Jesus did not say, “You’ll know prophets by their gifts.” He says, “You’ll know them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:20). Some false prophets (Matthew 7:15) even convince themselves that they prophesy and do miracles in Christ’s name, but if they live lives of disobedience, they are not in a relationship with Christ (Matthew 7:21-23).

Then there are those who start well but don’t finish well. God called Samson, and the Spirit empowered Samson. But Samson was playing around with sin. In Judges 16, even though he has just been sleeping with a prostitute, the Spirit of God still empowers him and gets him out of the situation. As the chapter progresses, God’s Spirit is still working in him while he is sleeping with Delilah. But eventually, his sin catches up with him. God is merciful, but he won’t be mocked. Samson “loses his anointing,” though he did not lose it as quickly as some of us might have expected. Ultimately, Samson does end up finishing well, but finishing much earlier than he would have finished he not wallowed in sin (Judges 16:28-31)

Then there are those who manifest the power of the Spirit not because they are people of the Spirit but because the Spirit is strong in that place. In 1 Samuel 16:13-14, the Spirit of the Lord departs from Saul and rests on David, and an evil spirit from the Lord (or a spirit of judgment) rests on Saul. In 1 Samuel 18:10, Saul is even prophesying by this harmful spirit. But in 1 Samuel 19:20-24, he sends messengers to kill David. Overwhelmed by the Spirit of God, these messengers fall down and start prophesying. When the first messengers fail, he sends more, and the same thing happens. After two such failed attempts to kill David, Saul goes to kill David himself. Yet he too falls down and starts prophesying by God’s Spirit, while David escapes.

Saul was no longer a man of God’s Spirit, but because he was in a setting that was full of God’s Spirit (because of Samuel and the prophets he was mentoring), the Spirit worked even through him. Sometimes people are gifted because others are praying. Gifts are not given to us in any case because of our virtue: then they would be earned rather than gifts. Gifts are given to us for Christ’s service, so we dare not boast in them. (Cf. 1 Corinthians 4:7: “What do you have that you didn’t receive [from God]? And if you received it [from God], why do you boast as if you didn’t receive it [from God]?”)

Do not assume that someone is walking with God simply because God seems to be using them. Do not be surprised when some people who seem anointed by God fall. (In some cases, it is partly the fault of followers who put God’s servants on a pedestal instead of supporting them in prayer as brothers and sisters in Christ.) Likewise, do not assume that someone whose ministry may not look big to you is less faithful. Indeed, we don’t know people’s hearts, where they’ve come from or what they’ve been through. Since we don’t know other people’s hearts, we can’t compare ourselves with them as better or worse. Thus Paul says, “I don’t even judge my own self. I don’t know of anything against me, but that doesn’t make me right. It’s the Lord who judges” (1 Corinthians 4:3b-4).

The Corinthians were trying to evaluate whether Paul or Apollos was a better Christian celebrity to follow. Paul warns them: don’t judge before the time (1 Corinthians 4:5). God alone knows the heart, and there will be many surprises on the day of judgment.

What did revival look like in 1 Samuel? First, it affected even the wider culture, even those who would not have been seeking God on their own.

Second, there can be times when the corporate presence of God is so strong that it affects even those around us. That is, its effects are not exclusively individualistic, though it begins with individuals whose hearts are for God. In terms of personal responsibility, we want to live our individual lives in the light of God’s presence. But sometimes God’s Spirit impacts even those around us through what we do or even how we worship.

I never visited “the Toronto Blessing,” and my illustration here need not reflect on everything that happened there. But I had a friend who visited it to check it out. He tells me that as he was approaching the entrance of the building he spoke to someone beside him, whom he didn’t know. “Do you think this is for real?” he asked. The other man shook his head. “I’m just coming to prove how fake it is.” The moment their feet touched the threshold, the other man dropped flat on his face, and my friend jumped back. “Is he dead?” he asked himself, terrified. Anna Gulick, a neighbor who participated in the Asbury Revival of 1970, said that even a block away from the campus, one could feel the presence of God so strongly that one could barely speak, so in awe was one of God’s holiness.

Third, we can see one of the ways that hearing from God spread from one boy, Samuel, to many others over the course of a generation. In a time when few were hearing from God (though some were—cf. 1 Sam 2:27-36), God sovereignly reached out to a boy consecrated by others for his service. Samuel began hearing from God and became widely known for this as he grew to be a young man (3:19-21). Still, Israel was following its institutional leaders, who were either corrupt (Eli’s sons; 2:12-17, 22, 25) or compromised and ineffective (Eli himself; 2:22-25, 29), and they led the entire nation into judgment (1 Sam 4). After twenty years, Samuel was in a position to summon Israel back to the Lord (7:2-6).

But many were thereafter drawn to Samuel, and learned from his experience of God. As we see in 1 Sam 19, Samuel was mentoring many younger prophets. Although God’s Spirit speaks perfectly, we humans do not always hear perfectly. Samuel, who had a perfect batting average in prophecy (3:19), could oversee younger prophets and help guard against them going astray. (In the first-generation churches of the Pauline mission, Paul has to appeal instead to peer review; 1 Cor 14:29; 1 Thess 5:19-22.)

Was this generation a one-off? Or did God work this way at other times? In a generation when Jezebel killed the prophets of the Lord (1 Kgs 18:4, 13) and replaced them with her prophets of Baal (18:19), Elijah thought that he alone was left a prophet of the Lord (18:22; 19:10, 14). (Technically, 18:4, 13, suggest that he was wrong, though he was probably the only one still speaking for God publicly.)

But by the time that Elijah is about to be taken to heaven in a chariot of fire, the land abounds with prophets (2 Kgs 2:3, 5, 7; cf. 1 Kgs 20:35). Although 1-2 Kings does not specify Elijah’s time mentoring these prophets, we do see his successor Elisha leading them (2 Kgs 4:38; 6:1; 9:1; cf. 2:15; 4:1).

I believe that this suggests that God can raise up leaders who not only experience the Spirit but who lead others into this experience, who over the course of a generation transform their generation by the spreading of the Lord’s message.

We shall see something similar or related in the Book of Acts, in (hopefully) future installments on this theme. Prophetic revival is not, however, the only way that God works, as if he is limited to a single method. God also works through societal transformation through godly leaders, as we see through King David or King Josiah or William Wilberforce. (I will take Josiah as my example for this.) God also brings revivals of worship, as we shall see in 1-2 Chronicles. God also works in other ways than what we might call revival in any sense—e.g., through promises of progeny to patriarchs (Abraham and Sarah) or through preserving people in famine (Joseph).

What does revival look like? And who gets to define it as such? There have been times in my life when I experienced such a deep spiritual connection with certain brothers and sisters that when we encountered each other even in a casual situation we began to overflow with worship and soon prophesying. Sometimes in a small group we would take turns prophesying. (Apologies to my cessationist brothers and sisters here, but with some of you I have experienced the same joy of us excitedly discussing Scripture; we all agree that God speaks through that, at least!) Essentially, we worshiped God, experienced his Spirit strongly, and I shared what I felt that he was speaking and encouraged others in the group to do the same. We sometimes kept going for a couple hours. Of course, in that small setting we could also offer course corrections without embarrassment if the others felt that someone went off biblically or said something that interfered with the sense of the Spirit’s approval (cf. 1 Cor 14:29). But it wasn’t something we worked up; it flowed naturally from the overflow of the experience of God’s Spirit among us. Whether you want to call that prophecy, as I would, or just worshiping and listening for God’s voice, seems to me just a matter of semantics.

I don’t think that a small group experiencing God’s voice together is what people mean by revival. But what happens if it spreads?

When I came here to teach at Asbury Seminary I learned more about the two twentieth-century revivals at Asbury College (now University), which of course impacted the seminary as well. When Anna Gulick shared with me her own experience of the 1970 revival, it triggered my memories of experiences I had at a Pentecostal Bible college (now part of a university) maybe ten years later. More than once the Spirit so moved us during worship in chapel that we couldn’t stop worshiping without neglecting his awesome presence (and who would do that?) Classes had to be canceled, and the Spirit of worship and prayer settled on the campus for days. Through Spirit-led leadership, we regularly sent out mission teams. We didn’t know to call that “revival.” But we cherished it, and expected that it would happen periodically.

What is the long-range impact? That’s much harder to measure. Out of the Asbury Revival did come a generation of servants impacting the world for Christ, such as Ajith Fernando. I have kept up with a couple of my friends from those small, usually spontaneous prophetic prayer meetings; one went to share Christ with an unreached people group, and the other facilitated training for over a million believers in a closed country. Not all my colleagues from Bible college even persevered in the faith, but many are now doing ministry all over the world and leading in cutting-edge mission. While we’re called to evaluate fruit, however, only God’s perspective in eternity will show us the fruit that comes from the true moving of God’s Spirit.

Whether we want to call something revival or use some other terminology, may we embrace whatever God’s Spirit wants to do among us. When our hearts are so tender before him that we want what he wants, willing to interrupt our otherwise-appropriate schedules when he invites us into special times of intimacy with him, when we refuse to limit what God might do if he wishes … call it what you will. Just welcome, embrace, and passionately desire his presence.

Since our usual definitions of revival are largely shaped by movements of the past few centuries, rather than from a particular passage in Scripture, it’s possible that we are blending together a few different biblical models of how God works. That is, God works in various ways, and we have clustered some of those ways under particular expectations of what we mean by revival.

Having said that, there are times in history when God expressed his presence in such a way as to transform a generation, and if we are praying for such transformation, these are worth looking at. We cannot determine what shape the answer to our prayers will take—Hannah was simply praying for a son from a desperate heart, not for revival. Revival was in God’s own heart when he answered Hannah’s prayers with the boy Samuel. God is sovereign, stirring us to prayer and answering prayers in ways that sometimes make us uncomfortable. Catholics were praying for a new era of the Spirit just before the Pentecostal revival broke out among ultra low-church Protestants. Many Pentecostals were suspicious when the Spirit began moving among mainline Protestants and among Catholics. And Peter was certainly taken by surprise when his sermon was interrupted by God’s Spirit falling on uncircumcised gentiles.

Moreover, keep in mind that the long-range measure of impact may take a generation—or even eternity—to evaluate. Nevertheless, those experiencing God’s presence in these dramatic ways were not waiting for such full-scale evaluations, but were embracing what God was doing in them and through them at that time. So let’s look at one example of a revival that changed a generation. Because even this part I (on 1 Samuel) is longer than most of my posts, I will divide it into two sections.

When Samuel was a boy, the word of YHWH was rare and visions were infrequent (1 Sam 3:1). But by the time that Samuel is an old man, prophets are traveling in bands, prophesying all together with their worship instruments (10:5-6, 10). The Spirit of the Lord could come on someone else who came among them so that he too began prophesying, although afterward he might act mostly the same at the beginning (10:10-13).

By “prophesying together” I do not mean that they were prophesying in unison, but that they were all experiencing the Spirit’s inspiration and were expressing this inspiration from God rather than, or more than, paying attention to each other. Or possibly they were taking their turns (if we think of something more orderly, as in 1 Cor 14:31). The point is, that the word of YHWH was no longer so infrequent. (For the sake of some readers who are accustomed to hearing “inspiration” used in a narrower, more technical sense, I add a parenthetical digression here: I do accept Scripture as inspired [2 Tim 3:16] and as uniquely canonical. But I am using the term here in the broader sense of the Spirit moving people to speak or act for God. The English term has wider usage, of course, than even how I am using it here.)

What changed between 1 Samuel 3 and 1 Samuel 10? The author may take for granted that we already know, but he nevertheless provides a window into what was happening. Later we see Samuel presiding over a group of prophets who are prophesying (1 Sam 19:20). The Spirit of God was so strong among them that when Saul sent messengers to apprehend David, the messengers, overwhelmed with the Spirit, began prophesying. This happened also with the next two groups of messengers that Saul sent (19:20-21). Finally, Saul himself went to capture David, and was so overwhelmed by God’s Spirit that he too cast off his honorable robes and, on the ground, prophesied all day and night (19:23-24).

Keep in mind that this same Saul had lost the royal anointing of the Spirit earlier, replaced by a spirit sent for judgment (16:14). Saul had been “prophesying” by this bad spirit (18:10), and had wanted to kill David as this spirit was tormenting him (19:9-10). But when he came to where God’s prophets were prophesying, the Spirit of the Lord was so strong in that place that Saul fell down and began prophesying by God’s Spirit.

This account provides us with several insights. First, just because someone can prophesy doesn’t mean they’re super “spiritual”; it might just mean that they’re in a place where God’s Spirit is moving. There may be some leaders today living in sin who experience God’s anointing not because they are walking with God but because their mission is bathed in prayer by others. Their anointing is not permanent; compare those whose gifts leave them because of persistent sin, as in Judg 16:1-20). In times of revival, even the wicked may be affected, though they may still be wicked when the anointing “wears off.”

More next week …

Hannah was unable to have children in a culture where many viewed inability to have children as God’s curse. Moreover, her husband had another wife, who was jealous and mocked her. My wife, whose parents each grew up in polygamous households, recounted the different kinds of relationships the wives could have with each other. Often in her culture, and always in biblical narratives about ancient Israel’s culture, they proved difficult. In 1 Samuel, the “other woman” helped make Hannah’s life miserable.

In a culture in which many evaluated a woman’s worth by her childbearing, a matter that Hannah could not control, she was powerless and marginalized. She had nowhere else to turn except God. Sometimes we need to recognize that our chief battle is a spiritual one. Jacob recognized that when he struggled with the angel the night before he faced Esau; Elisha helped his assistant recognize that when only Elisha could see the armies of heaven around them. In a different way, Abraham had to realize this when he sent away Ishmael; only God could protect his son. Prayer as a regular discipline is valuable, but Hannah couldn’t afford to simply go through the motions of prayer. She poured out her heart to God, the only one who could help her.

Hannah was desperate. She was so passionate, in fact, that Eli the high priest, seeing her emotional state, accused her of being drunk (1:13). Sometimes, when directed toward God, our desperation counts as faith: putting our trust nowhere else, we throw ourselves completely on God. God has the right to say, “No,” and sometimes does so. (This is true even in the matter of childbearing; we know this firsthand, having been through a number of miscarriages.) But sometimes in Scripture obstacles are there for us to surmount, not to invite us to give up.

This pattern appears often in Scripture, in a variety of cases. One thinks of the woman with the flow of blood; she was so desperate to touch Jesus that she violated cultural protocol to do so. One thinks of the paralytic’s friends willing to damage a neighbor’s roof to get their friend to Jesus for healing. One thinks of the Shunnamite woman whose son died, who would not let anything deter her from getting Elisha’s help in restoring him. One also thinks of the woman whose daughter was demonized, willing to humble herself before Jesus despite his initial refusal of her plea. I think of my own wife, Médine, who, when told by a doctor in Africa that she must abort the child or it would die anyway, refused. The doctor ridiculed her and promised that her child would die. Normally one should trust a doctor’s medical wisdom, but Médine refused to give up on the child. At the time of my writing, he is fourteen.

In contrast to powerless Hannah, Eli was the respected high priest. When he blessed Hannah, she expected that God heard her prayer, and went away happy (1 Sam 1:17-18). She respected his office, and God did answer her faith. But Eli, though a follower of God, was not as pure-hearted for God as Hannah was. Friends have told me of people they knew who were miraculously healed when ministers prayed for them, ministers who were soon discredited for moral failings. But it is God who does the miracles, and he can answer the faith of the recipient as well as that of the minister, or just act directly for his name’s sake.

The contrast between Hannah and Eli fits the contrast between her son Samuel and Eli’s sons Hophni and Phinehas. It also fits the book’s later contrast between David and Saul. Hannah dedicated her son to the Lord; Eli, by contrast, put his sons before God (1 Sam 2:29). They dishonored the Lord and the priestly office by their greed and sexual immorality (not unlike a few ministers today), yet Eli refused to remove them from office. He valued the personal tie of fatherhood more than his responsibility to keep the priestly office pure.

Hannah was not praying for revival. She was praying only for a son, but she prayed from a pure heart. Yet God used her prayer from a sincere heart to bring change to all of Israel. People were not hearing from God much in those days (1 Sam 3:1), but by the time her son was himself an elder, the land was full of prophets who listened to God (10:5, 10; 19:20). Eli’s sons were not leading Israel in a true relationship with God that brought God’s blessing; Hannah’s son Samuel led his generation in a different way.

We often respect the public leaders of religion; they are the ones we all know about. Yet when God judges hearts, it is often the people that barely anyone knows about, who simply have humble and sincere hearts before God, who make the greatest difference behind the scenes. Those are the people whose prayers have an impact for all of us. May we respect the humble and learn from them, for God is with them in a special way. As Hannah recognized, God brings down the exalted, but raises up the lowly (1 Sam 2:3-8).