The Thinking Chair is a weekly segment I am adding that will take a look at the different currents of culture and interest that are flowing through Christianity at large. Please feel free to add to the discourse as it takes shape.

This week, I wanted to consider the currently prevalent concept of revival.

Earlier, this morning, I attended an ecumenical meeting of many local pastors from all over the San Diego area. It was my first time there and I was very pleased to discover that revival was on the agenda for discussion.

We were asked to come up with ways to define revival and to describe what it meant to us. To my surprise, there were some very differing views represented. This spurred me to consider my own presuppositions. Indeed, as a kid, I always sort of associated the word revival with tents and snake handling. You know what I mean. As I got older, I came to understand revival as something entirely different.

Friends, you might not think it, but revival has become somewhat of a hot button between believers.

So what is it? Is it what has been happening in Lakeland? What about the Toronto blessing? Remember what happened in Wales? Which ones are real? How can you tell? Is it something that we can even define?

Well, I'd like to know what you think. I do know one thing for sure: regardless of the specifics of revival, we need it. We need it like never before. And although I may not be able to define it with technical confidence, I know for sure what preceeds it: Repentance...contrition...humility. These things draw God near. Consider the following:

For this is what the high and lofty One says-- he who lives forever, whose name is holy: "I live in a high and holy place, but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.
-Isaiah 57:15

So, what is revival? How does it relate to ministry?