Day 9: The Heartbeat of Revival

The renowned pastor Charles Spurgeon, while giving people a tour of his church prior to his sermons, led them down into the basement. “Here, I want you to see the power plant of the church,” he said. When Spurgeon opened the door, there was a roomful of men and women deep in prayer. God brings His people together on their knees. True spiritual awakening rests with one act of humility and reverence before God— prayer. “Prayer,” said the late evangelist, pastor, and author R.A. Torrey, “is the key that unlocks all the storehouses of God’s infinite grace and power. All that God is, and all that God has, is at the disposal of prayer.”

What the Bible teaches, what Charles Finney suggests, and what Christians about whom you’ve read are committed, is the one element that will bring us face-to-face with God. That one element, the key to the new Great Awakening in North America and personal revival, is prayer.

On September 12, 1990, forty-five thousand junior and senior high students from a handful of states around the US gathered in circles around the flagpoles of their respective schools to pray for God’s presence, strength, and direction in their classrooms, homes, cities, and towns. The “See You at the Pole” gathering swelled to one million students the following year. By 2014, this unprecedented day of student-led prayer involved three million followers of Jesus in twenty countries. As in all great movements of prayer, “See You at the Pole” did not begin in the hearts of people but rather in the heart of God. God used the obedience of a small group of teens to ignite what has become an international movement of prayer among young people.

How far and wide has this prayer-fed spiritual fire begun to spread? John Robb with the International Council of Prayer offers a 30,000-foot view, explaining that the Global Day of Prayer brought half a billion people together in prayer. Dale Schlafer, president of World Revival and Awakening, adds a needed exclamation point: “If it’s God who sets His people to pray, it must mean God is going to answer these prayers. He wouldn’t waste time on something He doesn’t intend to answer. Sometimes we get discouraged. What keeps me in the game is believing maybe this prayer is the one that tips it!”

1 John 5:14-15 New King James Version (NKJV)
Confidence and Compassion in Prayer
14 Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15 And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.

John 15:7 New King James Version (NKJV)
7 If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.

2 Chronicles 6:21 New King James Version (NKJV)
21 And may You hear the supplications of Your servant and of Your people Israel, when they pray toward this place. Hear from heaven Your dwelling place, and when You hear, forgive. 

Philippians 4:6-7 New King James Version (NKJV)
6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; 7 and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

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Phillips, Tom (2016-11-01). Jesus Now: God Is Up to Something Big (Chapter 4 p. 103, Chapter 5 p. 105, 115, 118). BroadStreet Publishing Group LLC.