10 Principles of Revival

Brian Simmons:

"I Will Release Again the 10 Principles of Revival Taught by Charles Finney"

In the awakening released by Charles Finney, entire cities were shaken by the power of God and the anointing of revival that once poured out of a man. With Finney's prayer partner, Father Nash, he would enter a city only after adequate prayer had saturated the ground and opened the heavens over a region. Many attribute those days of "Heaven on earth" to the prayers of Father Nash and his praying team. Not many days ago I had an amazing encounter with the Lord that has since left me trembling and awakened! The voice of the Lord came to me in power telling me that the Lord Himself was about to release AGAIN the revival that swept America during the days of Charles Finney – but in a much greater dimension.

The word of the Lord spoke and said to me:

"I will release again the 10 principles of revival taught by Charles Finney! I am releasing two of those principles to you now! The remaining eight principles you must ask for and seek to receive!"

I've found my spirit trembling many times since He spoke those words to me. After hours of prayer and research, allow me to share in brief what I've discovered about 10 Principles of Revival. These are the truths that Finney taught throughout his ministry after seeing miracle conversions in the northeastern part of the United States.

During the peak of the revival outpouring, Charles Finney took these principles and taught them (more than once) to the awakened churches that received him. These powerful revivals resulted in the largest number of conversions EVER, in the history of Christianity in America. Throughout the last one hundred and sixty years, revivals have occurred from the Holy Spirit's anointing with the practice of these very principles. I want to share with you these truths that I know GOD HIMSELF will restore to the holy awakeners who seek His face and are willing to run to the nations with a fire never before seen on the earth!

10 Principles of Finney's Revival

Here are these 10 principles of Finney's revival that we, like Joel's Army of Awakeners, will release in this coming awaking. Note: I believe the first two principles that the Lord said He was releasing in this very hour are: The Principles of Repentance and the Principles of Prayer. Expect to hear many of the prophets and preachers speak on these two themes – adeeper repentance and a higher level of intercession that is coming! Here's only a summary:

1. Principles of REPENTANCE!

This is what the Bible refers to as "breaking up the fallow ground," or laying our hearts exposed and naked before the eyes of glory to search and cleanse. Repentance always, alwaysprecedes revival outpouring. Is your repentance releasing the glory of God's presence into your life and ministry? If nothing else breaks open a city, try breaking open your heart for your city! (See Hosea 10:12.)

2. Principles of PRAYER!

Every revival can be traced back to prayer! Even in the upper room in Acts 2, they were in a 10-day prayer meeting! This is not general prayer or simply soaking in prayer – this involves a direct confrontation with spiritual forces that are hindering and holding back the deluge of power that will awaken a city in a day. Prayer to the next level will bring glory to the next level! Maybe the way we've been praying lacks potency to unlock doors to revival."These prayer principles WILL be restored again," says the Lord! (See 1 Thessalonians 5:17.)

3. Principles of HOLINESS!

Not only is God holy, He has made His holiness "absorbable." We can absorb this holiness that surrounds Him by lingering in His living glory – much like Moses who stood before a burning bush until he became one! God ignited Moses' soul because he was highly flammable!Moses absorbed a measure of the glory of God's holiness in such a way that he released deliverance to a nation. I believe that "absorbable" holiness will fill a generation of deliverers soon to be dispatched to the nations. Will you remain in the holy presence until you "catch" it and become a burning one? (See Isaiah 6:6-7.)

4. Principles of POWER!

How we all seek for the power of God, often not knowing what we're asking for! Imagine taking hold of 10 billion volts of power: would it change you as it lit up the sky? When we are willing to be changed by His power, not just ask for more power in our meetings, we will begin to see the nations electrified by God's dunamis power. Get insulated in purity before seeking naively the power of God. The power of this coming awakening will radiate out for many miles when it falls upon a city! Many will be converted when the Church is changed by the power of resurrection life! (See Philippians 3:21.)

5. Principles of FAITH!

Our preaching and ministries must now move into a greater dimension of faith in order to penetrate the darkness of our land. Faith – bold, raw, unrelenting, never-turning-back-faith is the key to revival glory! The authentic principles of faith will be released in a fresh and new way by those who carry the anointing of awakening! If revival depended on YOUR FAITH, how close are we to seeing cities bow before Christ and crown Him King? (See Hebrews 11:1.)

6. Principles of JOY in the Holy Spirit!

You have to understand how radical this message of joy would sound to a world being crushed and tested in the hands of God. Joy has a breaker quality, breaking open hearts and breaking open a city! Joy parties and alluring feasts of extravagant joy – even in the midst of difficulties – will unlock a city! Expect to see the Holy Spirit release new JOY PRINCIPLES and restore us like in the days of Gideon's victory! (See Isaiah 9:3-4.)

7. Principles of RIGHTEOUSNESS!

This is our breastplate that covers our hearts! The Christ-life is all our righteousness; we have none apart from Him! Without a living union every moment with this pure and holy Partner, we will become defiled by selfishness and sin. What glorious protection is this righteousness that guards us in all our relationships and in our daily walk! Expect to hear about and see new levels of righteousness taught by our shepherds and lived out in our lives! (See 1 Corinthians 1:30.)

8. Principles of DISCIPLESHIP!

Rapidly releasing new converts will be crucial as nation after nation opens up their arms to receive more of this heavenly gift: Jesus Christ! We cannot plod along any longer insisting new converts remain "under our covering" when they are ready to roll with revival! In the days of the Jesus Movement in the '70s, we would see converts won in a day, and by a month they were leading and charging forward with evangelism and Bible studies. God does not wait until we sprout wings and a halo before He uses us! Why keep in our "sheep pens" those whom God will equip to shake nations? Jesus sent out 70 before He gave them the Holy Spirit!

True discipleship means carrying the cross and going out in grace to reach a world! Discipleship must include releasing converts into the ripened harvest! Who let the sheep out? (See Matthew 10:1-8.)

9. Principles of PEACE

In days of great shaking and turmoil we will need to find the "eye of the storm" with Jesus in our boat! We need greater revelations of peace to grip us instead of fear of calamity and doom.Peace is a weapon for warfare.

Watch the GOD OF PEACE crush satan soon and swiftly under your feet! (See Romans 16:20.)

10. Principles of LOVE

The greatest truth of all eternity is this: Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so! You will never outgrow your need to receive and release the love of God. Everyone everywhere has a love deficit – so watch the Love of CHRIST change the world, starting with me and with you! More love means more power! More love means more of Jesus Christ given away to the world. You can have great faith for the harvest, but is it working through love in your life? Expect to see more broken-hearted lovers filling our churches in these days of Heaven on earth – the GLORY REVIVAL is upon us. Be ready, my friend! For all we need is faith working through love (Galatians 5:6)!

Lord Jesus, release to the hungry and passionate ones these principles of revival! Empower your awakened Bride to run to the harvest with great faith and overflowing love! Amen!

Please note that the Lord did not give me verbatim these 10 principles, only that He will release these and that we should seek and ask for God to give us these spiritual keys to unlock revival glory for our nation. It may be that after more research the Lord will enlighten us further, but these are those principles taught by Finney and that have been burning in my spirit since the encounter. May this be pleasing to the Lord and to His hungry people. 

(For more resources and study on the life and teaching of Charles Finney, see below.)

Brian Simmons

Apostolic Resource Center (ARC) & Stairway Ministries

Email: bwsimmons@msn.com

Brian and Candice Simmons have been described as pioneers, prophets, and pastors. As a spiritual father and mother, their teaching and prophetic gifts have opened doors in many nations to take the message of authentic awakening and revival to many. For the last 35 years they have labored to present Christ in His fullness wherever God sends them. As an apostolic couple they have pioneered church plants for many years with a tribal people group, planted churches in New England, and helped to translate the New Testament into the Kuna language. Brian is the founder and director of Apostolic Resource Center (ARC) based in New England, and they have established Stairway Ministries under which they travel full-time. Brian is the author of numerous books which reveal depths of insight that the Holy Spirit has released for the last days.

More About Charles Finney:

I compiled these 10 principles from Charles Finney from many sources. There isn't one message that he taught giving these 10 principles, but rather they became a summary of his revival ministry. His years of "burning" were about 10-12 years (1824-1836), then he became a professor and later president of Oberlin College in Ohio in 1851. There are hundreds of Finney's sermons online, most of which are listed in his books (or books about him).

Here are some great links for more study on the life of Charles Finney:

http://www.charlesfinney.com/home.php (This is a great resource for much of his teaching material.)

http://www.gospeltruth.net/cgfworks.htm (Another web site loaded with info, you can spend a day on this one!)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Grandison_Finney (This would be one of the best summary pages; however, it is not written from a Believer's perspective.)

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/search/?query=

Charles+finney (This page would be a good starting point for a summary from a Christian perspective.)

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/131christians/

evangelistsandapologists/finney.html?start=1

http://www.graceonlinelibrary.org/etc/printer-friendly.asp

?ID=405 (Strictly from an evangelical view, not charismatic or prophetic.)

If you google 10 principles of Finney's revivals, from this page you can go into dozens of others pages.

For the serious student; this link gives about everything written on Finney.

Leadership Burnout

Ten Signs of Leadership Burnout 
by Joseph Mattera

www.josephmattera.org

This coming November my wife and I will celebrate 30 years of full-time ministry.

In our day we have seen many leaders lose their zeal for God and leave the ministry. Often this occurs because they did not take adequate time to seek the Lord on a daily basis for self-renewal. Other reasons include not having a balanced life that incorporates things that advance physical and emotional health (instead of just focusing on work and ministry).

I also have been guilty of not taking enough time off, having never taken more than 10 days straight for vacation in over 30 years of hard, grueling ministry (with 95% of my vacations being only 5-7 days long). Up until the past year I never took one full day off per week to rest my mind. At the age of 52 I am now being forced to change my patterns because I have exhausted much of my mental energy and can no longer cheat. (The main reason I have lasted this long without regular time off is because I keep a strict diet, exercise regularly, and spend time seeking God every morning.)

I knew it was time to stop cheating because of some burnout symptoms I came perilously close to experiencing. Over the years I have done much research on this subject and also have ministered to many leaders suffering from burnout.

The focus of this article is not how to recover from burnout but some of the signs of burnout. (I will mention a few points at the end that will aid in recovery.)

The following are signs of emotional and mental burnout.

I. You lose focus and clarity of thought

When experiencing burnout your mind hits a wall and you have fogginess of thought instead of clarity. Sometimes your short-term memory even deteriorates because of the mental overload.

II. You lose your passion for work and/or ministry

You dread going to the office or conducting meetings. You do it because of a commitment more than because it is a passion in your life.

III. You go from being a leader to being a maintainer

The primary calling of a senior leader is to be a visionary. Visionaries are at their best when they receive instruction from God at the top of the mountain and then come down and give vision to their congregation or organization. When in burnout a leader doesn’t have the capacity for any more vision. Hence all forward motion grinds to a halt and the leader goes into maintenance mode, trying their best to hold everything together while hoping they will once again get back the energy needed to take their organization to the next level.

Unless they take adequate steps for restoration, leaders like this will only get worse and not better. They will begin to see people leaving their church or organization because unless there is a compelling vision coming from the leader the people scatter (Proverbs 29:18).

IV. You have a continual sense of hopelessness

In burnout your hope for the future grows dim, depression begins to set in, and you begin to view the world with dark, grey lenses because everything negative is highlighted in your mind.

V. You isolate yourself from others

When in burnout you start creating more and more emotional space from others because you lack the emotional and mental capacity to carry on extensive conversations and/or minister to another person’s needs.

VI. You run from new challenges

One of the main reasons a church needs to ensure their senior pastor takes regular sabbaticals is because, unless the senior leader goes away for an extended time to renew and refresh themselves every several years, the vision of the church or organization will be limited because the senior leader will begin to shy away from new challenges, new vision, and forward motion. An unrenewed senior leader will greatly limit the capacity of a church to expand and grow.

VII. You don’t want to problem solve

A person in burnout doesn’t want to strategize or problem solve because it takes too much mental energy.

VIII. You dream more about retirement than taking a mountain

I knew I was starting to get too close to the edge when I kept envisioning the scene in the movie Gladiator when the lead character Maximus is about to die and he keeps envisioning the next life in paradise when he would rest from war and enjoy life with his loved ones.

When you are dreaming about laying down your weapons instead of going off to war to defeat your foes, then you know it is time to get recharged! Anyone who lives for retirement is a person who has already stopped living! For example, when a senior pastor gets to the place when they are looking at their own watch on Sunday because they can’t wait until the services end so they can go home and relax, then you know they need to be retrofit and recharged! God has called leaders to minister out of their abundance and overflow, not from the fumes of an empty tank!

IX. You lack patience for all things mundane

Those in burnout lose their patience for all things petty when dealing with relational challenges. (In the past they had grace for the immaturity of the saints but in burnout they have no patience for it.) They also lack the patience to deal with average things needed to maintain oversight of their staff and organizational business.

X. You view ministry as work rather than a calling

The greatest privilege I will ever have in my life is to represent the Lord Jesus as the overseer of a local church. It is not a job but a calling. When in burnout, sometimes the only thing that stops a pastor or leader from leaving the ministry is economics (their paycheck). The moment I stay in a church for the salary I will have gone from being a shepherd to a hireling. It is not a job but a holy vocation (1 Corinthians 4:1)!

How to Recover

I. Honor the biblical sabbath

Take time away to pray, study and refresh yourself. Take at least one day off in seven. For pastors, they can’t count Sunday as a day off because it is a work day. What has worked for some pastors is to take a weekday off, or from Friday night to Saturday night (but Saturday is often spent in sermon preparation so that may not work for some).

II. Spend time enjoying the Lord on a daily basis

I believe that burnout comes the quickest when we stop spending adequate time with the Lord. Hebrews 4 teaches us when we enter God’s rest we cease from our own labors; when we attempt to lead in our own strength God allows us to lose our energy because unless the Lord builds the house we labor in vain (Psalm 127).

III. Prioritize the things that are life-giving to you

God has wired each of us so that certain things we do are life-giving while other things deplete life. For example, extroverts are energized by being around people while introverts are sapped of energy when with people. Introverts need to schedule regular time alone to recharge in order for them to meet the challenges they face daily.

Prioritize time with God, reading the Bible, church gatherings for spiritual renewal, time with key friends, time with family, exercise for physical health, hobbies, good music and literature for mental renewal.

IV. Recapture your original calling and vision

When lost at sea a person must read their compass to get back on course. When we lose clarity of vision and focus we need to read our journals and recapture things God has told us that enable us to recapture our original calling and commission.

V. Stay in accountable relationships with a leadership community

We all need spiritual mentors and spiritual oversight. If you are a pastor, find a pastoral community of leaders in which you can experience peer-friendships, coaching, accountability, and covenant. If you are in a local church and you are a leader, attach yourself to the leadership communities that are available to you.

Proverbs teaches us that as iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another. Being in a community can hasten your restoration; isolating yourself from other leaders and from the Body of Christ is one of the devil’s strategies to destroy us since during fragile times in our lives we need wise input from others more than ever!

What is True Prophetic Preaching?

The Power and the Pain of True Prophetic Preaching

By J. Lee Grady

www.charismamag.com

No true message from God will flow through a person who is smug and self-confident. If you want to speak for Him, prepare to die!

I did it again. This past Sunday I stood in a pulpit, looked out over a congregation of mostly strangers, cleared the lump in my throat and preached a message that the Lord had laid on my heart from the Bible.

Thousands of men and women speak publicly like this every week. It's what preachers do. No big deal.

"We measure the impact of a sermon not by whether hearts were slain by Holy Ghost conviction but by how loud the preacher shouted or how high the people jumped when the preacher told them what they wanted to hear."

But even though I speak often, I've found that preaching the gospel is one of the most difficult, frightening and painful assignments anyone could possibly attempt. It is not fun. I feel as though I die a thousand deaths right before I do it, and I die several more times after I go home and evaluate what happened.

After one particularly discouraging experience in which an audience stared coldly at me with their arms folded, I determined that preaching surely must not be my calling. I shared my struggle with an older pastor.

"Sometimes I feel really discouraged after I speak," I told my friend. "Does that ever happen to you?" I was sure he would counsel me to stop preaching, since it obviously was not my spiritual gift.

His answer shocked me. "Son, I have felt like that every Monday morning since I've been in the ministry."

When I tell my friends that I never felt I was gifted to speak, and that I stubbornly resisted the call of God on my life because of my lack of confidence, they act surprised. Most of us assume that people who stand in pulpits want to be there.

Think again!

The power of prophetic preaching actually works in the opposite way we assume it should. If we view things carnally, we believe God chooses gifted orators who hone and shape their skills like a doctor who learns surgery or an actor who learns to perform on stage.

But true preaching is not a natural exercise—it is actually one of the most supernatural tasks anyone can ever be called to do. It requires an imperfect human vessel to yield himself (or herself) to speak the very words of God. If we do it in the flesh, the results will be miserable; but if we wholly trust the power of the Spirit, prophetic preaching will unleash God to move however He desires.

If we fail in this process, we are humiliated. Why would anyone want to preach?

No wonder most of the leaders we encounter in the Bible were reluctant to speak. Moses made excuses about stuttering, Gideon tried to disqualify himself and Jeremiah complained to the Lord about the weighty responsibility of carrying a prophetic burden. Jonah bought a one-way ticket to the other side of the Mediterranean Sea so he wouldn't have to give his unpopular sermon.

And the apostle Paul, who was a silver-tongued Pharisee before he met Christ, was stripped of his worldly eloquence before he preached throughout the Roman Empire. He told the Corinthians: "I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God" (1 Cor. 2:3-5, NASB).

Charismatic revivalist Arthur Katz, who died three years ago, wrote about the power of true preaching in his 1999 book Apostolic Foundations: "The only one qualified to preach ... is the one who wants to run the other way, like Jonah. The man, however, who loves to talk, loves to be public, and enjoys being seen and heard, need not think that a word like this will ever be emitted from his mouth. The man who sighs and groans when called upon to speak, who does not want to be there, who feels terribly uncomfortable, who knows that he is not going to be understood, is the man out of whose mouth the word of true preaching is most likely to come."

That is certainly not the way most of us view pulpit ministry in contemporary America. We celebrate the smooth and the polished. We measure the impact of a sermon not by whether hearts were slain by Holy Ghost conviction but by how loud the preacher shouted or how high the people jumped when the preacher told them what they wanted to hear.

That kind of carnal preaching may win the accolades of men, boost TV ratings and even build megachurches. But the kingdom is not built on smug self-confidence. We need God's words. The church will live in spiritual famine until broken, reluctant, weak and trembling preachers allow His holy fire to come out of their mouths.

If this is your assignment, die to your fears, doubts and excuses and drink the cup of suffering that accompanies the genuine call of God.