“And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that He had said that He would do unto them; and He did it not.” (Jonah 3:10)
Near the time of the American Revolution, our nation was in serious moral decay. And worse yet, the problem was also seen in the churches. At the time, the Methodists were the largest denomination, and they were losing more than they were gaining in membership. Second were the Baptists, and they said “they were having their most wintry season.” It was a truth that the Congregationalists had not brought in one young person in sixteen years.
John Marshall, the then Chief Justice of the United States, wrote to the Bishop of Virginia, Bishop Madison, that “the Church is too far gone ever to be redeemed.” Voltaire said, “Christianity will be forgotten in thirty years time.”
Kenneth Scott Latourette, church historian said, “It seemed as if Christianity were about to be ushered out of the affairs of men.” It appeared that churches were about to die out. How did God change that situation? It came through the concert of prayer.
Just prior, there was a Scottish Presbyterian minister in Edinburgh called John Erskine, who wrote a booklet tiled: “Pleading with the People of Scotland and Elsewhere to Unite in Prayer for a Revival of Religion.”
He sent a copy to Jonathan Edwards in New England. He was so moved, he wrote a response. His title was: “A Humble Attempt to Promote Explicit Agreement and Visible Union of All God’s People in Extraordinary Prayer for the Revival of Religion and the Advancement of Christ’s Kingdom.”
The year after John Wesley had died, the Second Great Awakening began and swept Great Britain. But, in New England, there was a man of prayer named Isaac Backus, a Baptist pastor. In 1794, he sent out a plea for prayer to ministers of every Christian denomination in the United States. They knew this was their only hope. The Presbyterians, the Methodists, the Baptist Associations, the Congregationalists, the Reformed, and the Moravians all adopted it until America became saturated with a network of prayer meetings, using the first Monday of each month to pray. It was not long before revival came!
There are some today who say that it is too late, that America has gone too far in her decline morally. Sadly, some of those are preachers who claim to believe in a God of mercy and grace. I know this about my God; He is a God Who is not bound by time, but is eternal. He is not concerned about time, but about timing and redemption. He is not willing that any should perish. With that in mind, if we appealed to His mercy and grace in full repentance, I believe our God will act!
Beloved, I am a nobody, who is God’s somebody, begging the Church to seriously commit to faithful, believing, repentant prayer for the revival of the Church, and the spiritual awakening of America! Won’t you join me?
