What Has Happened to the 'Revival'?
If you go back and view the earlier meetings which are archived on the GOD TV website you can feel the difference in the 'atmosphere' compared to what is happening today.
The difference of course is the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Of course things are still happening at the Lakeland meetings; anytime you get several thousand Christians together who are seeking after God, you are going to see things happening. That should happen in your own living room if there are two or more of you. You don't need to travel thousands of miles to experience that.
The emphasis that was being placed on 'getting verified medical reports' does not line up with the accounts I read in the Bible when Jesus went about healing all those oppressed of the devil. In fact, the testimony of the person who says they are healed should be sufficient. Asking for proof from the medical community has the very seeds of doubt and unbelief at their core. When someone claims to be healed of this or that, and we immediately insist they get it verified we are saying we don't really believe them. In that moment the seed of doubt has been planted in the mind of the believer who is claiming a healing, which will be watered and nurtured soon enough by unbelieving believers and unbelieving non-believers.
This is an example of pandering to the media, so you can 'prove' that the LORD is in fact doing miracles! Think about it! You are asking the non-believing medical world and the non-believing secular media to give their stamp of approval to what the LORD is doing! It is good for us He is longsuffering!
The second mistake which has been made is all this emphasis on having the secular media come and verify what the LORD is doing! Does He need CNN or ABC or Geraldo to hype what He is doing? Were any of these networks responsible for the crowds which came to Lakeland right from the get go?
No, both of these ideas are born of men who are trying to manipulate and promote something which is HOLY and which should have been left in the hands of the HOLY SPIRIT.
Will we ever learn? If the ark looks like it might tip over, unless the LORD has anointed us, we are NOT TO TOUCH IT!
There is a whole industry in Christendom built around the sale of books and tapes and tee shirts who jump all over a move of the Holy Spirit for their own personal gain. Many of them got their greedy little fingers into the Lakeland pie and basically drove it into the ditch!
You will notice that the offerings started to dwindle and finances became more of an issue the more these men tried to take control of what the LORD was doing. In the beginning finances were NEVER an issue, the crowds were never an issue . . . . that is the way of it when the Holy Ghost is in charge.
Only when men put their grubby paws on it, did finances become an issue, did news reports go poorly, did medical verifications become an issue . . . . .
WILL WE EVER LEARN??
Is there still hope for the true 'revival' . . . . . I believe there is if enough of us cry out to God to not forsake what He has started and to grant repentance to those who would turn His sovereign move into their own little cash cow!
It has just been announced that the meetings are going to be held once again in Ignited Church (where it all started) after this weekend. This weekend is the last meetings in the 'tent'. So this revival has gone from a 700 seat venue, to a 3000 seat venue, to a 10000 seat tent back to a 700 seat venue. This will be good if they quit trying to make merchandise of the things of God. This will be good if they beg the Holy Spirit to return with His special Presence. This will be good if Stephen can keep the money changers out of the temple!
As for taking the 'ark' and moving somewhere else, if last weekend in Los Angeles is an example of what to expect, I am afraid this revival has been killed before it got out of the starting gate. Los Angeles was just another conference!
PRAY . . . . . . . . . PRAY . . . . . . . . . PRAY
