Last week, I wrote about the first “Jesus Revolution” that happened in the early 1970s. That movement had a profound impact on an entire generation. As hopeless as things seem to be in our country today, do we believe we could have another move of God impacting our youth? Is culture so far down the drain that it can’t happen again?
After a revival in 1970 on the campus of Asbury College, nearly 2,000 witness teams traveled to at least 130 college campuses around the nation, including California. They shared their revival experiences, and thus began the revival that became known as the “Jesus Movement.”
In February 2023, it happened again on the campus of what is now Asbury University. What was to be a routine chapel service resulted in a move of the Holy Spirit, leading to around-the-clock prayer and worship lasting for 16 days. People came from around the world. What would draw people from around the world to a small university in rural Kentucky? They felt presence of the Holy Spirit.
In September 2023, months after the Asbury revival, another move of God began on secular college campuses. Unite Us, a ministry started by a mom and her college-age daughter, went to Auburn University. What happened there exploded to dozens of college campuses across the country. It spread to the Universities of Georgia, Auburn, Florida State, Alabama, and Tennessee, to name a few, leading to spontaneous crusades attended by tens of thousands of students. At Ohio State, football players led a similar event.
Thousands of students flocked to arenas and stadiums, with hundreds of students being baptized after the events. Students have been baptized in fountains, ponds, pools, and — at the University of Georgia — backends of pickup trucks. You probably won’t see anything like that at Harvard; I don’t think they have pickup trucks!
Here in my hometown of Chattanooga, Shirley and I are blessed to spend time with three young couples who are involved in campus ministry at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. On the first day of school, an active-shooter alert went out, effectively shutting down the entire campus for the day. Whether the threat was real or not, I never heard. But I do know this happened on a number of campuses across the country.
The next night, over 200 students showed up for a night of worship and prayer. They were not the least bit intimidated by the threat. We’ve attended a few of these worship services for the past year, and seeing the hunger for spiritual truths has both blessed and excited us. We’re honored to be able to pour into the ministries of these young leaders with what we’ve learned from decades of ministry.
How many times have we heard the saying, “It’s the darkest before the dawn”? It’s true. Before every great move of God in our nation’s history, the spiritual darkness seemed to be overwhelming. Before each of the Great Awakenings, Christians didn’t believe the tide of evil could be turned back. But then … God!
What Shirley and I are seeing gives us great hope for the next move of God, and we are doing everything we can to let these young campus leaders and pastors of new church plants know there are seasoned saints who stand with them in prayer, service, and financial support. To do nothing is not an option.
Find those who are striving to make a difference in the lives of young people in your community, then get behind them. I have hope that we’ll see the next Jesus Revolution paving the way for the next Great Awakening.
Something to pray about!
Semper Fidelis
