(OPINION) From the nation’s capital to the harvest fields in the mid-west, Christians have been crying out to God for spiritual renewal in America. Some believe the nation sits on the brink of collapse, with the only hope being a visitation of God’s power and presence.
“Revival or we die,” Dr. Michael Brown told CBN News “That’s where we have to get. You have to get to a place where you can’t live any longer without visitation. It could be personal, personal revival where you know there must be a breakthrough.” Brown asks, “What will heal the deep racial, social, and political divisions that are tearing us apart?”
In his new book, Revival or We Die: A Great Awakening is Our Only Hope, Brown says a revival is vital to see things change. “America’s being torn apart by the seams,” explained Brown. “And we’ve seen that there are no political solutions, there are no social solutions, and the church itself has become impotent. We’re at a crisis point in American history where without divine visitation America as we know it could come to an end or could be so marred that the world our kids grow up in will be very, very different.”
Dr. Corne Bekker, Dean of Regent University’s School of Divinity agrees with Brown’s assessment. He says that the country has reached a time of spiritual reckoning. “I believe America recognizes that politics cannot save her,” Bekker said in an interview with CBN News. “Ideology cannot save her. Social change cannot save her. Only the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.”
A student of past revival movements, Bekker believes to experience true spiritual renewal, the church must first prepare.
“Revival throughout the history of the church is always a sovereign move of God,” said Bekker. “No man can, in essence, make it happen. It is supernatural. And so what we desperately need to do is cry out to God. That’s what Psalm 85 says, ‘Revive us, oh Lord.'”
Bekker added, “Secondly to search our hearts, to allow the Holy Spirit to search our hearts.” In 1995, Brown helped to lead the Brownsville revival in Florida, which lasted six years. He said supernatural moves of God are unscripted and out of the norm.
“When revival happens it’s not just a matter of one or two people getting excited or a crowd getting lifted up,” said Brown. “Revival happens outside of church buildings. Some of the greatest testimonies we heard during the Brownsville revival were after people left. When they got to their church service next Sunday the fire of God would fall. And the fire of God would continue to burn for months or even for years.”
Bekker is hopeful that the nation is on the verge of something even bigger than Brownsville. “True revival happens in the streets, happens in the homes, and happens in the darkest places of society,” Bekker explained. “Think of the most chaotic places in our world, darkest places in our world, that’s where the Spirit is hovering waiting to re-create. It’s not too late for America. It’s not too late.”
Bekker says the impact of God’s power will be undeniable. “We will see monumental change firstly in the church, but we will also see it in our community,” he said. “We will see families restored. We will see crime go down. We will see a thirst and hunger for holiness within our world.” READ MORE
