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B. Motives for Seeking Revival
a. First motive: for God’s sake
2. Meditate on the greatness of God
In praying for Revival we are praying for God to show more of his greatness and glory. As we have noted elsewhere “Revival is God.” It is God manifesting his majesty.
Just think of the greatness of our Creator God. To reach the edge of the universe we must travel from here to the Moon in just over a second then carry on at that speed for 92,000 million years to cross the rest of the universe. Yet God infinitely transcends the universe. We see things as they were up to 13 billion years ago. But God was present then as he is now and was there from all eternity. What immense power there was in the Big Bang to fling the galaxies 46 billion miles! Yet God’s power infinitely transcends that. Revival is huge to us but is actually a very tiny manifestation of his power. Let that encourage our praying in faith.
God is so great. His Spirit is so great that revival is just a trickle of his power, a mere trickle. But it is incredibly powerful to us. To bring revival is next to nothing in terms of effort to God, but it is awesome to us. We are asking God to do an infinitesimally small thing for him but an awesome thing for us. In fact, to bring about the Millennium on earth would be an infinitesimal task for God, for he indwells and rules the vast universe.
Yet this majestic God is being ignored and even blasphemed. We microscopic creatures on our microscopic planet ignore, dishonour and offend our infinite God. We ignore his ultimate act of love – the cross – and yet people either expect to join him for eternity in heaven or we just couldn’t care less about it.
How we need to pray for God to reveal his greatness in Revival. But in order to do that we need to go deeper and deeper in awareness and appreciation of his greatness. So we need to spend much time with the Lord in order for this to happen.
We should pray: “Be exalted, O God, above the heavens; let your glory be over all the earth … You who sit enthroned between the cherubim, shine forth … Part your heavens, LORD, and come down; touch the mountains, so that they smoke. Send forth lightning and scatter the enemy” (Ps. 57:5; 80:1; 144:5-6).
We need to follow Isaiah’s example and to pray: “Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains would tremble before you! As when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil, come down to make your name known to your enemies and cause the nations to quake before you! For when you did awesome things that we did not expect, you came down, and the mountains trembled before you” (Is. 64:1-3).
Here are some examples of the revelation of God’s greatness in Scripture:
The Lord replied to Moses: “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. … But,’ he said, ‘you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.’ Then the LORD said, ‘There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen’” (Ex 33:19-23). We can draw a parallel with what Paul writes: “God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see” (1 Tim 6:15-16).
“The priests could not perform their service because of the cloud, for the glory of the LORD filled his temple” (1 Kings 8:11).
Isaiah wrote: “In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: with two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another: ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.’ At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke” (Isa 6:1-4).
Then John describes the greatness of the ascended Jesus: “Among the lampstands was someone like a son of man, dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash round his chest. The hair on his head was white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, and coming out of his mouth was a sharp, double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance” (Rev 1:13-16).
We need to pray that God will reveal his awesome greatness amongst us in Revival.
A PRAYER ABOUT THE EXALTATION OF GOD (based on biblical passages)
I will sing to you Lord, for you are highly exalted. Yours, Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendour, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, Lord, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all … you are beyond our reach and exalted in power. You, Lord, are for ever exalted. You Lord, are high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of your robe filled the temple. Above you are seraphim, each with six wings: with two wings they cover their faces, with two they cover their feet, and with two they are flying. And they are calling to one another: ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.’
Lord Jesus you are seated at God’s right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. You have been given the name that is above every name, that at your name every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that you are Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
I long to hear the voice of 100 million angels; to see them encircling the throne and the living creatures and the elders. I long to hear them saying: ‘Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and praise!’ I long to hear every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, saying: ‘To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honour and glory and power, for ever and ever!’
This is what you, the high and exalted One say – you who live for ever, whose name is holy: ‘I live in a high and holy place, but also with the one who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.
(Ex 15:1; 1 Chronicles 29:11; Job 36:22; 37:23; Psa 46:10; 57:5; 92:8; 97:9; Isa 6:1-3; 33:5; Acts 2:33; Eph 1:20-21; Php 2:9-11; Rev 5:11-14; Isaiah 57:15).
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