I keep coming across a phrase: “The time is now.” I have seen it quoted by others, and I have had this same sense in my own heart from the Lord. Many leaders are sensing that this is a divine season for God’s work of renewal and revival in our country. Does that sound radical to you? Does it sound cliché’? Or does is it resonate with your heart as well?
In early February, Asbury University experienced a spiritual outpouring as a Wednesday morning chapel service turned into a non-stop continual worship and praying meeting for over two weeks with potentially more than 100,000 people coming to visit the small little town of Wilmore, Ky., hoping to spend a few moments in Hughes Auditorium where the outpouring had begun and continued.
They finally had to shift the direction and stop holding public meetings as the small town was overwhelmed by the crowds. Roads were shut down. There wasn’t parking, bathrooms and facilities that could handle such an inrush of curious and hungry seekers.
And yet the revival had already started to spread. Students from Lee College, Ohio Christian, Cedarville University and many more visited the movement at Asbury taking the fire home with them. They began to see similar movements in their colleges. In Waco on the campus of Baylor, there was a large gathering of students spending time in confession, repentance, worship and prayer for revival. There seems to be a great hunger among many people in our land including Gen. Z, which has been much of the focus in this season.
There have been many leaders such as Louie Giglio, Dutch Sheets, Anne Graham Lotz, Franklin Graham, Christine Caine, Jennie Allen and more who have been speaking of the possibilities that we could be entering a season of revival and awakening. There is a sense that the atmosphere is different. There is a shift happening.
In my own local body, there has been a great spiritual hunger, commitment to prayer and we are seeing strong movement of the Holy Spirit — healing, salvation, freedom. We are seeking to poise ourselves to lean into Jesus and be led and guided by the Spirit. We sense “the time is now.” God shows up where He is wanted, and people show up where God is moving.
The early church in the book of Acts had only one thing going for them — God. The Holy Spirit was moving in power. Over these last couple of years, many of us in the church world have been greatly humbled. We have big buildings, production value, and all kinds of gadgets, but do we truly have God? I believe the Lord is bringing us back to putting all of these things in perspective.
At the end of the day, if we do not have the presence of God in our midst, and the Holy Spirit truly moving in, around us and through us in power, then we really do not have much at all. The time is now.
Hosea the prophet said, “Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of unfailing love and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the Lord, until he comes and shows righteousness upon you” (Hosea 10:11,12)
It is time — time to seek Him. Are you hungry? Are you humble? Are you ready and open to what God wants to do with you and in you in this season? Let’s not miss this moment in time — for truly the time is now. And that’s the Word.
