A minister should go to every service as though it were the first, as though it could be the best, and as though it might be the last.
Devotion of the Day
Revive Us Again-But Not Now!
Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance.
Matthew 3:8
John the Baptist demanded real evidence of a change of heart. We live in an “epidemic” of so-called revivals the year round, but most church members weather them without repentance or the fruits thereof, renunciation and restitution. Most revivals begin with two or three sermons to the church and pass quickly into a drive for “prospects” and new church members, leaving the church quite unscathed.
We need a new John the Baptist putting the ax to the root, not the fruit, of the tree; calling for conviction-born repentance among Christians, a change of mind, godly sorrow, and confession and renunciation of sin, for he that “confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy”; and for restitution wherever possible-a straightening out of old accounts such as Zacchaeus made.
This is revival-not just singing, “Revive Us Again”, with no intention whatever of paying the price now!