Yesterday was "Mandate Monday", the day that I've set aside to tell stories about revivals that have happened because college students prayed but I was preoccupied and couldn't post a story. So today you get double duty. I believe most of you know what Tech 24-7 does on a monthly basis, but I
am not sure you understand the significance of it. There is a saying,
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." My
prayer is really similar, that as we remember, we will repeat history.
Graham Cooke, says, "We become what we behold." While ultimately
beholding Jesus, it is my hope that as we re-visit these stories of old,
they will fuel a fire in all of us to pursue a 21st century revival
among college students.
So join me, as I take us on an
extremely brief history of revivals in America and their connection to
college students praying. It's my prayer that as you read these
stories, the weightiness of what we are doing at Tech 24-7 will be
revealed to you. I also pray that you realize that you have a part to
play in this journey.
Birthing a revival among students at
Texas Tech requires adults, family members, professors, employers,
college pastors, friends, loved ones, and intercessors to pray, give,
serve, invest and believe that God can and will do this again. Ten years ago Pete Greig, one of the founders of
24-7 Prayer, sat in the first prayer room at 3am and scribbled a poem that would help define the 24-7 movement. '
The Vision Poem',
as it became known, spread like wildfire. I honestly, deeply, full
heartedly believe that God wants to loose a prayer movement here at
Texas Tech, which will in turn change the lives of thousands if not
millions. You can be a part of bringing that into being. Join with
us. For more information on how you can connect with us, visit our
website.
In the 18th Century, a group of young men began gathering on the campus
of Oxford University in England. This group consisted of a small group
of young men who called themselves the Holy Club. This club gathered
together regularly for the purpose of prayer, confession, exhortation,
and Bible study in order to challenge one another in their holiness and
pursuit of God.
The Lord began to breathe
upon two men in this group in particular, George Whitefield and John
Wesley. Through the ministry of these two men, the Lord began to revive
hearts throughout both England and America, as well as cause the word
of the Lord to prevail in entire geographic regions as many would be
convicted by the power of the gospel and repent unto salvation. It was
also through John Wesley that the Methodist Church was started. In the
early days of America's history, the Methodist Church served as one of
the most fervent vehicles of missions activity and church planting, the
fruits of which would dramatically affect the early history of
America.
All the universities in America at this time had been founded through
the Church and therefore were expected to supply the next generation of
evangelical leaders. The American churches viewed these student
communities as the coming future of their congregations, culture, and
society. They believed that the direction of their churches and that of
the whole nation would soon follow the spiritual bent and character of
America's college students - As the students go, so goes the nation. It
was this kind of farseeing perspective about students that made the
American Church quick to answer the call to a national day of prayer for
colleges.In 1806, Samuel J. Mills and five other students at Williams
College began to pray for the Lord to visit their university. This
prayer meeting is affectionately known as the 'Haystack Prayer Meeting'
because the weather forced them to pray underneath a haystack the
first time they gathered to pray. Many historians and students of
church movements trace the Second Great Awakening of America to this
prayer meeting.
Through the 1800s the Lord
began to move on college campuses. At a time where Deism prevailed in
the educational institutions of the nation, all across America the Lord
began to save souls. It is said that in the course of a year's time,
half of Yale's and a third of Princeton's student population were
saved. In the universities, these believers began to come together in
societies, which began to take on more and more of a missionary focus
as the years went on.
By 1886, some of these
students from such societies began to possess such zeal for the task of
world evangelization, they formed what is called the 'Student
Volunteer Movement'. Over the next fifty years, the Student Volunteer
Movement sent 20,000 college students into the foreign mission field
under the watchword of 'the evangelization of the world in this
generation'. It is also commonly estimated that the movement mobilized
nearly 100,000 college students in these fifty years in prayer for the
Lord's purpose in the nations of the earth.
In the year 1823, the last Thursday of February in each year was agreed
upon as the day for special supplication that God would pour from on
high His Spirit upon our Colleges and Seminaries. And what have been
some of the results? In the years 1824 and 1825 revivals were
experienced in five different Colleges; in 1826 in six Colleges; in 1831
in nineteen...In one of the Colleges it is stated that a revival
started on the very day of the concert of prayer. In 1835, not less
than eighteen revivals were reported by different colleges." By the end
of the nineteenth century, these repeated student awakenings had
radically transformed the culture and moral climate of many of our
largest universities. As a result many of America's ministers at this
time were encouraging their congregations to send their children to
college, if they wanted to see them safe and soundly converted.
