Revive Us, Oh Lord

We do well to pray as we sing: “America! America! God shed His grace on thee. And crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea!”

Much of the godly luster has rubbed off of America.

Instruments of measurement need calibrating.

Glasses need to be updated.

Rifles need sighting-in.

Clocks need to be synchronized.

Likewise, lives and nations need spiritual renewal.

America is in crisis need of rejuvenating. Rarely has despotism been given a green light. Our moral life has decayed. Spiritually we are bankrupt.

One in every five Americans needs a psychiatrist.

There are 25,000 suicides annually. Ten times that number try.

We recently experienced a 77% increase in juvenile crime.

We are a living demonstration that self-governance without self-discipline won’t work. 

While struggling to revive our core values don’t give up on America.

America needs revival. This, however, is not the only time revival has been needed.

In the early 1790’s when our young nation was emerging, they took a poll at Harvard and could not find one single believer.

They took one at Princeton and found two believers. They found only five students who were not members of the “Filthy Speech Movement” of the day.

When the Chaplain of Yale opened his Bible in chapel, decks of cards that had been inserted by students into a cut-out in the pages fell out.

At Dartmouth, students conducted a mock communion service.

These schools were all started as Christian institutions. Consider their decline and destitution. It is now said, “The road to hell is paved with Ivy League diplomas.

The nation’s public moral fiber was eroded. With a population of 5,000,000 we had over 300,000 alcoholics. A great whiskey rebellion was so destructive that President Washington had to call out the national guard.

Immorality and illegitimacy were rampant.

The churches were so decadent that Chief Justice John Marshall wrote Bishop Madison of Virginia saying, “The churches are too far gone to be redeemed.”

Time and time again throughout history God has shown His model of spirituality. His model may either be embraced for our good or rejected at our peril.

The low road of sin to disaster can be left by an individual or nation at any moment for the high road of obedience and blessing. May we live to see it.