During this time of year, many churches will have meetings that are often labeled “revivals.” Although the word “revival” is not used in the Bible, the word “revive” is, and it means to be restored to health or life, be quickened, to restore to life, to grow, and to sustain life.

The very word suggests that there has been a drifting away from those things that make Christians spiritually healthy. The meetings are intended to apply means whereby those attending can be strengthened and brought back to strong spiritual health.

Because the world has a strong pull on believers that can cause them to lose their “first love” for Christ, special meetings are employed to help restore them to a right relationship with God. The desired result is to weaken the world’s grip on believers and bring them back to a close walk with God and a refilling of the Holy Spirit.

As is illustrated in Acts 4, the filling of the Spirit is to glorify God and empower witnesses for the spread of the Gospel. While some like to think the filling of the Spirit is for speaking in tongues, there is no mention of this in Acts 4. They asked for the Spirit’s fullness for boldness to speak and not be ashamed.

Although revival meetings should help believers to be what God wants them to be, they often fall short. Rarely do these meetings actually see a God-given revival. Each believer must seek to draw nigh to God, which requires personal confession of sins, time spent in prayer, surrender to the will of God, and action to start doing His will faithfully.

True revival is something that only God can do, which is why the text verse asks: “Wilt thou not revive us again?” While God must do it, believers are responsible to prepare their hearts so God can revive them. Do you need to start seeking personal revival?

There is a real difference between what the world calls happiness and Biblical joy. Some Christians think they are the same thing.

Happiness is largely based on circumstances. When everything seems to be going right, most people are happy. Their happiness can quickly end when the good circumstances change. This is not at all what the Bible talks about when it speaks about joy.

When your “happiness” depends solely on your circumstances, it will cause you to have a wavering Christian life. It also means that you are looking to the wrong things to make you happy.

Instead, Christian joy is not based on circumstances. Because of this difference, you can have joy much of the time – regardless of what is happening. Paul even talked about having joy while in a Roman prison – which certainly was not a pleasant place to be.

Biblical joy is given by the Holy Spirit – it is one of His fruits. When a believer is in tune with the Spirit (surrendered to do His will), all of the fruit of the Spirit will naturally be present.

Before He left to go back to Heaven, our Lord told us that He wants His people to have the same joy that He enjoys. It is part of His prayer in John 17, verse 13: “And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.”

Notice also that the text verse says: “in thy presence is fulness of joy.” It means that by spending more time in the Word and in the prayer closet, you can enjoy more of His joy in your life. And remember that “the joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10) – which makes it easier to serve our Lord.

Christian, is your prayer closet only collecting dust?