“I fell on my knees with my arms over the seat in front of me, and the tears freely flowed. I cried, ‘Bend me! Bend me! Bend us!’ What bent me was God commending His love, and I not seeing anything in it to commend” Evans Roberts

In continuation of the 95 days Prayer Call for Personal Renewal that connects us through Epiphany – (Jan 6) to the Lenten season (Good Friday – April 10), God spoke to me on the urgent need for the church to arise and overcome Satan’s cure for revival, the sowing of leaven. The leaven of ‘once-saved-Always-saved’ continue to infect and spread through the church to the point that we make allowances for known sins and rebellions in our lives, churches, and nations. Easy-Believism is becoming normal hence, repentance is hardly preached. Revival, beyond the sowing of leaven must bend the church in order to save the world under the authority of Scripture. To bend the church is about purging the ‘Old Leaven’ and return to Biblical purity.

While studying at Cliff College, Derbyshire, United Kingdom, my heart has been captivated by great need for revival in United Kingdom. I took time to study some of the great revivals of the past. The first revival recorded in the Bible has nearly all the salient features of the many subsequent revivals described especially in the Old Testament (Gen 35:1). Revival is often ‘preceded by a period of gross iniquity, disgrace, and consequent fear’ (Gen 34:30-31). Revival is initiated by a word from God, direct or through a consecrated leader – “God said.” A genuine revival is about forsaking all that is displeasing to God – “Put away the foreign gods … purify yourselves.” In a true revival, ‘there is a corresponding return to obedience to God’s revealed will – “go up to Bethel,” “make an altar.” True ‘revival is accomplished by a new revelation of the character of God.’ In a true revival, ‘the promise of God are renewed and a revelation of the possibility of a higher spiritual life is given.’ The revival of Jacob and his family at Bethel suggests a national revival in the sense that Jacob and his 12 sons represented the nation in its embryonic stage. In other revivals, namely the revival of Israel at Mount Sinai under Moses; the revival of Israel at Shechem under Joshua; the revival of Manasseh, Asher, Zebulum and Naphtali under Gideon (Judge 6-9); the revival of Israel at Mizpah under Samuel (1Sam 7:1-17); the revival of the Northern Kingdom at Mount Carmel under Elijah (1Kg 18); the revival of the Assyrians at Nineveh under Jonah (Jon 3:1-10); the revival of Judah under Asa (2Chr 15:1-19); the revival of Judah under Hezekiah (2Kg 18:4-7); the revival of Judah under Josiah (2 Kg 22-23); the revival of the remnant under the preaching of Haggai and Zechariah; and the revival of the remnant under Ezra, one thing is common. Revival begins with a single changed heart.

Jacob through his changed heart experienced the revival of God through spiritual renewal, spiritual transformation, spiritual awakening. Revival is about change, new perspectives, new passions, and new principles to live and order their lives by. Jacob was transformed from a ‘rogue deceiver to godly patriarch, the presence of God in his life, from visions to wrestling and disciplines, all shaped together to reforge in him a new man, a person of vision and hope, a true grandson of Abraham.’ Using the words of Barnhouse, “The only cure for worldliness is to separate from it,” just as Jacob had to leave Shechem and go to Bethel.’

On Monday, January 6, 2020, Epiphany Day, God reminded me about the Welsh Revival of 1904-1905 that turned the nation around ‘and spawned great movements to reach the lost and take the Gospel to the world.’ Welsh Revival began with a single changed heart, in person of Evan Robert whose ministry and motto “Bend the Church and save the world” broke barriers, frontiers, and brought back the glory of the gospel. At 26, Robert, empowered by the Holy Spirit, though with little theological training birthed the Welsh Revival of 1904- 1905 which emphasised ‘on the great need for the Church to bow and yield to the Holy Spirit that He might do His mighty work of renewal and transformation.’ The Welsh Revival was first personal before becoming corporate. Roberts first experienced a redeeming and ‘powerful outpouring the Holy Spirit in his own life,’ before his meetings ‘characterized by a conviction of sin, public confessions of Jesus Christ, powerful conversions, joy and laughter,’ especially among young people in his hometown of Loughor, South Wales.

It is pertinent to note that, just as revival begins with a single changed heart, leaven is also introduced into only one person initially in the church, and ‘if unchecked, spreads from one person to another until the whole is leavened.’ John Wesley as another example of a single changed heart provides a pattern of revival with reference to his warmed heart experience. In one of his sermons on 24 August 1744 at St Mary’s, Oxford, John Wesley indicted the University, ‘what he perceived to be a poverty of ‘Scriptural Christianity.’ Wesley’s idea of the two forces, the ‘mystery of iniquity’ and ‘mystery of godliness’ as the basis of conflict throughout church history points to, ‘a beaten path,’ Satan’s cure for revival, ‘the still increasing corruptions of the succeeding generations…’ Wesleyan Revival was a major agent of change during the eighteenth century.

Joseph Ayodele Babalola, another example of a single changed heart leader was a Healing Evangelist, Apostle and Prophet. His change of heart and calling occurred on 11th October, 1928 when he heard an audible voice from the Lord to follow Him. Before he became the first General Evangelist and founder of the Christ Apostolic Church Nigeria, a church that metamorphosed from a prayer group popularly called “egbe aladura,” Apostle Babalola led a great revival in Nigeria after raising a dead 10 years old boy in September 1930 at Oke Oye, Ilesa. What followed this miracle was an abrupt end to the church General meeting at Ilesa where Babalola was invited for trial based on accusation centred against his evangelical activities. While Babalola was waiting in a room pending the time for his to be called to answer his query, he prayed for a dead 10 years old boy brought by the mother for prayer hence, the divinely kick off of the The Great Revival of 1930 in Nigeria. Followed by three weeks of healing and miracles, there was ‘the desolation of Churches in Ilesa because their members transferred their allegiance to the revivalist and that all the patients in Wesley Hospital, Ilesa, abandoned their beds to seek healing from Babalola.’

The church today need another firestorm especially when we need fire in our bellies and hope in our hearts to break the spirit of worldliness, unbelief and nominalism. We need another revival to turn our wilderness to fruitful field. Revival, back to the future is about heavenly invasion of the kingdom of God in our churches, our homes and our communities, starting personally by ‘laying down our personal agendas and fleshly desires, and letting Jesus truly become King in our lives. 

Revival, a call back to the future is about cry for the church to become humble, taking after Jesus and being less “preoccupied by her power, prestige and position in society.” To save the world, the modern church like leaven, rot and corrupt must bend in repentance, in prayer, and in holiness. Revival calls the church to expel the leaven and be separated to God. God hates the leaven of unrighteousness. Bend the church and save the world is a picture of the church being set apart to God, holy and without the leavening influences of the ‘hypocritical Pharisees who pretended to be examples of the truth but were living a lie.’ For our wilderness to become a fruitful field, the church must bend and be on alert of people ‘who are deceived or deceivers who are leavening churches, families, and children before our very eyes.’

The term, “leaven” as a symbol of the Body of Christ being influenced to sin by false doctrines just as a symbol of Israel being influenced to sin by surrounding nations summons the modern church to come alive. Leaven is used in a good sense in the New Testament to visualise the growth of the church (Lk 13:21). Other usage of leaven point to false teachings (of the Pharisees and the Sadducee), hypocrisy (Mk 8:15, Lk 12:1) and sin left unattended in the church like in the church at Corinth (1 Cor 5:8). Using the words of Roberts, bend the church to save the world is about leaven and you, the kind of leavening influence you are having – power of righteousness or the power of unrighteousness? Bend the church and saved the world is a clarion call for the true Body of believers to stand up for sound doctrine and stand firm in the faith.

To Bend the church is not by human legislation just as Wesley’s warmed heart experience was not a committee decision. To bend the church starts with you and I just as Roberts was bent by God commending His love when the Holy Spirit had come and melted his whole being by a revelation of the love of God at CALVARY, for “God commendeth His own love to us in that–Christ died for us.” James Black in one of his revival hymns provides a prayerful response on the need and how the church should bend to save the world:

God is here, and that to bless us
With the Spirit’s quick’ning power;
See, the cloud already bending,
Waits to drop the grateful shower.
Refrain

Let it come, O Lord, we pray Thee,
Let the shower of blessing fall;
We are waiting, we are waiting,
Oh, revive the hearts of all.

God is here! we feel His presence
In this consecrated place;
But we need the soul refreshing
Of His free, unbounded grace.

Refrain

God is here! oh, then, believing,
Bring to Him our one desire,
That His love may now be kindled,
Till its flame each heart inspire.

Refrain

Savior, grant the prayer we offer,
While in simple faith we bow,
From the windows of Thy mercy
Pour us out a blessing now.

Refrain