When Streams of Living Water Become a Flood: Revival at Asbury University [Firebrand Big Read]
Photo by Alfred Kenneally on Unsplash
What do you do when the streams of living water suddenly burst into a flood? The spiritual outpouring that began at Asbury University on Feb. 8 was spontaneous and unexpected. After an ordinary chapel service, a number of students felt called to linger and praise God. As students responded, the Spirit brought an immense sense of joy and peace. More students came. The Spirit remained, and so did the students. Worship has continued ever since, and—as a result of social media posts—thousands of Jesus-seekers have poured into the small town of Wilmore, Kentucky.
Asbury is no stranger to revivals; spontaneous worship has broken out multiple times in the past century, although the 1970 revival is perhaps the most well-known. Ever since, alumni and community members have prayed for God to grace the campus once again with a powerful experience of the Holy Spirit. The surprise at this latest outpouring is reminiscent of the shock felt by the disciples upon hearing of Peter’s release from prison in Acts 12:1-19: even though they had been praying for this very event, they weren’t ready when it happened. When Rhoda answered the door to discover a freed Peter standing before her, she was so overjoyed that she left poor Peter standing at the gate as she ran back to tell the other disciples.
We, too, were shocked and overjoyed at our unexpected—but long hoped for—visitation.
Personal Experience
I wasn’t in chapel when the revival started. I had been at the dentist’s office with my son. I first heard of this outpouring of the Holy Spirit when a student burst into my introductory New Testament class (located underneath the auditorium where worship is taking place) at 1:25 that afternoon and declared, “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I don’t know if y’all have heard what is happening upstairs—people are still worshiping, even though chapel finished three hours ago! The Holy Spirit is moving! Come join us!”
So what does a Bible professor do in such a situation? I was forced to make a split-second decision: Do I believe this student? Is it really the Holy Spirit, or just youthful exuberance? Do I cancel class and send students upstairs? Do I continue teaching? I’m a Bible professor, so I should follow the Spirit… but I am teaching about Jesus in this class, after all!
I responded, “I’ll send them upstairs in about 25 minutes.” If this truly were a movement of God, I reasoned, then surely it would still be going on at 1:50. And so I continued to teach about the crucifixion narrative. A few students left in the middle of the lecture to head up to the auditorium, but I wasn’t going to argue with the Holy Spirit. As class ended, I reminded students that Christ’s great sacrifice is exactly why people are worshiping upstairs, and I encouraged them to head up to the auditorium.
As an academic, I tend to be somewhat cynical about emotional displays of spirituality. I’ve seen enough manipulative emotionalism in churches over the years to be wary. But I also know that the Holy Spirit still moves powerfully among believers today. I confess that I also struggled that first day because I had been carrying some personal burdens, and I was afraid that once God started working on my heart I would be undone, a weeping puddle on the floor of Hughes Auditorium. So that first day I went upstairs for just a few minutes to see what God was doing. It certainly appeared that God was moving. The praise was genuine, the prayers unforced.
I returned to my office, located on the first floor of Hughes directly underneath the auditorium. The drafty, windowless room located in a building constructed in 1929 is not the most coveted location on campus. But in these last two weeks I have considered this one of the best office locations at Asbury. I can hear the joyous singing as well as the applause when worshipers affirm powerful testimonies. There is something palpable about this movement of God. That first day I could feel joy and peace oozing through my ceiling from upstairs. When I went home that evening, I continued to feel a remarkable spirit of joy and peace. It was so refreshing! As the revival has continued, I often wake up in the middle of the night with the music and lyrics of praise flowing through my head—not my normal nighttime experience.
On the second day of the revival I went up to the balcony of Hughes Auditorium to let God do the soul work I so desperately needed. When I first entered the balcony, I had a moment where I couldn’t breathe—there was a weight in the room, like a barometric pressure difference. It took a moment to adjust. We so often forget that our physical bodies are not separate from our spiritual selves. When God appears in powerful ways, we are physically affected by what is happening in our spirits. As I sat and listened to the worship, I wept as God lifted my burdens, and I rejoiced at the sweet, gentle Spirit of the Lord. This was not what I had expected when I heard students running down the hallway the day before proclaiming, “There’s a revival going on upstairs!” Stereotypes of big personalities and manufactured power had filled my mind earlier, but this was so very different. This was a tender and beautiful outpouring of the Spirit.
The worship in Hughes has been joyful and unforced. There are no PowerPoints, no set list of hymns. Rather, the worship leaders sing as they feel led, and we join our voices in praise. If we know the lyrics (as we often do), we join in singing. If not, we pray and listen to the movement of God. The musicians—many of whom are my students—seamlessly replace one another on stage to give each other rest breaks. It’s like passing the baton in a relay race. I am so proud of them! There is no need for a single leader and no competition to be on stage.
The testimonies have been moving and powerful. We have been led in times of praise, Scripture reading, intercessory prayer, and deep repentance. Students have publicly confessed addictions to pornography, anger at God, bitterness of heart, despair as the result of difficult family situations, and so much more. For some of these students, I know their stories, and through the semesters I have seen their anxiety, depression, and deep wounds. Yet now they proclaim healing, joy, and a deep love of God like they have never before experienced. This is not manufactured emotionalism. This is a powerful, transformative movement of God. Even when Hughes Auditorium has been nearly empty (it has been closed at times for cleaning), the Spirit of God remains palpable. A powerful, deep peace pervades the room. If you want to read more first-person accounts from our students, I encourage you to read the student newspaper or simply scan social media for testimonies.
God is working in stages through this revival. I needed God to do work in my own soul first, but after the refreshing came, God called me to pray for others. Then I felt released to do practical things, often as simple as directing others to the nearest bathroom. God’s healing grace is meant to show us God’s love, but also to empower us for service. I have been moved to see how the staff and faculty here have generously served, even on weekends—whether serving as ushers and parking lot attendants or cleaning toilets and mopping the floor of Hughes. The fruit of the Spirit is evident in their patience and kindness amid great disruption. In addition, members of the larger Wilmore community—local pastors and church members—have stepped up to serve on the prayer teams and in many other ways. Asbury Theological Seminary has opened its chapels for overflow worship, as have a few local churches. This is the body of Christ working across institutional lines to support a movement of God. How beautiful is the kingdom of God!
Theological Reflections
The day before the revival began, my Growth of the New Testament Church class was discussing Peter’s speech in Acts 3 after he healed a man in front of the Temple. Peter had described Jesus’ death and resurrection and then challenged the audience: “Repent, therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord and that he may send the Messiah appointed for you, that is, Jesus, who must remain in heaven until the time of universal restoration that God announced long ago through his holy prophets” (3:19-21). Our class had discussed the beauty of the description, “times of refreshing,” only to experience that refreshing the very next day!
My students had noticed in Acts several places where—after the Spirit’s coming at Pentecost— the disciples had been described as being “filled with the Spirit” (e.g., 4:8, 7:55, 13:9). They wanted to know if Luke was simply reminding his readers that the disciples had been filled with the Spirit previously, or if this was a new filling. At the time I described it as sort of a turbo-charge: there’s always gas in the tank, but sometimes you need an extra burst of power for the task at hand.
As I’ve been reflecting this week, two other metaphors have come to mind that might be helpful. It’s important to remember that the Spirit that is present at Asbury this week is the same God who was present three weeks ago and is the same God who will be here long after the crowds have dispersed. The difference is in the level of communion we are experiencing. God is always feeding us by his Spirit, but some occasions are a bit more special. It’s like sitting down to meals three times a day, but occasionally indulging in a fantastic Thanksgiving feast, enjoying all the special dishes with the best of ingredients, and sharing the overwhelming spread with anyone who shows up to partake. The Spirit is giving us a feast right now.
My favorite image, however, arises from Psalm 1:3: those who delight in the law of the Lord “are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither. In all that they do, they prosper.” Believers who regularly commune with the Lord through prayer, Bible study, corporate worship, receiving the Eucharist, and other means of grace are the trees planted by streams of water, receiving their nourishment. But occasionally we need flood waters to spur new growth—not the destructive floods that wipe away homes, but rather the essential spring flooding of the Nile that brought much-needed water and nutrients to agricultural lands in the ancient world. This is where we have found ourselves at Asbury these past two weeks. We are planted by streams of water, but the dry air of secular culture surrounding us has left us thirsting for more. The thousands of visitors to campus have only demonstrated how much spiritual thirst exists right now. These people are desperate for relief, life, and hope, and they are willing to wait in line for hours to enter the place where the veil between heaven and earth is remarkably thin right now. The Holy Spirit has graciously sent gentle flood waters to revive us, reshape us, and empower us for the work ahead. We are receiving a sort of spiritual Miracle-Gro, a nutrient boost to inspire new growth. We are drinking deeply from this refreshing gift.
Not everyone has found it comfortable to explore this movement of the Holy Spirit. Some students have said they feel pressured to go and join in the revival; others are skeptical or fearful of what they will encounter. Some students are experiencing the refreshing of the Spirit as they pray in their dorm rooms, rather than joining the immense and, for some, intimidating crowd. Some students have stayed in Hughes Auditorium for a few minutes at a time, while others have remained for hours or even days. These different experiences should remind us that we need to be gentle with one another, because what each of us needs from the Holy Spirit may be different. God is gracious enough to meet us where we are, and we are all at varying points in our walk with the Lord.
Yet we should also keep in mind that there is something powerful about being in community and hearing testimonies of how God is working among the body of Christ. When others publicly repent of their sins, we may be moved to do the same. When others praise Jesus in loud voices, we may experience a similar joy in the Lord. When others intercede in prayer for the nations, we may be urged to follow suit. Witnessing together the movement of God, we are strengthened for our own testimony just as we strengthen those who are giving testimony. Ephesians 4:15-16 reminds us of God’s desire for the body of Christ to be knit together in this way: “speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love.”
Some have asked how this outpouring of the Holy Spirit came about. How can it be replicated? The simple answer is that this was a spontaneous act of God, a beautiful act of grace. It was not manufactured. Asbury University simply had another average, ordinary chapel service, and God chose to move. We have done nothing ourselves to make this happen.
That’s not entirely correct. People have been praying for revival for years—some, for decades. God delights in these kinds of prayers. God responds in his own timing to the cries of his people. But make no mistake: this is not a “work.” The prayers of the people are a response to what God has done previously. God’s grace comes first, the people respond with prayers for more, and God pours out his grace once again.
What is so stunning about this kind of outpouring is that it is locally focused. We regularly preach the truth that God who created and sustains the universe is accessible anywhere—whether in foxholes or brothels or athletic fields or beaches or homes or churches. God is available to all who cry out to him. And yet there are times when the Spirit appears profoundly in a particular location. When Moses met God, he saw a burning bush that was not consumed, and he was told to remove his sandals because the place on which he was standing was holy (Exod. 3:1-6). When God led the Israelites through the desert, he did so by a cloud of his presence during the day and by fire at night (Exod. 13:21). God’s glory filled the tabernacle (Exod. 40:34-38). When the Spirit poured forth at Pentecost, it filled a house in Jerusalem where believers had gathered (Acts 2:1). These kinds of manifestations of God’s presence have continued through the centuries as God regularly revives his people. Now God has chosen this season to pour forth abundantly his Spirit at Asbury University. But this does not mean that God is any less accessible in your home church. Pray for the refreshing Spirit of God to bless your community. Be persistent. Wait with longing. Don’t give up hope. And don’t forget that even as you await the flood, you are trees planted by water. Drink deeply of the Spirit who is always present. The flood is no replacement for the daily drinking from the streams of God’s goodness.
A Few Practical Notes
As the Spirit began to move, the leaders have worked hard to keep the emphasis on Jesus. No one leader has emerged, but a large team is working together to make sure the music, the testimonies, the personal narratives, the discussion of Scripture all focus on glorifying God rather than on individuals in the room.
Repentance has been a large part of what God has prompted among those in attendance. In order for God to revive us, we must confess the ways in which we have followed our own wills rather than the will of God. We must be willing to flee sin and be transformed by a loving God who desires to give us a life of flourishing (2 Chron. 7:14). We have been called to a life of holiness.
Flexibility is an incredibly important part of responding to the Spirit. Our churches and institutions often have policies and procedures—routines that keep the cogs of progress running smoothly. But when the Spirit suddenly shows up in powerful ways, the rule book may need to go out the window. Our administration at Asbury encouraged professors to be flexible with assignment dates and attendance policies for those who have felt called to worship in Hughes Auditorium. Leaders have been creative in addressing unforeseen needs—a snack table outside the back door of the auditorium for those who remain for hours, portable toilets outside for those waiting in line to gain entrance to the packed auditorium, a baby changing table placed outside the restrooms (not your typical equipment here!). In the early church, organization developed over time. At first, the believers simply gathered together and “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers” (Acts 2:42). Later, in Acts 6, deacons were appointed to distribute food to the Hellenistic widows who had been overlooked in the daily food distribution. Structure was introduced to make sure the needs were met. Similarly, here at Asbury systems have developed quickly to meet pressing needs. At first, volunteers simply showed up and asked where they could serve; now, sign-up lists have been created and leaders appointed to organize the needs. Flexible structures are important.
Discernment is perhaps one of the greatest needs. How is God moving? How can this gift best be stewarded? Where might people intentionally or unintentionally be leading this community in a different direction than God desires? Constant prayer is an absolute necessity.
Spiritual outpourings today contain an element not foreseen in previous generations: social media. Word about this movement of God has spread like wildfire on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media platforms. In the past, teams of evangelists needed to travel from town to town to spread the word, but now in a matter of days people on the other side of the planet have heard about what is happening in Wilmore, Kentucky. For the first week and a half of this outpouring, Asbury University intentionally chose not to livestream the revival (other than our previously scheduled student chapel services). Some in the crowds, however, have been livestreaming non-stop. We need to be concerned about the potential for abuse. Those who are unaware they are being filmed but are moved by the Spirit to repent publicly of their sins—even if they are in a room of 1,500 people—are not expecting to see later their testimony spread to millions across the globe (including family far away who may not appreciate the personal revelations) or that their images may be turned into memes. When we post under these conditions, we should consider posting short snippets of praise and worship so that God may be glorified. But we must be careful not to abuse others in our eagerness to share. Just because we can post intimate personal testimonies to social media does not mean that we should.
This dynamic is admittedly different when those present are aware that they are being filmed. On Sunday President Brown announced that Asbury will begin livestreaming services during the next week. Believers across the world who cannot physically travel to Wilmore will be able to see how God is moving here. It remains to be seen, however, the ways in which broadcasting will affect the nature and tenor of testimonies and worship. My prayer is that the focus remains on God as our audience and not those watching through their screens.
What Happens Next?
As I write this, thousands of strangers are on campus—so many, in fact, that on Sunday police officers had to close access to the main road into Wilmore. The town simply does not have capacity for any more visitors. The crowds have been unsettling to some of our students, who have found their routines significantly disrupted. Yet I am reminded that these newcomers are standing where we were two weeks ago when we drank deeply from the well of the Spirit—thirsty and desperate for a touch from God. We need to be careful, once we have drunk from the flood, not to lose compassion for those who remain thirsty.
Our administrators have done well to support this public longing for God, but they also recognize that this outpouring is not meant to remain here, but to spread. Asbury University President Kevin Brown announced on Sunday that the services at Asbury for the general public would end on Monday, Feb. 20, although evening services for high school and college students will be held through Feb. 23. After that, services will continue at locations other than Asbury University.
My prayer is that revival will come to you. This refreshing Spirit is not for us alone, and there is plenty to go around. Scripture is full of language describing the abundance of God: “hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us” (Rom. 5:5). Already reports are occurring of revivals on other campuses, such as Lee University and Samford University.
The challenge will occur, however, after the flood waters recede. We must not forget that we are still streams planted by living water. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, even if we experience God in different ways on different days. We cannot forsake the normal means of grace in search of floodwaters alone. It will be important in the days ahead for local faith communities to disciple those who have found new life as a result of this outpouring. We will need to teach Scripture in depth and provide small-group support and accountability in order to help people make sense of what they have experienced and challenge them toward deeper relationships with Jesus.
This flood we are experiencing today is meant to revive us for a purpose— to share the joy and the love of God with those living in a dark world. As this revival has been occurring, we have simultaneously watched tens of thousands of dead being pulled from the rubble after the earthquake in Turkey and Syria. We have witnessed several more mass shootings, including one on the campus of Michigan State University. We continue to see famine and poverty, addiction and despair, racism and sexism, abuse and ailments across the world and in our homes. We need this refreshing of the Spirit more than ever as a testimony that God has not abandoned this dark world. We have tasted and seen that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8). This is the hope for a world gone wrong.
Our experience of this hope empowers us to go and preach the good news to the dying and the destitute, not only through our words, but also through our actions. God calls us to perfect love of both God and neighbor. If we keep this refreshing Spirit to ourselves, then we have missed the point. God has given us shalom—wholeness and healing and flourishing—so that we can bring the love of God to others. If we proclaim the love of Jesus but do not demonstrate God’s love by helping the poor and destitute, then we are nothing but a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal (1 Cor. 13:1). God forbid that we turn these songs of praise into nothing more than a noisy interruption.
Suzanne Nicholson is Professor of New Testament at Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky. She is an Elder in the Global Methodist Church and serves as Assistant Lead Editor of Firebrand.