Latest / The OneCry Podcast / #257 - When Revival Meets Prayer: A Pastor's Call to Unity

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#257 - When Revival Meets Prayer: A Pastor's Call to Unity · The OneCry Podcast

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  In the greatest way, and I think this is one of the things you're seeing in the pastor's
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  prayer.
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  The greatest way to build unity is prayer, isn't it, Lord?
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  Absolutely.
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  Welcome to the One Cry Podcast, a nationwide call for spiritual awakening.
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  The goal, accelerating the movement of God through sharing revival truth, stories, and
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  reports.
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  Well, welcome to the One Cry Podcast.
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  I'm Bill Eliff, and I'm really excited about the little series we've been doing these last
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  weeks as we've looked at how revival has just transformed lives.
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  And I've looked around for some of my dearest friends and just what God has done in their
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  lives.
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  And I know, like me, you have thrilled at hearing these stories and also learned something
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  from each one of these men and women about how we can cooperate with God and his great
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  enterprise of revival.
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  And I'm really thrilled to have my buddy Jordan Bowen with me.
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  Jordan, you can look at him and tell that he's younger, significantly younger.
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  We've had the privilege of walking together because he and I both pastor in the same town
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  in Little Rock, Arkansas.
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  And so we've spent a lot of time praying together and talking together, and Jordan has joined
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  our One Cry team and served with One Cry just in so many beautiful ways, and even overseas
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  in helping to start some One Cry movements overseas, which is beautiful.
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  And Jordan's been busy building a church, has planted a church in an area where a lot
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  of people wouldn't have planted them, and planted a church here in Little Rock.
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  And God has just blessed that church, and it's so full of the life of God.
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  I've preached over there for him every once in a while when he'll let me, and it's just
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  so full of God's presence.
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  And some of you know this, but Jordan has particularly worked among international people
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  and students.
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  Last count, I think, Jordan, you had 20-something nationalities represented in your church.
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  Yeah, yes, sir.
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  Yes, sir.
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  Praise the Lord.
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  Yeah.
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  So, Jordan, I've been asking people, where did they encounter revival, encounter God
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  in revival?
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  Revival's not an entity, but God manifesting himself in unusual ways that we would call
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  a movement of revival or movement of spiritual awakening.
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  And where did you first get exposed to that, begin to be thinking about that, and how did
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  it impact your life in the beginning?
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  Yeah.
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  Well, I think the first time I think back that I kind of maybe heard the word revival
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  or heard and gained an understanding of an extraordinary movement of God and through
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  the people of God was a little bit in high school, just hearing stories, stories of what
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  had happened in the past.
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  And then in college, one particular memory of just sitting down in the library, picked
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  up a book out of this, I went to Christian college and just looked through all the Christian
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  history kind of books and found one, started reading, and it was just basically someone's
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  life of encountering the Lord and seeing him move in extraordinary ways and their churches
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  and cities they would go into and hundreds of people being saved and transformed lives
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  and disciples being reproduced.
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  And it just stirred in me, so it was really stories of the past when I was in that time.
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  And it was just stories of, like you said, kind of the stories, they fan the flame in
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  you and that's really what it did.
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  It just began to light this desire in me of, Lord, if that's still possible, if you still
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  move in this kind of way, where you extraordinarily do a work that just seems to just move forward
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  a church or move forward a city beyond what I have seen, I really want to be part of that.
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  And not in any other way, but because I just, I know that I need it in my life.
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  I need to encounter you in that way, Lord.
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  And so that really began to posture me even as a student in college of, Lord, I want that
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  in my life.
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  And I didn't realize it till later, Bill, I actually, I asked a question, I think at
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  one point to Central Baptist College, where I did my undergrad, and one of the stories
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  I heard was this student who fasted and prayed, and then there was a particular chapel service,
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  a normal planned service that after this particular student fasting and praying for, I can't remember,
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  maybe a month, God just moved in an extraordinary way.
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  And I heard this story, and it wasn't until probably a few years ago that I began to kind
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  of think about that more.
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  And I think it was during, it had to have been around the Jesus movement, or shortly
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  after.
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  Probably was.
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  Yeah.
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  I think it's related to Asbury.
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  Yeah.
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  The movement at Asbury, yeah.
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  And so it's interesting because then to follow up to, this is where I first heard it, but
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  then now about five years ago, of course, personally encountered Lord in a reviving
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  sense, and you're a big part of that in my life, and I can speak to that here in a moment.
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  But then also began to see, oh, these stories I've read, like, they do still happen today.
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  And so, Lord, how can I posture my life in such a way to set open my sails for however
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  you want to move?
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  Yeah, it's so beautiful because we've been talking, Jordan, to a number of different
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  people.
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  A lot of them who are my age, who were in, they just encountered Jesus in the Jesus movement.
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  Right.
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  So their first encounter was God just erupting on a campus or something like that.
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  But for you, it was just learning about it and hearing about it, and it's stirring something
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  in your heart.
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  And I was thinking as you were talking, one of the reasons we started the OneCry podcast,
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  one of the reasons we started OneCry at all was to tell the stories and resource information
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  to people about revival and awakening to help stimulate that in their life.
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  So that's what I say.
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  And then I know, Jordan, you've really become a student of revival, even, or tell us a little
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  bit about that, how you've grown in that understanding.
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  Yeah.
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  Thank you.
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  Yeah.
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  Well, a lot of it was in a desperate season of life.
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  I know I've shared some of this before on this particular podcast.
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  The Lord, I mean, just clear as can be, prompted me to send you an email.
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  I had met you one time before at a prayer gathering, it's the first time I'd ever seen
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  churches come together to pray, and I didn't know that was even possible.
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  So that already just enlarged my heart.
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  But then in a particular difficult, painful season, the Lord just clearly said, you need
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  to reach out to Pastor Bill.
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  And from there began our friendship.
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  And I think just by being with you, I began to ask questions of revival, as well as the
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  relationship of revival and prayer.
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  And so not only did you walk through that season with me, but you helped me see that
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  particular season was an opportunity to encounter the Lord and seek personal revival.
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  And because that's really where it landed me, was personally getting with the Lord and
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  personally surrendering and seeking the Lord for a fresh encounter with Him in my life,
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  and then living that out.
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  And through that, it was stories that you shared with me of your experience and coached
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  me through, and then asking you to teach me how to pray, to say, can we get together and
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  pray, I want to know, there's more I know.
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  But then I remember in particular, I said, okay, now, how can I be useful to the Lord
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  in sharing this?
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  And one of the things you encouraged me to do was to be a student of revival.
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  And so I did, I just started collecting stories of past and present.
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  And I found that the best way was to use my notes app on my phone, that way, wherever
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  I'm at, I can quickly go to a particular note, and I have all the stories there.
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  So I can just quick, if I need a remembrance of a number, a fact, or a date, I can pull
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  that out and be accurate, and be able to say, hey, in the first great awakening, and speak
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  to that.
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  But then I began, by God's grace, just hearing stories of current.
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  So I just started currently tracking and storing up stories of personal testimony from Asbury,
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  that I heard.
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  And I would gather those stories, collect the information, put it in that notes app,
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  and then just tell it to other people.
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  I mean, truly, some of that's on Sundays, preaching, but like, a lot of it was just
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  talking to someone and be like, hey, do you know, and I began to tell a story of a young
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  lady at Asbury in particular, that was considering suicide, I mean, just had no desire in her
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  life at all.
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  The Lord encountered her there, and radically changed her life.
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  And so being able to see God use those stories.
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  I think that student part has first began by being a, Lord, I need to be the student.
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  I need you to grow in me what it means to be a man that's humbly broken before you every
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  day, daily seeking personal revival.
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  But it was also through this podcast, I gained stories and collected them, and also heard
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  from other leaders of what God's doing in their lives, and just saw that doesn't matter
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  how old or young you are, you need revival.
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  So that's kind of just this, yeah, testimonies.
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  Yeah, it's, it's beautiful in it.
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  And it really illustrates something, Jordan, that, you know, I think any true believer
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  wants more.
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  I mean, if you really know the Lord, and I've experienced him, and yeah, grateful, you know,
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  some professing Christians could care less.
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  And you wonder, are they really even a Christian?
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  But true believers, I think they're just, you just, you hear a story or a testimony
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  or, or a report of something, you just think, Oh, my goodness, I wonder if we can have it
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  in our church.
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  I wonder.
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  And I know, I know two things I think of about you, you're one of the few guys in my life
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  who has ever come to me and said, Would you teach me how to pray?
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  Just straight up.
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  And I just, I love that.
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  And I thought, Okay, this is this is a wonderful privilege and an opportunity.
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  And then I watched you as you were planning this church, so hungry for the presence of
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  God in that church.
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  And you were doing everything I, you know, you'd asked me about this and that, and I'm
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  sure ask others about things, and you just wanted to create an atmosphere in that church
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  where the Lord was pleased to dwell.
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  And I remember, I don't know if you remember this, but one time after I was preaching for
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  you in that church, I said, Jordan, I said, Don't get the big head about this, but I'm
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  in all kinds of churches all over the country.
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  I don't know of a church that's so full of presence of God as your church.
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  And it was it was true.
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  And it's because you've made room for that.
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  And because you were hungry for that, which really teaches us something on this podcast
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  about how we approach this.
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  You know, the Lord said, Open your mouth wide, and I'll fill it.
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  And he's just, you know, he's just waiting to give us more and more and more.
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  But we've got a hunger for it, and we've got to go after it.
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  And that's what the Lord has done.
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  And consequently, not only have you experienced that, but you've also been used to help others.
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  I know a day you came to me and said, Hey, we need to be we've had a vibrant movement
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  of pastors prayer in Little Rock for over 30 years, and it ebbs and flows, and it was
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  kind of down, not flowing much.
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  And you came to me, I don't know, a year or so ago and said, Yeah, we need this.
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  We need to we need to get this going.
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  And I said, Well, maybe God's calling you to do it.
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  And you did.
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  And there's a really neat movement of prayer among our pastors again, which is really needed.
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  It's really needed.
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  It's hard to sustain.
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  Pastors are so busy doing their, you know, leading their churches and stuff.
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  So what do you see as you look around the country?
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  And what do you long to see in your generation?
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  And beyond what what's on your heart?
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  If you just saw God really take the lid off this thing?
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  Yeah, yeah, I would think it would be movement of revival that leads into awakening, which
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  is the loss being saved and in more and more.
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  I think that's what especially particularly among the nations that that are for me and
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  my neighborhood, you know, that they would radically come to know the Lord and then radically
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  make him known at any cost.
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  And so I think what I long to see is, is, I mean, you and I've shared about this, but
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  some of the things I've read and heard and stories to happen in Little Rock, I long for
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  that.
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  I long for more unity among the churches and prayer and in opportunities of making Christ
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  known in our city and through that churches coming alive again.
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  I think without revival, at least in the particular denomination I serve with currently, without
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  a move of God, a lot of churches are just going to phase out.
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  Unfortunately, that phase out will probably last 10, 15, 20 years of ineffective work.
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  It would be better if it just came quicker, but revival can shift all that in a month's
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  time because we need churches that are ready to receive people to just like recycle them.
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  And it sounds like we're, our storms are going on.
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  Five flood warnings.
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  Both of our phones.
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  That's right.
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  At the same time.
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  Yeah.
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  The alarm is not rising at your house if you're watching this right now.
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  But I think to answer that, I think that would be, I mean, personally, yeah, it's just to
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  see a move of God in my, in wherever he has me and not to miss it, not to be willing and
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  ready to listen to the Holy Spirit's prompting and the lead in those moments, but then to
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  help unite churches so that it's, I think that if churches are not united, then the
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  revival we're seeing, it doesn't continue to spread rapidly, right?
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  If churches aren't ready and which would lead into some of the, what we know about the Jesus
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  movement and some churches not being willing or ready.
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  And I don't want that to happen again.
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  So if my generation, my generation, I would want to be part of leading that change this
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  time of no, we're going to be ready to receive, to lead, to serve, to multiply, to shepherd
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  this movement so that it can spread and it can really shift, not just a decade or a generation,
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  but hopefully generations to come, a nation, the nations, the world, and that would be
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  cemented in my heart.
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  It's beautiful.
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  And we, we have a good friend, Bob Bakke, who's on our Born to Cry team, and Jordan
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  and I both know and love deeply.
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  In fact, we interviewed him for one of these podcasts and Bob is known as often saying
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  that movements happen among friends, you know, history is made among friends, and there's
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  something about building a relational network in a city or on a college campus or wherever
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  among people that if that, if that's built, the movement and the fire of God comes upon
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  it.
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  Well, it can spread just way quicker and has greater stability because you're not, you're
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  not looking across the road and saying, well, I wonder who that guy is and what his agenda
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  is.
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  You know, you know that guy, you've lived with him, you, and, and the greatest way,
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  and I think this is one of the things you're seeing in the pastor's prayer, the greatest
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  way to build unity is prayer, isn't it, Jordan?
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  Absolutely.
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  Absolutely.
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  Praying together.
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  Why, why is that, you think?
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  Well it's hard to be mad at someone you're praying with, I'll tell you that, like I just
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  think that the best way to keep a church united is to get them praying out loud together,
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  right?
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  It just really hard to be disunified.
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  I think a lot of that has to do with if you're rightly praying, then we're rightly hearing
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  from the Holy Spirit what He is leading us to pray to the Father and what the Father
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  wants to do here on earth, right?
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  And that's something you've taught me from Ephesians that it's, I think that that is
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  a part of praying in the Spirit is, Lord, what do you want to do?
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  What do you want me to pray back to you for you to do or move in my life or on this earth?
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  So if you're rightly doing that, you've got to lay aside a lot, your agenda, your personality,
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  your preferences.
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  And so as you begin to lay that down, it unites you.
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  I think the second thing is you find out people are hurting and grieving and in pain just
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  like you are when you play with them.
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  I pray with pastors of churches of every size you can imagine.
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  They struggle with the same things that I do.
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  They hurt the same way, they get hurt the same way, their kids are of different various
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  ages but have the same struggles.
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  They're praying for the same exact thing and it just humbles you because you realize, wow,
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  we're really just people who really need Jesus.
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  And so you just begin to pray in a way that you care for the person next to you deeply.
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  Envy, competition, all that stuff just kind of falls away when you pray together.
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  So Jordan, I love this and it's so interesting.
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  Each person who we've interviewed has given us one more little piece of understanding
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  about this and just as you have today and it's so good.
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  As you know, we always love to end this podcast by praying and inviting the people to pray
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  with us.
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  So would you, for the next moment, would you just lead us in a time of praying for that
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  very movement that you're longing for, a way that is in your heart.
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  Would you just cry out to God for us and we're going to join you in that prayer.
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  Yeah, absolutely.
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  Yeah, Lord, we do.
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  We thank you for what you've done and what you're doing.
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  And Lord, I was just saying the other night, I don't ever want to not come to you and say
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  thank you.
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  But thank you for what you've done in my life, the church I get to be a part of, my
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  family.
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  Lord, at the same time as I say thank you, Lord, I want to seek your kingdom, come your
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  will be done.
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  I want heaven on earth, Lord.
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  And so Lord, I do with every listener right now, we all together, we say, Lord, we know
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  that there's more you want to do in our lives and through our lives.
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  We know that there's an extraordinary work of yours, God, that can only be done by you.
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  And so Lord, right now, every listener, we just want to surrender ourselves to that purpose,
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  Lord.
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  We do.
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  We want to say, what do you want to do in my city, in my home, in my state, in my nation,
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  among the people, group or culture I'm a part of, that would be a revival move of you, God.
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  And then from that, Lord, we want to say, well, you begin it in me, would you begin
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  it in me, that I would be able to lead from a place or serve from a place of encountering
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  you, of a fresh relationship with you, God, and it would just be an overflow from my intimacy
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  with you, Lord, would come the doing, that the abiding would be priority.
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  Lord, I pray that, Lord, and that that would move in such a way, Lord, that there would
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  be not just a generation, but generation after generation, there would be a culture shift,
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  Lord, that we would see true revival and awakening, Lord, when there's a shift in a culture, because
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  they encounter you, Lord, and Lord, that's what we say, would you move in such a way
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  into each area where we're praying right now together, Lord, that it would shift a culture,
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  it would shift beyond a generation, that it would affect our grandchildren, our children's
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  children, Lord, that they would be able to walk in that encounter with you into the next
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  work you have for them, Lord. And so, Lord, we just lay these things down before you,
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  Lord, and we do, we pray that from this would be a great move of people coming to know you.
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  Lord, I long for the days where there will be people that they accept Christ by encountering
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  you, and then they come to church and say, hey, I just accepted Christ, what do I do now?
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  And then that churches would be ready. Not only would they be going out and sharing the gospel,
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  but then, Lord, they would be ready to disciple those new believers and be able to multiply them
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  into going back into their circles of impact to share the gospel. So, Lord, would you just birth
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  story after story of life transformation because of your presence, Lord. And so, Lord, I just,
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  I close by saying in your presence is fullness of joy. And so, Lord, we thank you for the promise
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  of that. And we seek your presence right now in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thanks so much,
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  my friend, and I love you and having you on today. And thank you all for joining us. And I pray that
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  if you enjoy today, you'll tell a friend and send them a link to this podcast and
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  then always and forever join us next week. We'll be plowing away until the Lord comes back,
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  crying out for more and more of God. So, thanks again for joining our work, our podcast.
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  Amen.