Revival in the Church can be an amazing thing to behold, but what does it look like? President and CEO of the Southern Baptist Executive Committee, Dr. Ronnie Floyd shares his experience of pastoring a revival at his church in Northwest Arkansas.
The entire video is above, and the complete transcript is below.
When revival comes to the Church, the Church will never be the same again.
When I look back at my ministry at Cross Church in Northwest Arkansas, I remember a definitive day, I remember a moment, and I remember some secondary moments and successive moments that followed that literally redirected that church. And we call that day, the day revival came to our church. And in reality, I really believe it was there. It was genuine.
We were living in a moment where the power of the Holy Spirit was being outpoured from heaven. I saw open repentance. I saw immediate obedience. I saw brokenness like I’ve never seen before. And since that day, on June the 4th, 1995, that church has never been the same. When you look back at the real results of revival, it’s not simply about a moment. It’s what I would call a generational moment.
Just recently, when I left as the senior pastor of that church, that day was recounted by so many people to me in personal conversations because it so – in their words – “altered their life forever”. That’s what revival does.
Revival is when the presence of God comes upon God’s people and they experience life like they’ve never experienced before. Yes, they were followers of Christ and yes, they were trying to walk with the Lord, but when God’s presence and power comes upon a church, upon a life, in a sovereign way and when that church or that individual is so willing to embrace what God is doing, when those two come together there’s nothing like it. That is the need of the Church today.
Because immediately it was no longer about what’s good for me or how is this going to affect me? It became how are we gonna reach our community? How are we gonna take the gospel to Arkansas? How are we going to take the gospel to America? How are we going to take the gospel to the world?
That was a moment when the Great Commission began to live in and through and around us more than ever before. That’s the power of revival and that’s what the churches in America need today.
