Considering Revivalism

Iain Murray traces the development of Revivalism in Revival & Revivalism: The Making and Marring of American Evangelicalism.  Three factors are most important in the development of revivalism as distinct from revival: the Kentucky revivals, Dr. Nathaniel Taylor and Charles Finney.

The story begins in Kentucky during the revivals during the Second Great Awakening (early 1800s).  There were physical phenomena in previous revivals, but in Kentucky they seemed to take on a life of their own.  Previously, wise pastors put the emphasis on the proclamation of truth.  Most of the revivals took place among Calvinists, so there was an emphasis on doctrine influencing practice.  In Kentucky, the Presbyterians, Baptists and Methodists would join together for camp meetings.  They would celebrate communion, and people would hear a number of sermons.  The camps grew so large, you could have multiple sermons being preached at the same time.  When physical manifestations popped up, some of the pastors began to encourage them rather than restrain them.

By and large the Methodists encouraged the physical manifestations.  The Presbyterians were split over them.  What ended up happening is that those who supported and encouraged these physical manifestations soon began to preach against Calvinism as anti-revival and unbiblical.  They were anti-doctrine in general, and loathed Reformed Theology in particular.  Francis Asbury was one of the leaders in this new attack on Calvinism here in America.  He was one of the people who began to institutionalize the camp meetings.  He thought certain practices produced certain results.  The physical manifestations became necessary elements of revival, which was a new development.  This is a sad development, in part, because American Presbyterians had often assisted the fledgling Methodists.  This was clearly a knife in the back.

At the new Yale Divinity School, Dr. Taylor began his assault on Calvinism.  He rejected the doctrine of depravity.  He began to popularize Grotius’ governmental theory of the atonement.

It was Charles Finney who combined these two things.  As an itinerant Presbyterian preacher, he was part of the revival in central and western NY in the 1820s.  At some point he put the focus on “results” and advocated “new measures” to receive those results.  The results were the controversial aspects of revival, the hysteria, falling down, crying out, and sweeping altar calls. 

He used Taylor’s theology to justify the new measures.  With men having the power to repent if they want to, the focus turned to manipulating them into making a ‘decision’.  It was up to the pastor/evangelist to stir up the revival.  And if he didn’t, he was not a good pastor/evangelist and should be removed.  Many churches began to split over the use of these new measures.  Finney demonized those who criticized the new measures as cold hearted, anti-revival and needing to repent.  Those who took issue with his new measures, on theological grounds, tried to argue on a theological, rather than personal, basis.  But Finney got results, so many people listened to him.

We see the effects of revivalism around us to this day.  With revival in the hands of men instead of God, pastors are supposed to produce ever-increasing churches.  The success syndrome destroys many pastors and churches.  We are always seeking for the “newest measures” God supposedly uses to produce revival.  We have shifted from the biblical ministry of prayer and the Word which God blesses as He sees fit, to all manner of new programs, models etc.  Pastors become addicted to whatever is new, chasing the glory cloud of some other church.

Additionally, we are not concerned with theology.  We want a theology that pleases us, rather than humbles us.  Many are taken up with various reworkings of old heresies that keep man at the center of his own affections (and often God’s).  Christianity in America has become mostly about us, and our own prosperity.  It has been compromised by the Harlot.

So we find an American “Christianity” that is obsessed with results, at best theologically ignorant and at worst heretical.  We are caught up in the fantastic- watching rows of people ‘slain in the Spirit’, holy laughter etc.  We are bored by the ordinary means God uses to raise those dead in sin, and awaken slumbering Christians.  We are, as many have noted, a mile wide and an inch deep.  We stress quantity over quality and charisma over character.  Charles Finney is a revered figure despite the fact that he held to positions that were declared heretical (Pelagianism) or ‘merely’ outside the scope of historic orthodox views (the governmental theory of the atonement).

All is not lost, however.  We do see a resurgence Reformed Theology among younger pastors as the seed sown by Packer, Piper, Sproul and others bears fruit.  We see that many of these young men are evangelical too, planting churches and winning the lost as true biblical Calvinists.  But we see a tug of war for the soul of the church.  In the 1820s revivalism won.  This time perhaps a biblical view of revival will carry the day.