Today on Living on the Edge, Chip welcomes guest pastor John Dickerson. Pursue revival as if your life depends on it. Here is the thing: if you want revival for your own heart, you are going to have to live with a posture of urgency and dependence. I am Dave Drui, and this is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. We're in a brand new series called Hearts on Fire: How God Sparks Revival with Chip's friend and guest teacher John Dickerson.
Last time, John showed us how David faced Goliath with both urgency and dependence on God. Today, he picks up with a pattern that shows up again and again in Scripture: blessing leads to comfort, comfort leads to complacency, and complacency leads us to worship other things.
So, what breaks the cycle? John says it comes down to one choice, and it's a matter of life or death. Here's John continuing his message titled "Urgent and Dependent." Here's what revival looks like in Scripture. I call this the blessing judgment cycle. I'll walk you through parts of this.
Let's start at the one o'clock position. If this was a watch face, the one o'clock, which is where people turn to God. When you turn to God, He will bless you. I'm not promising you that you'll win the lottery or never have the man flu again.
Okay, but when you turn to God and you start to say, "God, I will live life your way," guess what? Your relationships will improve. Obey Him long enough, you will get free from sins that used to control you. Obey Him long enough, your career will improve because you're on time, you're honest, you're reliable, you get along with people. Those things tend to pay off.
And so, what happens is that blessing then leads to comfort, and what does comfort lead us to? Sadly, comfort leads to complacency. We get complacent, we get distracted, and then, out of complacency—not even doing it on purpose—we start to worship other things. We start to worship our wealth, or our comfort, or our family. Or a love relationship, or worship ourself, or our sexuality, we start to worship some other thing, and then here's what happens: Whenever a person of God starts to worship some other thing, God sends a call to repent.
In the Old Testament, this came through the prophets. Actually, in the story where David faces off with Goliath, the reason it's a revival story is that there was a king named Saul who had gone through all of this. He had turned to God. God had blessed. The people were wealthy and prosperous.
It led to complacency. And guess what? When the Philistines were invading Israel. The people of Israel were worshiping other gods. They were worshiping other idols, and a prophet named Samuel had been telling them, "Repent, turn back to God." David had, but most of the nation had not.
And here's the fork in the road that you face today, and you'll face it repeatedly in your life. Is right here at about the eight o'clock position. God sends a call to repent. You have a choice to make. Will you repent?
If so, then you go through revival, and it takes you right back up to turning to God, and you go through the good part of the blessing cycle again. Whenever we don't choose to repent, we go in some level down the judgment cycle. And what's inspiring about the story of David versus Goliath is the whole nation was choosing the judgment cycle. That's why the Philistines were invading, but David's faith and his love for God was significant enough to change the course of the entire nation. What if our revived love as a movement could change the course of the nation that we live in?
When people don't choose revival. They don't repent. It leads to judgment. You might think, well, gee, that sounds really mean of God. A lot of judgment.
Most judgment is self-inflicted. It's our own consequences. Here's an example: Someone drinks a little too much and they decide to drive. They're swerving around. They get pulled over.
They get a DUI. They get their license taken away.
Now they don't have a driver's license. Did God judge them? Nope. They just did that to themselves, right? Person has an affair, blows up their marriage.
Did God do that? Nope. Most of our judgment is self-inflicted, and nations, when they deny the truth of God, tend to choose demonic ideologies that can bring judgment to the whole nation, often by just natural consequences. There are times of divine judgment in Scripture as well, like Noah's flood or Sodom and Gomorrah. We can see this in the Old Testament, but we can also see this in recent history.
The nation of Germany was, from about the 1500s to the 1800s, a quote Christian nation. And what happened in the 1800s is that you had a population that had read the Bible and had known God. One o'clock position. And because of the Bible, they had started schools and universities that generated wealth, and they had become comfortable. They had become complacent.
And by the 1880s, you get German philosophers like Friedrich Nietzsche, who says, "quote God is dead," and his peer at the time, Karl Marx. Who says our whole nation is built around the church? Let's swipe that away. Let's build a nation around just the community good called communism.
So Marx and Nietzsche say we don't need God anymore. We are a once Christian nation. We're willfully turning away from that to do life better without God. You get to the nineteen thirty s. And you get a democratically elected leader, this really charismatic guy named Adolf Hitler, whose favorite philosopher was Friedrich Nietzsche, and the population chose to say, "We're not going to repent and turn to God.
We can do better without God." What happens when there is a whole society that no longer believes in God and demons, in good and evil, in the supernatural realm? They have to somehow deal with the reality that people are evil.
So, if you are going to deny the supernatural, how can you deal with that reality? It's happened all throughout history. You vilify a certain race or group, you make them the scapegoat, and so Germany. Having adopted a worldview that said, "Well, people are inherently good, but there's bad in our world. It must all be the fault of the Jewish people," and so they start rounding up the Jewish people in concentration camps like this: Buchenwald, Dachau, Auschwitz, etc.
Children, women, men—men like these guys who are starving to death. And between six and ten million Jewish people exterminated with industrial efficiency. That's on top of the tens of millions killed as a result of World War II. Talk about choosing evil after knowing what is right, and what followed incredible judgment. Look at the city of Dresden, Germany, at the end of World War II.
This city had been a jewel of the German Empire, and it was just all rubble. A firestorm went through the city and killed the entire population. Here is the thing, you guys: when people groups choose revival or not, it is a matter of life or death. And the more a people group has known the Bible and the Word of God, the more dangerous it is if they resist repentance. Here's how it goes for people and nations.
Stage one: the hearts of God's people slowly harden, especially in times of prosperity and blessing.
Now, you might not know this because we all have problems in our life, but we live in the most prosperous and free time and nation in world history. I'm not saying everything's perfect by any means. There's a lot of problems, but it's easy because it's all we've ever known to not realize we live in the very kind of time that breeds complacency. This happened over and over in the Old Testament. Revelation chapter two, God says in the New Testament era, He looks down at a church and He says, "You've lost your first love.
Return to your first love." So that's stage two. God sends a call. To people who have known Him, in times of prosperity, return to your first love. In Christian revival, this is the role of bold, biblical preaching for decision. In the Old Testament, the prophets did this.
In the New Testament, this is our role. Those of us who God entrusts to stand on this stage. Did you know the Bible says that in the end times, people will hire people to stand on church stages and tell them what they want to hear? Did you know that my job is to never tell you what you want to hear? My job is to tell you what God wants you to hear.
And if you ever move, if God ever takes you somewhere else, you always need to be part of a church where the Bible is being preached boldly, and it's preached in a way that forces you to make a decision week after week. You're deciding: Do I love God more than all these? Do I love Him more than everything else? This is my role in these forty days to call you to make a decision for God, which leads to stage three. God's people choose one of two paths.
There's the path of repentance, which leads to revival, starting individually, then in families, then in the church, and Lord willing, spreading beyond. Or the easier path in the moment of comfort, distraction. Just keep living for yourself and kind of your version of the American dream. Don't worry about repenting from that sin. And it lulls us to sleep spiritually and leads ultimately to death and ruin.
When God's people choose the path of distraction and self, they enter the judgment portion of this blessing and judgment cycle. And so it's in God's love, it's His kindness that leads us to repentance. It's in love that He says, "Be revived in your love for Me," because it's the only thing that can protect you from yourself and from the lies of the enemy. You're listening to Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram and guest teacher John Dickerson. We'll get back to the message in just a moment, but first, did you know that you can take Living on the Edge with you wherever you go?
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Well, now here's John continuing today's message. Why revival matters. We either choose repentance, which leads to revival, or we continue in our self comfort that leads to ruin. Sin always leads to death of some kind, pain of some kind, loss of some kind, missed opportunities for eternity. If you're a Christian, that you'll look back and you'll say, "I can't believe I didn't!
I can't believe I missed that." Kids and grandkids negatively affected when we allow sin, bondage and slavery. It starts in the spiritual realm, but can absolutely show up in the physical realm when whole societies turn away from God for long enough. What is the heart of God? He doesn't want us in the judgment part of the blessing judgment cycle. Luke fifteen, Jesus tells the story of the prodigal son who runs away.
It's a picture of us when we run away from God. He has all these judgments that happen in his life, and they're all self-inflicted. God the Father's waiting the whole time for him to just repent, return home. And when the son returns home, the father takes him back.
So let's look at the better path, the ideal path, the path God invites you down. When God's people choose the pain of repentance, it leads to revival.
Now we'll learn more about repentance next week, but here's what I want you to know: repentance. If your idea of it is that it's all about a cloud of shame and you just live under this cloud of guilt, you're like, "Woe is me! I'm this terrible sinner all the time. I can't ever do anything right." That is not biblical repentance. Biblical repentance is the prodigal son returning home to the father.
The father throwing his arms around him, having a huge party. Repentance actually leads to joy. Repentance leads to restored relationship with God, and you walk with God, and He becomes your best friend. Repentance may lead through sorrow, but sorrow is not the end of it. We'll talk more about that next week.
Now, here is what is incredible about God's grace. A whole nation can be choosing the judgment path, and one person like David can choose repentance in such a revived way that it changes the course of the whole nation. And when a group of those people work together, that's called a remnant—the remnant of believers. All through church history, churches get corrupted and polluted by wealth and power and all sorts of other things. But there's always a remnant.
Who say we're going to truly follow Jesus, no matter what it costs? And what revival is is us saying, as we revive our own love for God, we're going to be the remnant for Indiana. We're going to be the remnant for our families. We're going to be the remnant, maybe even for our nation. Moses interceded and saved his entire nation.
Esther interceded and saved her entire nation. What if your choice to walk these forty days of revival is not only something that at the end of your life you look back and you say, "Wow, that was a pivot in my life of supernatural power and love for God that I didn't even know existed." Not only that, but I see people and cities, and maybe even a nation that was spared from judgment. Because I obeyed God in revival. Here's what I believe: I fully believe that if the United States does not see revival, it will see ruin. I mean this as a civilization or a culture.
Only God can bring this kind of revival, and I believe He is seeking to partner with awakened believers like you and me to bring about the next great awakening. This is my opinion, spiritually. As well as sociologically, as an award-winning journalist who's done a lot of work with large systems and populations and sociological patterns, my belief is we are on a trend line of division and hatred between Americans that only Christianity can heal. And whichever side of the aisle you're on, fine for you. But neither side of the aisle is offering much in the way of actually bringing people back together.
Our nation has been in this position in previous times, and you know the only force that has brought it back together: the cross, the Bible, Jesus lifted high, not forced on people, but men and women full of the Holy Spirit who go out into their schools and their workplaces and neighbors who are deceived. In demonic lies, get told the good news of Jesus, and their eyes are opened. You guys, I believe this is perhaps the most important work of our life. You guys, God could have chosen for you to be born at any moment in history, on any continent, any civilization, any country, any century, and He chose right here, right now, when this nation that you've been born into is at a spiritual fork in the road. A spiritual fork of are we going to figure out a better society with God or without God, and the enemy of our souls, Satan, who came to kill and steal and destroy, he prowls about like a roaring lion.
And there are ideas being spread right now, ideologies that millions of people are grabbing onto that will not lead to life. And you might get frustrated with them. You might try to argue with them. It's not going to help. The only way for them to see the path that leads to life is for them to come to Christ.
You realize that apart from Jesus, you and I are powerless against demonic ideas and ideologies. You look at nations like Germany or Russia with the Bolshevik Revolution. All throughout history, it's like why would people choose a path of death and destruction because of demonic ideas? The only way to combat demonic ideas is through a supernatural power—the power of Christ.
Now, if you're here and you're a believer in Jesus, First Corinthians 15 tells you this: Thanks be to God; He gives us the victory. How? Through our Lord Jesus Christ. You might look at things like World War Two, Germany. You might look at certain things happening in the world today, and you could be overcome by intimidation of the Goliath might of some of these evil forces.
And it's true that if you were to try to oppose those huge evil movements on your own, you'd get squashed. But in Christ, you can have the victory. In Christ, these supernatural battles that are being waged for souls and for cities, for populations and nations, the gospel is the power to set people free. Here's the thing: this victory in Christ, it's been purchased at the cross by His blood. But just like David, you've got to step onto the battlefield, the battlefield of your own thoughts, your thought life, the battlefield of your own home.
The battlefield of the city you live in, and I mean spiritual battlefield. You're going to learn in this revival journey how to pray like you've never prayed before. That you are spiritually interceding for the spiritual territory in which you live. If you will step into this, you're going to experience God's power as you increase your love for Him in ways you haven't experienced before. Because like David, God's waiting.
He's just waiting. Who will step up? Because he's eager to empower, I want to skip you forward to why you should ask God to revive you. Four reasons: your family needs it. You guys, there's no hope for our loved ones.
Healthcare, money, the political party we like—all of it lasts less than a hundred years, and then we all die. Your family needs Jesus. Pursue revival so that you know your loved ones have eternal life. Your future needs it. I don't want to be part of a civilization and a society where the majority of the people turn away from God because it doesn't end well.
And I am not going to force it on other people, but I want to do everything in my power to be a compelling witness of the love and the hope and the life and the grace and the peace that are only found in Jesus. Our future depends on it. Our cities need it. Avon needs revival. Carmel needs revival.
Fishers and Brownsburg need revival, and my goodness, does the society or civilization we live in, the United States, need supernatural, spiritual, Jesus-centered revival? John chapter ten, Jesus says that Satan and his demons are active in the world doing three things: they're stealing, they're killing. And they're destroying, and they do this primarily through ideas. Jesus says, "I have come into the world that people who are deceived by demonic ideas might instead have life, and life to the full." Here's what's beautiful: you don't have to solve all the world's problems. All you got to do is follow Jesus with your whole heart.
And he takes care of the problems. As we have been following Jesus as a movement, he has been bringing revival here in this church. And it's not because we're perfect, and it's not because we have a great strategic plan. We don't have it all figured out. We've just been following Jesus.
You're listening to Living on the Edge with guest teacher John Dickerson and a message titled "Urgent and Dependent." To learn more about what John just shared and to find the small group video guide that goes with his study, go to therevivalproject.org/livingontheedge. John reminded us today that God isn't waiting for perfect people; He's waiting for hearts that will choose Him again, like the prodigal son coming home, growing deeper in Christ. Christ, our 365-day devotional from Chip Ingram, was created to help you build that daily rhythm of prayer, repentance, and fellowship with Christ. And with a new leather-bound edition available this November, it makes an incredible Christmas gift for a family member, friend, or prayer partner. Get your copies of Growing Deeper in Christ today at LivingOnTheEdge.org/offers.
Every copy you purchase helps put resources like this one into more. Hands, a listener named Donna wrote to us to tell us what happened after she spent time studying God's Word with Chip. In her words, it sparked something in me that reignited my journey with the Lord. And that's exactly what revival looks like—one heart at a time. And when you give to this ministry, you're helping someone else hear that same invitation to come home.
Would you give today? Visit livingontheedge.org or call triple eight three three three six zero zero three, or mail your gift to Living on the Edge, P.O. Box three thousand seven, Swanee, Georgia three zero zero two four. And if you'd like to walk through this whole revival series at your own pace, every program is waiting for you on the Living on the Edge podcast. Just look for us in your favorite podcast app and hit follow.
Well, now here's Chip. Maybe you're the type of person who prays about everything, and then just sits back, waiting on God to handle it. Or maybe you're the opposite. You're the type of person that muscles through everything on your own, and you almost forget to pray at all. Here's the balance that John laid out today, and I think it's one of the most practical things in the entire message.
Work for like revival depends on you, and pray like it all depends on God. We see this delicate balance in David's life. He didn't sit at home praying about Goliath; he ran straight at him. And right before he threw the stone, he said, "I come against you in the name of the Lord." He was moving with everything he had, while depending 100 percent on everything God had to bring to that battle. Here's the tension many of us get wrong: we either work ourselves into exhaustion trying.
To fix everything and everyone, or we pray and we never get off the dock. We never move. We never do anything. Here is the situation. I want you to ask yourself: of those two tendencies, which one is you?
Are you a prayerful person that doesn't act much? Or you may be a bit like me. I'm ready to act, act, act, and I have to remember to stop and to pray and be dependent. And so, on this day, here's what I want you to do. I want you to move forward and say, "Lord, I pray a lot, but today I'm going to ask you for one specific way to reach out and help another person to actually engage." And if you're an engager, I want you to pause right now.
I want you to set your watch and for ten. Minutes, just ten minutes, sometime today. Close your eyes, get in a quiet place, and say, "Lord, I just want to share with you all the things on my heart, and all the things that are burdening me, and where I'm asking you for help." Let's take that next step together.
Next time, John Dickerson begins a message called "No Revival Without Repentance." And if you've ever wondered what to do with your shame, your regrets, and your failures, you won't want to miss it. That's right here on Living on the Edge. Today's program is produced and sponsored by Living on the Edge.
