Youth Revival Last Weekend

This past Friday and Saturday, I was asked to be the evangelist at a zone youth revival at a Nazarene church in my home state. This was the first time I have ever done a youth revival per say, so this was new territory for me.

It was only a two service revival, which turns out to be very limiting in your overall theme and delivery. Usually with a revival, you have at least 3 or 4 days to flesh out an overall theme for the week. Having only two sessions is a different monster; you have to get in and get out. My plan for the two services was to have the first service focus on getting right with Christ, and the second lead into the "What now?" discussion. Below are brief synopses of both sermons. Neither is a complete manuscript of the sermon, but I do have those available if you are interested.

Session 1.) Ezekiel 37:1-14

I used the "Valley of Dry Bones" passage to kick off the revival. I can think of no other scripture that better illustrates revival than this one. I spent a few minutes placing them in the middle of this valley with Ezekiel, where they are surrounded by nothing but death and hopelessness for as far as the eye can see. But then we see God's command to Ezekiel to prophesy to the bones, and then we see these dry bones coming back together and eventually having their life breathed back into them by God Himself.

In verses 11-14, God explains to Ezekiel that the bones represent Israel and that he would restore them in the same way that he restored the dry bones. I then spent some time talking about where we are in the history of Israel when Ezekiel receives this vision. They had already been delivered from Egyptian bondage, spent time in the desert, and settled in Canaan. Things were wonderful for many years, as the Israelites walked with God and enjoyed such great leaders as David and Solomon. Eventually, the Israelites fell away from God, and introduced pagan religions, idols, and rituals into their culture. Internal fighting ensued and Israel split into two parts. Eventually, both parts were overtaken by the Babylonians and the Assyrians respectively. Israelites were transported all around the Babylonian empire, and they were nothing but an empty shell of who they once were. Surely we can see why they were dry bones.
Nevertheless, God tells Ezekiel that he will revive and restore their dry bones. I then transitioned the discussion in order to talk about the interconnectedness of the Old and New Testaments. I explained that even though we often see them as two completely different books, that they essentially tell the same story- the story of God rescuing his people from bondage (slavery in OT, sin in NT) and delivering them into the Promised Land (Canaan in OT, Heaven in NT). I explained that when God told Israel that He wanted to restore the nation who turned their backs on Him, that we can be assured that God wants to do the same with his New Testament Church.

I asked the teens to think about where they were spiritually. Were they in a "dry bones" period in their lives? As they looked back over the past year, could they point to where they were on fire for God after camp, but slowly fell away over time? God wants nothing more than to take His children and to breathe the breath of life into them. He wants to restore and He wants to revive us all spiritually.

Session 2.) Ezekiel 37:10; Matthew 5:13-16

We begin the second service by looking back at verse 10 of last night's Ezekiel passage. The Scripture reads that after the dry bones were brought back to life, they stood and formed a great army. The fact that they formed a "great army" implies that there was some sort of action or mission to accomplish yet. Surely God would not a revive a great army simply to have them stand in a valley forever. So the question is, "What is their mission? What is their objective?" What could the purpose be of this newly revived army of former dry bones?

Too often we (youth pastors, pastors, camp speakers, revival speakers) fail our teens. We tell them, "You have to get saved. You have to get saved. You have to get saved. You have to get saved." We set the goal as having this big moment at the end of camp where everyone gets saved. Where we fail is that we don't tell them what to do next. Ok, I'm saved...now what? Is it any wonder that a majority of teens experience only a "camp high" and fall back to their pre-camp state within weeks of returning to the real world? We treat conversion as the ultimate goal, but in reality it is only the beginning of our individual spiritual journeys. It is upon our conversion that the heavy lifting truly begins. The problem is that telling teenagers how much work is involved in being a Christian may not send them flocking to the altars, so we leave that part out. We fail them.

We are the army of former dry bones. What is our mission? What is our objective? From this point I turned to Matthew 5:13-1 and looked at the popular "salt and light" passage straight from the mouth of Christ. I went into detail about the nature and value of salt in the ancient world, concluding that by being the salt of the world we should be having an effect on the world around us. We look at the light passage for some time and conclude that we should look different as Christians. We should act differently, we should speak differently- in essence we should stick out like sore thumbs if we are truly living the Christian life. We are to be noticeably different, and we are to have an effect on those around us. Our mission, our objective is simply to expand the Kingdom of Christ- to see more dry bones revived.

I asked the teenagers to stand up right where they are if they were willing to stick out and make a difference in their homes and in their schools for Christ. While they were standing, I told them one last thing about salt. Salt effects only what it is put on. It starts small and makes a difference where it is placed. Likewise, the best way for Christians to have a positive effect on the world is not to try to save the entire world at once- it is to make a difference where you are already planted. I asked everyone standing to think of one person in their inner circle who they knew needed the saving power of Christ. It could be a friend, parent, family member, whoever... so long as it was someone who was close to them. I explained that a successful revival was not measured by a great speaker or even by numbers at the altar. A successful revival is measured by whether or not the people at "ground zero" (people who attended the revival) carry on the spirit of revival and go out and make a difference themselves.

Instead of a traditional "come pray for yourself" altar call, we did something different. I told them that if they truly wanted revival to break out in their community, that they had a job to do. I asked them to come to the altar and pray for the name that they had in their head from their inner circle. I asked the to pray that the Lord would start working in their lives and that they would have an opportunity to share Christ with them in some way. This is how revivals are started. It starts with a small group of committed individuals who are willing to make a difference in the world around them.

And that's how we ended the youth revival; On our knees, at the altar, praying for someone close to us that we knew needed Christ. We cannot look at revival as something that takes place within the Church. It has to be something that the Church takes out into the world.