A season of revival

Renewal and revival.

Great words.

Needed words.

Needed in our hearts and our spirits.

Renewal is when the people of God are brought alive in their walk with God.  They draw closer to the Lord.  They are rebooted, so to speak in their intensity and passion for God.

Many times, as God's people are renewed, they experience certain manifestations of the Holy Spirit.  Trembling.  Falling on the floor.  A sense of peace.  A sense of passion for God.

As followers of Christ, we all need those times when the fire of God is lit once again within our spirits.  Where we once again follow God not as a "have to" but because we "get to."  We are so full of God that it literally bursts within our spirits.

Sometimes we quarantine those experiences and say to ourselves, "God has moved - He has sent revival."

But revival, in the truest sense of the word is when people are connecting to Christ.  They are being saved from their sins.  They are turning away from the past - asking for forgiveness of sins - and changing the patterns of behavior and thinking in their lives.

We desire both.  We desire that God not only stirs our hearts as Christians, but that that experience will so empower us that we reach out to those who do not know God.  The non-churched.  The unsaved.  The non-Christian.  However you want to put that.

Yet, the third step is the step that few revivals ever reach.  Where God moves so strongly and His power is so evident that the culture and the society in which the people live is changed.

The way people live, the way they work, eat, drink, sleep and play is transformed into a holy, godly culture.

We change.  That's renewal. 

Non-churched people are changed.  That's revival.

Changing our culture - that's the ultimate goal.

Just a thought for a Tuesday.