ANNOUNCER: What does it mean to you when someone says our church is having a revival? How does the concept of revival stack up biblically? What is the saving message of most revivals in history? Well, stay tuned. I think you’ll find this episode very informative. Welcome, friend. We are so glad you’re joining us today on Grace In Focus. Our website, if you want to know more about us, is faithalone.org, where you can find all kinds of resources to help you in your Free Grace pursuits and studies. And please be mindful that for the fall semester, our online seminary, the time for application and registration is now; application deadline coming soon. So if you want to study with us this fall, get your application in and if you’re already a student, go ahead and register for classes. You’ll find everything you need at faithalone.org/seminary. 

Now with today’s question and answer discussion, here are Bob Wilkin and Ken Yates. 

KEN: I got a question from Jeff, and it concerns revivals. And Jeff is a student of revivals. And he says that more often to not, they always begin with contrition and conviction of sin among God’s people, followed by conviction of sin and a deep awareness of people, and here he’s talking about unbelievers, offending a holy God, which leads to turning to God and salvation. How does such witnesses, or what we read about these revivals, where would the free grace message of no need to tell people about their sin? 

BOB: Okay. First of all, what is Jeff talking about when he talks about the history of revivals? Is he talking about the Bible? In other words, we’re looking at revivals in the Bible? Is that what he’s talking about? 

KEN: No, he doesn’t give any example that. 

BOB: But what would most people say when they’re thinking of revivals, what would they be thinking about? 

KEN: Sure. I mean, as a guy who grew up in Baptist churches, we would have revivals every year, which is looking to get people saved in the community. 

BOB: Right. And you have some schools that do this. What was the famous recent revival we had? 

KEN: Asbury. 

BOB: In Kentucky, right? 

KEN: Right. Asbury. 

BOB: And there was a revival, and it went back, you know, many years, 40 years ago, I guess they had a revival at the same basic time. And of course, there was what’s called the Great Awakening. 

KEN: Well, two of them. 

BOB: Two of them? 

KEN: Yeah, there were two Great Awakenings. 

BOB: Okay. When were the two Great Awakenings? One was Jonathan Edwards, during that time? 

KEN: Yeah, there was one in the 1700s, and then there was one in the 1800s, right?

BOB: And what Jeff is saying is he studied those, and this is what he’s seen? 

KEN: Right. That it begins with the Church feeling remorse for their sin, and that leads to the unbeliever, feeling remorse, you know, after prayer, and these churches doing this, then unbelievers feel remorse for their sin, and that leads them to faith. And we’ve seen, his question again, even though he doesn’t word of this way, I’m sure this is what he means. If that’s what we’ve seen in history, that these great revivals are done by God, starting with contrition over sin, beginning with the people of God, and the unbelievers in the communities, having contrition over their sin, then what about the Free Grace message that we don’t need to preach that? If it’s been so successful, at least as we look at history, right? Why do we say that we don’t need to do that? 

BOB: Okay. So, first off, I guess we could ask the question, have the revivals that we’ve seen in our lifetimes,

KEN: Or even in history, 

BOB The first and second Great Awakenings, do we have strong evidence that the clear message of justification by faith alone apart from works or regeneration by faith apart from works, the John 3:16 message was being preached? And from what I can tell, the message that was being preached during the first and second grade awakening was a lordship salvation message. And that many of the revivals that we’ve seen in our lifetime have centered on lordship salvation. 

You know, I think you and I both did some blogs and some videos about the Asbury revival. But from what I saw, I didn’t get any clear evidence that anybody was proclaiming the free gift of everlasting life simply by faith in Christ. After all, Asbury is in the Pentecostal holiness perspective. And that is Arminian, they believe you can lose everlasting life, and you persever to keep it. 

KEN: And when you read those stories in the great awakenings, for example, very heavy on works, on repentance, from my understanding, that’s where the sinners bench, uh, mourners bench, where people would come down and mourn for their sins. And that’s part of the question here. They would come down and mourn from what I understand, for days. You know, they were, or at least hours, they would come down and weep at these, before they could be saved. 

BOB: Well, remember, Jonathan Edward’s famous sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God?” He had people—now, from what I understand, Jonathan Edwards read his sermons and he intentionally read them in a monotone so that from his perspective, the power of God’s word would come through, not his eloquence. And he had people hanging on to the pillars of the church lest they be sucked into hell. I mean, they were scared to death, they were going to hell. 

But the problem with it was they weren’t thinking, if I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, then I’m saved once and for all. They were thinking, I have to turn for my sins. I have to commit my life to Christ. And I have to follow Christ the rest of my life. And of course, Puritan theology has always had this quest for assurance. You know, they’re always looking, 

KEN: And it’s elusive. 

BOB: It is very elusive. David Englesma, who’s a five-point Calvinist, but disagreed with the ways some Calvinists understood the five points, basically said that Puritan theology is a gospel of doubt. That was the expression he used, a gospel of doubt. Joel Beeke, he wrote his dissertation at Westminster Seminary on the section dealing with assurance, calls his book that he came out of that, The Quest for Assurance. Basically Calvinists are on a lifelong quest for assurance. 

So the question I have based on Jeff’s question, I don’t think it’s clear, is he saying then that contrition for our sins is a condition for everlasting life, or is he saying that contrition for our sins can lead us to be open to the free gift of everlasting life? Which one of those is he saying? 

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KEN: He seems to be asking the question, if this has been so successful, if it has brought all these great results, like in the Great Awakenings and the other revivals that he studied throughout history, doesn’t that suggest that maybe this is the way God wants us to get the unbeliever to faith, to point out their sin to them. They need to emphasize that, for example, camp meetings, where the people would just wail over their sins, and many, many, many people quote, unquote, came to faith or became believers as a result of this. If this has been a successful method in the past, doesn’t that suggest that God’s approval on such a method? 

BOB: Number one, hypothetically, yes. I mean, if this has been proven to work in the past, hypothetically, this could be a good method. I do not believe it’s been proven to work in the past. I think most of the studies that have been done suggest that most of the people who come forward at the sawdust trail and the revival meetings end up not sticking. They don’t end up joining and staying in a church. They end up some kind of emotional response, and then they don’t end up persevering. 

Now, are many of those people born again? From our perspective we could say probably many of them are. And the fact they don’t persevere doesn’t prove they weren’t saved, but from a Calvinist or our many in perspective, if they fall away, it proves this wasn’t genuine, right? 

KEN: And then the other thing is, those who are saved, is it because they felt contrition over their sin or because they heard John 3:16 and believed it. 

BOB: Exactly. So, that’s the other part. What does the Bible say? 

KEN: That’s the issue, right. 

BOB: So does the Bible ever tell us that we need to have contrition over our sin in order to be born again? There’s no hint of that in the epistles or in the gospels. So, I would argue in the first place, it’s not forbidden by Scripture, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not commanded either. But the second thing I would argue is take a look at Jesus’ evangelistic method in the gospel of John. Did He tell Nicodemus to have contrition for his sin? No. How about the woman at the well? No. How about in John chapter 5? No. How about the bread of life discourse in John 6? No. Nowhere in the gospel of John does He say that people have to have contrition over their sin in order to be born again,

KEN: Now, for some people that could happen and as a matter of fact, I guess it might happen a lot. An unbeliever, I feel contrition over my sin and then he hears the message of eternal life in John 3:16 and he believes it. 

BOB: And this is a problem I have, Ken, because for a lot of people, here’s what they do. They say, I came to Christ by ABCDE. First, I wallowed in my sin and I hit rock bottom. Then I had contrition over my sin and I went through a 12-step program or whatever. And then I turned from my sins and I committed my life to Christ and then, you know, I was born again or something. And they don’t even teach justification by faith alone. They teach by conviction of sin and commitment of life. Why? Because that’s what they did. Well, my experience is only accurate if it’s consistent with Scripture, right? 

KEN: Kathryn, my daughter, tells the story that she grew up in a Free Grace home and she became a believer at a very young age, she heard the message of grace.

BOB: Probably can’t even remember when she came to faith.

KEN: Exactly. And so she hears these stories of contrition to sin and going down to the mourning bench and she can’t relate to that at all. She simply believed the message of grace, right? People’s experiences are different. 

BOB: Right. For some, it’s a dramatic turning from sins and contrition for others. It’s simply they hear the message, they believe it and they’re born again. Jeff, it’s a great question, but I would say we base on the Word of God. And since the Word of God does not give us a blueprint for revival and does not even command us to have revivals. 

KEN: And the gospel of John does not tell us to preach contrition of sin, even though some people do. 

BOB: Therefore, I would suggest, let’s make sure we get the message of life clear that we tell people that whoever believes in Jesus whom God the Father sent will not perish but has everlasting life. Let’s make that clear. 

KEN: Because that’s a message of grace. And that’s why we keep grace in focus. 

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On the next episode: will some believers really be ashamed at the Judgment Seat of Christ? How can this be possible if we have glorified bodies? Join us for the next episode of Grace in Focus.