If you go outside and walk down a busy street and look around you, you will see the faces of many people who do not know Christ.  You probably have gone to your church, to your school, to your home, and prayed fervently for God to start a revival, but for the first time in a long time, your prayers seem unanswered. 

Sure, there are moments when you see a young Christian become fired up for Christ or you are able to witness the conversion of a nonbeliever.  A new member joins your church.  Someone is healed in the Name of the Lord.  All of these are great things that are happening all around you... but where is the revival? 

According to the dictionary, the definition of a revival is: "a restoration to use, acceptance, activity, or vigor after a period of obscurity or quiescence." 

Is that not the truth of what has gone on in the United States- and the globe, for that matter- for past hundred or more years?  Christianity has fallen into a state of obscurity and apathy.  Many- if not most- Christians today are in a state of deep sleep.  We are like the walking dead.  Do you not believe me?  Let me ask you a few questions.

1. When was the last time you openly witnessed to an unbeliever?  How often do you share your faith with the lost?
2. When was the last time you took the Lord's Name in vain?  (for example, saying "Oh my ---.")
3. When was the last time you listened to music or watched a movie or a television program that contained people inappropriately using the Name of the Lord as a cuss word?  
4. When was the last time you spent more than ten minutes in solid prayer?
5. When was the last time you spent more than ten minutes reading the Bible?

As you answered these questions, did your heart sink?  If these questions did not apply to you, then do you realize how many Christians that they do apply to?  I am not going to lie.  I feel like a hypocrite when I read these questions, and I'm the one who wrote them!  I know for a fact that I still have a long ways to go in improving my life for the Lord.   

We are praying for a revival.  We are praying for a restoration of the use, acceptance, activity, and vigor of our faith after this period of obscurity and quiescence.  But at the same time, what are we as Christians doing to start this revival?

Here is a huge issue: when we long for a revival in our nation and around the world, we look at the people around us.  "If we could get Christians to stop being hypocrites and actually follow God... if we can change the reputation that Christians have to unbelievers... if we could get more people to have faith in Christ and less people to doubt... if we could get more people to pray..."  That is not the issue.  Other people are not the issue. 

You are the issue.

Instead of looking for the lack of revival in other Christians, in our nation, and in unbelievers, why don't you look for the cause of this missing revival inside of yourself?  You are the only person that you can change.  Every revival has to start out with a core group, and why can you not be one of these people? 

If you are doing something consistently sinful in your life, be it watching movies that take the Lord's Name in vain, be it listening to sinful music, be it not living out every aspect of your own life to God's glory, then how can you truly look around you and ask, "Why is there no revival?"  What are you doing to start this revival?  You must do more than pray.  You must do more than wish.  You need to make a change in your own life before you can make a change in the lives of anyone else. 

Matthew 17:20 says, "...I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."

Have you seen any great miracles lately?  Have you seen a true revival in your nation?  No, our world is sliding further and further down into the depths of sin and worldly things.  According to Jesus Christ, the smallest amount of faith should be doing things even greater than moving a mountain.  When have you seen such a thing happening lately?  When have you seen mountains being moved?

When have you seen a true revival occurring all around you?

I believe that we're close.  I believe that starting a revival isn't too far away.  It can happen. 

The next time you close your eyes and pray to God to start a revival in the United States and around the world, I would like you to reword what you have to say.  Instead of saying, "Please, God, start a revival in the world," why don't you pray, "Please, God, start a revival in me?"  If God can start a true revival in your heart- and in mine as well- then our lives will shine through the darkness, and a revival will have begun.  A revival begins with each individual. 

I would like to end this post with a quote from A.W. Tozer that I think is extremely mind-blowing if you stop and think about what he has to say. 

"Have you noticed how much praying for revival has been going on of late- and how little revival has resulted?  I believe the problem is that we have been trying to substitute praying for obeying, and it simply will not work.  To pray for revival while ignoring the plain precept laid down in Scripture is to waste a lot of words and get nothing for our trouble.  Prayer will become effective when we stop using it as a substitute for obedience."

What is the obedience that can begin to start a revival for Christ in our world?  Obedience is obeying the ten commandments, refraining from participation in worldly activities, witnessing (you witnessing) on a frequent basis to unbelievers, and your life becoming transformed to that of Christ Jesus.  That is true obedience.  That is what will begin a true revival that will go beyond moving mountains.

Do you have any comments about this subject?  Feel free to leave your opinion in the comment box below.

Credit to the photos I used in today's post go to here and here.     

What I've done is probably going to cause a lot of controversy amongst my readers.  Some of you guys may be shocked and angered.  You may call me a hypocrite, and you may say that what I've done is sacrilegious and blasphemous.  On the other hand, I think that a lot of you will be positive about what I have done, and you may even want to do this yourself. 

What I've done is cut up a Bible. 

Now before you start to feel indignant, I would like you to stay seated and keep reading what I have to say.  I did not cut up my Bible because I was angry with God or because I disagreed with things that the Bible has to say.  No, the reason I cut up my Bible was to make a point. 

I cut out every verse in the Bible that has to do with poverty and helping the needy.  The reason why I did this was partially to prove to myself exactly how much importance that God places on serving the less fortunate.  I also did this so that I could have tangible and physical evidence to show people and be able to honestly say, "Look at what our Bible is, at what our faith is, without us serving the poor and the destitute." 

I suspected that there would be many sections chopped out of the Bible after this experiment- big holes eradicated from God'sWord- but I was shocked to discover what was left of my Bible after I had removed the verses about helping the poor and the needy.  My Bible was completely tattered.  There was little left of its pages.  It was unreadable, unusable. 

When Christians do not serve the needy, we are not putting into practice what the Bible so strongly emphasizes that we need to do.  We are ignoring these huge sections of God's Word when we should be obeying them with every fabric of our lives.   

The Christian church today does not put nearly enough emphasis into service .  Don't get me wrong- some churches are focused on helping the needy in their communities and around the world, but most churches are more focused on other things.  These things are also important, but Christians too often overlook the needs of so many people across the globe, and that gives Christ a bad name.  There are people dying of hunger, thirst, lack of medical care, and poor sanitary conditions every single day.  There are so many people who are living without shoes or a home and who are going through life without an education.  This is a huge problem. 

As children of God, we should be following in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, the One who said, "I tell you the truth, whatever you did for the least of these brothers and sisters of Mine, you did for Me."  (Matthew 25:40, TNIV)  Service was so important to Jesus, and this is reflected throughout the Bible, in the New and Old Testaments. 

What makes me cringe is the fact that there are so many more secular efforts to feed the hungry and shelter the homeless than there are Christian efforts.  Why do the big rock stars who are into drugs and sex and worldly things do more for the poor than we as Christians- who are supposed to do what Jesus did and live how He lived on earth- do for the poor?  This puts Christians in a bad light when people think to themselves, "I'm doing more to help the hungry than the people who love God do.  Why would I want to be like them?"  This needs to change right now.

Over the next several weeks I am going to be expanding on this vitally important issue.  I am going to be talking about the greatest needs of the world today in regards to poverty.  I will also talk about what you can do as a Christian, right now, in your community and around the world.  Don't allow your faith in Jesus to be tattered and torn like my Bible because of the fact that you ignore one of His most important commands: to help those who are in need. 

Please leave your comments below or send me an email.  I want to hear your feedback about this.  What do you think about this topic?  Do you believe that the church has been greatly apathetic in regards to helping the poverty-stricken people throughout the world?  What do you think about my physical evidence (the ripped Bible)?  What do you plan to do to serve the needy in your community?