Growing up, I lived in small Texas towns with a small to average sized Baptist church. The rhythms of life were different then. One of the rhythms happened every year -- a church wide revival meeting.
In my earliest memories, these week long events with nightly meetings were comprised of great music and preaching by a guest preacher or evangelist, often followed by desserts and fellowship. Many times, revival weeks were a spiritually anointed moment of renewal for believers and salvation for those who were lost. But it was not just what happened during that one week.
These meetings were frequently preceded by prayer gatherings in homes, evangelism training and counselor training weeks before the revival, as God’s people slowed down and turned their attention back to the Lord and the mission of the Church to reach the lost with the good news of Jesus Christ.
There are some key things I learned from these revival meetings: intentionality to seek the Lord by setting aside our normal routines to do that, the importance of corporate prayer that indicates our humble dependence and readiness for divine intervention, the needed investment to train people for evangelism and spiritual counseling so there is a preparedness for effective spiritual conversations, and the initiative to work together to share Jesus with those who are lost.
What we need as we come out of this pandemic is a good, old fashioned revival meeting -- or something like it that contains these key elements. Let’s establish again the rhythm of revival.
-- Mike Thibodeaux
