel Clary hidden in the wings.

And this was the case, friends, when D .L. Moody visited England and the church he was preaching in soon saw a powerful revival. The work of God was so startling it shocked Moody and gave him a desire to locate the reason behind the revival.

In speaking with the church's pastor, he learned of a church member who was absent from the church during those meetings. She was a bedridden invalid, a young girl who had seen a picture of Moody in an American newspaper.

And she began to pray to God to send this man to her church for God to use this American preacher in revival. Upon discovering who this invalid girl was, Moody went to visit Marianne Adlard in her bedchamber.

Hidden Intercessors Behind Public Ministry

And 29 years later, G. Campbell Morgan became the pastor of that church and he paid a visit to Marianne Adlard. This is his account of that meeting. When in 1901 I was leaving England for America, I went to see her.

She said to me, I want you to reach that birthday book. I did so, and turning to February 5th, I saw in the handwriting I knew so well, D .L. Moody, Psalm 91. Then Marianne Adlard said, he wrote that for me.

In 1872, and I prayed for him every day until he went home to God. Continuing, she said, now will you write your name on your birthday page and let me pray for you until either you or I go home. Well, I should never forget writing my name in that book.

To me, the room was full of the presence. Listen friends, there are heroes and heroines out of sight who labor in prayer to make it possible for those who are in sight to do God's work. The force of a life of ministry and prayer can never be measured.

Well friends, I like that story, don't you? Revival goes hand in hand like biscuits and gravy with prayer. Every great revival, if researched, will prove the importance of prayer connected to that revival.

When Charles Finney would get into a town, the first thing he'd do was to inquire of the townspeople if there were any praying women in the town. He would then go see them to get them to pray for the meetings he was conducting there.

Prayer Supporting Preaching Ministry

And I know full well from personal experience the importance of prayer. Years ago, I was conducting an evening school of preaching on the subject of revival at the Stephen Oldford Institute in Memphis, Tennessee.

I knew I'd be addressing a room full of pastors, so I brought two men with me. These two men were men I was discipling at the time, and I knew they were praying men. And I told them to sit at the back of the room while I preached.

And their main objective was not to listen to me, but to be engaged with God and prayer that entire evening. Well, I was preaching out of John chapter 15, and I was describing the divine pruning knife that God uses on his servants.

And about halfway through my message, the faces of the pastors were suddenly altered with looks of concern, as if they were peering into eternity. It was obvious that God was doing a work among them, and they told me so afterwards.

One man in particular, an elderly black pastor, threw his arms around me and he hugged me. And he said, I want you to know that after this night, things will be different with me. I'm going to go home, and when I get there, I'm going to kneel by my bed, and I'm going to ask the Lord to get his pruning knife out on me and my ministry.

Well, that's revival, friend. And it came not because of me or my preaching, but because of those two praying men who labored in prayer while I was preaching. The same thing happened one time in a church where I was invited to preach the Sunday morning sermon.

The pastor was a godly man of prayer, and he told me he'd have to miss my sermon altogether, because he'd rather shut himself up in his study for that entire time praying for me, while I was preaching to his people, while he was on his knees with God in prayer.

And I was preaching that morning on the Last Judgment, and toward the end of my sermon, God showed up. And it was like the Last Judgment, it looked as if a cannonball had just been shot down the center aisle of that church, because the looks on the faces of the congregation were looks of alarm.

And it was as if for one brief, extended moment, we were all standing on the very verge of eternity, gazing out into the darkness. One young man jumped out of his chair, came bounding down the aisle, hopping up and down and hollering that he just got saved.

And one of the deacons afterwards shared with me that they felt they were frozen in their seats by an unseen force, and the music minister had a grin on his face, ear to ear, as he excitedly told me that he looked up and he saw a glimpse of Jesus sitting on his throne.

Well, that's revival, friends. And when God comes in His manifest presence in the midst of His people, it's an unusual, accelerated, exciting activity. Well, once you experience the power of God in a meeting, you know the difference, and you know the supernatural from the natural.

Burdened Prayer and the Cost of Revival

But the prayer that God hears is the desperate prayer of a burdened heart, crying out to God to come and revival, no matter the cost. One of the deepest and lasting revivals under the preaching ministry of John Sung in China occurred in 1931 in Nanchang because of an American Methodist missionary by the name of William Schubert, who prayed and fasted for 50 days for God to send revival.

That's when John Sung showed up and the power of heaven came down on the people in revival as they confessed their sins and weeped before the Lord. But it was all due to the cost and sacrifice of this praying saint, William Schubert, and the obedience of John Sung.

John Sung recorded in his journal how he overheard Reverend Schubert pray when he stayed as a visitor in his home. Sung wrote, Reverend William Schubert often went to fasting prayer and cries of worship could often be heard from upstairs.

Oh God, isn't it time to revive the church at Nanchang? If not now, when? There's no point for me to stay here. If you don't show any mercy, I might as well go back to my country. John Sung said his earnest prayers touched the very depth of my heart indeed.

Make it a practice, brother pastor, to pray on a regular basis for revival. You'd be amazed at what God can do in answer to this kind of prayer. Let me close with a following true story that was related to me by a pastor friend from Glasgow, Scotland.

Corporate Prayer and Transformation in Glasgow

He said that his city of Glasgow had a city banner and a slogan that stood for over a hundred years. And all over the city you could find a banner that read, let Glasgow flourish in the name of the Lord and the power of his spirit.

Then some liberal civic leaders voted to do away with the old banner and replaced it with a new one that simply read, let Glasgow flourish. Well, these godless politicians did away with the rest of the slogan in the name of the Lord and power of his spirit.

They got rid of God in the new slogan by only saying, let Glasgow flourish. And my pastor friend told me that when this occurred, the crime within his community went up noticeably. There were more unwed teenage pregnancies, more drug arrests, more public drunkenness, more vice and crime.

It seemed that wickedness and evil were now taking the field. And this pastor said it disturbed him so deeply that his city was changing for the worse that he called a group of other pastors in his community to make a covenant one with another that they would meet on a weekly basis to pray for their city of Glasgow.

They would band together and pray with the sole purpose of pushing back the darkness within their community. And my pastor friend said that after gathering in prayer for some long months, he saw a decrease in crime, drug arrests went down, the number of unwed pregnancies decreased, the occurrences of public drunkenness decreased, vice and crime went down.

Their faithful supplications began to push back the darkness in their community and fill it with light. Like I said, friend, we can do more in prayer than out of prayer. The engine of the church used to be the weekly prayer meeting, but when churches quit that, they quickly ran out of gas.

A Closing Appeal for Revival Prayer

Are you praying for revival in our day? Well, let us pray right now. O ancient of days, dear heavenly father, I come to you now by the name and blood of your son Jesus. Turn us, O God, into praying individuals who have power with you, power with you in answered prayer.

Our nation lies in the very grip of the devil. It's as if the antichrist is already in the land and society is just spinning out of control into moral chaos. We need revival, Lord. We need it now. I pray, great God, that you look down and hear our prayer.

Bend your ear and hear our heart cries. Come in your power, in your majesty, in your authority. In our midst, once again, we pray. And I ask these things in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.