Divine Awakening: Experiencing God's Power and Presence

It is a wonderful privilege for us to be together and I have been thinking a great deal about our conference, about its theme. Those of us who speak regularly at the Ligonier conferences often wonder, but don't dare to ask, "How did you come up with this theme?" But whatever we may think about themes, we thank God that R.C. and others with him in thinking a long time ago now about this conference settled on this theme of "Awakening." [00:00:39]

We suffer from an enormous impoverishment of worship. The most obvious signal is what happens after the benediction is pronounced and people get on with the next part of their business and it's an indication that we know so little about what we have just been doing, and we know so little of that overwhelming sense of the presence of the God whom we have been praising that we would want to linger in His presence and continue to worship Him and that anything else would be a distraction from our greatest delights. [00:03:48]

I don't think I need to underscore for you that a revival or an awakening is not something that we can accomplish. Like many other strangers to these parts, I still vividly remember a Saturday afternoon at a conference in a church in a state that will remain nameless to protect the guilty, and I wandered outside of the church and looked across the road and there was another church that was advertising a revival the following week on the Tuesday and Thursday. [00:07:12]

What marks it really is not so much that God does things that He doesn't ordinarily do. It isn't that regeneration and conversion are somehow superseded by revival and awakening. It is not so much that God does extraordinary things in that sense but that He does ordinary things in an extraordinary way. And in doing so, He both awakens the church from its lethargy and revives the spiritually dead from their judgment and their condemnation. [00:08:43]

There is an intensification of spiritual experience, especially an intensification of a sense of guilt before a holy God and joy in the forgiveness of sins by that holy God. There is a movement from pleasure in the things of grace to profound joy in the things of grace, and along with that intensification and partly as a fruit of it, there is also an acceleration of God's work. [00:09:45]

The Day of Pentecost did not happen again, but many of the Spirit-given realities that marked the Day of Pentecost came again and again like waves beating on the shore. These very realities of which we've just been speaking, an intensification of spiritual experience, an acceleration of the gospel, a multiplication of those who were converted, was characteristic of that whole opening section of the Acts of the Apostles through the experience of Philip in Samaria. [00:14:46]

And you see this again and again as historians seek to trace this. Sometimes they can trace it back to a moment. Sometimes they can trace it back to a single prayer. You know what it is to be in a gathering for prayer when everyone is half-asleep, and then suddenly the gathering comes to life because of the prayer of an individual. [00:22:47]

One of the things that happens when the Holy Ghost comes in awakening is that preaching is re-centered on Jesus Christ, and conversations are re-centered on Jesus Christ, and you see this happening both on the day of Pentecost and punctuating these early chapters of the Acts of the Apostles right through Peter's understanding of what happens in the household of Cornelius. [00:34:05]

There is a boldness of application of the truth that in some sense seems to be possible or appropriate only in a season when the Holy Spirit, as it were, oils the channels between the Word and the needy hearts of people to make it possible to engage in this close application. One of the things that characterizes this preaching, you see it in Simon Peter in an amazing way. [00:39:23]

And then, of course, everything gets sorted out. Everything becomes tidy. No, then there is always painful opposition to the gospel. That's the story of early Acts, isn't it? And it always seems to come in the same style as in the early Acts. First of all, there is intimidation. "We've got to stop this." And then when intimidation fails, there is position seeking within the church. [00:46:39]

A burden for prayer, an exaltation of Christ, a boldness in preaching, a painful opposition to the gospel, and a glorious transformation of believers. I knew somebody, still know them, who experienced such an awakening. I asked them, "What was it like for you?" and the thing that struck me was that the pattern was still the same. They said, "I was just overwhelmed with a sense of conviction of my own sin. [00:48:29]

I had a desire to turn from my specific sins, but from all sin to Jesus Christ. I was overwhelmed with a sense of the joy of forgiveness and the love of Jesus. I wanted to devour the Word of God. I longed to be with Him in prayer. I saw the needs and the difficulties of others more clearly, and I felt that I would be willing to forsake everything for the Lord Jesus Christ." [00:49:05]