on the continuing prayer and worship on the campus of Asbury University in Kentucky. “Hundreds, if not thousands, of people have been inside Asbury University’s Hughes Auditorium since last Wednesday looking to strengthen their relationship with the Lord.”
“‘There’s been a lot of people receiving a lot of healing and restoration in their lives and people coming to Christ for the first time and hearing the gospel for the first time,’ said Abby Laub, the University’s director of strategic communications.
Asbury University, a methodist college in Wilmore, Kentucky, has famously seen revival before. Christians from different backgrounds have welcomed the news. “
“I know that people of a more Calvinistic bent tend to be reflexively sceptical about such reports,” writes the Souther Baptist Academic, Denny Burk.
“After all, haven’t we moved beyond the shallow “revivalism” of the past and moved on to more stable forms of the faith?
“I do hope that Christians have stable and established faith in Christ. But I do not feel cynical about these reports. On the contrary, I feel prayerful. Hopeful. In fact, I’ve gotten choked up more than once over the last couple of days at the thought that a genuine outpouring of the Spirit could be happening among our Methodist brothers.”
A public service announcement by Matt Barnes, a professor at Asbury, helpfully points out that there are “no second-class Christians.”
“Not everyone has experienced what is happening at Hughes Auditorium [the site of the revival meetings] the same way. Not everyone has entered the building and felt the presence of the Lord. Not everyone has felt peace. Not everyone has sensed a special moving of the Spirit. Not everyone has even felt any desire to darken the doors of Hughes Auditorium at all.
“And that is ok.
“Not everyone experiences the Spirit the same way. This has always been the case. It doesn’t make one group better than the other. Some of those who haven’t experienced a move of the Spirit in Hughes HAVE continued to feel the Spirit move in other ways — through gathered worship in the local church, through personal devotions, through the love of their friends and family, etc.
“As Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 12: ‘There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone, it is the same God at work.’
And here’s the most important point. Both experiences are valid. Neither is better than the other. Different gifts, different kinds of service, different kinds of working — one in the same God.”
Jason Vickers, another professor at Asbury, thought he was too busy to take part – at first. “If you are following the revival on social media, you will know that it began on Wednesday morning,” he posted. “My office is directly across the street at Asbury Seminary. Despite this proximity, as of this morning, I had not put in an appearance. I was not avoiding doing so. I’m simply in a busy season of writing about sacramental theology.
But he did go. “Alas, around 2:30 this afternoon, I crossed Lexington Avenue and made my way up the stairs of Hughes Auditorium, slipping into a seat in the back row. I wanted to see for myself what was happening. The following is a blow-by-blow account of what I experienced for the next hour and a half.
“I had been seated in the auditorium for less than ten minutes when I came to, by which I mean to say when I suddenly found myself having conscious thoughts about my surroundings and about what I was experiencing. The best way I know to put this is to say that it was as though, in just a few short minutes, I had completely zoned out.
“Upon the resumption of deliberative conscious thought, two things stood out to me. First, there was a noticeable lack of tension in my body. I was completely relaxed. There was also a complete lack of mental tension or distraction. My mind was at utter peace. And I had only been there for ten minutes.
“The second thing I recall thinking is that I could sit here in this chair forever. The desire to linger indefinitely was quite unexpected. I had planned to pop in for a few minutes before returning to work. Suddenly, work was the farthest thing from my mind.”
In the student paper, the Asbury Collegian, executive editor Alexandra Presta writes, “Revival broke out Wednesday morning after an ordinary chapel service. On Friday afternoons, worship, confession and praise are persistent in Hughes Auditorium.
“‘However, I think it’s important to note once again that everything occurring here – the healing, the weeping, the rejoicing – is not because of the building. Has revival occurred on these floors and across the seats before? Yes, and what a glorious experience it was for all those involved. But it didn’t happen because the sun lit the room in a specific way. It didn’t happen because of the particular people leading or the songs sung.
“It happened because of Jesus. Everything happening here right now is because of Jesus.
“We have heard testimony from K-Homes Founder and Director Tammy, who shared how God saved so many of the children, her family, in India and across South Asia. One man also said a prayer over those who haven’t gotten to know the name of Jesus.
“And there’s a sense of wrestling, or rather, restlessness. Not in the way of discontentment; actually, the complete opposite. People are still wanting more. It’s like we’ve tasted His goodness and grace, and we don’t want it to stop.
“And there’s quiet. Sometimes we think God only moves through significant events or loud dance-worthy moments. When I read 1 Kings 19 for the first time, I thought God would show up to the prophet Elijah in a big, mighty way. There was a shattering wind that howled. But God wasn’t in the wind. Then came an earthquake that rattled the ground and a bright raging fire. But God wasn’t in the earthquake or the fire.
“He showed up to Elijah in a gentle whisper. He can speak to us in the quiet.
“We think we have to be making noise for Him to hear us. However, He hears us in the shouts but also in the silence. He still hears us whenever we don’t have the words or our hearts are in so much pain we can’t even speak. He still listens.
“Revival has continued. And the moments I’ve seen— a woman in the front row still with her hand barely raised and tears in her eyes, a huddle of friends sitting on the ground in desperate prayer, the heart of an Asbury student running to Dollar General to buy coffee and supplies and so much more— have occurred because Jesus is listening, moving and speaking.
“But it is also important to remember that He continues to listen, move and speak outside this room. He is not limited to Hughes Auditorium, Asbury or Wilmore, Kentucky.”