Augustine and the Gospel

“And here lies the secret of his profound realization that Christian happiness consist in “comforted remorse”.

“Before him men were prone to conceive themselves essentially God's creatures, whose business it was to commend themselves to their Maker: no doubt they recognized that they had sinned, and that provisions had been made to relieve them of the penalty of their sins; but they built their real hope of acceptance in God's sight more of less upon their own conduct. Augustine realized to the bottom of his soul that he was a sinner and what it is to be a sinner, and therefore sought at God's hand not acceptance but salvation.”

“And this is reason why he never thought of God without thinking of sin and never thought of sin without thinking of Christ. Because he took his sin seriously, his thought and feeling alike traveled continually in this circle, and could not but travel in this circle. He thus was constantly verifying afresh the truth of the Savior's declaration that he to whom little is forgiven loves little, while he loves much who is conscious of having received much forgiveness … So he came to understand that the heights of joy are scaled only by him who has first been miserable, and that the highest happiness belongs only to him who has been the object of salvation. Self-despair, humble trust, grateful love, fullness of joy – these are steps on which his own soul climbed upward: and these steps gave their whole color and form both to his piety and to his teaching.”

- B.B. Warfield, Calvin and Augustine. Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing, 1980, p. 336-350

Women's Heart

"A woman's heart should be so hidden in Christ that a man should have to seek Him just to find her."

Max Lucado

Wait For The Man

"Wait for the man who is more in love with God than you."

Adrienne Sadosky, 'Wait For The Man'

Speaking In A Tongue

Paul assures us, for instance, that speaking in a tongue and uttering prophecies (the exercise of Spirit-imparted gifts) are under the voluntary control of individual Christians. The Spirit may inspire, but the Christian chooses when to utter. "If anyone speaks in a tongue, two - or at the most three - should speak, one at a time..." (1 Cor. 14:27). "The spirits of prophets are subject to the control of prophets" (1 Cor. 14:32).

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 117

Holy Spirit

Slowly I began to suspect that a powerful anointing of the Holy Spirit tends to produce among other things a new leaned pattern of behavior with its own triggering mechanism.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 117

Sin - Dominion Over Us

In all our lives there seems to be a time when God deals with specific issues. We may struggle for years with a problem, aware that a particular sin need not have dominion over us, yet repeatedly we may fail to throw off the sin. And then after years, the sin, like an evil, overripe fruit, drops to the ground often with a flash of inner-illumination. Suddenly we are free. What all along was true theologically becomes true in our experience.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 111

Word Of Knowledge

The "word" of which he speaks is a "word of knowledge", a term to describe a revelation from the Holy Spirit about one's own or someone else's personal need.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 110

Manifestations

We have already seen that equally powerful manifestations may produce profound spiritual changes in some people, and none at all - or at least none that are discernible - in others. And this suggests to me that the Spirit's action calls at some level for a human response, conscious or unconscious and that the response is essential to the result. It seems that the spiritual aftereffects of such a manifestation are dependant on the subject's willingness to let God have his way.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 108-109

Manifestations

Manifestations take place during revivals. Those Christians whose spiritual progress has been quiet and steady may never, even where the power of the Holy Spirit is present, be subject to any manifestation. The fact that God is inscrutable wisdom deals in this way with some people does not mean that if you have not trembled or been thrown on the floor, then you are inadequate as a Christian. To be sure, all of us need to be empowered and anointed by the Spirit, but that empowering does not need to be dramatic,...

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 104-105

Understanding Christianity

If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God’s child, and having God as his Father.

If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all.

For everything that Christ taught, everything that makes the New Testament new, and better than the Old, everything that is distinctively Christian as opposed to merely Jewish, is summed up I the knowledge of the Fatherhood of God.

Our understanding of Christianity cannot be better than our grasp of adoption.

- J.I. Packer, Knowing God, p. 201 -202.

Experiences

Unusual experiences are by definition not part of normal discipleship. If God should have an unusual experience in store for you, and if that should help your relationship with God, well and good. But the experience itself is neither here nor there, except as being an evidence that God is moving in revival. It is your relationship with God that matters.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 102

Revival

"Their joyful surprise has caused hearts as it were to leap, so that they have been ready to break forth into laughter, tears often at the same time issuing like a flood, an intermingling a loud weeping."

Jonathan Edwards, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 90

Revival

Dr. John Hamilton, in a similar vein, gives his own description of the revival in Cambuslang, Scotland: "I found a good many persons under the deepest exercise of soul, crying out most bitterly of their lost and miserable state, by reason of sin; of their unbelief, in despising Christ and the offers of the Gospel,... I heard them express great sorrow for these things, and seemingly in the most serious and sincere manner, and this not so much... from fear of punishment as from a sense of the dishonour done to God..."

Dr. John Hamilton, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 88-89

Emotions

"The town seemed to be full of the presence of God; it was never so full of love, nor of joy, and yet so full of distress, as it was then."

Jonathan Edwards, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 88

Fear of God / Worship

How could I live and see what I saw? Garbled words of love and of worship tumbled out of my mouth as I struggled to hang on to my self-control. I was no longer trying to worship. Worship was undoing me,, pulling me apart. And to be pulled apart was both terrifying and full of glory.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 88

Fear of God

"Many cry out in the bitterness of their soul. Some... from the stoutest men to the tenderest child, shake and tremble and a few fall down as dead. Nor does this only happen when men of warm address alarm them with the terrors of the law, but when the most deliberate preacher speaks of redeeming love..."

Dr. Alexander Webster (1742), When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 87

Fear Of God

"The Scriptures place much of religion in godly fear; insomuch that an experience of it is often spoken of as the character of those who are truly religious persons. They tremble at God;s work, they fear before him, their flesh trembles because of him, they are afraid of his judgments, his excellency makes them afraid, and his dread falls upon them."

Jonathan Edwards, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 87

Mysterium Tremendum

[Randolph] Otto uses, as C.S. Lewis did later, the term numinous to describe this quality of the fear. The numinous experience is made up of an overwhelming sense of one's creaturehood, such that one experiences a "submergence into nothingness before an overpowering absolute might." Other elements are what he calls, Mysterium Tremendum which is not "that which is hidden and esoteric, [but] that which is beyond conceptual understanding, extraordinary and unfamiliar."

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 86-87

Fear

During the past two years I have come across two episodes of such a terror - the terror of persons who, caught up in a mystical experience, thought that God was about to kill them. Both incidents took place when the subjects were fully awake and out-of-doors at night. Both people were also servants of God who were about to back away form his call on their lives. In terror they both instantly repented.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 85

Fear of God

Moses experienced both kinds on different occasions. In Exodus 4:24-26 there is a disturbing account of the first kind of fear - the fear of the disobedient servant. Moses and Zipporah are on their way to Egypt with their family. Moses' firstborn son is uncircumcised. In a single shattering sentence we learn that "at a lodging place on the way, the LORD met Moses and was about to kill him." Only after Zipporah carried out the circumcision, smearing the blood on Moses' foot, did the danger pass.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 85

Spirit Comes

'Restrained! Quiet! Unobtrusive! My dear friends, why not listen to the evidence? This is the kind of thing that happens when the Spirit 'comes' upon man, even the building was shaken...

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 84

Religion

"True religion, in great part consists in holy affections."

Jonathan Edwards, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 84

Spiritual Opposition

I think the case was often this; the word of God would come with convincing light and power into the hearts and consciences of sinners, whereby they were so far awakened... [that] the peace of the strong man armed would be disturbed; hell within would begin to roar; the devil, that before, being unmolested, lay quiet in their hearts, would now be stirred up."

Ralph Humphries, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 76

Demons/ Revival

One night more than twenty roared and shrieked together while I was preaching... [some of whom] confessed they were demoniacs. Sally Jones could not read and yet would answer if persons talked to her in Latin or Greek. They could tell who was coming into the house, who would be seized next, what was doing in other places, etc....
I have seen people so foam and violently agitated that six men could not hold one, but he would spring out of their arms or off the ground, and tear himself, as in hellish agonies. Other I have seen sweat uncommonly, and their necks and tongues swell and twist out of all shape. Some prophesied and some uttered the worst of blasphemies against our Saviour.

John Cennick, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 75

Spirit Moves

Even Satanic delusions, wrong ideas that creep in to spoil a work of God, far from being an indication that the work itself is Satanic, may in fact serve as a proof of the very opposite. Jonathan Edwards wisely comments,. 'Nor are... delusions of Satan intermixed with the work, any argument that the work in general is not of the Spirit of god." Wherever the Spirit moves powerfully, an enemy not only opposes but seeks to undermine.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 74-75

Supernature

Most of us, you see, think of God as a "God of the gaps." We don't intend to , but we do. Having been educated in the West there is a deistic twist to your thinking, causing us to view a tree as growing by natural laws. We fail to see God working everywhere (God pulling and shaping each leaf, each blade of grass) even though we may subscribe in general to the notion. We are affected by our knowledge of science. Whatever our stated beliefs, in everyday practice we think of God setting the grass growing and then moving off to do something else, so to speak.
The God of the Bible runs everything. He created Nature and Supernature which are actually all of a piece with no division between them. Nothing in Nature woks by itself. God 'works' it. He intervenes unceasingly. Every musical note we hear, every sunrise and sunset we see, every birth we rejoice in, every exploding supernova we marvel at - all are expressions of his power. His presence keeps the whole show working.
Similarly every angelic appearance, every miracle of healing are likewise the working of his sovereign laws. In this sense there is no fundamental difference between what we call miracle and what we call ordinary. Yet we need some sort of a division to aid us in discussion.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 59

Revival

"How we wait for it or work for it, the critical issue history raises is whether we will recognize it and embrace it when it comes."

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 56

Fanaticism

Fanaticism... is a terrible danger which we must always bear in mind. It arises from a divorce between Scripture and experience, where we put experience above Scripture claiming things that are not sanctioned by Scripture, or are perhaps even prohibited by it.
But there is a second danger and it is equally important that we should bear it in mind. The second is the exact opposite of the first, as these things generally go from one violent extreme to the other. How difficult it always is to maintain a balance! The second danger, then, is that of being satisfied with something very much less than wheat is offered in the Scripture, and the danger of interpreting the Scripture by our experiences and reducing its teaching to the level of what we know and experience; and I would say that this second is the greater danger of the two at this present time.

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 55

Interpret Scripture

We all have experience, whether we experience the supernatural or the total absence of the supernatural. And all of us ten to interpret Scripture according to the experience we have, whether it be negative or positive, present or absent. To deny the tendency is to deny our very humanity.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 55

Feelings

Edwards claimed that feelings expressed the soul's movements. Without them a radical change of direction was not likely to follow. This explained why some people were never changed by the Word of God. "They hear... commands... warnings... and the sweet invitations of the gospel. Yet they remain as before... because they are not affected [moved] with what they hear."

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 52

Emotions

His pastoral experience compelled him to conclude that nothing of religious significance ever took place in a human heart if it wasn't deeply affected by such godly emotions.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 52

Emotions

"The Holy Scriptures everywhere place religion very much in the affections; such as fear, hope, love, hatred, desire, joy, sorrow, gratitude, compassion, and zeal."

Jonathan Edwards, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 51-52

Emotion

Emotion comes from seeing, from understanding. I experience fear when I realize I might die during the operation the surgeon has suggested to me. The depth of my fear measures the clarity with which I see. My fears will be healthy if what I "see" truly corresponds with reality, for emotion is a test of my grasp of reality. Emotions do not save me - except in the sense that they may startle and shake me into acting in the light of truth.
When the Holy Spirit awakens people, he seems to cause them to perceive truth more vividly. Satan's deceptive mists are driven away. People see their sin as terrifying rocks threatening to sink them or as a foul, stinking cancer that will kill them. They see the mercy of the Savior with the eyes of those who have been snatched from a horrible death. Their trembling, weeping and shouts of joy reflect the clarity of their vision.
Keely aware of this, Dillimore states that the emotional manifestations we are talking about took place in people who were "solemnly conscious of the presence of God... and bitterly aware of their won helplessness."

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 51

Emotions

And what better place could there be for the release of our pent-up emotions than before the throne of grace? Why can some Christian leaders scream with delight or howl with rage at football games but never think of shouting "unto God with the voice of triumph"? Our Christian culture has too often made it difficult for us to "shout for joy and be glad" even when it would be appropriate to do so.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 50

Facts / Feelings

For one thing, it is possible to be mistaken about the facts since Mr. Facts really represents one's own limited understanding of Scripture. It is always possible for our own grasp of facts to lead us astray, unless we are open to revise or refine it from time to time. And again, feelings are complex. Faith is only one of many factors influencing them. After all, if something so ordinary as a missed night's sleep or a bout of indigestion can affect them, what else might?

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 49

Revival

"Revival stirs our hearts when we read about it. But would we perceive it as of God if it broke out noisily in one of our own services or meetings?"

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 45

Revival

John Wimber writes: "When warm and cold fronts collide, violence ensues: thunder and lightening rain or snow - even tornadoes or hurricanes. There is conflict, and a resulting release of power. It is disorderly, messy - difficult to control."
He further says: "Power encounters are difficult to control. This is a hard word for many Western Christians to accept, because phenomena that do not fit rational thought are uncomfortable: they plunge us into the murky world of the transrational in which we lose control of the situation. Events that do not fit our normal categories of thinking are threatening for us, causing fear, because they are unfamiliar - especially where spiritual power is involved."

John Wimber, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 45.

Affections

"Though there are false affections in religion, and in some respects raised high: yet undoubtedly there are also true, holy, and solid affections; and the higher these are raised the better. And when they are raised to an extremely great height, they are not to be suspected merely because of their degree, but on the contrary to be esteemed."

Jonathan Edwards, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 43

Revival

Such a commotion surly was never heard of, especially at eleven at night. It far outdid all that I ever saw in America. For about an hour and a half there was such weeping, so many falling into deep distress, and expressing it in various ways... their cries and agonies were exceedingly affecting.
Mr. McCullough preached after I had ended, till past one in the morning, and then could scarce persuade them to depart. All night in the fields might be heard the voice of prayer and praise. Some young ladies were found by a gentlewoman praising God at break of day. She went and joined with them."

George Whitefield (1742), When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 43

Revival

True revival has commonly been opposed because it came dressed outlandishly, a wild and uncouth invader. Each revival had its own style, its own novelty.
Field preaching, for example, was unheard of in Britain before the Wesleyan revival. Churches and chapels were scandalized initially. Press articles describing it scorched the paper they were printed on. When George Whitefield first introduced him to it even John Wesley found field preaching hard to accept.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 41.

Revival

"I would define a revival," writes Martyn Lloyd-Jones, "as a large number... being baptized by the Holy Spirit at the same time; or the Holy Spirit falling upon, coming upon a number of people assembled together. It can happen in a chapel, in a church, it can happen in a district, it can happen in a country."

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, When The Spirit comes With Power, p. 39.

Revival

"Alas! alas! in how many things I have judged and acted wrong... I have been too bitter in my zeal. Wild-fire has been mixed with it, and I find that I frequently wrote and spoke in my own spirit, when I thought I was writing and speaking by the Spirit of God."

George Whitefield, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 38.

Revival

Critics seized on inconsistencies, but Edwards' dictum was: "A work of God without stumbling blocks is never to be expected." In fact he said: "It is no sign that a work is not from the Spirit of God, that many, who seem to be subjects of it, are guilty of great imprudencies and irregularities in their conduct. We are to consider that the end for which God pours out his Spirit, is to make men holy, and not to make them politicians. It is no wonder that, in a weak and strong natural abilities, under strong impressions of mind - there are many who will behave themselves imprudently." He also wrote: "Instances of this nature in the apostles' days are innumerable... gross heresies... vile practices..."

John White, When The Spirit Come With Power, p. 38

Revival

"From time to time cosmic mopping-up operations achieve other breakthroughs, what we call revival occurs and the invisible side of the picture seems for a time to become more apparent."

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 37.

Revival

"This is no age to advocate restraint; the church today does not need to be restrained, but to be aroused, to be awakened, to be filled with a spirit of glory, for she is failing in the modern world."
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, When the Spirit Comes With Power, p. 34.

Hearing From God

Why do many people who pray earnestly for a visitation from God reject what he sends because they find it offensive? What can we say about the bizarre behavior that occurs, the unwise words and actions of its prominent leaders, the bitter quarrels that arise? How shall we avoid the tragedy of missing it when God sends it?
John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 33.

Ministry Calling

"Ministry is the one vocation you arrive at by running after something else. You run after humility and service in order to end up in ministry. If you run right at ministry you will be sidelined or put on a slow train. "

-Dave Harvey

Communication of Scripture

...let’s have this unmovable goal: discernible growth in my grasp and communication of Scripture, in its specifics and its sweep.

Teaching The Word

Dr. [D. A.] Carson say, “Effectiveness in teaching the Bible is purchased at the price of much study, some of it lonely, all of it tiring.”

Teaching, Discerning the Gift

This is what happens when the gift of teaching is operating. You make scriptural truth clear, you make scriptural truth attractive, and you make scriptural truth operational. You make it clear—people understand it. You make it attractive—people value it. And you make it operational—people apply it. When those things happen, the gift of teaching is happening, it is functioning. That is what we want to cultivate.

-Jeff Purswell

Pastoral Ministry

We are to “rightly handle.” I think we could render that “deal with it straightly.” Literally it means to “cut a straight path.” We deal with it straightly. So that means two aspects: correct meaning and clear communication. That is what we strive for: faithfulness, clarity … faithfulness, clarity … faithfulness, clarity: faithfulness to the meaning of the text and clear communication of the message of the text. In brief, that is what we are about in rightly handling the Word of God.

-Jeff Purswell

Pastoral Authority

Now, of course, we do have a degree of authority to preach God’s Word in the church and to govern the affairs of our church. But as far as authority in people’s lives, that lies only in God’s Word. It is only God’s Word that is to bind the conscience of a believer, not my opinion, not my preferences. And when we deviate from God’s Word or we distort God’s Word or we displace God’s Word we have forfeited our authority. This is where our authority derives from—the truth of God’s Word.

-Jeff Purswell

Biblical Leadership

Your teaching is the primary expression of your leadership. The core of biblical leadership is setting forth for our people a biblical vision of God and his purposes and then calling them to live life in light of it and modeling for them what it looks like. That is biblical leadership.

-Jeff Purswell

Scripture

It is this Word and this Word alone that God promises to accompany with saving and sanctifying power. Where is your confidence? It should be here because it is only this that God promises to accompany with saving and sanctifying power! Oh, this Word is powerful. This Word makes massive promises about itself. It advertises its power to change and transform. This Word discloses God. It brings us into an encounter with God himself. When we hear these words, we are hearing the voice of God. This Word is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword. This Word discloses the gospel. The gospel itself is “the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Romans 1:16). Embedded in the gospel, in its DNA, is this explosive power to bring people from death to life. It is in here. This Word transforms hearts, breaks the power of sin, and engenders new affections. Oh, this Word does so much.

-Jeff Purswell

Pastoral Ministry

So as Paul spoke, his preeminent awareness was the gaze of God. His preeminent concern was the approval of God. All too often my preeminent concern is my presentation to you, to people. My preeminent concern is the approval of you. So who are you most aware of? Whose approval are you seeking? Whose test do you want to pass? Here is the sobering reality: Whom we are trying to please now will determine what we hear then. So let us now seek to please him. Let us labor, not merely with devotion, but with an awareness of divine scrutiny.

-Jeff Purswell

Pastoral Ministry

John Piper wrote, “The Word of God that saves and sanctifies from generation to generation is preserved in a book. And therefore at the heart of every pastor’s work is bookwork. Call it reading, meditation, reflection, cogitation, study, exegesis, whatever you will. A large and central part of our work is to wrestle God’s meaning from a book and to proclaim it in the power of the Holy Spirit.”

Pastoral Ministry

Something massive and eternal is at stake in our labors. The work of preaching and teaching is God’s chosen means to secure and preserve the final salvation of his Church. That’s all. In so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers—not that you will justify them, but that these will be the means that God will use to secure and preserve the final salvation of Christians. So teach, preach, give yourself, persist, and devote yourself. This is no time for “sleeping and snoring.” As pastors, we are not special. But we are called to be specialists! We have a specialized call, we have specialized labor, and it involves this Book.

-Jeff Purswell

Pastoral Ministry

“Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching. … Practice these things; immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress. Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers”

(1 Timothy 4:13,15,16).

Pastoral Ministry

Some pastors and preachers are lazy and no good. They do not pray. They do not read. They do not search the Scripture. The call is watch, study, attend to reading. In truth, you cannot read too much in Scripture and what you read you cannot read too carefully. And what you read carefully, you cannot understand too well. And what you understand well, you cannot teach too well. And what you teach well, you cannot live too well. The devil, the world, and our flesh are raging and raving against us. Therefore, dear sirs, and brothers, pastors and preachers, pray, read, study, be diligent. This evil, shameful time is not the season for being lazy, for sleeping and snoring.

-Martin Luther

Pastoral Ministry

Earlier in chapter two he used these metaphors to inspire Timothy: “Think of the soldier, Timothy. Think of the athlete, Timothy. Think of the hard working farmer, Timothy.” Those are Paul’s ministry metaphors, images that inspire labor and courage and perseverance and discipline and self-denial. You can’t read the Pastoral Epistles and come to the conclusion that pastoral ministry is a soft occupation; an “indoor job with no heavy lifting.” No, pastoral ministry is not for the lazy. It is not for the casual. It is not for the indifferent. In fact, it is not just enough not to be lazy. It is not just enough to do your work. The text says, “Do your best.” Exercise the utmost diligence and do it persistently.

-Jeff Purswell

Faithful Pastor

Brothers, let us at all costs avoid a failure of perception in this area. We have one fundamental role. We have one governing priority. The governing priority for the faithful pastor is devotion to the teaching of God’s Word.
- Jeff Purswell

Revival

What we have called revival during the last three hundred years represents an unusual work of the Holy Spirit with the following characteristics:
1. Converted and unconverted men, women and children, are stunned by a vision both of God's holiness and his mercy, are awakened in large numbers to repentance, faith and worship.
2. God's power is manifest in human lives in ways no psychological or sociological laws can explain adequately.
3. The community as a whole becomes aware of what is happening, many perceiving the movement as a threat to existing institutions.
4. Some men and women exhibit unusual physical and emotional behaviors. These create controversy. They can be an offense to opponents of the revival and a snare to its supporters.
5. Some revived Christians behave in an immature and impulsive way, while others fall into sin. In this way the revival appears to be a strange blend of godly and ungodly influences, of displays of divine power and of human weakness.
6. Wherever the revival is extensive enough to have national impact, sociopolitical reform follows over the succeeding century. In this way Christ kingdom begins to be exercised over the evils of oppression and injustice.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 32-33.

Revival

...Jonathan Edwards preached his sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." I can see him in my mind's eye in his pulpit, reading his sermon shortsightedly as he peered at the manuscript by candlelight. He must have been charged with passion. But his reedy, high-pitched voice would hardly qualify him as a dynamic preacher. It was the power of God, not erudition or eloquence, that gripped church members that night. The building rang with echoing cries of terrified listeners, men and women clutching the pillars of the building with all their strength, terrified that the floor would split, and their feet go slipping and sliding into hell.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 31.

Baptism In The Spirit

Joy Unspeakable, Lloyd-Jones used the term in a sense steeped in the biblical understanding of the English Puritans. To him it meant an anointing or enduing with power, sometimes, but not usually coinciding with conversion, often repeatable, intended for all the church, dramatic, experimental, observable and connected only indirectly with sanctification.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 28.

Revival

In 1904, Evan Roberts, the leader of the Welsh revival wrote, "After many had prayed, I felt some living energy, or force entering my bosom, restraining my breath, my legs trembling terribly; this living energy increased and increased as one after another prayed. Feeling strongly and deeply warmed, I burst forth in prayer."

Evan Roberts, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 29.

Holy Spirit - Baptism

"...one day, in the city of New York - oh, what a day! I cannot describe it, I seldom refer to it; it is almost too sacred an experience to name... I can only say that God revealed himself to me, and I had such an experience of his love that I had to ask him, to stay his hand. I went to preaching again. The sermons were not different; I did not present any new truths, and yet hundreds were converted. I would not now be placed back where I was before that blessed experience if you should give me all the world - it would be small dust in the balance.

Dwight L. Moody, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 28.

Spirit of God

On his way there the Spirit of God comes on him, and like a puppet on a string he prophesies until he arrives. And just as his men have been stripped of power, so the king is stripped of his robes and lies naked on the ground before Samuel, prophesying all that day and on through the night (19:23-24).
The Spirit of the Lord does not honor Saul. It humiliates him, shaming and rendering him impotent, totally unable to exert his will in the presence of his foes. His stubborn heart rejected God's mercy.
Therefore when the power took effect it mocked his pride and kingly power. Manifestations of the Spirit's power do not ever reflect credit to the person in whom they are manifest. They reflect only the power, the glory and the mercy of God, whether the manifestation results in the subject's blessing or the subject's humiliation. They can never be a ground for boasting.
They are never a sign of God's favoritism or of superior spiritual attainment.

John White, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 26

Healing

"I know men's atheism and infidelity will never lack somewhat to say against the most eminent providences, though they were miracles... but when mercies [i.e. of healing] are granted in the very time of prayer, and when, to reason, there is no hope, and without the use or help of any other means... is not this as plain as if God from Heaven should say to us: I am fulfilling to thee the true word of my promise in Christ my Sonne? How many times have I known the prayer of faith to save the sick when all physicians have given them up as dead!"
Richard Baxter, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 20.

Holy Spirit

"We must be very careful in these matters. What do we know of the realm of the Spirit? What do we know of the Spirit falling on people? What do we know about these great manifestations of the Holy Spirit? We need to be very careful 'lest we be found fighting against God,' lest we be guilty of 'quenching the Spirit of God.'"
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 13.

Holy Spirit

These effects on the body were not owing to the influence of example, but began... when there was no such enthusiastical season as many account this, but it was a very dead time through the land."

Jonathan Edwards, When The Spirit Comes With Power, p. 13.

God's Obsession

“Do you not know... what God's estimate of the gospel is? Do you not know that it has been the chief subject of His thoughts and acts from all eternity? He looks on it as the grandest of all His works.” - Charles Spurgeon

Retreating vs. Invading

“Most of us are guilty at precisely this point, and the evangelical church in particular is guilty. We have retreated from the world rather than invading the world."

- James Montgomery Boice, The Gospel of John (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1985), 1595.