WHY SO FEW
REVIVALS? What the
Church must do to gain revival - Charles G Finney
Now, my dear brethren, I hope and trust that you will not be
offended with me if I speak my mind on this subject with great
plainness. The circumstances of the Church, the decline of
revivals, and the whole aspect of the Christian world, demand it. I have seen in the public papers various reasons assigned for
this declension of revivals, this absence of revival influence,
this powerless preaching of the gospel.
Now it does appear to me that we who are ministers, instead of
looking abroad and searching for the fundamental difficulty
beyond and out of ourselves, should see that whatever else may be
an occasion of the great falling off and decline in revivals, our
own spiritual state is certainly one, if not the primary and
fundamental, reason of this decline. Want of personal holiness,
unction, power in prayer, and in preaching the Word, the want of
holy living and consecration to the work of self-denial, and
energetic effort in the ministry, these, no doubt, are the
principal reasons why revivals are so few and far between, and of
so superficial character at the present day.
The fact is, ministers have turned aside, in a great degree,
to vain janglings; have given up their attention to Church
politics, Church government, and ecclesiastical proceedings of
various kinds. The ministers have been diverted, to an alarming
and most injurious extent, from promoting revivals of religion
out of the Church and holiness in the Church.
I appeal to you, my brethren, of all denominations, if it is
not a fact in your own experience and observation, that ministers
have to a great and alarming extent suffered themselves to be
diverted from the direct work of promoting the conversion of
sinners and sanctification of the Church. This is too notorious
to need any proof. The journals of the day, the movements of
ecclesiastical bodies, the doctrinal collisions, and shall
I say? ambitious projects, that have come up and figured
before the public within the last few years, bear no dubious
testimony to the fact that the great mass of ministers are turned
aside from promoting revivals and the holiness and entire
consecration of the Church.
Now, my beloved brethren, while this is so, does it not become
us to take this home, confess it, bewail it, and first of all
understand that whatever else needs to be corrected and set
right, we must ourselves repent and receive a new unction for the
work?
Beloved brethren, it is of no use for us to go abroad and
search for reasons, while the principal of all the reasons lies
at our own door. While our hearts are cold, our zeal in revivals
abated; while we are turned aside, and running here and there to
attend Conventions, Councils, ecclesiastical bodies; while we are
engaged in reading the vituperative publications of the day, and
entering into Church politics and jangling about Church
government and all these things it is no wonder that both
the Church and the world are asleep on the subject of revivals.
Until the leaders enter into the work, until the ministry are
baptized with the Holy Spirit, until we are awake and in the
field with our armor on, and our souls anointed with the Holy
Spirit, it certainly ill becomes us to be looking around at a
distance for the cause of the decline of revivals.
I have no doubt that there are many causes which, the Lord
willing, we will search out. But this is the first, the greatest,
the most God dishonoring of all that the ministry
are not in the work, that the shepherds have in a measure
forsaken their flock; that is, they are not48
leading them into the green pastures and beside the still
waters, are not themselves so anointed and full of faith and
power as to be instrumental in leading the Church into the field
for the promotion of revivals.
To a considerable extent the Churches seem not to be well
aware of the state of the ministry, and for the reason that they
themselves are in a state of decline. The decline of vital
godliness in the ministry has been, of course, the occasion of so
much decline in the Churches that they are hardly aware either of
their own state or of the spiritual state of the ministry.
Now, my dear brethren, I hope it will not be said that, by
writing in this way, I am letting down the influence of the
ministry and encouraging a fault finding spirit in the Church. I
would by no means do this. But I think that we may rest assured
that, unless we are frank enough, and humble enough, and honest
enough, to look the true state of things in the face, confess,
forsake our sins, and return to the work and engage in the
promotion of revivals, God will undoubtedly rebuke us, will raise
up other instruments to do His work, and set us aside; will
alienate the heart of the Churches from us, destroy our influence
with them, and raise up, we know not whom, to go forth and
possess the land.
Among all the Conventions of the present day, I have thought
that one of a different character from any that have been might
be greatly useful. If we could have a Ministerial Convention, for
prayer, confessing our faults one to another, and getting into a
revival spirit, and devising the best ways and means for the
universal promotion of revivals throughout the length and breadth
of the land, I should rejoice in it. It has appeared to me that
of all the Conventions of the day, one of this kind might be the
most useful.
What shall we say, brethren? Are we not greatly in fault? Have
not the ministry, to a great extent, lost the spirit of revivals?
Is there not a great lack of unction and power amongst us? And
have we not suffered ourselves to be greatly and criminally
diverted from this great work? If so, my dear brethren, shall we
not return? Shall we not see our fault, confess it to the
Churches, to the world, and return, and, in the name of the Lord
lift up our banner?
I hope my brethren will bear with me, while I further insist
on the general delinquency of ministers, especially of late, in
regard to revivals. There has been so manifest and so lamentable
a falling off from a revival spirit among the ministers of Christ
as to become a matter of general. if not universal, observation.
Nothing is more common than the remark that ministers, as a
general fact, have lost the spirit of revivals, have become very
zealous in ecclesiastical matters, censorious, afraid of
revivals, of revival men and measures, and that they do little or
nothing directly for the promotion of revivals of religion. Now I
do not think that this is a universal fact, but as a general
remark it is too obvious to need proof, and I think must be
conceded by all.
Now, dearly beloved brethren, unless there is a spirit of a
revival in the ministry, it is in vain to expect it in the
Church. The proper place for the shepherd is before or in advance
of the sheep. The sheep will follow him whithersoever he goes;
but if he attempt to drive them before him, he will scatter them
in every direction. If the shepherd fall away from a revival
spirit, the sheep will naturally decline also. If he advance in
the work of the Lord, they will almost as a thing of course
follow him wherever he leads.
The greatest of all difficulties in the way of the promotion
of revivals has been a superficial work of grace in the hearts of
ministers themselves. If this is not true, I am greatly mistaken.
My brethren, believe me, I speak not this censoriously. or in
the spirit of fault-finding; it is the full and deliberate
conviction of my own mind an opinion formed, not hastily,
but from protracted observation, and from an intimate
acquaintance with great numbers of the ministers of Christ of
different denominations.
While the ministers of Christ are filled with the Spirit of
God, the Church, as a general thing, will not backslide. I say as
a general thing. There may, in some instances be influences
brought to bear on the churches that will divert them from the
promotion of holiness in their own hearts and the conversion of
the impenitent, in spite of all that the most wakeful and
vigilant ministry can do. Great political excitements, great
commercial embarrassments, great depressions or elevations in the
business and pecuniary state of the Church or the world, may, in
a great measure, divert the mass of professors of religion for a
time from deep spirituality, although the ministers maybe awake.
And yet it is my deliberate opinion that a thoroughly wakeful,
prayerful, energetic ministry, by their influence, would
generally, if not universally, prevent all the calamities and
disturbances, by so deeply engaging the Church and the community
in general on religious subjects, that war, great political
excitements, great commercial excitements, speculations, or
embarrassments, would not be likely to occur. However this may
be, I can not believe it to be otherwise than a general truth,
that if the ministry are baptized with the Holy Spirit, and
deeply anointed with the revival influence, so the Church will be
Like priest like people.
And now brethren, it does seem to me that when we ourselves
are thoroughly in a revival spirit, our call to the Churches to
arise and engage in the general promotion of revivals will be
immediately responded to on the part of the Church. Let the
ministry only come out in the true spirit of revivals, and I
doubt whether any minister in the land can preach for three
Sabbaths to his Church, in the Spirit, without finding the spirit
of revival waking up in the Church.
Let this experiment once be tried; let us wake up to the
importance of this subject, confess and forsake our own sins, and
cry aloud to the Church, and spare not: let us lift up our voice
like a trumpet, and rally the host of Gods elect; and if
they are deaf to the call, then let us inquire most earnestly
what is next to be done. But until we are anointed to the work,
do not let us tempt the Lord or abuse the Church, by looking out
of ourselves and away from ourselves for the cause of decline in
revivals.
Do not misunderstand me. I know that the Church id in a state
of decline, and needs greatly to be quickened and aroused; but I
am confident that the prime cause of this decline in the Church
is to be found in the fact that the ministers have been diverted
from their appropriate work. And I am also confident that the
only remedy for this state of things is, first and foremost of
all, for ministers to come into a deeply spiritual and revived
state of mind. And as soon as this comes to pass, there will be a
general revival. And I am not looking for it to come unless
ministers do thoroughly wake up to their own state and the state
of the Church.
Source: International Revival Network: archive.openheaven.com.
May be freely copied provided source and/or copyrights are included with the
text.
|