Last night I was blessed to be at a unique gathering. It’s early, but it’s exciting. It has all the signs of the beginning of revival.

Four years ago I retired from 34 years of pastoring in Maryland, most of that in the Baltimore-Washington region. Paula and I moved to a piece of farmland her father had owned in the most rural Missouri Ozarks. A year later I was asked to become part-time pastor of the United Methodist congregation in Eminence, 33 miles away.

Eminence UMC averages around 27 people in attendance. That’s actually not bad, considering there are seven other congregations in a town whose total population is 600. It’s the county seat of Shannon County, population 8,279.

Two years ago the city of Eminence celebrated its 150^th birthday. As part of the sesquicentennial celebration, the Ministerial Association was asked to coordinate a combined worship service at the high school baseball field. It was amazing and inspiring. That Sunday morning there were folks from First Baptist Church, West Eminence Christian Church, Eminence Assembly of God, the Church of God of Prophecy, the Jacks Fork Country Church, Faith Tabernacle, Saint Sylvester Roman Catholic Church, and the Eminence Methodists. All these different people, from all these different traditions, singing and worshiping and praying together. That’s where I believe the seed of revival was planted.

Since that time there’s a saying in most of those churches, especially among the youth and young adults:  “There’s only one church in Eminence.” We meet in different buildings, we listen to different preachers, we’re comfortable with different kinds of songs and liturgies, but we are all one church. We’re all part of God’s family, the body of Christ, the bride of the Lamb.

Part of what makes me think this potential revival might be the real thing is that the pastors have had basically nothing to do with it. That’s not to say pastors aren’t important. It’s just that I’ve studied revival a lot, even wrote my dissertation on it, and it seems to me that most of the time what pastors do to incipient revivals is snuff them out. Competition, turf wars, and arguing about doctrine are primary among the things that quench and grieve the Holy Spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:19; Ephesians 4:30). It blesses me no end to say that this is not the case in Eminence. The pastors there work and pray together like I’ve never seen anywhere else. That mutual respect and closeness and support is vital for the seed of revival to take root. But in our weekly prayer breakfasts and our monthly Ministerial Association meetings, the only talk about revival was to pray about it. We knew some of our folks were praying together, but that’s about it. In fact, pretty much everything I know about how all this came about I learned last night.

Apparently a couple years ago, perhaps not too long after the community service at the ball field, some of the young women got together and attended a women’s conference in another town. It seems to have had a deep spiritual impact, because some of them continued meeting and praying together – I don’t know if it was a regular thing or just as the Spirit moved them. Anyway, a year or so ago they felt led to host a conference for the women in Eminence.  As I recall it was called Ashes to Beauty (from Isaiah 61:3), and the weather was really bad – I’m actually not sure if they were even able to hold the meeting. But that didn’t deter these women. A group of twelve, from five different denominations, started meeting together for Bible study and prayer. They continued through the spring and summer.

When they finished the study they were working through, they started praying about what God wanted them to do next. And notice this, because this is key. They didn’t take a vote on what book they wanted to study next. They didn’t search online and say, “Oh, this looks like a good one.” They prayed and asked God what he wanted them to do. And God told them.

The leader, or at least the one telling the story last night – they didn’t announce names because, Eminence being a small town, everybody there knew each other except me – this young woman noticed that one particular book, Awaken by Patricia Shirer, kept coming to her attention. It would pop up online when she was looking for something else. A friend would bring it up in conversation.  It was everywhere. Finally she decided God was trying to tell her something. She ordered the book. When it came she got very excited, because apparently it’s a ninety-day devotional for women aimed at inspiring personal revival. She also got very confused. How could a devotional book be a Bible study guide? And how could all the women who had already expressed interest fit into her living room?

But as she and her friends kept praying, they felt God saying not to worry about that, just get the book into the hands of as many women as possible, and leave the rest to God. So that’s what they’re doing.

Around the same time, Bruce from the Baptist church became challenged to do an experiment. He reasoned that when he told his children to do something, he expected them to obey him instantly, because he loved them and he knew what was best for them. Didn’t the same thing apply to his relationship with God? So this last spring, he decided that whenever he felt God was telling him to do something, he would instantly obey. In particular, if someone asked him to pray for them, he wouldn’t just say, “I’ll do that,” and try to remember it for his next devotional time. As much as possible, he would stop and pray for them right there, out loud, with his hand on their shoulder. He discovered he could even pray like that on the job, with his eyes open, supervising high voltage work at the top of an electric pole.

It was transformative. (That was not intended to be an electric linemen pun, but there you have it.)

Bruce went on to say that a few weeks ago he had a vision. In the middle of talking to someone, he suddenly couldn’t hear what they were saying because he was seeing a vision of people praying for each other, people he recognized. His wife had a similar vision. One of the Ashes to Beauty women had a similar vision. Three visions from God, at least two from people whose churches typically don’t major on that kind of thing. When they got together and compared notes, they decided God was calling them to do something. In keeping with Bruce’s new emphasis on instant obedience, they started right away.

That was two weeks ago. Last night, about 120 people crowded into the Assemblies of God sanctuary. We pastors were there, but just for support. We sat in the pews and wondered what was going to happen just like everyone else. The worship was contemporary songs many of us didn’t know, singing along with recordings. Most pastors will tell you that’s a recipe for disaster, but last night the Holy Spirit didn’t seem to know that. Two young ladies and Bruce told their stories, then Bruce’s wife exhorted us from Ephesians 6:18 on the importance of Spirit-led prayer. We watched a powerful video of a woman praying for God to raise up prayer warriors. Then Bruce said, “I don’t know what happens after this. The altar is open for prayer.” And that was the whole program.

But the night was just getting started. People started praying. Those whose tradition was to pray out loud prayed out loud. Those whose tradition was to come forward and kneel went forward and knelt. Those whose tradition was to stay in their seats and pray silently did that. People prayed for each other. Pastors prayed for each other. There were tears. There was joy. Most of all, there was a strong sense of the presence of God.

One of my friends has an international ministry of mentoring pastors and teaching on prayer. About two years ago (does that time frame sound familiar?) God led him to move from the big city to a plot of land just outside Eminence. He’s been around many moves of God, and he is not given to hyperbole. As we stood surrounded by little groups of people in prayer, he told me, “I’ve been praying for this for years.”

So is this the beginning of revival? I think it could be. It doesn’t look like the last revival, but they never do. The last revival is not what we need today. Nobody talked about next steps. Nobody tried to take leadership. We just prayed. The impression was, if God wants us to do something else, he’ll let us know.

To me, that’s encouraging. One of the big killers of revival is when people step in and try to guide it or help it along. If it does turn into revival there may come a point when pastoral oversight will be needed, just because pastors should know enough theology and church history to recognize if it starts to veer off in a dangerous direction. But for now, I and my fellow pastors are quite happy to let our people follow God. It’s what we’ve been working to equip them for.

Last night, as I sat and looked and listened, I thought I just might be witnessing the birth of a revival. Please pray for us. Can you hear the sounds of a newborn?