The Asbury Revival of 2023

Some reflections on the revival at Asbury Seminary

Yesterday, Thursday Feb 16^th, I attended the Asbury revival. What I say relates to yesterday and may or may not relate to all of the previous days of the revival.

My overall conclusion: this is NOT revival. This is not to say that there are not some good things happening there nor that the Lord wasn’t doing a great work at the start of these meetings. Again, I’m only referencing my point from being there yesterday. I want to give you the good that I saw there and the things of concern also. In short, it was a very mixed bag of marbles. There was good and concerning things in the meeting together.  So here are my takeaways from my time there yesterday. 

1. The music was very God centered and Christ exalting. Modern Christian hits often seem very amorphous in their theology and vague in what they talk about. Not these songs. The songs celebrated Christ’s victory over death and sin for us. We sung about His exaltation as King of Kings. This was very good!
2. The people were singing to the Lord with great enthusiasm. God was most certainly glorified in the people’s heartfelt singing to Him. The words of the songs glorified God and had great truth in them so the Lord was honored when we were singing great biblical truth back to Him. This was very good.
   1. However, the same ones who sung these great content oriented songs could not seem to discern theological error when various people spoke or when scripture was wrongly explained but instead literally applauded and shouted at everything in an affirming way. I explain more of these concerns thru the letter.  
3. I often would see people praying. The place at front seemed to always have some folks there praying. People in the audience would be seated and praying. This was very good.
   1. The balance seemed to more on singing than praying/repenting, etc. What I’ve read and studied about the great revivals of the past is that there were great times of prayer, and prayer that was soul wrenching over their sin and God’s holiness. This did not seem to be present. Great revivals in the past would see people even outside of the indoor meeting who would be grieving over their sins sometimes weeks at a time until they received gospel relief from God Himself. We were inconvenienced about 30 mins in the rain before we got inside.
4. I and two others guys with me along with many other folks stood out in the rain waiting for an opportunity to go in. Even when we left the service the line was still probably 100 yards long with others waiting for their opportunity to go in, and yes they too were standing in the rain. It seems there is a hunger for people to meet with God in an authentic way. Some have come from Kansas and Canada to meet with God’s people in order to seek to meet with God Himself. It showed people are still willing to do hard things if they can really have the opportunity to meet with God. This is very good.
   1. One of the most concerning things I saw there was that there were no Bibles. It seems no one came expecting to look at God’s word or to encounter God in and through His word. They expected to encounter God at a building, with a seminary group of students, with the music, with the testimonies, etc. More of a consumer to go order placed at a restaurant. We just want God to meet with us in a consumer like fashion: God is stirring at a certain place so we will just show up …someone else has prepared the meal/meeting with God and we show up to consume. This is not biblical revival. The absence of God’s word is the absence of God. Period.  This point cannot be stressed enough. God does not move without His word! However, when some scripture was read, the light commentary on it was off. When students read scriptures, it would be followed by a personal, emotional reading of their own poetry they’ve written, or some word faith type pronouncement of ‘I pronounce victory over you’ or “I cast out the spirit of fear’ etc…Yes, these are literal testimonies that they audience lapped up and vociferously shouted about, and applauded.  If you don’t understand these type of “pronouncements”, understand that they are from the heretical word-faith movement of people like Benny Hinn, Joyce Meyer, Jentzen Franklin, Kenneth Hagin, Kenneth Copeland, TD Jakes, etc. See here for a brief summary of word faith belief. https://www.gotquestions.org/Word-Faith.html
5. A few thoughts about the testimonies
   1. Faculty at the school asked for volunteers to come forward to meet with them and share a testimony of what God has done today or in the last several days if they’ve been there for other meeting times. The faculty would screen the testimonies to make sure they are legit and biblically faithful. This was good to hear.However, when the testimonies started it soon became apparent that either the faculty didn’t discern word faith tendencies in their testimonies, or the students misspoke (or didn’t share enough) to the faculty about their testimonies. The discernment of the faculty AND/OR(!) the content of the testimonies of the students/others was very weak regarding the gospel with the exception of 1 girl. From I had back pain and now I’m better, to one saying “The Lord is saying this to you” in reference to what the student was saying (as if God were speaking directly to the people thru the student…again, this is word faith “God told me” stuff), to several pronouncing certain victories over you, or casting out various spirits of (fill in the blank).  This smacked very much in violation of Jude 8 Yet in like manner these people also, relying on their dreams, defile the flesh, reject authority, and blaspheme the glorious ones. Scripture warns about rebuking spirits. Jude goes on to warn further in vs 9-10 ⁹ But even the archangel Michael, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, did not himself dare to condemn him for slander but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” ¹⁰ Yet these people slander whatever they do not understand, and the very things they do understand by instinct—as irrational animals do—will destroy them.   The great archangel Michael would not even rebuke Satan, and yet several students sought to speak ‘prophetically” and rebuke several “spirits’ over the people. Again, the people enthusiastically applauded these pronouncements and the students enthusiasm and often loud speaking/yelling into the microphone these ‘pronouncements.’  One young lady spoke about her fear in pursuing a nursing career, of how difficult it was, and how she just didn’t have confidence in doing something so hard, But God spoke to her and showed her at the meeting that this was what God has called her to do and now she had assurance this was God’s desire for her life of how she could serve others. This was her basis for encouraging others that they too could have a God purpose for their lives. Again, the audience applauded and shouted ‘yesses’ to this. I don’t know if the Lord has called this young lady to singleness or not but why is this ‘revival’? Why is God affirming what she wants to do rather than God’s design for women? Why isn’t there a ‘revival’ that leads people to seek God’s normative pattern for living?  Listen to what the BIBLE says over the idea of how God seems to always ‘verify us’ in our choices. Again, true revival restores God’s patterns for our lives, not reinforce our personal autonomous decisions. Titus 2: 3Older women, likewise, are to be reverent in their behavior, not slanderers or addicted to much wine, but teachers of good. 4In this way they can train the young women to love their husbands and children, 5to be self-controlled, pure, managers of their households, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be discredited.   I’’m confused why revival means God approves of my individual decisions rather than the desire to rebuild the home and grow families. It goes without saying that the family structure in America and modern evangelicalism is in very bad shape. Further 1 Tim. 2:15 states the importance of God designed roles, though politically and modern evangelically incorrect – “But women will be saved through childbirth—if they continue in faith, love, and sanctity, with moderation.” This speaks to the importance of men being men and women being women, not amorphous, autonomous self designed living with God’s stamp of approval upon it. Motherhood is a great design and call by God; not women rushing off into society and conquering the world. Yes, Proverbs 31 does speak of a woman working wisely, but note the trajectory of scripture: women in the home, women grieving over no motherhood (see Hannah) rather than grieving about a personal career.…Again, where is the revival of the focus on the home, marriage, children, motherhood, and fatherhood according to God’s design?  
   1. One man who said he was a church planter came to read John 15. He only read about 5-6 verses of the chapter and made some comments on the text. He stated that too many pastors are busy doing things and not ‘connecting’, his definion of what it means to biblically ‘abide.’ He stated we need to connect and not be so busy. He then asked pastors who feel they’ve been too busy and not “connecting/abiding” to stand up. Several stood and again the audience cheered. This is good in that the people there are seeking to be supportive of our brothers. Then the man who read John 15 said, “if you are a pastor and were too embarrassed to stand, I want to just say…” and then in a little louder voice in the microphone, “I rebuke the spirit of embarrassment over you.” I quickly looked thru my bible concordance to see if I could see any verses that deal with the spirit of embarrassment, and too my surprise I could find none! Obviously I’m being sarcastic but my point is the careless, and lack of biblical fidelity that was passed off as ‘revival’ is very disconcerting. Again the crowd vociferously applauded and shouted in approval.  The other issue with his insight on John 15 was he was totally amiss about the meaning of the passage. In short, John 15 is about us abiding in Christ VIA HIS WORD!! Please read the parallels Jesus makes about Him abiding in us then a few verses later His word abiding in us: it’s the same! Jesus abides in us via His word not thru some undefined ‘connecting’ as the man put forth.
6. The faculty
   1. The faculty sought to pray with and come alongside the students. This was good.
      1. However an older lady who spoke several times raised some serious concerns. Below are her words… again which the people unanimously applauded and cheered on.
         1. “We’ve had an outpouring of the Holy Spirit here. We want others to come and experience this. We want you to experience the Holy Spirit”… My friend, this is not biblical language nor the pattern of scripture. When the Spirit comes, He will speak of Christ crucified and glorified not about your encounter with Him or about you seeking an encounter/experience with Him. You know you’ve encountered the Spirit by you rejoicing in Christ crucified and risen. Read John 14-16.
         1. After a song or testimony, I don’t recall, the same lady said “We just love the gospel.  Turn and share the gospel with someone beside you; tell them God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.”  Now lest you think that she was saying this in addition to saying the gospel, she wasn’t. This was her understanding of the gospel. Folks all around understood this as her definition of the gospel bec they repeated without thought to ones beside them: God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. This is again is more word faith ideas and even something you would hear from Veggie Tales: “God made you special and he loves you very much.”   This is true, but it is ABSOLUTELY NOT the gospel. This is disturbing bec this is the leadership’s understanding of the gospel and again without reservation the people embraced it in the pews. Frightening to say the least. Again, the same crowd that could sing zealously gospel songs turned and repeated the false gospel message of the lady to one another. In my opinion, it seems the excitement of what people were experiencing authenticated any and everything that was done and said. This certainly seemed the case in the lady’s redefining of the gospel.  
7. I do want to be discerning about what the students may be desiring and what the faculty at the theologically moderate, left leaning seminary may be doing. I saw a seminary office of lady who teaches New Testament at the school. You can’t square this w/ the bible’s teaching of women not teaching men. Asbury has had major issues on biblical authority, women’s roles, and even the anti-biblical social justice movement they teach/support. (See here: https://asburyseminary.edu/elink/d-min-cohort-offered-in-social-transformation/)  Again, what was God doing w/ the students that beginning Wednesday and what is happening with an off kilter faculty can be different things. But the theological incongruity of the faculty’s theological stances at the school and words at the revival are highly concerning.
8. Some concluding thoughts
   1. American evangelicalism is in deep trouble theologically and profusely needs rebuilt in our churches. Hundreds of people from all walks of denominational life who can sing rich theological songs and then in the next instance applaud, yell, celebrate, etc to the same degree at gospel error tells me more of the desire for personal religious experience than it does of worshipping God in spirit and truth. There seemed to be no noticeable discernment between the good truth in the songs and the bizarre testimonies, lack of gospel understanding etc that was put forth at the meeting. The charismatic, word faith influence is very strong in evangelicalism and I don’t see it going away any time soon. We must separate from the Charles Finneyism like experience in our churches. For a good book on the difference of two approaches in revival, read God Sent Revival: The Story of Asahel Nettleton and the Second Great Awakening by John Thornbury. Short summary: Finney focused on experience, singing, with little biblical preaching. Nettleton focused on strong doctrinal preaching, God’s wrath, the deception of unbelief, etc. 15 years later, only 1 out of 10 people from Finney’s revivals were still in church. 7 or 8 out of 10 of Nettleton’s converts still were in church serving faithfully. Content matters. Means of grace matter. Preaching the word matters. Asbury is more in line with the Finney style revival than God’s work thru Nettelton. The end result of Finney’s revivals was called the burned out districts. New York and other northern states experienced revival under Finney only later to have people dull, bored, and indifferent to the full gospel. It set the stage for the radical secularization/liberalization of the North that we see today.Im not sure what happened that original Wednesday and between my time there yesterday whether they are the same or not. I hope for the gospel sake they are different. If this was what was happening last Wednesday, it raises lots of concern for the church.
   1. I want to say again: no Bible, no God of the Bible present. The fact that there were no Bibles in the hands of all the people that I saw in the lines outside when we were going in and when we came out nor of those who sat all around me nor of those in the hall ways (perhaps there were a few) is troubling and tells more about the experience sought than the desire to hear from the God of the Word.  The sparse reading of scripture was that: sparse. No biblical preaching, no exhortation from the word of God and again the brief commentaries about Scripture were off.  Here is the crux of the issue about the lack of Bibles there: all there were singing sincerely and from their hearts to the Lord. A response to the Lord apart from the word of God directing us is not a biblically based response because it is not based on the Bible. At best it’s a response in our energy and zeal but not one empowered by God’s Spirit thru His word.  Previous revivals under Edwards, Nettleton and others had people responding: first to God’s holiness and sin and then to the greatness of God’s redemption in Christ. This was not present from what I could see. It was we are here and we need to sing to the Lord. Again, this is not all bad, it’s just a really mixed bag of things. It is incomplete. Yes, the people blessed the name of the Lord thru song, but they were not led or taught the word of God. We encounter God in His word. The emphasis of encountering God there was being with others who loved God, singing good songs, and thru personal testimonies. In the end, it was/is a passionate song service towards the Lord, but is not revival.