(2006 Heart-Cry) Prayer and Revival Through History - Part 2 — Mack Tomlinson

I appreciate Brother Don Curran doing those book reviews. I've always looked up to him in a lot more ways than one. I appreciate and love him and pray for him and his ministry. For years, he's just traveled far and widely preaching the gospel with the Canadian Revival Fellowship.

I still hadn't figured that out, a Georgia guy with the Canadian Revival Fellowship. But that's all right. I would like to invite you to turn to Psalm 102. As you turn there, you know, God tells us to remember his works.

The Third Great Awakening and the Set Times of God

And right now is the 150th anniversary of the Third Great Awakening in America. It started in September 1857, so we're heading into the anniversary of it. And it was at its full-blown beginnings by November there in New York City.

And so that's what I want to speak to you today on. When heaven touched earth, America and the Third Great Awakening. And I've chosen as a text because I believe it's fitting Psalm 102. We're going to read verses 12 through 17.

But thou, Lord, shalt endure forever in thy remembrance unto all generations. Thou shalt arise and have mercy upon Zion for the time to favor her. Yes, the set time has come for thy servants take pleasure in her stones and favor the dust thereof.

So the heathen shall fear the name of the Lord. And all the kings of the earth, thy glory, when the Lord shall build up Zion, he shall appear in his glory. He will regard the prayer of the destitute and not despise their prayer.

That verse 17 is one of the most precious promises about answered prayer. Because it's not the great, the educated, the wise, the deep, the successful, the greatly gifted, the smart, the rich, the handsome, the beautiful.

But it's the destitute that God says he will regard their prayer and not despise it. And what an encouragement to remember that the Bible also says that any Christian, God delights in the prayers of the righteous.

What a thing to think about. I want you to note particularly verse 13 where David speaks of set times. He says the set time has come to favor her. That is Zion, that is the people of God, the church of Jesus Christ.

Yes, the appointed time has come. There are times in redemptive history where God says, in effect, I'm going to do a new work, an accelerated work. I'm going to supercharge my kingdom. I'm going to quicken and enliven and enlarge and mobilize and accelerate my kingdom.

I'm going to save multitudes in a moment and nations in a day. This is what I'm purposing to do now. Not by ordinary times and ordinary means, but by an extraordinary increased visitation of my power on earth.

I'll make heaven touch earth once again, and I'm purposing to do it all over again. And I'll do this by stirring up my people to pray and enable them to lay hold on me so that they might participate with me and that I might get glory all over again by sending a season of refreshing from my presence, by reviving my work in the midst of the years.

And instead of sending wrath, I'll send mercy, mercy drops, not only mercy drops, but showers of blessing. That's what God purposes to do in these set times. So, as Matthew Henry said, when God purposes to do a new work of grace, he sets his people to pray, he stirs them up to pray.

He quickens their hearts to call upon his name. He gives a prayer burden. He gives desires. He enlarges their hearts to seek after him. He stirs them to pray in fresh ways and new ways. Well, one of those divine moments, one of those set times of the Almighty was 150 years ago on 19th century American soil in the third great awakening.

Two Marks of Genuine Revival

Now, before we begin to talk about it, I just there were two truths on my heart about awakenings and revivals that I think are so important to have etched in our minds. The whole idea of revivals and awakenings especially includes two major truths.

Truth number one, in an awakening, the influence and the coming of the Holy Spirit is in a much greater measure and power during times of revival than in normal times. Now, he's always working. He's always building his church.

Every believer and every true church of Jesus Christ is always being sanctified and led and helped and kept by the Holy Spirit of God. He's always working. But there are times when God chooses to greatly increase the working of the Holy Spirit in great measures with fresh power.

It becomes an extraordinary time, not an ordinary time, a much larger increase of God's grace and power, a much larger, larger giving of the Holy Spirit when his presence comes more when his power. Remember that scripture in the Gospels, even about the Lord Jesus, where it says, and the power of the Lord was present to heal.

Duncan Campbell in the Hebrides revival in 1949 through 1952, 1953, he made the statement in trying to describe what God did in that visitation by saying something to the effect that even the town and the atmosphere was saturated with the presence of God.

So that's the first truth. An increase of the presence and power of the Holy Spirit is what characterizes revival. That's what causes revival. Secondly, second truth, the Holy Spirit is primarily concerned in every genuine revival about one thing primarily.

And some of us might say the glory of God. Well, that that's a given. But as far as among the hearts of people, his primary concern, the primary work in an awakening is one thing. Sound conversions. This past year, I heard about the latest wave, and I don't know if it came out of Canada or Florida where, but it's it's the drooling revival.

And one prophet got the word that. Based on the scripture that says, unless we become as little children that we won't inherit the kingdom of God and what do little children but do but drool. And so people gather together and they begin to wait on the Holy Spirit and suddenly they know he's moving because people begin to drool.

Well, let me be on purpose. Politically incorrect about this stuff. The barking like dogs, the howling like wolves, the crowing like roosters, the cackling like chickens and the falling backward. Where you think you've got the spirit is not the Holy Spirit's work in revival.

Now, they've got a spirit, all right. But it's not the Holy Spirit. I want you to look at a verse in Zechariah chapter 10. I'm sorry, 12 verse 10. If you don't have a Bible, just listen close. But Zechariah 12 verse 10.

It's the next to last book in the Old Testament. Go to Malachi and go back a page. Zechariah 12 verse 10. Look at what God says will be the effect of the outpouring, the sending of the Holy Spirit. And I will pour upon the house of David and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of supplication.

As brother Bill McLeod said last night, that can be translated the spirit of grace to supplicate. And they shall look upon me whom they have pierced. This is the effect when the spirit is poured out. This is what results.

This is what happens. They shall look upon me whom they have pierced. So it's not the seeking of manifestations of some gift or experiences. It's Christ centered. They shall look upon me whom they pierced and they shall laugh a lot, right?

Well, the living Bible might say that, but my Bible doesn't. And I'm not trying to be funny. They shall mourn for him as one who mourns for his only son and shall be in bitterness for him. What happened on the day of Pentecost?

The Bible says when Peter preached a simple gospel sermon that they were pricked in their heart, they were stabbed in their consciences and they cried out the primary work of God, the Holy Spirit, when he is poured out is conversion.

It is times where God moves mightily and profound conviction of sin and profound repentance occurs. Suddenly, those people in Jerusalem that morning at Pentecost, they woke up that morning, they didn't have a clue what was fixing to happen.

And in a few hours, they were deeply broken under conviction of sin. The spirit in times of revival produces saving faith in Jesus Christ among thousands of people simultaneously. Pentecost was the conversion of 3000 persons through one sermon.

In times of spiritual declension, there are 3000 sermons and maybe one conversion. In times of awakening, there can be one sermon and 3000 conversions turning men from their idols to serve the living God, turning men from Satan to the Savior, translating them from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's beloved son, that seasons of refreshing might come from the presence of the Lord.

Sound conversion is the mark of the Holy Spirit. Proverbs says, turn you at my reproof, behold, I'll pour out my spirit upon you. So this is central in understanding. And in the 1858 prayer revival, this is what happened.

The 1858 Prayer Revival as a Sovereign Work of Grace

This is the third great awakening in American history. And it's been regarded by many historians as the greatest work of grace that the world has ever seen since the day of the apostles. And yet it may be the least known major awakening of all, because maybe for two reasons.

First of all, no major account of that awakening was even written until well into the 20th century. Oh, there was a book we have on the book table, The Power of Prayer, about this awakening in New York.

But it was written one year after the awakening in 1859. So a definitive record couldn't be written yet. It was only until the 20th century that two main works were written on it. J. Edwin Orr's book, The Event of the Century and Roy Fish, When Heaven Touched Earth.

So that may be why it's lesser known. Secondly, the awakening was not dominated or brought by any outstanding preacher or revivalist or theologian or man. As Orr said, the movement sprang from the labor of no great man or preacher.

Yet it became the most thorough and extensive and wholesome awakening ever known in the history of the Christian church. And I believe that's true. Much bigger than the first great awakening. Much bigger and more extensive than the second great awakening.

It was a sovereign movement of prayer that resulted in an outpouring of the Holy Spirit that was unparalleled in all of U .S. history. For the most part, it was unexpected and sudden. Now, before the 1850s, there were several major periods of widespread awakening.

The first great awakening, the years would be about 1727 to 1770. George Whitfield died in 1770. And all through there, Whitfield preached for 34 years. And he saw awakening almost his whole ministry.

Dying in 1770. Jonathan Edwards, George Whitfield, Howell Harris, Daniel Rollins. And you should read their lives. You should read the writings related to them because they represent the first great awakening.

The second great awakening came 30, 35 years later, 1792 to about 1843. And there had been powerful revivals only a few years prior to the 1850s in New York City. Under the ministries of such men as J .W. Alexander and a man named Asahel Nettleton.

20 to 40 years earlier, before 1858, J .W. Alexander. He was the son of Archibald Alexander, who was the primary theologian in America at the time, in Virginia. And he was the founding professor of Princeton College.

And Alexander had seen mighty revivals. And his son, J .W. Alexander, had grown into and had lived among the fruit of great revivals. Alexander and Nettleton had experienced wonderful outpourings of the Holy Spirit under their preaching in several places.

Alexander, for instance, writing to a friend in 1837 about God's work in New Jersey, said this. Brother in New Brunswick, the old town is now shaken by a great awakening. And at Princeton, Alexander said soon after that, the entire college is now aroused.

From 100 to 200 students are now attending the college prayer meeting. And some of the worst young men on campus seem now to truly be converted. Now, previously, a Baptist author, and you know, you have to watch them because they're prone to evangelical exaggeration, as they say.

Described an outpouring of the Spirit in Hartford, Connecticut, wrote this description. The Lord seems to have stepped out of the unusual paths to affect this work more immediately in the display of His power and the outpouring of the Spirit, probably to show that the work is His and His only.

Now, by 1856, one year prior to the prayer revival, Alexander had seen real stirrings of God in his own church in New York City. He had taught at Princeton. He had gone to New York City to pastor, and later he would go back to Princeton.

But here he is toward the end of his life, and he had seen stirrings. In the spring of 1856, he invited, after one service one evening, those willing to be guided about seeking salvation to come to his home.

And more than 40 people followed him to his house. God was stirring the waters and blowing on the embers. And then as the nation came into the mid -1850s, several revivals began to happen, even before 57 and 58.

There were two especially powerful outpourings of the Spirit in Pennsylvania and then South Carolina. In fact, in Beaufort, South Carolina, there was a major, remarkable local revival. Now, I don't know how big Beaufort was at the time, but my guess is it couldn't have been a thousand people.

I don't know for sure. But in a matter of 14 weeks, 428 people professed sound conversion and were baptized in a 14-week period in the context of a genuine moving of the Holy Spirit. And the whole county was in the grip of God's presence.

Then soon after that, a significant movement of God in Canada, in Hamilton, Ontario. And that was a small beginning of larger things to come soon. But the largest stirrings of the Third Great Awakening really began in New York City.

Jeremiah Lanphier and the Fulton Street Prayer Meeting

The year was 1857. It's the fall of the season. And how did it start? A small, very small, simple prayer meeting. That was started in September at the North Reform Dutch Church on Fulton Street. And let me tell you where this is.

The church building isn't there anymore, but it's right down near Ground Zero. In fact, if this church building had been there on 9 -11, it would have been hit by debris. That's the location that the North Reform Dutch Church was on Fulton Street.

And in June of that year, a city missionary named Jeremiah Calvin Lanphier had left his business to begin to do mission work in the city. For nine years prior, he had been a member of J .W. Alexander's Church.

But by 1857, he had joined the Fulton Street Church officially to become a local city missionary. After he went there, two months later, a financial panic of 1857 began in New York City. An insurance company in Ohio had lost $5 million and 55 banks in New York City held a major part in that company.

Suddenly, it set off a huge financial chain reaction that affected, first, New York City and all the East Coast. And so one 19th century historian says this. Suddenly, thousands who had been trusting in uncertain riches were suddenly ruined, lost their jobs or businesses, and tens of thousands of people were unemployed.

Men were filled with distress, people were homeless, without food, and their hearts were failing them for fear. And suddenly, in the context of God fixing to shake the city and the nation unbeknown to them, thousands of Americans were seeing the vanity and uncertainty of this world, and they began to feel their need for something more certain and more enduring.

Well, Jeremiah Lamphere saw this. He walked the streets, and one day he saw, in some men on the streets, anxiety and stress. And the thought came to him. You know, wouldn't a period of prayer at noon be something that could provide a blessing to people?

So he decided, don't ever imagine that the least little real step of obedience by you is unimportant. Jeremiah Lamphere made some notice to announce a noon prayer meeting. He said, I'll do it. He made some notices, which would be on the third floor of the church.

The first meeting was on September 23rd, and he showed up at noon to pray. And guess who was there? Him. He's the only one that showed up. Guess what he did? He started praying. But at about 1230, he heard some steps coming up the stairs.

One, and two, and three, and four, and finally five men from four different denominations, strangers to him, joined him. Six men were praying that first day. And that six-man prayer meeting became, it was the beginning, of what would be the most significant movement of prayer since the day of Pentecost.

Now, perhaps the 1904 -05 welts revival could be compared. But at the second meeting, 20 men were present. And within three weeks, a hundred men were coming regularly at least. A number of which they thought appeared to be unconverted at first.

By mid-October, when the New York banks all ceased, they all closed. They ceased payment of any kind. The Fulton Street prayer meeting was into its fourth week, and hundreds were coming. Lanphier records this in his diary.

I called on a number today to invite them to the noon prayer meeting. A large number present. We had a precious time. It was the very gate of heaven. So the movement of prayer just spontaneously began to ignite.

There was nothing he did. There was nothing that men did. This was just the work of God. It spontaneously grew. It spread into other rooms of the church. Soon hundreds and hundreds more began to come.

And no sooner would a new place for people to pray be opened up, than it would fill up and they would have to find other places to go. All kinds of people. Men came, and then ladies came, and then young men, and then young ladies.

And it was later that children began to have their own prayer meetings. It was like Psalm 32, 6 was literally fulfilled, where David said, For this shall everyone who's godly, that is everyone who's a believer, pray unto thee in a time when you may be found.

God was saying, I'll be found right now. Call upon me. Call upon me and I'll answer you. I want to be found right now. Ask of me. Seek me. You won't seek me in vain. Just pray and call and I'll answer.

That's what God seemed to be doing. During this time, Alexander said this. I perceive such a degree right now of spiritual inquiry. Now, we don't use such phrases today. Hunger, thirst, desire. As I've never seen before in all of my ministry, personal study is impossible.

For I am sought out continually by persons, many of whom I've never known, who are in distress and in search of spiritual counsel. Wouldn't you like to see that in your town? The prayer meetings, he said, are very sobering and edifying.

The openness of thousands of people to sound doctrine and reproof is undeniable. He said, rest assured that a great awakening is now among us with meetings of great size as God has poured out a spirit of grace and supplication.

By March of 1858, six months after Jeremiah prayed the first morning, over 50 ,000 people were attending noon prayer meetings across the city of 700 ,000 in New York. There was no hysteria, no uncontrolled emotions, but simply a hunger in the hearts of thousands upon thousands of people to pray.

It seemed like they were drawn to pray by an unseen reality that couldn't be explained and couldn't be controlled. Minutes from the Boston North Church Association, 1858, read this. One of the most remarkable features of this work of grace, which has prevailed in our churches during this past year, is that it began and has carried forward by no specially planned methods, no special events, but by the instruments designed to be abiding and within the reach of all Christians.

Those being, of course, prayer and the scriptures, prayer and the word of God. Now, it's been wrongly reported that there was no preaching in this revival. Oh, there was. There was preaching regularly, but preaching wasn't the primary.

Like in the first great awakening with Edwards and Whitfield and those men, preaching wasn't the primary central means that God used. It was prayer, prayer. And it became a classic example of widespread, sudden, sovereign revival in the land.

The Spread of Revival Through Cities, Churches, and Communities

Ian Murray states regarding the 1858 awakening, all the classic marks of a true spiritual awakening were present. Powerful and numerous conversions. Hunger for the word of God and for real prayer. Spiritual appetite for serious Christian literature.

A sense of wonder and awe. Remember, it says that in the book of Acts, that men were in fear. Great fear came upon them and multitudes were added to the church. A sense of wonder and awe. Profound serious mindedness.

And the same power of the Spirit manifested not just in one place, but widely simultaneously. Joyful praise and readiness to witness. And Murray says a change in the entire moral climate of the community.

It reminds me what A .W. Tozer always liked to say. Revival changes the moral climate of the community or it's not revival. Well, as the revival began to spread, a spirit of prayer suddenly began to spread literally like a forest fire, a prairie fire and run through other states south into the west.

John Gerardo, the great southern preacher during that time, said that during this period, genuine revivals and outpourings were occurring over practically the entire country. It was true all the way to South Texas and all the way to California.

I don't know what happened in the northwest, but all over the east and southeast and the south and the midwest and into South Texas. And as far as California, the Spirit of God was mightily, mightily saving thousands of people who had come to a prayer meeting.

Simply coming to a prayer meeting. Boston, then a city of 175 ,000, began to be powerfully affected. And thousands came to Christ. Philadelphia, one of those original six men in the first prayer meeting, went to Philadelphia to lead the initial prayer meetings there.

And God worked powerfully all over the city. And finally, after about six months, they weren't sure if they were to continue those and they were thinking about stopping them. When in one of the meetings one night, when children found out that the meetings might not be going on again, suddenly into one of the meetings, it said that 200 children marched in together singing hymns.

And the adults and the leaders began to cry. And the meetings went on for another year there. In Newburyport, Massachusetts, the burial place of George Whitefield, it had a population of 13 ,000. It was reported that 600 conversions and additions to the local churches in a few number of months.

Many of them adults who had been professing atheists and agnostics. Whitefield's bones under the church at the time might have been rattling if somebody had checked. God was shaking Newburyport, the last place Whitefield preached at midnight.

And he died that night in his room and he was buried there below the church. Many other places in Massachusetts communities, testimonies, powerful testimonies began to come forth that God was truly moving in power.

From New Hampshire, the word came. The occasion of the great prayer revival is in almost every city and town and neighborhood in our state. Daily prayer meetings being held at noon in all the cities and large places, not only in church buildings, but in public halls, stores and businesses.

The voice of heartfelt prayer is everywhere, is everywhere. Now, let me mention a neat story. There was an incident in in New York state where a true story was shared in the Fulton Street prayer meeting as a testimony.

Somewhere in a rural area, there was a group of about 20 families, very rural, cut off, cut off from most towns. And this place was noted for its outward wickedness and and profanity and violence. In fact, it had been come to know be known as Hell's Corner and civilized people wouldn't go there.

Well, the residents of Hell's Corner had heard about people getting religion. So they decided they would hold a mock prayer meeting. And there was one man there who had once professed to be a true believer in Jesus Christ.

But he was obviously a notorious backslider. But they called on him to lead this mock prayer meeting. When he began before long, he broke down and he couldn't continue. And suddenly the mockery and the snickering was gone.

And a spirit of soberness just began to grip those men. And they sent someone to the nearest town that they knew of. And they invited a deacon from that town to come and lead a meeting. Well, he thought it was a trick to hurt him.

He didn't want to go to Hell's Corner. He thought they were trying to do something to him. But he sought counsel and he took others with him. And so they went to Hell's Corner to see the situation. And his report was as follows.

I had been there only a few minutes when I knew that the Spirit of the Lord was there powerfully. Four or five hardened men had been struck under conviction of sin. And a meeting was held and they and others were converted.

And it said these prayer meetings there continued. Many of those persons have been converted and have become praying men and women. And the work has spread from Hell's Corner with real power. At the last meeting, they reported there were more than a hundred present.

He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh when men mock. In Pennsylvania, a lumberjack in the mountains related his conversion. He said all through the Pennsylvania mountains, the Lord has been pouring out His Spirit.

And among these thoughtless, wicked men as they are around here, He has brought many to repentance. For 49 years, I lived the life of an unrepentant sinner. But now it has been over three months that I've been a true Christian.

I had gone to a Methodist meeting and it pleased the Lord to awaken me in that meeting. I knelt down to pray and the Lord met me. He led me to complete surrender and my burden was gone. And I knew my sins were forgiven.

Conversion Testimonies from the Revival

A young actor in New York City gave this testimony. I trust that during this summer, I have been brought to embrace Jesus Christ as He's offered in the Gospel. I had attended these prayer meetings nearly every day for two months.

And God has made them the means of my salvation. My life and work has been sad and wretched beyond all description. Ten years ago, I was under conviction of sin when preparing for college. I then grieved away the Holy Spirit and I began to drink, which nearly proved to be my ruin.

During this time, I was an actor on the stage with all its vices and allurements dragging me down to ruin. But God, who is rich in mercy, God's grace has been mercifully shown to me in bringing me a poor, repenting sinner to the Savior.

He surely saves to the uttermost all who come to God by Him. This was the kind of testimony among hundreds of thousands of people in the Third Great Awakening. Missouri and Illinois were greatly affected by this prayer revival.

In St. Louis, the power of prayer suddenly began to spread supernaturally. It was said by one, we do not remember ever to observe such a general awakening of the people on the subject of true religion.

And as is now clearly seen here, Methodist preachers reported over 900 conversions in the Oskaloola area of Missouri. And powerful movements happened in St. Joseph, St. Charles and Troy areas. The St. Louis News, a main paper of the city, gave this report.

Now, folks, this is better than the Cardinals winning the World Series right here. There is scarcely, St. Louis News reported, there is scarcely a single county in our local states that has not shared in the blessing from heaven.

Almost every country meeting house in Missouri and Illinois has been or now is the scene of earnest and zealous preaching resulting in genuine revivals. Prairie fires breaking out everywhere and men couldn't contain it or resist it or control it when it happened.

Ohio reported 10 ,000 conversions over 200 different towns with the testimony that, God has come down in mighty power and converted men by the thousands, universalists, spiritualists, Jewish families and the most hardened and wicked men have been converted, whom the churches here had almost ceased to pray for.

Now, in April, the Christian Index in Missouri, the Christian Index paper reported that they had heard that the revival had spread powerfully into Georgia and Alabama. In Alabama, is that where we are?

Powerful movements and numerous conversions happen suddenly in Mobile, Livingston and Montgomery area. The Alabama paper, the Southwest Baptist reported, the most cheering reports continue to reach us from almost every point of our state of a most gracious outpouring of the divine spirit.

Revival in American Colleges and the Civil War

Colleges were shaken in this awakening in a powerful way. In the 1850s, there were approximately 200 colleges of various church denominations in the nation from New England to California, though they were predominantly Presbyterian.

They did include schools among Baptists and Methodists and other several other groups. And from the beginning of the awakening, colleges were profoundly affected. Harvard, for instance, it had already by 1858 become Unitarian, but it saw a sovereign movement of God sweep through the campus, resulting in numerous conversions.

Brown University in Rhode Island, Dartmouth College, both saw powerful visitations, numerous conversions, especially the wickedest students. Yale University in Connecticut saw the most powerful movement of grace since 1821, 200 students publicly professed Jesus Christ and they were turning to him.

Princeton saw the power of God come down on campus. And when the smoke had cleared, there were 102 professed conversions among the 272 students on campus. Now, of course, we know such statistics don't tell us the full accurate story.

So we must keep that in mind. And what was probably a typical scene on those campuses in that day was described by one who experienced it firsthand. He said this, a young man, shall I ever forget that memorable morning in the old classics room in that year of 1858 among my senior class of 20 members, most of whom were already true Christians, when such a divine presence overshadowed us that we were constrained to stop class and spend the better part of the hour in prayer for the unsaved members of our class and school.

Now, those of you in college, that doesn't mean Monday or Tuesday in class, you ought to tell the professor, hey, can we pray instead of study? But God had moved into that campus and those campuses and he was moving powerfully.

The Civil War was affected by this awakening. We we need to remember that this greatest awakening America ever saw was three years prior to the beginning of the worst war America ever was involved in.

There's no question, though, that the 1858 prayer revival was still affecting churches widely, even while their young men left for the battlefield in the fall of 1861. For instance, there was a powerful movement among the soldiers near Richmond.

Numerous soldiers began confessing their sin and embrace the gospel message. The Confederate Lieutenant Lieutenant Thomas Stonewall Jackson wrote of another movement of God writing on December 12th, 1862.

Jackson said this while we were near Winchester, it pleased our heavenly father to visit my troops with a rich outpouring of the Holy Spirit. There were probably more than 150 men in my brigade inquiring concerning the way of salvation.

It appears to me that we may now look for many conversions in the army. Now, I being from the south, I didn't get to research the statistics on the conversions in the Union Army, but there were many and I'm sure there were as many elect of God on both sides.

They say, J. Edwin Orr says that there were at least 150 ,000 soldiers that profess faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, reported this to their chaplains and later were baptized after the war. Hymns, songs and spiritual songs were a great effect of this movement.

Quite a number of gospel hymns were written during this great awakening or came into prominence during this revival. Fannie Crosby ever heard of her? She wrote a few, didn't she? Up to that time of 1858, she had mainly written poetry.

She began to write hymns after this and God got a hold of her life fully. Daniel Webster, who served as a prisoner of war during the war, wrote the revival hymn there shall be showers of blessing, precious reviving again.

And it was in the context of the 1858 revival that a simple children's hymn was written by a lady named Anna Warner with the desire to see children come to the Savior. She wrote these words. Jesus loves me.

This I know for the Bible tells me so. William Featherstone, at the age of 16, wrote the hymn during those days of revival. My Jesus, I love thee. I know thou art mine. For thee, all the follies of sin, I resign.

A strong militant hymn came into prominence during the revivals. Stand up, stand up for Jesus. He soldiers of the cross. Lift high its royal banner. It must not suffer loss. And Joseph Scriven, a teacher in Canada, wrote a hymn that powerfully influenced many during the awakening.

What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear. Now, the conservative estimates about the prayer revival of 1858 are that between three and five million professions of faith and salvation came to American churches.

And remember that those were days where you didn't become a member of church by walking the aisle, signing a card, and you're voted on right then. They still counseled and dialogued and examined to see some credible evidence of regeneration and conversion.

There was a little examination that went on. Then it was still harder to become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ than to become a member of the Lions Club, unlike today. But three to five million professions of faith and additions to the churches when the population in America was 30 million and the staggering after effects of the revival can't even be estimated.

The largest revival America ever saw, and perhaps comparable to the 1904 revival in Wales, the biggest in all of history. So what's the main explanation of this movement of God? The primacy of prayer.

Prayer, Divine Sovereignty, and the Means of Revival

Prayer, the sovereignty of the Holy Spirit working through prayer, not prayers of great men and leaders, prayers of men and women and boys and girls of young men like land fear who was prompted by the Holy Spirit to begin a prayer meeting prayer without question with it was the outstanding means and characteristic of the revival of 1850.

God poured out a spirit of grace and supplication. True, honest prayer, burdened, consistent prayer, sincere prayer, humble prayer. People didn't care what others thought about their praying. Now, you know what?

Let me tell you something. In some of you in your church prayer meetings, when the leaders or the elders call a prayer meeting, you won't ever pray because you're too prideful or scared about what people are going to think about your praying.

Here's a big theological word of counsel for that. Get over it. Put your pride to death. You're praying to God, not me, and it doesn't matter who's listening. God hears the cry of the heart. That's what he hears.