Well, here we are with another broadcast. The subject is the Prelude to Revival. Stay tuned for our broadcast, and if it's possible, have your Bible ready. What we saw in our last broadcast in Nehemiah chapter 3, they're building some gates here. The sheep gate in verse number 1, the fish gate in number 3, the old gate in number 6, the valley gate, verse 13, the dung gate, verse 14, the gate of the fountain, verse number 15, and then we have the water gate, interestingly, 26. the only gate where no repairs are mentioned. Down in 28 we have the Horse Gate, then we have the East Gate in 29, and finally the gate Mimpcad in verse number 31. They all represent something that is necessary our prelude to revival if we're going to see God work then we're gonna have to rebuild these gates here now we saw last broadcast that the first gate mentioned here is the sheep gate and of course it has to do with our relationship with Jesus Christ but also It has to do with Nehemiah's concern for God's sheep. We see here that he asks concerning the sheep back there, concerning the remnant. When I was a young boy from the age of about two years old until I was about 11 years old, I lived on a sheep farm. My dad was in charge of looking after all of these sheep. We had hundreds of sheep there. And one of the things I learned about sheep is they're not too smart. I don't think God did us much of a favor when he likened us unto sheep. They're really dumb. I remember one time they were unloading a boxcar. In fact, a lot of boxcars. A train had come in and there was hundreds of sheep. And they would put a plank down that these sheep would come down a ramp. And at the bottom of the ramp, they had a board. It was actually about four or five feet long and probably a foot or a little more high. And at the bottom of the ramp, they put this board up there so that when the sheep came down, they would need to, one after another, they would jump over the board and onto the ground. Well, after about 10 sheep had jumped over the board, they took the board out and every one of those sheep that came down off of that ramp jumped over a board that wasn't there. Why did they do that? Well, they're dumb. One before them did it, so I guess we better do it too. And sheep are very interesting animals, and God, as I said, didn't really do us a favor when he likened us unto sheep. Not too smart. Sheep cannot defend themselves. Most animals can fight back. A sheep, he can't fight back. In fact, he can't even run. If he runs too far, he'll overheat, fall over, and die. So the thing about sheep is that they need a shepherd. They need someone to protect them. And so we see here that Nehemiah was concerned about the remnant that was back in Jerusalem. The walls were down, the gates were burned, the remnant was in reproach and in much affliction there. and he was concerned about doing something about it. And so that's part of what's necessary if we're going to see a revival today. We need to be concerned about the remnant, about those people that really do want to do right, but they're just kind of apathetic now because it's been a while and we don't seem to be hearing too much from the Lord. Well, the Lord's not hearing too much from us, and that's the bigger problem. Also back in Wales in 1904, we've been looking at that revival. It was a tremendous revival. And we saw in our last broadcast that there was a pastor by the name of Joseph Jenkins, and he was going through the routine as pastors do from one Sunday to another and holding services, but he was very concerned about the sheep. He was very concerned, especially about the young people. They were a good group. They were coming to all the meetings, and yet it was just more like a Christian social club. How many people were really concerned about the things of God? Well, he read a couple of books, and one of those books was D.L. Moody's biography, and the other one was with Christ in the School of Prayer by Andrew Murray, and they stirred him up, and he decided he just needed to do some more praying. Well, as a result of getting serious about praying, one day in February of 1904, he was preaching a message to these young people. Now, he had the young people form a group, and they called it the Christian Endeavor Meetings, and there was about 60 of them that would stay behind for these special meetings. And that was commendable. However, he preached on 1 John 5 and verse number 4 about overcoming the world. He went home that night and shortly thereafter, a young teenage girl by the name of Flory Evans showed up at the door and she said, I'm very concerned about my spiritual state. And he asked her this question, can you talk to the Lord? And when you talk to Jesus, can you call him my Lord? And she thought for a minute and said, well, I know that in my head, but I can't actually say that. Then he said, you need to be saved. You need to trust Jesus Christ as your personal savior. And then after you do that, you need to acknowledge him as the Lord of your life. Tell him that you will let him take control and he can do whatever he wants to do with your life." And so she went home. Well, the next Sunday, they were having a meeting again. Again, there was about 60 young people present in this Christian Endeavor meeting, and Pastor Jenkins was talking to them, and he said, I want to ask you a question. And the question was this, what does Jesus Christ mean to you? Well, there was kind of a pause and silence for a little while. After a little while, one of the young men answered and said, Jesus Christ is the light of the world. He said, well, yeah, that's exactly what he is, but that's not my question. My question is, what does Jesus Christ mean to you? Now we ought to ask ourselves that question. What does Christ really mean to me? Well, there was a silence there, and finally, after a moment of silence, this young girl Flory Evans, who was somewhere between 16-17 years of age, she stood up and she said with a broken heart, I love the Lord Jesus with all my heart. And she sat down. Well, pretty soon there was silence for a while, and then you could hear sobbing in the room, and people began to weep, and young people began to break, and an amazing thing happened. And this was actually the beginning of the Great Welsh Revival in 1904. Young people, 16 to 18 years of age, Their hearts were melted. The Holy Spirit had moved in. And as soon as that happens, this is what happens. The young people went out and began witnessing everywhere. Everywhere they went, they just started telling people about the Lord. And pretty soon, crowds begin to come in. and they had more meetings, and souls were being saved. And Pastor Jenkins took these young people, and he formed them into a group, and he went from one church to another, and he let them testify about what the Lord was doing in their hearts and in their lives. And the revival, pretty soon the newspapers got a hold of it, because crowds of people we're meeting in all of the churches in that area. And keep in mind that this was a full six months before Evan Roberts was having his meetings. And young Evan Roberts, he was a young fellow. He was 26 years of age. Of course, the newspapers, they got on him and they used him. They promoted what was happening there, and that was fine. But what happens is that Evan Roberts seems to be the one where we look and we say, well, that's the one that God really used. And God really did use Evan Roberts in a marvelous way. But six months before he even came on the scene, a little teenage girl said, I love Jesus Christ with all my heart. And prior to that, what happened was a pastor got very sincere about the condition of his sheep, and what could he do to get them to fall more in love with Jesus Christ. And so we see this revival, the prelude to revival, as it was in Nehemiah's day, was when he got concerned about the sheep. And the Bible says that Nehemiah sat down, that means he stopped everything he was doing, And he prayed, and the Bible says there he didn't pray for, you know, an hour. He prayed for four months, night and day, he said, I make this prayer before God. that God would do something for that remnant back in Jerusalem. And we see the same thing happened here with this pastor by the name of Joseph Jenkins, and he got a burden for these young people. And the first thing that happened as a result of that burden was he was directed to spend more time in prayer. As a result of that, he was directed to start these youth meetings. These youth meetings then were used of God to start the great revival that we call the Welsh Revival. Well, I want to turn to Psalm 85. Once again, read this prayer. It says, Lord, thou hast been favorable unto thy land. That's past tense. Thou hast brought back the captivity of Jacob. Verse 2, thou hast forgiven the iniquity of thy people. Thou hast covered all their sin. Thou hast taken away all thy wrath, and thou hast turned thyself from the fierceness of thine anger." And so the psalmist is praying here, and he's looking back, and he's, much like we're doing today, we can look back to Nehemiah's day and say God did a marvelous thing there, as we saw in Nehemiah chapter 8. He did, that revival was underway in a marvelous way. We can look back to the days of 1859, the Great Revival then, or we can look back to 1904 when we see that God did a marvelous thing in Wales that actually affected the entire world. And we can say with the psalmist, thou hast been favorable, thou hast forgiven the iniquity of thy people. But then he stops and he turns in verse 4 here, And he says, turn us, O God of our salvation, and cause thine anger toward us to cease. Wilt thou be angry with us forever? Wilt thou draw out thine anger to all generations? Wilt thou not revive us Again, that thy people may rejoice in thee. Show us thy mercy, he says in verse 7. And verse 13, set us in the way. Oh, how much this is so needed today. And we see here that in Psalm 85, like in the day of Nehemiah, Or like in the Great Revival, actually in 1859 you'll find it was the same, and back in 1904 it was preceded. The Prelude to Revival was when concerned people turned to God in prayer, and began to seriously pray that God would help us. Help us. We are dumb sheep and we need some help. So what is the Prelude to Revival? Obviously, it's prayer. There was a man named Henry Roberts. Who was he? He was the father of Evan Roberts and people talked about him. They were amazed at his Bible knowledge and how he could memorize scripture. He worked in the mines and he would stop actually for a two-hour lunch hour And he would spend most of that time memorizing scriptures. His brother used to get upset with him when he was a young man because he would memorize scriptures into the night and keep his brother awake. His book, it was the Bible. He loved to be in the Bible, and that was God talking to him. And he loved to pray. That was him talking to God. And then there was a woman. Her name was Hannah Roberts. Who was she? She was the mother of Evan Roberts. They had 14 children. Her book, it was the Bible. And where would you find her when she had any spare moments? You would find her at a prayer meeting. Then there was Evan Roberts, a boy who was only 13 years old and was praying for revival nightly. It was his testimony that as a result of his prayers that he would have a tremendous burden for lost people. He used to come to the meetings that were underway once the revival began, and sometimes you would find him in the back row right near the door, and he was just sitting there praying. Another time you would find him halfway down the aisle talking to some lost soul. And then he would make his way to the pulpit, and mostly what he did there was say, let's pray, and very little preaching, but mostly getting people to pray. The prelude to revival, it is simply prayer. Evan Roberts once said, we will not be prompted to pray until first of all we realize our personal need, our personal need. And then he said, we need to develop a love for the Lord. We need to have a desire for the Lord to be glorified. And how is the Lord glorified? The Bible is very plain about that. Herein is my Father glorified. that you bear much fruit. And the only way we're going to bear fruit is that the Holy Spirit have control in our lives. And the only way that's going to happen is if we ask Him to. And that's going to happen as we determine to find time to have a communication with God, because you can't have a relationship with anybody if you don't talk. And so the Lord wants to talk to us through His Word. He wants us to talk to Him in prayer. And there you have it, the prelude to revival.