Revival Conference 2007 - Part 4

God knew. God knew what memory does, you know, there with Revelation chapter 2, there with the church at Ephesus. I mean, everything was going real nice, you know, they're taking a stand for the Lord, and they're laboring, and they're doing many good things.

I mean, they're a fine church, and they were a fine church, but God knew. God knew better. God knew the memory that they had in their minds, and He told them, Nevertheless, I'm somewhat against you.

You have left your first love. Sometimes they say, you lost your first love. Brother, sister, we don't lose our first love.

We leave it. There's a big difference, isn't there? Losing something, oh, where did it go? And leaving something, little by little, allowing the heart to get cold, and insensitive, and a little sin creeping in there. And all of a sudden, that fire, that love, that zeal that we had, it's gone.

You see, God knew that the beautiful memory of revival was in the hearts of that church at Ephesus. And He said, Remember, and do the first works. Well, we can give many accounts here, but we better move on.

Understand, there's no clock in this building, is that right? I don't see one. All right, let's move from there to the great need of revival. You see those two flow together.

First, you have the beautiful memory of revival, and with that beautiful memory of revival, then that comes to settle down upon the heart, the great need of revival. When you realize that's something back there, but I don't have it here, it's like it creates a jealousy in your heart, doesn't it? I remember the account of the Welsh revival, and when the news of the Welsh revival ended up down in India, those people down there in India, in the area where Amy Carmichael was, and other missionaries down there, they heard about this revival, and it did something inside their hearts. It provoked them, and they realized, Hey, if God did it for them, God can do it for us.

Let's start praying. It's just that simple, brothers and sisters. If God did it for them, then God can do it for us.

And they began to pray. The great need of revival. Oh, Lord of hosts, how long wilt thou be angry against the prayers of thy people? You're not answering our prayers, Lord.

You're feeding us with troubles and tears, and it seems like there's troubles on every hand. The great need of revival. Our neighbors, Lord, we're a reproach to our neighbors.

Lord, that beautiful vine that you planted there all those many years ago, and you put a hedge about it. You said, This is my vine. These are my people.

And you put a hedge around us. Why have you broken down the hedge, Lord? The hedge is broken down, and the boar out of the woods comes in and tears at us. And the people walk by, the heathen walk by, and pluck the fruit off of the vine.

The great need of revival. Brothers and sisters, is there not a great need for revival? What about the Lord's testimony? What about the testimony of the Lord? His name, His name is not being represented properly. I think of the children of Israel.

Oh, they had some memories. They remembered how the vine prospered. They remembered back there in those days, in Solomon's days, when the temple was built, and the Holy Ghost came down and filled that temple.

The Shekinah glory in the cloud filled that place, and all the priests had to run out of there, and the people fell on their faces, and then Solomon gets up there and offers a sacrifice out there, puts no fire on it, fire comes down out of heaven, and lights the sacrifice on fire. They remembered those days, those beautiful days, when the Lord's testimony was clear, when the people traveled from nation after nation all around Israel. They came, they came, what for? They came to hear the wisdom of Solomon the king.

They came to see the order of the people as they worshiped. They came to see the beautiful temple, God's house, which had been built there. And now, all of that's gone.

All of that's gone. What about the Lord's testimony in our day, brothers and sisters? You see the great need of revival. When you start reflecting on the memories of revival, if you reflect on them sincerely, up out of your heart will gush a burden.

It's not that way anymore. And it's not that way anymore, brothers and sisters. We all know that.

I mean, come on, there's no difference between the world and the church. All the Gallup polls attest to it and they're not slanted one bit. You know, they're totally unbiased.

They go out there and take these Gallup polls and find out there's basically no difference at all between the world and the church. What about the Lord's testimony? And I thought about all those people coming by and plucking fruits, you know. When you first read that, you think, OK, the world's coming and eating those nice grapes.

They're not plucking grapes, brothers and sisters. They're plucking sons and daughters. Mark it down.

If Israel was a vine, then the fruit of the vine is sons and daughters. Oh, how the world loves to pluck the sons and daughters of the church of Jesus Christ. God, help us.

God says, I'm grieved with you. I'm burdened down, he says in the book of Amos, because I gave you sons and I gave you sons for prophets and Nazarites. And you just let them go do all kinds of other things.

Yeah, the world loves to pluck the fruit from the church. Fine young men and young ladies, crisp, gracious, kind, mannerly, hardworking, obedient. Just pluck them one right after another.

Just pluck them. And instead of a prophet, you get a businessman who makes a million dollars. So what? God says, my heart is bowed down heavily, because I gave you sons for prophets and Nazarites.

There are not very many prophets around anymore, he says. Why hast thou broken down the hedge, Lord? We know, don't we? We know. We have a great need to revive and we need to revive.

But from there, we don't stop, praise God. We have this beautiful memory of revival, which begins to quicken in our hearts. We begin to see the need, the great need for revival.

Then out of that, we've got to respond.