When we think about revival, it’s easy to focus on supernatural displays of God’s presence: miraculous healings or ecstatic experiences. But these chapters record one of the greatest revivals in the history of God’s people: nothing had been seen like it since the days of Solomon (II Chronicles 32:26). But this time there was no fire from heaven that descended on a mountain, and no thunderous voice of God pronouncing His law to His people, as He did in the days of Moses (Exodus 19:18-20). There was not even a glory cloud that prevented the priests from accomplishing their duties in the newly constructed Temple of Solomon (II Chronicles 5:13-14).
No, instead of being marked by special effects, this revival simply consisted of God’s people repenting, turning back to Him. First, King Hezekiah determined to cleanse the Temple of all the foreign rituals and practices that his father Ahaz had instituted. Then, he challenged the religious leaders, the priests and the Levites, to join him in this effort to reform the worship God, bringing it into greater agreement with the Scriptures (II Chronicles 29:5-6).
And once the ordinary means of God’s grace were ready for the people to receive, the leaders invited not only the people of Judah, but all of God’s people in the Kingdom of Israel who had not been carried off into captivity by the Assyrians (II Chronicles 30:1, 6). Reformation was thus necessarily accompanied by evangelism.
And what was the result? The revival led to substantial social and cultural change. For as the people turned back to God, they turned away from all the false idols they had been worshipping, destroying all of them that they could find (II Chronicles 31:1). And they dedicated themselves to support the ministry of God’s Word, providing for the work of the Temple with great generosity (II Chronicles 31:5-8).
No, true reformation doesn’t depend on special effects. It just involves elders, deacons, and Christians turning back to God, individually and collectively, devoting ourselves more consistently to the Word and Sacraments and prayer, and living out our repentance through faith in Christ, sharing the good news with those around us and welcoming them to join us in worship and praise.
Can we doubt that God will bless such repentant and devoted people? And how might our society change if God’s people turn back to Him in this way?
II Chronicles 29:1-11 (NASB)
Hezekiah became king when he was twenty-five years old; and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. And his mother’s name was Abijah, the daughter of Zechariah.
2 And he did right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father David had done.
3 In the first year of his reign, in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of the LORD and repaired them.
4 And he brought in the priests and the Levites, and gathered them into the square on the east.
5 Then he said to them, “Listen to me, O Levites. Consecrate yourselves now, and consecrate the house of the LORD, the God of your fathers, and carry the uncleanness out from the holy place.
6 “For our fathers have been unfaithful and have done evil in the sight of the LORD our God, and have forsaken Him and turned their faces away from the dwelling place of the LORD, and have turned their backs.
7 “They have also shut the doors of the porch and put out the lamps, and have not burned incense or offered burnt offerings in the holy place to the God of Israel.
8 “Therefore the wrath of the LORD was against Judah and Jerusalem, and He has made them an object of terror, of horror, and of hissing, as you see with your own eyes.
9 “For behold, our fathers have fallen by the sword, and our sons and our daughters and our wives are in captivity for this.
10 “Now it is in my heart to make a covenant with the LORD God of Israel, that His burning anger may turn away from us.
11 “My sons, do not be negligent now, for the LORD has chosen you to stand before Him, to minister to Him, and to be His ministers and burn incense.”
