Faith and Revival — Manley Beasley

But I am looking forward to bringing you the message that I have on my heart today. And it's going to be a different type of message. This is actually a message where I am talking to some of my friends across the country about revival.

The Burden for Personal and Corporate Revival

Now, what I mean by that is there is a number of men across this nation that have a vision, that have a burden, and have faith, and have works for a real, or toward a real, genuine revival. And we are looking into the possibility of just having a real revival one of these days across this nation that will just shake this nation.

And I have been burdened with revival in my heart for about 22 or 23 years. And at times, I have a proper balance about this thing of revival. But occasionally, I get out of balance. And when I get out of balance, then I become inactive, and things dry up on me, and things do not happen.

And I find myself in an imbalanced position scripturally. And when truth is taken out of balance, it's error. And so I find myself in a real dilemma. And I feel that as I have found myself in these stages throughout these 22 or 23 years, I have been blessed of God to be brought out of these stages by seeing the truth in its proper balance.

And I have been looking forward to the Lord dealing with me in a very deep and personal and special way about revival for the last 2 or 3 years. Because I feel that there is not the ultimate, the manifestation or the manifestations in my meetings that really relate back to a patience, to a work, to a faith, to a vision that really is initiated of God.

So this month, I am just talking out of my heart to my friends across this country that share the burden, the vision, the work of faith. In relationship to revival. I felt like that this particular type of message would be of a deep special interest to my tape ministry.

Because many, many of you people that are on the tape ministry are people that feel like that you are closer to me than just knowing me as a preacher. You know, you are part of my ministry. Because actually that's what this ministry, this particular tape ministry is all about.

It's giving me an opportunity to share my burdens and share my visions and works with you. And then in you, in turn, sharing your life with me by prayer and by support. And it's a beautiful family and a beautiful experience.

So I count you as a special group of people. So I'm going to include you on this very special meeting. Now, I never have been a teacher as far as a preacher teacher. And in the strict biblical sense, I have a different type ministry.

I feel like I'm just a preacher. That's what Vance Habner said he was. And I feel like that's what I am, just a preacher. And so, I'm just going to even depart from just preaching. And just share out of my heart what I found to be of the Lord in relationship to my own personal ministry.

Revival Now Through Faith and Obedience

Now, we are talking about revival. And what we're talking about here is how to have revival now. Now, if you're not having revival now, you know, you need to do what Charles G. Finney said. And that's draw a circle around yourself.

And stay in that circle until you personally have revival now. Malachi 3 .10 says, Prove me now. You can stay there until you have a revival right now. You can confess your sins and get those sins up to date.

And believe God has cleansed you. Believe God has filled you. And believe God has revived you now. And you can have personal revival. Yes, sir. You can be filled with the Spirit and have revival right this very minute.

By paying the price of just simply getting right with Jesus. Now, we're talking about personal revival. But we're not only talking about personal revival, we're talking about corporate revival. A revival that will shake the world.

A revival that will shake the church you're in. A revival that will shake the community you're in. And we're talking about having it now. And when we talk about this, how can we believe God for revival right now?

What are we talking about? Now, I'm going to give you this outline. And I'm going to talk to you about this outline. I'm going to talk to you about this outline. We're just going to talk. It's not going to be a homiletical message.

It's going to be something I have seen in my own heart and life. And first of all, I want to give you these thoughts. First, if you're going to believe God for revival, there has to be what is called the vision of faith.

The Fivefold Sequence of Faith

Then, the second thing, after the vision of faith, there has to be the act of faith. And then, after the act of faith, there has to be the work of faith. And then, after the work of faith, comes what I call the patience of faith.

And then, after the patience of faith, will come the manifestation of faith. Now, this outline has put this thing together for me better than it's ever been put together in all my life as a minister. I've studied this matter of revival.

And as a minister with a message on faith, I have studied and studied and studied about how the faith message fits revival message. And then, I have been led into moments of imbalance by getting passive over the sovereignty of God.

And on several occasions, God has, in mercy, allowed me to see the passivity in my life and then has used scripture and the Holy Spirit to quicken my heart and bring me back from passivity to a living position to where I have seen measures of revival.

Enough mercy drops, you know, to at least meet my need and let me know that the greater meeting is on the way. But when I ran into this outline that I just gave you, I realized that I had finally discovered a sequence of substance that satisfied me to bring me to the place of active participation with God to secure God's ultimate end and see the hand of God.

Abraham's Faith as the Scriptural Foundation

Now, I want to read you some scripture. And out of this portion of scripture comes the whole outline. Now, I'm not going to use this portion of scripture to illustrate the whole outline completely. I am going to use it to illustrate part of the outline.

But this illustrates the outline. And this is the scripture basis for trusting God for revival now. And it tells us how to trust God for revival now. Romans, the fourth chapter. I'm going to begin with the 16th verse through the 21st verse, or 22nd verse.

And the 16th verse just lays the foundation for the other verses. And so that's the reason I'm including it. But the actual verses that lay out the material on faith it starts with the 17th verse. Therefore it is of faith that it might be by grace to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.

Now listen. As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations, before him whom ye believe, even God, who quickened the dead, and called those things which be not as though they were. Who against hope believed in hope that he might become the father of many nations according to that which was spoken, so shall thy seed be.

And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead when he was about a hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb. He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully persuaded that what he had promised he was able also to perform.

And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now you can read on if you like, but that portion of scripture basically gives us this outline, the vision of faith, the act of faith, the works of faith, the patience of faith, the manifestations of faith.

Now we will break each one of those points down as I talk to you. Now I want to give you a story out of a book titled Behind the Ranges by Mr. and Mrs. Howard Taylor about a man by the name of Frazier.

The Canadian Farmer and the Work of Revival

Now this man, Frazier, lays out in this book, if you read the whole book, the approach to winning the lost, the approach to mighty revival. And I believe this approach is the approach that we should discover and secure and practice in our revival work, in our evangelism work today.

And I believe that this illustration I'm going to give you about the Canadian farmer will help me to illustrate the whole message and we will go back and draw upon this illustration as I go through this message with you.

The story is told about the officials in Canada having all of this land, having all of this land, and all of this land having the great potential to grow wheat and the world in great dire need for wheat.

And people all over Europe falling on top of each other. Here the Canadian government made a decision to allot a family, say a hundred and sixty acres, and then they put out an advertisement that a person could receive from the government a hundred and sixty acres of land.

Why a hundred and sixty acres per family? Because that was about the amount of land that a one family could break up, cultivate, and harvest, and so on and so forth. The government laid out the possibility of the land being given to any person that would come and claim the land.

The government emphasized the ultimate, the final, the literal object was to reap a harvest of wheat. Now that was the final, ultimate, final objective was to reach a harvest of wheat. It was really something.

The Canadian government sent out this declaration that this land was available, free, they would be furnished with grain, be encouraged to cultivate this land for the one ultimate purpose of harvesting wheat.

Now, to me, this is a very significant illustration. And you say, well, what makes it so significant? It looks like to me that the people of God with any kind of burden for revival, that the ultimate, ultimate end is for a mighty revival.

You say, what do you mean the ultimate, ultimate end is for a mighty revival? Well, the ultimate end is for a mighty breaking, awakening in the church that will sanctify the church and redeem the lost.

Now this, to me, is the ultimate, final objective. Now, the Christian, the Bible, especially the Christian that has a burden for revival seems to me is something like the farmer up in Canada. God, the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit is the one that owns all the lost sinners.

You say it owns them? Yes. The Lord Jesus, God created man. Man fell. Jesus came and purchased him back. Jesus came and purchased the lost man back. But the lost man is still out there under the dominion and power of sin, Satan.

His eyes are blind. His mind's all confused. His will is all bound up. And he's not a free man. He's out there. And the lost man sort of reminds me of the land. And then the church that's blinded and bound and defeated by Satan sort of reminds me of the land also.

But here the Lord Jesus owns us if we're saved. And theoretically he owns us if we hadn't been saved. Well, the Bible has a message. And the Bible encourages the saved, sensitive, responsible Christian to come out and claim the land that actually belongs to the Lord.

He can claim just as much as he is capable of working. But he has to come out and claim the land. He has to come out and claim it, make it his. And then once he has to come out and claim the land, then, beloved, he's got to work the land.

And then he's got to wait on the land. And then he has the manifestation coming his way. Now, you may see where I'm trying to head to as I talk to you. As I said, I'm not trying just to preach to you.

I'm just trying to talk to you out of my heart. I trust this triggers in your thinking enough truth in the Bible to realize the comparison here and also sense the responsibility. Now, what we're going to talk about at this point is the outline I gave you.

The Vision of Faith and God's Promise

Now, what were we talking about when we talked about the vision of faith? We talked about the vision of faith. Well, the Lord spoke to Abraham and told him that he was going to make him a father of a nation.

The Lord spoke to him and said, I'm going to make you the father of a nation. Now, I believe that God dealt with brother Abraham and brought him to the truth that God had for brother Abraham. And brother Abraham got a vision.

In fact, every time, if you knew the Scriptures, and I feel like most of you do, you'd realize that every time Abraham looked up and saw the stars, he thought about the promise God made him that he was going to make him a father of a nation.

Every time he stepped on the seashore, he thought about the promise that God said, I'm going to make you a father of many nations. He looked around about him. He saw and realized that God said, I'm going to make you the father of many nations, not just a nation.

I think I said a nation a while ago, but the Bible says many nations. Well, Abraham got a vision, a faith, that he was going to be the father of many nations. Now, I believe that in order for us to believe God for mighty revival, the father has to give us a promise.

He has to come and give us personally, individually, a promise. I'm going to make you the father of many nations. I do not mean literally making us the father of many nations in the sense that he talked to Abraham, but I'm talking about God has to give us a promise whereby we can anchor our faith, because faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

Let me ask you, you want God to send revival. You anticipate the fact that God will send a mighty revival one day. You desire for God to send a mighty revival today. Has God ever spoken to you through his word, through circumstances in your life by his spirit, and said, this is it.

I'm going to send a mighty, mighty, mighty revival. This is where it has to start out. That Canadian farmer would not have been aware that there was any land that belonged to the Canadian government. He would not have been aware that there was 160 acres out there for him.

He would not be aware that that could be his by just claiming it if it had not been for the fact that they declared that this is so. Has God declared to you that a revival is in the heart of God, the plan of God, the purpose of God for you?

Do you have a word from God? That's the first step I have found in believing God for a mighty revival. I call that the vision of faith. Now, let's look a little further. Let's look at the act of faith.

The Act of Faith and Claiming God's Promise

Now, once you have the vision of faith and get it anchored that God has really given you a promise, then comes the act of faith, Mark 11, 24. He says, Whatsoever you desire, believe that you receive, and ye shall have it.

So there must be a claiming, a definite claiming of this promise. You say, How much can I claim? As much as you have faith for. You can claim a mighty, mighty revival. You can claim it right then. Now, here's where some folks get messed up.

And I have not been able to make this clear in all of my teachings on faith. People feel like that when they believe, that right then there is an immediate manifestation in response to their faith. And sometimes there is.

But sometimes there is not. And so we're talking about believing God for a mighty revival. I believe that you have to act on the promises that God is reviving you now. This is the act of faith. I believe that the Canadian farmer has to receive the word from the Canadian government that there is land out there available.

And then he has to go and claim his title deed. Has to go and claim his title deed. I believe the believer has to do that. He has to realize that there is a word here from God. He has to claim it. It may take a day to claim it.

It may take seconds to claim it. It may take weeks to claim it. I received a promise from God here sometimes back. And I have been wrestling with God for weeks now over claiming that promise. Believing that it is being operative in my life right this minute.

It's something else. It's not easy to claim a promise. So the act of faith is claiming a promise. Claiming a promise. At this point, most people try to work for God instead of work with God. And they miss the point of claiming a promise from the Lord.

That's right. And so it's very difficult to get across that we must claim revival right now. Have you claimed it? You say, I know God is going to send a mighty revival. That's not it. Have you claimed it?

Right now, have you claimed mighty revival? Have you claimed revival for your church, for your city, for your country? You say, well, I can't claim that much. Okay. What have you claimed from the Lord right now?

That's right. So, after the act of faith comes what is called the works of faith. You say, what do you mean by the works of faith? Well, after you claim, when you have faith, that faith goes to work. Now, let's look at a verse or two and let me see if God will open this up to us.

The Works of Faith: Preaching, Prayer, and Corresponding Action

We talk about the works of faith. Well, for instance, we can go ahead with the Canadian farmer. He hears the message. He claims the land. Well, does he just walk out on the land and immediately there is a harvest?

His ultimate goal now is a harvest of wheat. When he hears the message, there is land available and you can have it, but you must first claim it. Can he just walk out on the property and there be a harvest of wheat?

No. He has to go to work. He has to go to work in conjunction with his promise that he has received from the government and in conjunction with his faith. In other words, if he is claiming the land for a harvest of wheat, he doesn't go and plant potatoes.

He doesn't go and plant sugar cane. He starts working in conjunction, all the detail work in conjunction with bringing about a harvest of what? A harvest of wheat. So, let's look at this. James 2 .14 says, What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and hath not works?

Can faith save him? The Weymouth translation of that verse says, What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and hath not corresponding action? Can that kind of faith save him? No.

If a brother or sister be naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be warm and fill, notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body, what doth it profit?

In other words, he's saying, you say you have faith and you see a person in need and you have what that person can use to meet their need, and you do not have a corresponding action to what you say is faith and meet that need in that life, then that kind of faith is futile in you.

So, what we're saying here is when we claim revival and believe God for might of revival, then we have works that correspond with bringing about a revival. For instance, what kind of works brings about revival?

Well, there is the preaching of the word that comes from a heart with faith and vision, and then there comes prayer that's offered up to God that resists Satan and relates to God in relationship to our faith and our vision.

So, there are two works that we mention there, two phases of works, preaching and then prayer. I call this sowing and watering and cultivating and then will come later on the manifestation. So, what are we talking about?

There has to be works of faith. We have to lay the seed out there. We have to put the seed out in relationship to our faith. That's right. We do have corresponding action according to our faith. Now, what's the ultimate end?

It's a harvest. Does the Canadian farmer automatically have a harvest of wheat? No, sir. He goes to work, he prepares his land, he plants his seed. Then we come to another thing. Then he has to wait. Then he has to wait.

The Patience of Faith and Waiting for the Promise

I call this the patience of faith. You say, what do you mean the patience of faith? Well, after you've done the will of God, then it says wait. Hebrews 10 .35 says, Cast not away therefore your confidence, which have great recompense of reward.

For ye have need of patience. After that ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promises. See, you've broken the land up, you've cultivated the land, you've planted the seed, you've watered, but now you must have patience.

You must wait. In that position of trust, faith is an act and an affirmation of that act that bids eternal truth to be present fact. So, then there is the waiting time. There's the waiting time. In weeping of a harvest, you have to wait several months.

The harvest of a child, like in Abraham's case, I didn't go into Abraham's story, with he and Sarah, but after she conceived, they had to wait nine months. There's a waiting time. You have to wait. You have to wait.

The Manifestation of Faith and the Promise of Harvest

And then if you wait, then there comes what is called the manifestation of faith. There will come that manifestation of faith. I like this verse. I've preached from it many, many times. It says this, these all died in faith, not having received the promises, but, listen, they all died in faith.

Here were these great men and women of God in the Bible. They received the promises. In other words, they claimed the land. They claimed the land. They saw the promises. They claimed the land. They worked in faith.

They patiently waited. And some of them died before they saw the manifestation. But they died in faith. Now, the Lord says that's victory. But we have a promise that we're going to have a great harvest.

So, the victory is that we die in faith waiting for the manifestation. Although the manifestations will come in mercy drops and in floods, and I'm trusting for this manifestation myself. Now, I don't know that this discussion will help you like it has helped me.

But it has really revolutionized my thinking and brought me back to a balance that I have been looking for for the last three or four years. Sometimes we can get so successful that we can miss a turn in the road by not looking carefully to God.

And I feel that this has helped me to get my thinking right, which in turn will get my faith right, which in turn will get my works right, and which in turn will bring about the manifestation right. And I trust that this discussion has helped you as it has helped me.

And if you have questions about it, please write to us and ask us about it because I think it will do us good to discuss it. And I believe the Lord will bless you as you pray that the Spirit of God will rejuvenate me and bless me and stir my heart and move in my life in a mighty, mighty powerful way.

Well, it's been good to be with you again this month. Pray for us every day. God puts us upon your heart. Martha and I both are real busy. The children will be busy all this summer. Pray for all of them.

And may God richly bless you is our prayer. Your friend in Christ, Brother Manley Beasley.