Throughout the course of divinely spiritual history, God has chosen to breakthrough among men in power. At times, these visits are very focused and powerfully penetrating. Especially when men have fallen and slipped into perpetual carnality and carelessness. We saw in last week’s podcast that revivals of religion are scriptural. We looked at an Old Testament example with King Asa. What about the New Testament? Are there any revivals of God’s Presence there? The answer is one hundred percent yes. The Book of Acts lays out for us some of the essential components of breakthrough revivals.

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Each week’s podcast contains a call to action. The Word of God will not produce in your life unless you put into operation.
This week’s call is:

Revival is God’s working and moving in the lives of His people. One by-product of His moving is that while He is reviving you, He can sweep the people in your world who do not know Jesus into His Kingdom. Learn all you can about the essential components of revival and learn to work in cooperation with Him so revival can come right to your doorstep.

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Each week’s podcast also contains a question designed to encourage testimony. Testimony is vital to a believer’s life. We overcome by it (Rev. 12:11).
This week’s question is:

Question: What has the revival outpouring of His Spirit accomplished in your life. What did you learn and grow in? Would you please share your testimony in the comments section below?

About Emery

Emery committed his life to the Lord Jesus Christ over 40 years ago and has served as both a full-time pastor and an itinerant minister. Both he and his wife Sharon of 35 years emphasize personal growth and development through the Word of God. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is both the focus and the hallmark of their mission. Read more about them here.

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Podcast Notes

Breakthrough Revival in Ephesus

Acts 19:9–12 (KJV) — 9 But when divers were hardened, and believed not, but spake evil of that way before the multitude, he departed from them, and separated the disciples, disputing daily in the school of one Tyrannus. 10 And this continued by the space of two years; so that all they which dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks. 11 And God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul: 12 so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them.

• Ephesus was the city of locale.
• It was where a tremendous revival broke out.
• What caused this mighty move of the Spirit?
• What can we learn about it from the Word of God itself?

Ephesus: Home of a Major False God

• The first thing we know is that Ephesus was the home of a major false god.
• It was the home of the Temple of Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
• The Temple, which sat just outside the city walls, was massive in size.
• It measured 100,000 square feet in size.
• That’s a building a little over two acres in size.
• One historian recorded these words about this false god Temple.
  • “First and last it was the work of 220 years;
  • Built of shining marble and supported by a forest of columns, each 56 feet high; a sacred museum of masterpieces of sculpture and painting.
  • At the center, hidden by curtains, within a gorgeous shrine, stood the very ancient image of the goddess, on wood or ebony reputed to have fallen from the sky.
  • Behind the shrine was a treasury, where, as in ‘the safest bank in Asia,’ nations and kings stored their most precious things.
  • The temple as St. Paul saw it subsisted till A.D. 262 when it was ruined by the Goths.” ¹
• But the big thing about this temple was not just it’s size but the amount of money that flowed through it’s doors.

Ephesus: Home of a Major Shrine Business

• The shrine business was a big deal in Ephesus.

Acts 19:24 (ESV) — 24 For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen.

• With that thought here’s the Historical Background of the day.
  • These shrines were miniature representations of the most sacred portion of the heathen temple; that part of it where the statue of the goddess was situated. They were made of wood or precious metal, and were worn as charms. A little door on one side concealed the image of the goddess within.²
• Shrine making was a mega money making machine in Ephesus.
• So much so, that when it was threatened due to believers coming to Jesus, it caused a riot in the city.

Acts 19:23–29 (ESV) — 23 About that time there arose no little disturbance concerning the Way. 24 For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen. 25 These he gathered together, with the workmen in similar trades, and said, “Men, you know that from this business we have our wealth. 26 And you see and hear that not only in Ephesus but in almost all of Asia this Paul has persuaded and turned away a great many people, saying that gods made with hands are not gods. 27 And there is danger not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis may be counted as nothing, and that she may even be deposed from her magnificence, she whom all Asia and the world worship.” 28 When they heard this they were enraged and were crying out, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” 29 So the city was filled with the confusion, and they rushed together into the theater, dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians who were Paul’s companions in travel.

• Did you hear what Demetrius said?
  • “From this business, we have our wealth.”
• Demetrius was no fervent follower of Artemis.
• He wasn’t concerned with being faithful to the goddess of fertility.
• Demetrius never went out on a limb like Joshua did and said, ‘As for me and my house we are going to serve Artemis.’
• No, he didn’t believe in Artemis.
• He believed in the money he could make selling these souvenir shrines.
• Demetrius would never have challenged the real prophets of God to a test by fire like Elijah did with the false prophets of Baal.
• He wasn’t a truly devoted follower of his religion.
• Demetrius had his eyes on dollars, not devotion.
• Paganism produced a passion for a paycheck pure and carnal.
• You can see from reading this passage that’s what he and his fellow craftsmen worshiped.
• It was the goddess of gold that put a gleam in their eyes, not this phony Ephesian idol.
• That’s why they incited a riot.
• They wanted it to go viral.
• Shrine sales would soar.
• Religious riots are good for the ritual business.
• Revivals of God’s power and glory are never good for sin and ungodliness.

Breakthrough Revivals of Finney

• In one revival under the ministry of Charles Finney, in 1830, in the city of Rochester New York, 100,000 people got saved.
  • In Finney’s revivals, it is estimated that eighty percent of the people who received Jesus stayed saved.
  • This revival was called the greatest work of God and the greatest revival of religion that the world has ever seen.
    • This comment came from one of Finney’s critics.
  • The whole city was transformed.
  • The revival was so strong it shut the bars down.
  • The crime rate plummeted in the city.
• Revivals from God are bad for the sin business.
• So, understand what we have going on here in Ephesus.

What Caused Breakthrough in Ephesus?

• We have a major false god in a major city and at the same time, we have a major manifestation of God’s Presence and power.
• That manifestation began with Paul the Word of God, the Bible, the Sword of the Spirit, the living will of the Most High God, for two years.
• And at the same time, God was working special miracles by the hands of Paul.
• People were being healed and demons were being evicted by these anointed handkerchiefs.
• So you have two things going on.
• You have the Word of God faithfully preached and you have the moving of the Holy Spirit via the hands of a man.
• That combination of Word and Spirit is what flipped Ephesus on its head.
• That, and this next part starting in Acts 19:13-20.

Acts 19:13–20 (ESV) — 13 Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists undertook to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.” 14 Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Sceva were doing this. 15 But the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?” 16 And the man in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded. 17 And this became known to all the residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks. And fear fell upon them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled. 18 Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. 19 And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver. 20 So the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily.

Breakthrough Catalyst

• Right behind Paul teaching the Word for two years, right behind these special miracle manifestations by the hands of Paul, a demonstration of the power of the Name of Jesus.
• When the citizens of Ephesus, both Jews, and Greeks, saw that the Name of Jesus wasn’t just a charm, it wasn’t a magic formula, that anyone could invoke, that you really had to know Jesus in order to use His Name to combat and drive out demons, when the city realized that, the fear of the Lord fell on all the inhabitants of the city.
• The very next action that took place?
  • Those that practiced black magic, that used incantations and spells that contacted demons, when they were filled with fear over what happened with the seven sons of Sceva, brought all their black magic books and burned them.
• Probably, the seven sons of Sceva were of this group.
• That is they practiced spells and incantations and that’s what they were trying to do with Jesus Name.
• They just treated it like it was just a spell from one of their black magic books.
• When those demons heard the Name of Jesus, that’s what stirred them all up.
• That’s what happened with these demons.
• The seven sons of Sceva stirred these demons nest with the Name of Jesus.
• Revivals are bad for the sin business.
• The value of these black magic books was 50,000 pieces of silver.
• The coin referenced here is the drachma.
• One drachma was a days wage back in the 1st century.
• That’s about a $170.00 a day in today’s money.
• So the cost of these books, $8.5 million dollars.
• Saying it again, revivals are bad for the sin business.
• Now, let’s talk about healing moves of God.
• You see that healing was part of the revival moving of God here in Ephesus.
• Healing is a part of many of the moves of God.

Breakthrough Healing Moves of God

• There have been spectacular revival type moves of God all throughout the course of history.
• Consider the moves of God in the area of healing.
• Healing is not just a 20 or 21st-century phenomenon.

The Quakers

• In the mid-1600’s, there was a group known as the Society of Friends.
• Quakers are the more common name they are known by.
• The founder of the Quakers, George Fox, had a significant healing ministry.
• Most healings in his ministry were instantaneous.
• His journal contains the records of many who were physically healed.
• After his death, a ‘Book of Miracles’ was discovered which documented in detail 150 of the healings under his ministry.
• At Ulverston, in 1652, there was a riot caused by George Fox Speaking in the church.
  • “And when they had led me to the common, a multitude of people following, there they fell upon me with staves and hedge-stakes, and the constables and officers gave me some blows over my back with their willow rods, and so thrust me amongst the rude multitude; and they then fell upon me as aforesaid, and beat me on my head and arms and shoulders till they had dazed me, and at last I fell down upon the wet common. And when I recovered myself again and saw myself lying on a watery common, and all the people standing about me, I lay a little still, and the power of the Lord sprang through me, and the eternal refreshings refreshed me, that I stood up again in the eternal power of God, and stretched out my arms amongst them all, and said again with a loud voice, ‘Strike again; here is my arms, my head, and my cheeks.’ And there was a mason, a rude fellow, a professor; he gave me a blow with all his might just atop of my hand as it was stretched out, with his walking rule staff; and my hand and arm were so numbed and bruised that I could not draw it in to me again; so as the people cried out, ‘ He hath spoiled his hand for ever having any use of it more.’ And I looked at it in the love of God, and I was in the love of God to them all that had persecuted me. And after a while, the Lord’s power sprang through me again, and through my hand and arm, that in a minute I recovered my hand and arm and strength in the face and sight of them all.” ³
• This testimony of George Fox sounds like the same thing that happened to Paul at Lystra.

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