We don’t often do book recommendations at Rooted Thinking, but I recently read a book that was just too good not to share with our readers. A God-Sized Vision, written by Collin Hansen and John Woodbridge, provides historical accounts of revival that the Lord has used to build and strengthen His church. Below are a few quotes that encourage us to seek the Lord’s presence and power afresh as we labor for God’s glory:

A God-Sized Vision

  • “A God-sized vision constitutes far more than having a ‘big’ vision of God’s capacity to display great power in the world. Rather, it calls us to completely reorient our frame of reference through which we look at the world” (181).

Characteristics of a True Awakening

  • “During genuine revival, the Holy Spirit contends and convicts, but he does not manipulate as he grants Christians a new experience of God’s presence and power.” (11)
  • “According to Edwards, a true revival exalts Jesus Christ, provokes Satan, prioritizes the Bible, and inspires love… Often, at least a handful of faith-filled believers engaged in heartfelt prayer for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit in order to experience revival.” (182)
  • “It may be that what we classify as revival, the apostles understood as the church’s expected posture toward God, one another, and the world around them. If so, then we might understand revival as times when Christians remember and embrace their calling by God’s grace and the power of the Holy Spirit.” (28) 

The Need for Revival

  • “Many Christians have grown so content with the ordinary that they don’t bother asking God for anything more. False biblical dichotomies that widen the chasm between the New Testament and us cannot justify reluctance to pray as Jesus and the apostles prayed. We who live in an era of small things must remember eras when the big things seen and heard in the Bible returned once more.” (12)
  • “The Korean awakening showed how revival can even touch nations without a dominant Christian culture. Many religious leaders had supposed that Christian nominalism was a necessary precursor to revival. Yet the Korean revival brought spectacular growth to a small Christian minority amid a culture hostile to their faith.” (110)

The Role of Prayer in Spiritual Awakenings

  • “There never has been a revival except where there have been Christian men and women thoroughly believing in and whole-heartedly pleading the promises of God.” (153)
  • “Is it possible that we do not see God working in mighty ways because we don’t ask him to work in mighty ways?”
  • “The 1857-1858 awakening testifies that God is not intimidated by the size of our cities and the sin found therein. His Holy Spirit can move through these cities again. God is looking for people like Jeremiah Lanphier who ask this question: ‘Lord, what would you have me to do?’ He is looking for people of prayer. And he uses this prayer to bring the Christian unity that so often precedes and accompanies revival.” (94)

What Revival Can’t Do

  • “Revival can never supplant the need for consistent, faithful teaching and discipleship. Without this follow-up plan, revival can promote mountaintop spiritually ill-equipped to survive the valleys of life.” (135)