Isaiah's Personal Revival — Morris Gleiser

Join us now for the chapel hour coming to you from the campus of Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina. Our speaker today is Dr. Morris Gleiser, staff evangelist for Burge Terrace Baptist Church in Indianapolis, Indiana.

The title of his message is Isaiah's Personal Revival. The text is from Isaiah chapter 6, verses 1 through 9.

Isaiah’s Personal Revival and the Call to Witness

Isaiah chapter 6 this morning, please. Isaiah chapter 6. Good to see you again. Our third day together and our journey of learning some things and issues regarding this matter of getting prepared to be the kind of witness we ought to be daily, and especially as you focus on the holiday season.

I know you've got a lot of plans for the holidays, and rightly so. Your family's looking forward to having you home. You're looking forward to seeing friends and family, getting back to your home church, and getting back to seeing maybe some folks you knew in high school or folks that you haven't seen in a long time, relatives of a long time that you haven't seen, and maybe even your dog and cat.

Who knows what all is waiting for you as you head home. Some of you are looking forward to that opportunity to sleep in and to just kind of conk out and relax and unwind. And it's an important time to kind of get yourself physically prepared for second semester and to just kind of unwind and enjoy that time.

It's a great time. I know you're looking forward to it. Now, don't put your brain in holiday gear yet this morning. And I'd like to just simply say to you that it's been a privilege to get to know you and to get to spend this time with you.

I sense that the Lord is doing something. I sense that He's doing something in many hearts. I've based that upon the conversations I've had with many of you. I've based it upon the way in which you intently have been listening.

I want to thank you for being so kind and gracious to listen to a very simple preacher in the last two days. Yesterday in particular, I just sensed that you were really comprehending what the Lord was trying to say to you.

And I thank you for that. We have just a few moments together and it's a very valuable time. And I ask you to once again give your wholehearted attention to what the Lord would have you to hear for your future this holiday season.

When you look at Isaiah chapter 6, there's a natural tendency for anyone who's familiar with that passage to look quickly to verse 8. And to immediately say, well, that must be where he's headed today, because what preacher has not preached when it comes to the matter of ministry or witnessing who's not hit verse 8 of Isaiah chapter 6?

In which the Lord said, Then whom shall I send and who will go for us? Then said I, Isaiah said, Here am I. Send me. Who among us have not heard some missionary preach from that text? Some preacher talk about the ministry.

Somebody say, I was called to the ministry with that text. Some of you may claim it as a life verse because God used it greatly in your past somewhere. And it is a wonderful, wonderful verse, but I'm afraid that too often we miss all that leads up to verse 8.

Isaiah gives us a biography of his own life. And yes, it says there in verse 8 that he sees a renewed awareness of ministry. I call it Isaiah's revival. I believe Isaiah was revived in this chapter, and I believe Isaiah speaks about that revival.

His own personal renewal and refocusing and being revived in the area of the call of God in his life. And I know commentators and scholars have argued about why it's given to us in his prophecy here in this particular section, Isaiah chapter 6.

People argue, why didn't it come in chapter 1? Why didn't he give us his explanation of God's calling and then the rest of the book written about his prophecy and everything that God gave him? And we can argue, but the point is not to be argued as to when this came in Isaiah's life, but it is clear, young people, that Isaiah speaks about God got a hold of his heart and he was never the same.

My prayer for you is that God will get a hold of your heart and never be the same. I happen to be somebody who still believes that God can bring revival to this country. I still pray for God to send great, sweeping revival across this nation before He comes again.

Now, if He comes back, so be it, and thank the Lord we'll be raptured and go on. But I still pray for revival for this country. I'm in thirst to see what I've read about in church history past. I get a little tired of just reading about what happened in the days of the great awakening.

I long to see it now. I get a little tired of reading about Dwight Moody and thinking about the mass crowds that sat in front of him when he preached. His little simple messages and mass numbers of people were brought to Christ.

And I think to myself, Lord, I'd like to see that in our day. I hunger to see what Billy Sunday saw in the early part of the last century. Lord, I thirst and I hunger to see a sweeping revival. But you hear me, my friends.

Personal Revival Before National Revival

While waiting and praying and asking and pleading with God to send a general sweeping revival, hear me, there's no excuse for anyone who knows the Lord this morning not to experience, and forgive me for using that word, a personal revival.

There's no reason why anyone here in this room ought not know what it is to be personally awakened. That's what Isaiah writes about here. Isaiah said there was a day in which God woke me up. He got my attention.

And I've never been the same. God grabbed me. God alerted me. God awakened me. And I was revived. And a part of that revival, young people, resulted in the clear, evident fact that he became God's proclaimer.

And the Lord said, Whom shall I send? Who will go for us? And Isaiah jumps up and he says, Lord, use me! Let me be your messenger. Young people, may I say to you as we talk about this matter of soul winning and witnessing, may I say that the clear-cut need of our life is that we all know what it is to be revived.

For long after these four days of soul winning emphasis, long after this semester is over, long after the holidays are over, long after this school year is over, God helped each one of us to continue to be that proclaimer of God's deliverance.

Isaiah's two-fold message was one of God is bringing judgment, people of God. He was saying to all of Judah and all of Israel, God will bring judgment. Judgment is coming. But at the same time, Isaiah came back and he said, But God provides mercy if you'll receive it.

Sometimes we get the image of a prophet as being somebody who almost delighted, who almost enjoyed to proclaim the judgment of God. I think we do a disservice to some of these good men. All these good men.

We get the idea that they almost enjoyed seeing people condemned to judgment. But I believe with all of my heart that there was a brokenness on the part of so many of them as they not only gave the statement that God was bringing judgment, they would always turn around and say, But you don't have to suffer God's judgment.

You can have His mercy. I'll tell you, when I first got into ministry, when I first took off in youth ministry, I was one of the meanest preachers you could have ever met. I mean, I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I was preaching some of the meanest sermons you could have ever heard.

I'd preach sermons like, Heaven, and why you're probably not going. You know, things like that. And I'd say, Hey, come back tonight, young people. Tonight I'm preaching on you're not worth a nickel. You know, and things like that.

I was just mean. And I thank God that somewhere along those early days of my ministry, God broke my heart. And I don't want to ever be the same. I'll tell you what we need, young people. It's the broken heart of a prophet who had to tell that God's judgment is coming, but you need to receive God's mercy and you can have it.

We need compassion. I still believe that we as individuals can know what it is to be personally revived. Nobody here enjoys waking up in the morning, do they not? Nobody enjoys getting up and starting their day and nobody jumps out of bed and says, Whoa, man, I'm glad to be alive.

Nobody does that. We usually crawl out of bed and say, Where am I? And am I? What am I supposed to do? And what's supposed to be done to me today? And we don't even know where we are. Most of us don't like to wake up.

Spiritual Wakefulness and the Witness of Mercy

And the devil doesn't want us to wake up spiritually either. The devil loves for God's people to stay spiritually asleep. For if you and I will stay spiritually asleep, there will be a world that will never hear the proclaimed message of mercy and the fact that they can receive Christ and receive the hope of eternal life.

He wants us to stay asleep. He wants the church of God to stay asleep. And he wants you as an individual believer to stay asleep. Just like Jonah who slept in the bottom of a boat physically, running from God's call.

When the storm came up, he woke up physically, but then he woke up spiritually in the belly of a giant fish. He had fallen asleep physically, but before he did that, he fell asleep spiritually. I look at Lot.

There's old Lot sleeping in the city of Sodom and Gomorrah. He built him a house and he was in the midst of perversion, living physically and sleeping physically in an environment of perversion. But long before he fell asleep physically, he fell asleep spiritually to the work of God.

I see Samson taking a nap in the lap of Delilah, sleeping when he had a call. He had a job, a ministry to do, but he slept in the lap of a harlot. But long before he slept physically, he had fallen asleep spiritually before God had to get his attention and woke him up.

I wonder how many are in this building this morning sound asleep spiritually. What will it take to awaken you to get you to see there's a world around you that needs the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Isaiah woke up here in this chapter.

Isaiah’s Vision of the Holy God

He gives us his biography of waking up. Look at verse 1. Isaiah said, In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple.

Above it stood the seraphim. Each one had six wings. With twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.

The whole earth is full of His glory. And the post of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. Then said I, Woe is me, for I am undone because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips.

For mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphim unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar. And he laid it upon my mouth and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips, and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged.

Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I. Send me. Don't miss verse 9. And he said, Go and tell this people, Isaiah woke up. In this passage, we see Isaiah's revival of waking up.

And I want you to see that long before he became aware of his ministry, he woke up to something else. And I want you to clearly see, because long after these meetings are over, young people, if you're going to stay personally revived, you've got to have this awakening in your heart.

Renewed Adoration for the Lord

Number one, he woke up to a renewed adoration of his God. Don't get lost in the wording. Don't just hear the words of another preacher who's up here trying to proclaim something and say, well, here comes just another chapel message.

You hear what's being said this morning. He had a renewed adoration for his God. He said in verse 1, In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord. Now you read that in your English words. It just says he saw the Lord.

But you hear me. The Hebrew word that Isaiah used there was the word, the term, the name Adonai. This was a personal statement on the part of Isaiah. Later on in the passage, he used the term, the name Jehovah.

But in this particular point, he uses the word, the name Adonai, which made it a personal comment. In the year that God took away Uzziah and He got him out of my sight, I saw my God. I saw my Lord. I saw my Lord again.

There had been something that had been blocking the view in the past, but when God removed King Uzziah, I got a renewed view and adoration for my Lord. Time does not permit for me to go through these verses, young people, but he saw the thrice holy God, and he was deeply moved.

You hear me, my friend. You listen. If you're going to make an impact on this lost and dying world, if you're going to be a witness at your home, if you're going to be a witness to those people that you used to know, that you went to high school with, if you're going to be a witness to those family members, if you're going to be a witness to people on the way home, it will occur long after the Christmas holidays if you will stay deeply in love with your Lord.

I'll tell you, the number one requirement for you as a soul winner is to walk with God. For when you walk with Him, you know what will happen? What happened in Matthew 9 and verse 36 where the Bible says that when Jesus saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion on them.

Hudson Taylor was asked one time, Hudson Taylor, what's the number one requirement of missionaries? That they love souls? And Hudson Taylor said, oh no, the number one requirement of missionaries is that they love God.

For if they love God, they'll automatically love souls. Isaiah fell in love with his Lord. There are some of you who are very passionate about a lot of different loves in your life. Some of you get very eager and enthusiastic about making top grades and the highest grades possible and you ought to.

You ought to make the greatest grades you can. You ought to make the best grades you possibly can. But when that's the love of your life, you know something? You've got your focus on the wrong thing. For some people, it's the focus of relationships with one person or with several people.

And that's the number one devotion. That's the thing that you view. That's the thing that you're focused on day after day after day. And that's the one sole focus of your life. It's not that God is unimportant.

He's just not the supreme love of your life. In the day and the year that God removed Uzziah, I saw my Lord again. For some people, it's sports. It's the number one passion of their life. It's the thing that motivates them.

It's the thing that kicks them into gear. It's the thing that keeps them going. It's the number one focus of their life. We live in a world of great and heavy passion for money. We live in a world of passion for clothes.

We live in a world of passion for cars. We live in a world of passion for relationships. We live in a world of passion for athletics and sports. And on and on and on the list goes. Where are the people of God whose passion will be deeply for their God?

Renewed Admittance and Confession of Sin

Isaiah fell in love with his Lord, which led to a future ministry of soul winning. But not only did he have a renewed awareness and adoration for his Lord, number two, there was a renewed admittance of sin.

Now hang on. In verse 5, the Bible says here that Isaiah said, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. For mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.

When Isaiah fell in love with his Lord again, all of a sudden he saw the junk and the corruption in his own heart. Now young people, I'm your friend, but I'm going to shoot straight with you here this morning.

There are some of you who cannot see folks around you without Christ because you're carrying some baggage of sin unconfessed in your heart and life. There's many Christians who live their day-to-day life carrying some besetting sin in their life, going on unconfessed and unclean in their life.

And Isaiah had gotten to the point when he saw his Lord, he saw himself. The end of myself. I'm undone. I can't live this way. I saw myself as a man of deep uncleanness, and I looked the world around me as a world of deep uncleanness.

Oh God, forgive me. Lord, purge me of my sin. Let me ask you something, young people. When was the last time God got a hold of your heart for sin that was in your heart? When was the last time you asked some preacher to pray for you during an invitation of a service?

Preacher, I needed that tonight. God's dealing with my heart. When was the last time you got on your knees after a service? When was the last time you skipped lunch and went back to your room and fell on your face along with the Lord and said, Oh God, I'm not right with you.

The world around us never gets the Gospel message when God's people live with sin in their heart. With sin still unconfessed, if there's something there between you and the Lord, get it out today! You'll never be the effective witness you ought to be both here and at home or anywhere else for the rest of your life if on and on and on you walk with sin unconfessed.

Jeremiah said, Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? And he gave the answer, Nay! They were not at all ashamed. Listen now. Neither could they blush. You can get to the point to where you can play and dabble with sin and flirt around with sin and get involved with some sin habit and some sin thought life and some sin activity and get to the point to where you lose your spiritual blush.

It doesn't even bother you anymore. And you can get up and walk out after a service and never be the same. One time, young people, in fact, it was in my early days of ministry, I was asked to preach in a church that was my home church and I went back to preach in my home church and I was scared because there was in that service that night a man that I greatly respect.

He's an evangelist. I don't know that anybody here would really know him. He's a man that I have greatly respected for all of my years. And I had no idea he was going to be in the service that night. And here I was, a young preacher, and I stood up to preach and there he sat in the service.

And I'm going to tell you, I didn't even want to preach. Not with him in the building. Now, I probably shouldn't have felt that way, but I did. I mean, it'd be like a lady trying to cook with Betty Crocker in the building.

You know, I just did not want to do it. And there he sat. I stuttered and stammered and tried to make my way through the sermon. And the whole time I was preaching, I was thinking, Man, I'll be glad when this is over with.

I'm ready to get out of here. When I got through that old weak message I got through preaching, I had everybody bow their heads and I thought, I've got to hurry up and get through this invitation. And I was closing with some thoughts and prayer.

And I lifted my eyes. I had everybody's heads still bowed and eyes still closed. I couldn't wait to get out of that building and get away because of that man making me so nervous. He was a great evangelist, a great preacher, and more importantly, a great soul winner.

I lifted my eyes and I was going to start the invitation and I just was going to ask a couple of general questions and then turn it over to the pastor and leave. But when I lifted my head, young people, something caught my eye.

And I was about to start asking some questions, but I turned and I looked off to my right side and there at the altar already was that evangelist friend. On his knees. And I was at such an angle that I could see his face.

I could see tears in his eyes. I could see him pleading with God for forgiveness and he was talking to the Lord about something. Something from my little old weak message. God had spoken to his heart.

And there he was already on his knees. And I thought, that's the reason why I have such deep regard for the man. He has a tender heart. How long has it been since you as a student, sitting in chapel after chapel after chapel, service after service after service, have ever heard the work of God and the Spirit of God saying, hey, hey, I'm knocking on this compartment of your heart.

I want your whole heart. I don't have your whole heart. Hey, hey, let me in. I want this little apartment. I want this little closet in your heart. You've not confessed this. Get this right with me so that I can use you.

You say, I thought you were going to preach on soul winning. I'm trying to help you. I'll tell you how you can be an effective witness. Keep your heart clean. Isaiah's revival started with a renewed adoration for the Lord and it continued with a renewed admittance of sin and then it concluded with renewed awareness of His ministry.

Renewed Awareness of Ministry

I said to you yesterday, young people, that we need to have souls on our eyeballs. I hope you don't get away from that point. How do you get souls on your eyeballs? By seeing your Lord. Every time you're in the Scriptures, you're looking for the Lord.

You hear His voice. You hear Him talking to you. Has there ever been a time, young people, when you've read the Bible and you backed away from it and you said, Whoa! I hear you, Lord. I see what you're saying.

You say, no, I've never quite acted like that. Well, maybe not quite like that. But in your heart, has there ever been a lift in your spirit that God was trying to tell you something? And you heard Him?

And you fell deeper in love with Him? It breaks my heart that some of you will go home during the Christmas holidays and maybe never one day open the pages of this blessed book and you'll become cold and backslidden and people around you will never hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Isaiah got a renewed awareness of his ministry. And God's hand was upon him. He began to proclaim the message of God everywhere he went. Young people, hear me. Witnessing is not something that we just do.

It's something that we are. We are to be a witness. A light in a dark world. Salt in a sick world. There was a young lady sitting in my youth ministry years ago who was experiencing a revival one night and I didn't know it.

Hope’s Prayer for One Soul

She was sitting in our crowd of our youth ministry and I was preaching that night and as I was speaking, I didn't know what was happening in her heart, but God was getting a hold of her heart. I didn't really notice anything different about her.

Her name, by the way, is Hope. What a great name. Hope was sitting there and God was dealing with her heart and she realized she was not in close, sweet fellowship with her Lord. Oh, she knew the Lord.

She was saved, but she was not in close fellowship with Him. She had gotten busy and had kind of lost touch with Him. And on top of that, she realized she had not been the witness she really needed to be.

I didn't know what she began to pray that night. She began to pray, Dear Lord, now listen to this. She said, Lord, would You please just give me one soul this week that I could win to You? Lord, just give me one person that I could win to You this week and let me be able to pour my life into their life and disciple them and watch them grow.

Lord, just give me one, she said. Lord, just give me one. I didn't know she was praying that. She didn't share it with anybody. That week, she went out and was going door to door, making some visits with another friend of hers.

They were going door to door, and as they were going door to door, they walked up to one door, and in her heart, she kept praying, Lord, just give me one. Lord, just give me one. The door opened and two teenage girls walked to the door.

Hope introduced herself, introduced her friend to these two teenage girls, and she met those girls. The name was Lori and Rosa. She stood there and talked to Lori and Rosa for a while and found out that they didn't go to church anywhere.

She invited them to come visit our church and visit our youth group. Lori and Rosa said, yeah, well, maybe we can come sometime. Then Hope looked at those two girls and she said, can I ask you another question?

If you were to die today, do you have 100 assurance in your heart that you'd go to heaven? Young people, I think that's the best question to ask when you're witnessing. She asked them, are you 100 sure you'd go to heaven if you died today?

Lori looked at her sister Rosa and said, I don't know that. Do you? Rosa said, no, I don't. Hope said, would you like to know? And they both said, yeah, sure would. Hope in her heart was thinking, I asked for one.

I'm going to get two. She took her New Testament. She began to open it and began to show those two girls the Scriptures about Jesus Christ and introduced both of them to the Lord. They both bowed their head and accepted the Lord.

I remember when they came and got baptized in our church. I never will forget it. They both went to the public schools there in our city of the Tampa, Florida area. Lori went to the first day of school.

This happened in the summer when school started. Lori started up the first day of school. When she went to school, the first day in one of her classes, one of her teachers told everybody just to be quiet and still.

They weren't going to do any work that day, just to be still. The teacher worked on a seating chart and so forth. After a while, Lori, realizing her teacher was free, she stepped up to the desk and she said, ma 'am, is this your first year to be a teacher in our school?

The teacher said, yes, it is. What's your name? Lori said, my name is Lori. She said, well, Lori, nice to meet you. Boy, Lori would just light up a room. She was just an effervescent young lady. And the teacher said, well, thank you for encouraging me.

She said, this is my first day to ever teach anywhere. This is my first school to ever teach in. She said, oh, that's great. She said, you'll be great. Lori said, hey, by the way, have you started going to church anywhere since you came here?

She said, no, Lori, I haven't had time to look for one. Oh, she said, you need to come visit my church. I'd love for you to come visit. She said, boy, you'd love it. I just started going there a few weeks ago.

She said, boy, I wish you could come visit my church. She said, well, maybe I can. Lori said, can I ask you another question? She said, sure. She said, if you were to die today, do you know for sure that you'd go to heaven?

Now, can you imagine asking a public school teacher on her first day to ever teach anywhere, if you were to die today? That dear lady said, Lori, do you know something I need to know? She said, no. She said, I don't think you're under any kind of danger.

She said, they told me that was the best question to ask. She said, can I just tell you what someone showed me? And she said, sure. Lori pulled out her New Testament. Get this. Here's a class sitting there quietly while Lori takes her New Testament just like Hope had told her.

And she showed that teacher the same verses that Hope had shown her a few weeks before. And she showed that teacher how she could know that she was on her way to heaven. Get this. She said, teacher, would you like to accept Christ as your own personal Savior right here?

You can do it. She said, I got saved on my front porch. And the teacher said, you know, Lori, I think I would. And that class sat there in quietness while Lori bowed her head and prayed. And then that teacher bowed her head and accepted Jesus Christ as her Savior right there in the public school.

Lori won eight of her friends to Jesus Christ and brought many of them to our church youth group. I was back there. Final part of the story. I was back there in that city. I had been gone for several years.

I went back for an ordination of one of our old preacher boys just about three or four years ago. And I went back after the service that night. I was standing down at the altar and I was just greeting some old friends at the church I worked at years ago.

And I was greeting friends and said, boy, it's good to see you. How are you doing? And while I was greeting people, I heard this young voice off to my right-hand side. Hi, Brother Morris. Turned and I looked and there was Lori.

I said, Lori, how are you? She said, I didn't know if you'd remember me. I said, remember you? Man, I never forget you. I said, how are you doing? She said, I'm doing fine. Big old smile just like always.

She said, I want you to meet someone. I said, who's that? She said, my husband. I said, your husband? You're just 14. What are you doing? Last time I knew her, she was 14. I reached over and shook the hand of a Tampa police officer, her husband.

And I said, hello, sir. How are you? I'll be good. Lori looked at her husband and she said, Derek, you want to tell him? He said, sure. He said, Brother Gleiser, Lori tells me you were her youth pastor years ago.

And he said, I want to ask you to do something for us. I said, what's that? He said, would you pray for us? We believe God's called us to the mission field. We think we're going to South America. We just want to do what God wants us to do.

One Person’s Revival and a Lifetime of Witness

It all happened one night when one girl said, Lord, I'm sorry I've not been right with You. Would You just give me one? Who knows? Who knows how many hundreds, maybe thousands of people will come to Christ as a result of one girl's revival.

Lord, just give me one. May every child of God in this building under the sound of my voice go home during the holidays with that prayer. Let's bow our heads for prayer. Father, finish this service as You see fit, we pray.

May there be some young people. May there be people all over this room who will say, Lord, give me one soul. Give me one person before this year is out that I can invest some time with. Leading them to You.

Discipling them for their walk with the Lord. And seeing spiritual growth take place in their life. Lord, may there be personal reviving taking place in the hearts of many young people all across the room today.

Because we know, Lord, as a result of that, as we fall in love with You, confessing our sins, we'll see our need of ministry. Lord, may our lives be changed permanently. In Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you.

You've been listening to the Chapel Hour, coming to you from the campus of Bob Jones University. Our speaker was Dr. Morris Gleiser, staff evangelist for Burge Terrace Baptist Church in Indianapolis, Indiana.

If you'd like a cassette copy of today's message, send a check for $6 .50 to Campus Store, Bob Jones University, Greenville, SC 29614. Be sure to mention the name of the speaker and today's date. The Chapel Hour has been sponsored by Bob Jones University.