“A Cry for Revival” | Sunday AM | Pastor David K. Caruthers

Original Broadcast of Sunday Morning 11 AM Worship, 05/03/2026 

Speaker: Pastor David K. Caruthers

Message Title: "A Cry for Revival" 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

I'd like to direct your attention to the book of Acts, chapter 3, verse number 19. Acts chapter 3, verse 19, if you can join me there. I want to read one verse of scripture to you that's probably familiar to many of you and just pray and ask God to speak to our hearts today. So Acts chapter 3, verse number 19 says, Repent ye therefore. Well, that's a tough way to start a command, isn't it? Repent ye therefore and be converted that your sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord. And today I want to preach to you for a few minutes Hearts Cry for Revival. Let's pray and ask God to speak to our hearts. Lord, we thank you for this time, this moment, this place you've given us. We thank you for every person that is gathered here today and for their worship being gifted to you today. We pray, Lord, that you would speak to our hearts, that you would touch our minds, help us to receive your word. We give you praise and honor and glory in the name of Jesus. We pray. Amen. Amen. You may be seated. Thank you so much. And those of you who join us online, thank you for being with us today. If I can, I want to jump right in without a lot of introduction today. I just want to say we need revival. We need revival in America. We need revival in our own communities. We need revival in our own selves and in our own homes. We constantly need revival. And today I want to preach to you for a few moments about revival. I want to say, by revival, let me just define what I'm saying today, because sometimes we talk about revival only in the sense of personal renewal. But today I want to talk to you about revival as a sovereign touch, a sovereign move of God that somehow ignites and refires and engulfs us. So much so that it goes beyond us, that extends beyond where we are, extends beyond the individual, extends into the community, extends into the people around us. When we truly are revived, it's never focused only on us. But it goes from us. The Spirit of God works through us, and we began to fulfill what God has called us to do. And so I'm speaking a revival that that is more than just you, more than just me, more than just the church, but that spreads outside of the church into the community around us where God touches people's lives. Now that kind of revival that I'm referring to this morning is a sovereign God movement. It's not excitement, it's not a new fad. It's not a new style, it's not a new method of doing things, but it's a God-breathed moment that God does something powerful in our lives and in our world. Now we are grateful and we celebrate everything. I don't want to go any further till I say we are appreciative and we are celebrating and we are filled with thanksgiving for everything that God has done. Amen. Every miracle that God has provided, we thank God for it. Every opportunity he has given us, we thank God for it. Every person that he's healed, we thank God for that. Every person that he has saved and filled with his spirit, we thank God for that. Whatever God has done, we are grateful, we are thankful, we are appreciative, we will remember, we will celebrate, we will rejoice in what God has done, but we also know that's not the end of the story. We also know that God has something more, God has something greater, God has something powerful for us, both now and as we move into the future that He has planned for us. And so we're grateful, and we're grateful for all the daily things that God does in our lives. God does miracles in our lives daily, God helps us daily, God gives us victory daily, God gives us strength daily, God gives us his mercies every day. And I'm thankful for all of those things that God has done and that God is doing on a continual basis. But there are times, there are places, there are moments when God chooses to do something even greater. The Bible tells us that in the New Testament they had miracles, and many people were filled with the Spirit, and they had a lot of things happening day in and day out. And oftentimes we read in the scripture just sort of a summary of some things that have happened, and it'll say things like these signs, these miracles continued. Because it's not naming them all. It's impossible to name them all. So there's always things happening that God is working, that God is doing things in people's lives, and and that's uh to be celebrated. But it also uh we also find that there are special times. There are times that God does notable miracles, that God has a special outpouring of his spirit on our lives and on the lives of people, where God takes a moment and we see a pivot where God is doing something that really changed the way uh that people received what God was doing in their lives, or changed the audience entirely from an audience that was excluded as now God has brought into the equation. We can see those moments, those miraculous moments where God does something divinely, God says something supernatural that really that really shifts things. And sometimes in our lives, God brings us to those moments. And I, as a pastor, I want to say that I I sense, I feel like we're we're at one of those moments where God wants to do something special, God wants to do something powerful, God wants to do something that we can look back to and say, that was a moment, that was a time when we can see God did something that was miraculous, greater than we have seen on that day-to-day basis. That God gives a special outpouring of his spirit. Now, the Holy Spirit is available to you anytime. Anytime. There's not a special moment that you can't get the Holy Spirit or you can't receive what God wants to do in your life. We find that outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Acts chapter 2. You don't have to wait for another Acts chapter 2. It was poured out for us all. But we also know that there seems to be sort of waves of when God pours out his spirit in another way, in another moment, in another time, or in another place where many people are come to that place where they can receive what God wants to do. And I I believe that that, and I'm calling that a revival today, and I believe that that still happens in our lives, in our walk with God, in our relationship with God, and in a church that God still does these things. But it won't happen by chance, it won't happen just because, well, we're special people, it won't happen just because we have the right building, it won't happen because we have the right talent, it won't happen because we have the right music, it won't happen because there's a celebrity gonna bring it. It won't happen because a preacher's gonna come with his suitcase and bring it to us. It doesn't work that way. It's a sovereign move of God, it's a power of God, it's a strength of God that is poured out. And I believe God wants to do that for us and in our lives and in this church. Do you believe that today? And we have to have something that stirs within our hearts. Our hearts have to begin to cry out for revival, have to be crying out for what God wants to do in hunger and thirsting for God's move in our lives, God's touch in that supernatural way in our lives. We must desire it. We must sense that calling. We must feel that need. We must reach out and say, God, we want that move of your spirit. We want that revival to happen. We want hearts to be touched. We want our lives, not just our lives to be renewed, but we want you to do that spectacular thing that you have promised, that you desire. I believe God wants to take us to that moment. God wants to take us to that place. But it will require us to believe that He will. It will require us to have faith. It will require us to say, yes, we believe God wants to do that. Because faith is what compels us into action. Faith is what compels us to seek after God. Faith is what compels us to call on his name and expectation and faith. We must believe that he is, and that he is the rewarder of those who diligently seek him, as the scripture says. That's how we come to God in faith and confidence and believing in him. It's so important for us to have faith that he wants to do something, that he wants to touch our lives. We start with faith. In Jesus' hometown of Nazareth, the scripture says about that place, and he, Jesus, did not many mighty works there. Why? Because of their unbelief. Not because he didn't love them, not because he didn't care for them, not because he was busy in Jerusalem, not because of anything else, except because they were so familiar with him and expecting him to be just the common son of Joseph. That they didn't believe that it was going to happen there. They didn't trust, they didn't believe, they didn't have faith that it was going to happen, and because of that, it did not happen. They did not allow Jesus to work the way he wanted to work in his hometown because they didn't have faith that he could do it or that he would do it. Faith is a key factor. It's important for you and I sitting here today as a congregation, as a body of Christians, as a group, to say, we believe that God will pour out his spirit. We believe that God will do the miraculous. We believe that God will do something spectacular. We believe that God will draw hearts and lives. We believe that God will fill people with his spirit and his power. And faith, as the Bible says, without the works to support it, is dead. And so believing alone is not enough. Just having faith alone is not enough. It has to compel us to action, it has to compel us to move forward in trusting in God. And so because we believe, because we expect that God will work, we will prepare for what God wants to do. We'll prepare, we can't do the work that God does. It's a sovereign work of God. I tried to emphasize that very much at the beginning. We can't make it happen, but we can prepare the way for God to do what He wants to do. We can prepare our hearts for what God wants to do. We can prepare our lives for what God wants to do. We can bring our hearts to the place that our hearts are crying out for God to do something, for God to do that miraculous work. As our hearts cry out for revival in our lives. And so what do we do? Well, first of all, we have to surrender to God. We have to surrender to God. Romans chapter 12, verse number one and two says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world, but be a transform by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. That it takes us to surrender our hearts to God. It takes us to commit our hearts to God, to not just in a moment, not just in a crisis, uh, you know, when we're facing an obstacle in a crisis moment where we're saying, God, I'm surrendering to you because my life is falling apart. No, it's a surrender, a commitment to God that we live with day in and day out, uh, following after God. As Thomas said, My Lord and my God, my Lord and my God, we submit to God. My Lord means he's the master, and I'm submitting to him. Brother Tyler referred to that even in the teaching this morning. It's it's it's that we we he if he's Lord, that means we submit to him. I know, I know, I know. It doesn't sound very American. We have, you know, sort of uh our identity is built on this sort of independence, you know, that nobody can tell us what to do. Except for children. Yes, your parents tell you what to do. You know, we kind of can adopt that mentality, but that's not how we we that's not how we approach God. We approach God in surrender. We approach God by submitting ourselves to Him, to submitting ourselves to God. You know, when you submit yourself to God, you still pray for the needs that you have. And you pray for those needs because that's what He told you to do, to ask. He said to ask, and so we ask. But you don't demand, you ask because that's what He said to do. And you then submit yourself to God. You you give those needs to God in thanksgiving, as the Bible describes. You come with a gratefulness, not a demanding proud attitude. You come with a gratefulness to God for what he has done, asking him to touch our needs and our lives. But we don't we don't do it in pride. Instead, we say, God, not your will, not our will, but your will be done. Not what I want, but how you want to work in our lives. How you we follow the example that Jesus displayed in the garden when he said, Not my will, but yours be done. We do the same thing. That's submitting to God. You're not submitted to God when you're stomping around, stomping your feet, demanding God do stuff for you. Now, most of us live for God that long enough that we've done that a few times. You know, I know you're not gonna raise your hand because you don't want your children to see that you had a temper tantrum. But we've come with that approach sometimes, and I hear that approach in our culture sometimes, even in Christianity sometimes, that somehow I force God to do what I want him to do. No, you don't. You don't. That's not how it works. You submit to God, you surrender yourself to God, you give yourself to God. And so to have a revival that you that you need to have, that I need to have, that our world needs, that a church needs, we have to surrender to God, surrender to him, submit to him. Not only that, we have to clear our conscience. In Acts 24, 16, the apostle Paul writes, and herein do I exercise myself. This is what I do, he said, to have always a conscience void to the offense toward God and toward men. He said, I determined that I'm not gonna hold an offense, that I'm not gonna hold a wound, but instead I'm gonna surrender it to God, I'm gonna give it to God, I'm gonna forgive. I want to tell you that a critical attitude is a barrier to revival. God appointed no one to be a critic. No one. You're not spiritual because you can criticize people. You don't have spiritual insight because you can criticize people. If your insight comes from God, it should drive you to compassion, care, and love, not to criticalness. So we're not talking about measuring everything, we're not getting our measuring stick out on anyone else, nor are we some other church or some other place or some other time. We're just saying, God, I surrender to you and I want revival. I want your spirit, I want your touch in my life, I want your work in my life. Because if we have that, it'll distort. We'll say God said all kinds of things that God didn't say. We must be willing to clear our conscience, we must be willing to repent. We must let God change us. You get offended when God confronts you with something that tells you something's going on in you. When God shows you something, it should result in repentance. When we're praying and fasting and seeking God, sometimes God shows us something that needs to change in our life. It's not always sin, but He He chose us something that needs to change. It may be priorities. He shows us something needs to be changed. Don't get offended by that. Don't let that hurt your feelings in some way. Instead, surrender that to God. God's trying to direct you, He's trying to guide you, He's trying to help you. If you dig in your heels and resist, then it'll prevent the revival God wants to give you. It'll prevent what God wants to do in your life. Be willing to allow God to correct you. Be willing to get right with God and get right with others. Matthew chapter 5, verse, this doesn't sound very evangelistic, Pastor. Matthew chapter 5, verse 23 and 24 says, Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar, and there you remember that your brother has aught against you, you leave your gift at the altar, go your way, first be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift. You gotta forgive. You can't outprey it. You can't outworship it. You've got to forgive. You've got to forgive. Forgive doesn't mean the person is okay. It's not going to say, well, you did this to me, and so uh it's okay. Nor is it saying, you did this to me, I've held this, you've hurt me so badly, you've destroyed my life, and I want to just tell you how bad you've done me. That's not repentance. Repentance is releasing your right to punish. It's the crowd that stood around the uh Jesus and the woman that was caught in adultery. It's the crowd that dropped the stones and said, Okay, he that was out sin cast the first stone. That's what forgiveness is. It's dropping the stone and saying, Well, I could, but I don't have to. And I can forgive instead. I can forgive. It doesn't mean the hurt's not real. It doesn't mean the words or the hurt or whatever it was that happened doesn't mean it doesn't justify it, it doesn't make it right, it doesn't do anything about it. All it does is release you from it. It releases the strings that's wrapped around your heart and mind so that God can give you the revival and the refreshing and the renewing that He wants to give you. A clear heart allows God to speak to you, it allows God's word to come alive in your life, it allows God to give you that revival that you need. But it requires that humility. The psalmist said in Psalm 34, verse 18 the Lord is nearer to those that are of a broken heart and save such as be of a contrite spirit. I want you to notice what it's saying. It's not saying those that have bad things happen to them, it's talking about our approach to God. Isaiah 57, verse 15 says, For thus saith the high and holy one that inhabits eternity, whose name is holy. I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, to revive the heart of the contrite. Psalms 51, the prayer of forgiveness and repentance, the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise. A broken and contrite heart. It's not about you being in some terrible circumstance. It's about us coming before God and allowing God to work in our lives, being open before God, allowing God to minister to us. 1 Peter chapter 5, verse number 5 says, God resists the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. We come before God with humility. And the fourth thing I want to mention to you is that we have to spend time with God. If we want a revival, we've got to allow God time to work in our lives. And this may be one of our biggest challenges for modern America. We've got a schedule, we've got responsibilities, we've got stuff going on in our lives, but it always takes some time. Not because God needs the time, because we need the time to work in our lives. In fact, we were created. To spend time with God. Genesis chapter 3 and verse number 8 tells us, and they heard the voice, this is Adam and Eve of the Lord walking in the wilderness, in the excuse me, walking in the garden in the cool of the day. And Adam and Eve had hid themselves from the presence of the Lord because they had eaten of the tree. The sin is what stopped the time they had with God. But it was his desire to spend time with it. We're too often in too much rush for God to do what he wants to do in our lives. I believe God wants to give us revival. We have to prepare our hearts for it. We have to prepare our minds for it. We have to let go of some things for God's work. And we have to allow God the time to work in our lives, to do what he wants to do. I believe God wants to give us that outpouring, that revival in our lives and hearts. In fact, I'm just going to ask you to pray with me right now. Just pray with me right now. Would you just reach out your hands to the Lord, God, forgive us? Lord, forgive us of every sin, forgive us of every every attitude, forgive us of every critique we've made, forgive us of every obstacle we have put in place that prevents you from doing what you want to do in our lives. Lord, we're surrendering ourselves to you because our hearts are crying out for revival. Our hearts are crying out for your work to be done. And we ask you, Lord, to wash us, to cleanse us, to purify our hearts, our minds. Let your will be done, not ours. Let your work be done. Let your power work in our lives. Lord, and we just surrender to you right now. We surrender to the work you want to do. And Lord, we forgive others who might have offended us. We forgive them. Lord, we want to release that from our lives. Help us, God, to let go of that, to release that hold, that barrier, that obstacle for what you want to do. Lord, let us be able to let go of that offense and let our minds be fixed on you. Let your spirit touch our hearts. Let a renewing happen in our hearts, Lord. Let a grace begin to work in our lives. We want, God. We desire, God. We seek for that revival, that openness, that that window that opens, that you can do something miraculous and powerful in our lives. We join together right now. Would you join with me right now in the name of Jesus? We ask you, God, to wash us, to cleanse us, to purify us, to make us whole, God. Let our hearts be prepared for what you want to do. Let your spirit minister to our lives. In the name of Jesus, we want to just take this time to ask you, Lord, that our hearts would be cleansed and our lives would be open for what you want to do. We want to surrender to your work, to your power, to your grace. Lord. In your name, Jesus, let your work be done. In the name of Jesus. It's not enough for us to simply pray for ourselves. It's not enough for us to simply feel renewing in our own hearts. It's not enough for us to just be refreshed in the Spirit ourselves. The church is not a restaurant where you're served until you're full and satisfied. Church is a place to give ourselves to God and for God to work in our lives. It's not just a place for us to receive. It's not just a place for us to get what we need, but it's a place where we are compelled to go beyond ourselves. Jesus, as he looked on the city of Jerusalem, he said this recorded in Luke chapter 13 and Matthew chapter 23. Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which kills the prophets and stones them that are sent to thee. How often I would have gathered thy children together as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and you would not. How often I desired, how often I would have, how often I wanted to, but you would not. But you did not. His heart cried out for the revival of the people in Jerusalem. His heart yearned to draw them together to do something in their life, but they resisted. They resisted. It's so easy for us. It's so easy for us to just focus on ourselves. But I want you to take a few minutes. I want to take a few minutes today and just say, Lord, we we don't want just for ourselves. We don't want just for what we want, but we want your revival, your spirit to be poured out in the lives of people around us. If that was your prayer, then our prayer should be praying for those people around us and what you want to do in their lives. And so today I want to take a moment to ask for your help. Our culture and perhaps sometimes just humanity seems to drift into the most comfortable place. The place where things are comfortable. It's that, you know, depends on how you, you know, what your background is. It's the first part of Newton's first law of motion, or maybe you just call it inertia. But it's summarized often by saying objects in rest tend to stay in rest. It takes some other act on it to make it move, to make it do something. It's so easy for us to be quite passive when we're comfortable. It's easy for us to ignore and even dislike someone who prods us out of our comfortable position. So I'm not sure you're gonna like me today. I'm trying to prod you out of your comfortable position and say our world, our city, our culture is crying for God to do something in their lives, and we cannot sit by smugly and act as though it's not. We've got to be moved, we've got to lift up our eyes, we've got to see the people around us. We can't just focus on ourselves. Too many times we're just on our own needs, and so we get something and we walk away. But God wants to do so much more than that. He wants to extend well beyond you, well beyond the church walls, well beyond what you know, into our community, into our city, into the people around us. Lift up your eyes. Look, there's people all around you that need God. I know there's thousands of people in church, even in San Antonio this morning, but there's also thousands of people on the street, thousands of people living their lives, thousands of people going about their day uninterrupted by anything else that need God in their lives, that need God's power in their lives. So I'm asking you as a church body, I'm cry, I'm asking you to let your heart cry out for revival. I'm asking you to lift up your eyes to the community around you, lift up your eyes to God and cry out to God. I'm asking you during this month of May, if you'll just uh stretch your heart and stretch beyond your normal, stretch beyond what you normally do, and spend some time in prayer and fasting and seeking God for those that are around us that need God in their lives, those that are unsaved, those that are overtaken by their lives in this world. And so I'm challenging you today to get out of your comfort zone. I'm challenging you, I'm trying, I can't act on you, but I can ask you to act on yourself, to make a commitment, to make a commitment from your heart that I'm gonna pray this month, I'm gonna fast this month, I'm gonna seek God this month because I believe that God wants to pour out his spirit. He wants to do something miraculous and powerful, and I want to invest in faith in what I believe that God is going to do. Our hearts. Those lost sheep that Jesus came to seek and save. And I ask them to fast and to find time to fast. And I just want to tell you that the the leadership team is behind what I'm saying today. They've gotten on board with it. I've heard from almost every one of them now, and they've committed a total of 75 days of fasting and prayer in the month of May. And I'm asking you to join as a church body. I'm asking you to join with us. Ministry leaders are gonna be asking you to join with prayer. Ministry leaders are gonna also be asking you to fast. I'm asking you, I believe God wants to do something, God wants to do something miraculous, and we are right on the edge of it. And if we believe it, we should go all in. We should go all in. We should go all in. We should say, Lord, I'll pray more, I'll fast more, I'll do what I can, I'll reach out to my community, I'll let my eyes be open to those that are hungry. Lord, our hearts are crying for that revival, for that move of your spirit, for that outpouring of your spirit that we know you want to do. We've experienced it personally, but we know there's something even greater than that, where the community begins to feel the presence and the power and the spirit of God. So I'm asking you, will you help? Will you commit? Will you commit? So I'm just I just want to ask you as a pastor, would you raise your hand just that you will commit to prayer and fasting? I'm not asking you for a number, but all the rest of you, uh leaderships, I ask for a number. They're leaders. Would you commit yourself and say, yes, pastor, I'm gonna commit myself. I'm gonna find time for prayer and fasting for the unsaved around us. I'm gonna I'm gonna invest in what I believe God wants to do. I believe God's gonna hear that. I'm sure, I'm certain that we'll have a much more than 75 days of fasting altogether. With all of you, we'll have much more than double of that. But we're just praying for God to pour out his spirit in a miraculous and powerful way. Our world needs revival, and our hearts cry out for God to respond. They don't know, they don't know how to cry out for it. They don't even know what they're hungry for, but God's spirit can come in like a flood and touch our lives and hearts and touch our souls. Would you stand with me? But it can't be just about us, it can't be just about me. So I want us to pray together that God would give an outpouring of his spirit. I'm just gonna leave.