Revival and Prayer

Series: We Need Revival! An Interview with Dr. Henry Blackaby

Leslie Basham: Henry Blackaby says that when you’re burdened to pray, it means God is ready to do something.

Dr. Henry Blackaby: So when I suddenly have a burden, it becomes a tremendous sense of trembling for me. God has set in motion in my life a partnership with Him in some area He knew I needed to pray for.

Leslie: This is Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss for Friday, July 21st. Revival involves repentance, surrender, and worship.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss and Henry Blackaby have been discussing these topics this week. They’ll pick up the conversation today with the focus on revival and prayer.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss: Dr. Blackaby, I hear from listeners, many of the women who listen to our program, and some of whom who really have a heart and a passion to see the presence of God visit His people. Some of them are honestly crying out and saying, “We don’t hear this in our church. We don’t hear this kind of preaching.”

They’re discouraged. They don’t know what to do. I’m saying to women, “You need to pray for your pastor; you need to lift him up; you need to support him.” But honestly, many are feeling the frustration that the church in general seems to be going through the motions, playing games, but not serious about God.

You’ve been a pastor. How could we encourage the person sitting in the service who’s burdened, who’s concerned? What does that woman do? How can her life make any difference?

Dr. Blackaby: Her life can make a difference. When Hannah prayed, God brought a whole . . . one of the greatest prophets in all of Israel, and gave her a son.

Nancy: But she had to wait for that.

Dr. Blackaby: I tell all kinds of people, “When you pray, number one, expect God to answer, and number two, expect your life to be a part of the answer.”

So don’t pray for your pastor and not tell him you’re praying. Now a lot of people are praying earnestly for their pastor but not telling him.

I’d say every time you see your pastor say, “Pastor, I’m still earnestly praying, and God has given me a great burdened heart for you and the staff.”

Nancy: Sometimes the answer will not come quickly. You mentioned Hannah, and I think of all the years that she had to wait with that unfulfilled longing while the nation was getting worse. The pastorate, if you will, the priesthood was getting worse, and she wasn’t seeing God answer her prayers.

I’m thinking about the Shantung Revival that I’ve heard you talk about where the missionaries prayed for four years crying out to the Lord.

You prayed in Canada with other pastors for two years before you saw the visitation of God that you longed for.

Dr. Blackaby: I think God’s people need once again to come back to a fresh encounter with God where they understand the nature of God and the ways of God. It never crosses my mind that when I pray, God is not already in the process of answering.

He doesn’t have to let me see, but it never crosses my mind that He’s not answering. So I can continue whether it’s in my lifetime or not. But God will hear and everything He says in the Scripture is that He responds to those who diligently seek Him.

Nancy: He is at work even when we can’t see it.

Dr. Blackaby: He is work whether He let’s me see or not. It’s like the Children of Israel in bondage in Egypt. They were crying unto God and God then announces, “I have heard the cry of My people. I’ve seen the affliction, and I’ve come to deliver them.” Well, Moses didn’t see any difference. Nothing seemed to be changing.

Nancy: Then it got worse before it got better.

Dr. Blackaby: Yes, and he didn’t have to see the changes to believe that what God said was true. But so often God’s people say, “I’ve prayed and nothing happened.” I’d say that’s a spiritual impossibility for a sincere Christian to pray and nothing happen.

What you’re saying is God didn’t let you see what He was doing in answer to your prayer, and so you thought nothing was happening. Boy, it never crosses my mind that nothing is happening when I pray, but I don’t demand that He have to show me so He can prove to me that He is doing something.

Nancy: The danger is that we would give up having not seen.

Dr. Blackaby: Because we would have to disbelieve what God says in His Word about how He responds when His people pray.

But He doesn’t say, “I’ll let you immediately see all the evidence of my activity.” He just simply says, “I will hear, and I’ll respond.” But by the time God does something, He puts a lot more in place than would be in place if He answered it when we asked Him.

So I would encourage every woman to believe that one solitary woman who diligently seeks the Lord in prayer is making a profound difference—whether God lets you see or not. He is at work, and He will be working. I’ve encouraged many a person when they’re frustrated with their pastor how to pray.

I would say pray believing that God is far more concerned about the church than you are. Believe that He is far more concerned about your pastor and his family and his marriage than you are.

He may know some things that are taking place in his life you know nothing about. That’s why He has put you to praying. He sees him on the edge of a moral disaster, so He puts you to praying.

Nancy: Not criticizing, but praying, interceding,

Dr. Blackaby: Exactly. The faults God lets us see in others is not for criticism but for intercession.

Nancy: Not just a pastor, maybe a husband, a wayward son or daughter.

Dr. Blackaby: Absolutely. And for your Sunday School teacher, for the workplace.

I would say one of the greatest honors God can ever bestow upon a person is to make them sensitive in their prayer life. So if you begin to have a burden, in Philippians 2 Paul said you need to let the implication of your salvation work itself into the farthest corner in your life. Do it with fear and trembling because it is God who is at work within you causing you to want to do His will, and then enabling you to do it (see verses 12-13).

So when I suddenly have a burden, it becomes a tremendous sense of trembling for me. God has set in motion in my life a partnership with Him in some area that He knew I needed to pray for.

It’s not just me suddenly becoming aware of something. It’s the Spirit of God making me aware of something that’s on the heart of God. Therefore, I can pray with great confidence that the God who put it there is a God who wants to do something. Because what I pray He will enable and give me the grace to do it until He has accomplished His purpose.

So to have a heart for prayer, for any matter, is an incredible honor. It’s God-initiated, and God-enabled. You ought to be very, very honored that God would incorporate your life into the middle of His activity.

Nancy: Dr. Blackaby, I know you’ve been praying for years and years, and calling others to pray for a true moving of God’s Spirit in our day. I’d like to just ask if you would pray now and lead us. I know many of our listeners may even be able to just stop whatever they’re doing right now and join with us, join their hearts with us. Would you just lead us as we cry out to the Lord and ask Him to revive us again that He may be glorified in our day.

Dr. Blackaby: Father, there’s a trembling in our heart when we stand in the holiest place of the universe, when we stand in the throne room. But You said that is what You have provided for us. In Your throne room, You have everything under Your control.

You choose to reveal not only what You’re doing, but what You want to do. So oh God, I thank You for Your faithfulness. Everything about Your Word says that You are absolutely the same today as you have always been. Open our minds afresh. Open our hearts anew to You and to Your presence and to Your nature and Your will and Your purposes.

May we be obsessed with having our life right with You? We would daily allow the searching of Your Holy Spirit through the Word of God to check us to see if there is anything out of place.

That indeed we could say, “Not my will but Thine be done.” That we could watch You unfold it—even if it means the cross as it did for Your son. So Father, thank You for loving us. Thank You for loving a world the way You did which our mind will not understand even in all of eternity. We will not come close to being able to put together that kind of love.

But Father, would You continue to work in our hearts to cry for revival. I sense You still want to bring it, and Lord, we would pray that You would keep on touching our minds and hearts in the part that You have for us both in writing and speaking, in living out with the people.

May there be no idle word when we speak with others or when we’re speaking Your Word. May nobody, nobody be caused to stumble through how we live and what we speak. We say that for our children’s sake and our grandchildren’s sake, for Your people’s sake.

So Father, I thank You that You still have on our heart a heart cry for revival. And we’ll be careful to acknowledge that You are the author of it all. It is for Your purposes and for Your name that You do it. It’s in Jesus’ name I pray, amen.

Nancy: And Father, I thank You for this servant, for Henry and Marilyn, and for Your faithfulness to them and their faithfulness over all these years to listen to You, and to speak the Word that You give to them.

Thank you for Henry being willing to give this time this morning in the midst of a week of giving and giving, and I just pray that even in these next moments that You would replenish him by the power of Your Holy Spirit.

I pray, Lord, for fresh oil, for fresh anointing, for fresh fullness, and that the ministry the words spoken might be the overflow of what You have been doing in his heart. Grant, I pray, ears to hear, and hearts to receive.

Thank You Lord for how You have spoken to me in some of the specific things he has said today. Lord, we just pray for the gift of repentance in our own hearts and the hearts to those whom we speak,

So Lord, fill Your servant. Freshen and strengthen him physically. We pray for protection from the evil one. We pray that You will keep him faithful all the way to the finish line.

And Lord, may the heritage of revival and holiness and godliness that You have entrusted to him long outlive him, and would live out through my life and other lives—his children, his grandchildren—until Jesus comes. We pray that You would be glorified through the fruit and the legacy of Henry and Marilyn’s life. We’ll bless You for that in Jesus’ name, amen.

Leslie: Isn’t it an incredible opportunity to pray along with Nancy Leigh DeMoss and Henry Blackaby?

They’ve offered some important insights this week on the subject of revival. If you want more of God in the areas of prayer, repentance, and worship, you’ll want to hear Nancy’s entire conversation with Dr. Blackaby on CD.

We didn’t have time to air the whole interview, but you can still hear every meaningful moment. Just visit www.ReviveOurHearts.com and get the series We Need Revival: An Interview with Dr. Henry Blackaby. You’ll be able to get a hold of the extended conversation on CD or MP3.

Imagine how free you would feel if you could just escape TV for one month. Sound impossible? It’s doable, and it’s a great opportunity. Find out more about the great TV escape next week when Bob DeMoss joins us for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss is an outreach of Life Action Ministries.

Note: Special offers available only during the broadcast of the radio series.