Is there anyone here today that loves America? Me, too. I love America. But I must say, I love America for what it has been, but its getting harder to love America for what it is becoming. We are living in times of big wheels, crooked deals, fuel spills, endangered seals, pep pills, cheap thrills, unpaid bills, take-out meals, and when you can tell the Jacks from the Jills.

Years ago Vance Havner said that at the rate America is decaying morally we shall have to change our national symbol from the eagle to a vulture!

One of three things lies ahead for America.

It may be RETRIBUTION. Some ask this question, “Will God judge America?” My friend, God is already judging America! Francis Schaffer warned us that we would one day wake up and discover the America we once knew was cone! Ladies and gentlemen, that day has come. The America we once knew is gone! Psalm 9:17 “The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.” Is God blind to the sin of our nation?

Prayer in school outlawed.
Homosexuals proudly parading as an alternative lifestyle demanding acceptance and full marriage rights.
Illegitimate adults having sex like it’s a game.
Abortion remains the mopping up operation for people who refuse to take responsibility for their actions.
Under the protection of the highest court in our land millions of unborn babies are murdered each year.
Whales, trees, and snail darters are more protected than the unborn child.

The second possibility is the RETURN of the Lord Jesus Christ. There is every indication from the Word of God to believe the coming of Christ may be very soon, Luke 21:28. No man knows the day nor the hour, but Christ could return at any moment.

There is a third possibility—REVIVAL. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to see a sweeping, weeping, reaping revival move across this land before we end up destroying ourselves?

Let me say this about revival.I do not know whether or not revival will come to America, though we ought to earnestly pray for it. But there is one thing I know in my heart --- if God’s people in God’s churches today want to experience revival, it is entirely possible for us to have genuine revival.

A sign in front of a church building read, “Either this church will have a revival or a funeral.” That is exactly as it is! Our survival depends on a revival. This is our greatest need. The greatest need is not finances, thought that is always a need. It is not newer or better buildings, thou more space is usually needed. It is not more staff. The greatest need is a genuine, old-fashioned, heaven-sent, sin-killing, devil-chasing, Christ-exalting, soul-saving, saint-stirring revival!

2 Chronicles 7:14 is the only thing that stands between us and revival. This is possibly the greatest single, stand-alone Scripture on revival.

1. The People of Revival. “If my people.”

This declares that God has a people for Himself. Are you one of His people? Do you know it? Are you absolutely sure of it? It is not the unsaved to whom God is looking to influence the world.

Revival does not begin in the White House with some elected political officials. It begins in the Church house with the saved, born-again people of God!

1 Peter 4:17 “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at use, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?”

Revival is a saint problem, not a sinner problem. Sinners can’t be revived. The word “revival” means “to make to live again.” Sinners don’t need revival; they need to be “vived,” to be made alive to begin with.

God’s people are “the people” of revival. God’s not going to bring revival through the Chamber of Commerce or the Kiwanis or the Masons or the Mooses or the Gooses. It is going to be through the redeemed, those who have His name, those who know God through Jesus Christ. Are any of those people here today?

And all the dope dealers, baby butchers, and whiskey runner cannot hold back revival. People say, “But what about Hollywood, Washington, Wall Street?” No, the people of revival are God’s people. “If my people.”

2. The Posture of Revival. “Humble themselves...”

There are at least two ways to be humbled. You can humble yourself or God can humble you. Which do you think is better?

This word “humble” means to “bend the knee, to bring down (low).” We take this attitude because we realize our complete unworthiness and hopelessness without God.

We have nothing to strut about, yet we are still far too self-centered, self-satisfied, self-serving, and self-promoting.

Jesus said, “And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.” Matthew 23:12. The way up is down. And the reason we are not on our way up is because we are not on our way down!

And while we are down there we are pointed to:

3. The Prayer of Revival. “And pray.”

Prayer doesn’t make a difference - prayer is the difference.

President Abraham Lincoln’s Proclamation for a National Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer, April 30, 1863.

“We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us! It behooves us, then to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.”

Isn’t that is an awesome thing that a President would led our nation to prayer? Until the Supreme Court said students could not be led in prayer in our public school, it was a daily activity. Prayer may or may not be reinstated in school, but, regardless, it can be reinstated in our personal lives. No one can keep you from praying if you desire to pray.

The history of ancient Israel is full of evidences that the prayers of God’s people in times of crisis result in divine intervention. King Jehoshaphat - 2 Chronicles 20:12. “We have no might against this great company that cometh against us; neither know we what to do; but our eyes are upon thee.” Ezra was so convicted and so broken about his sins and the sins of his people that he tore his clothes, “confessed, weeping and casting himself down before the house of God,” 10:1.

There has never been a spiritual awakening in any country or church or any heart that did not being with fervent prayer. Revival is not planned out or worked up, but it is prayed down.

4. The Priority of Revival. “Seek my face...”

Revival and national repentance is not about seeking God’s hand, that is, His provision. National repentance is about seeking God’s heart, His pleasure, His smile. People do not have peace and joy in their hearts because we have lost God’s smile. 2 Chronicles 15:2, “If ye seek Him, He will be found of you...” Jehoshaphat “set himself to seek the Lord,” 2 Chronicles 20:3.

We are not to seek revival - we are to seek the Reviver! Revival is not a meeting - it is an encounter with the living God. Revival is not an unexpected accident. It comes to the seeking heart.

God is not the “spare tire” that you pull out when you are in trouble. God is the “fuel” that make your life go. The power that we need to operate in this life is only possible as we live in the knowledge of the presence of God.

The idea of “seeking God” is that of something we aggressively pursue. Its not a casual thing. Its not a “if I get around to it” thing. It is on the top of the list of our priorities. We bring ourselves before God.

Seeking God is more than coming to church every week, but it is certainly not less than that! It is an absolute shame that churches have vast numbers of church members, but as few as 25% attend weekly services. Vance Havner said, “We have a cheap chruch today because everybody is in it. Anybody can get in and nobody gets out. What started as a sheepfold looks more like a zoo!”

5. The Purity of Revival. “Turn from their wicked ways...”

We are a sinful people and the only way we can have a relationship with a holy God is by having those sins covered by the blood of Jesus Christ. “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me,” Psalm 66:18.

This purity is not the false purity of self-righteousness, but the true purity of the imputed righteousness of Christ. It is not the boast of a person who has arrived, but the broken cry of a person who wants to know and please God.

We do not like facing our sin. Have you ever noticed—we take credit for all our successes and all our failures we blame on others. We must stop fighting for our sin and start fighting against it. As long as we waste time defending ourselves we’ll never have revival.

6. The Promise of Revival. “Then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”

Why do we want revival?
For America’s sake? That’s not good enough.
For the church’s sake? That’s not good enough.
For our children’s and grandchildren’s sake? That’s not good enough.
For the unsaved? That’s not good enough.
We should want revival for the glory of God!

The kinds of moral changes discussed and debated by the politicians can only come to the hearts and lives of people who have encountered the living God.

If there was ever a time when we as a people needed to seek God and cry out to Him for mercy, it is now. Now is the time for us to turn to Him, commit our lives wholeheartedly to Him, and work with Him in rebuilding the spiritual foundations that have been destroyed.

The pain that our nation now feels does not have to be the agonizing pain of death. Rather it can be, it must be, the rejoicing pain of birth — the rebirth of our nation.

Jesus Christ died for a world of lost sinners. Many of those sinners are living in America.

Let’s have revival in America? I don’t know if she is ready or not.
Let’s have revival in our city? I don’t know if they want to listen.
Let’s have revival in our church? Jesus is outside, knocking.
Let’s have revival in our family? They won’t follow.
Let’s have revival in you! That’s it.

We may take a hundred steps away from God, but it only takes one step to return.

Its not too late to awake!

A headline that appeared in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, February 15, 1999, should give all of us hope. The headline read, “Comatose man wakes after 7 1/2 years to dilemma.” It gave the account of police officer Gary Dockery in Chattanooga, Tennessee, who had taken a bullet in the forehead and was in a coma for 7 1/2 years. What was remarkable was when he woke up, he immediately spoke clearly to his sister as if no time has passed. A family friend said, “There’s not but one way to describe it. It’s a miracle of God.” When officer Dockery awoke he asked for his sons whom he had not seen since they were 5 and 12 years old, then 12 and 19.

If a man who had been in a coma for 7 1/2 years can wake up, there’s hope for everyone in this service!