This Is What Spiritual Revival Looks Like

Duane Patterson 4:00 PM | September 15, 2025
AP Photo/Joseph Kaczmarek

For over 30 years, Greg Laurie, the pastor of my home church, Harvest Christian Fellowship, has held Crusades in Southern California annually in order to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ and bring people to faith. It's been his passion for his entire life in ministry. 

My amazing wife and I volunteered to help work at this year's outreach in July, because without volunteers, the logistical nightmare of staging such an event would be insurmountable. We were eager to help out. What we saw there on a Friday night in July was something I've never seen before. 50,000 people tried to fit into a stadium that held a smidge over 43,000. Orange County Fire Authority officials ordered the gates closed, and thousands watched from the parking lot on screens around the various promenades of Angels Stadium. Many others just listened. 

Inside, when Pastor Greg gave the altar call, thousands of people filled the aisles and made their way to the field. In a Harvest Crusade first, they had to close off access to the field because there were simply too many people on it. There was no room for more. There were no complaints. No riots or fights. People just stayed in the aisles where they were and prayed. 

Over 5,500 people made public professions of faith that night, with thousands more getting baptized a couple weeks later at a beach in Newport Harbor called Pirate's Cove. Laurie's preaching of late has had an overarching theme - that we need another spiritual revival in this country if it has any chance to survive for any length of time. 

That prayer for revival has been repeated in lots of churches and mid-week Bible studies for a very long time. Many Christians say the words, but may not have fully appreciated what it might look like if God did answer that prayer. 

We are seeing that in real time. And not just here in the United States, but globally. 

The world witnessed undeniable acts of evil that bookended last week. First, the surveillance video of the Lynx Blue Line in Charlotte, North Carolina showing Demarcos Brown, Jr. stabbing 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska to death with a pocketknife and then pronouncing, "we got that white girl, we got that white girl", dripping Zarutska's blood from his knife as he walked. And on Wednesday, we all were witnesses to the assassination and martyrdom of Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University in Orem. 

To some on the progressive left, especially in the case of the murder of Kirk, this was cheered and celebrated. But to most people, even those not previously holding any religious beliefs, this was a seminal point in history. They saw evil up close. It scared them. They were repulsed by it. In one example I believe to be a microcosm of the explosion of faith taking place all across the globe, it propelled them to take sides, even if they didn't know fully what the side they were choosing might hold in store. 

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For millions of people, this past week crystallized that evil in fact does exist, and it's not random. History is full of people who were killed for their faith in God. So recognizing the horror as the evil it is, combined with God's spirit moving in people unlike anything anyone alive has ever witnessed before, including through an enormously powerful message from Charlie's widow, Erika, Friday night, people began searching for God. 





That's just five examples. I could share thousands posted on X alone. God is moving right now in people's hearts. It's awesome and incredible to watch. And it's transcending ideological politics, as one would hope and expect. 

In Los Angeles:

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In Honolulu, bruh:

In Long Island, NY:

In New Hampshire:

In Washington, D.C.:

I don't mean to slight any particular region. If I so desired, I could post vigils from all 50 states. 

Prayer took place at concerts. Sporting events at stadiums all over the country held a moment of silence. One particular instance all the way down to kid level was this football game. Even the refs joined in to pray:

And God isn't just at work in this country. God is taking this revival thing global. In the UK over the weekend. 

Estimates were there were about three million Brits in the streets. Three million. France was convulsing last week. The government fell, Emmanuel Macron is desperately trying to maintain a toehold on power until elections are called, and people were in the streets demanding everyone get out. They were not happy. By Friday, they were returning to Church for the first time in a very long time.

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In Poland's Parliament:

In Italy:

The Netherlands:

In Australia:

In Germany:

In South Korea:

Again, I could go on. There is no denying what is happening...unless you're on the political left taking sides with evil against God.

As details rolled out over the weekend about the background and lifestyle choices of Charlie Kirk's assassin, the left twisted itself into knots trying to paint him as a right-wing Trump supporter, because he was raised in a conservative family. 

Angry pushbacks online that this assassination had nothing to do with the militantly unhinged trans movement disintegrated when it was revealed that the shooter was cohabitating with a young trans man presenting as a female. Suddenly, all the messages inscribed on the rounds of ammunition corroborated the fact that this young man had been poisoned by progressivism and led him to commit murder. 

Other voices on the left tried to attack Charlie, projecting their hatred upon him falsely, before attempting to change the story to something Brian Kilmeade said on Fox Friday morning. Suddenly, we were told that as supposedly the biggest outrage of the week. Bill Kristol, charter member of the Never Trump club, issued a capstone of the left's flailing by Sunday. 

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The appalling behavior of so many progressives, the disgusting comments by elected Democrats like Ilhan Omar, silence from many other Democrats, has only turned off people once ideologically aligned with them forever.



To my Republican and/or conservative friends, especially those in elected office: Be human. Speak the truth, but do so in a winsome and loving way. You are on the cusp of a moment in this country's history that may never come around again. You have the ability to seek common ground on values with a whole lot of people that would otherwise not give you the time of day. They are willing to listen to you now. Don't squander that opportunity. Listen to these people and remind them that their real home is in the party that recoils from evil the same way they do. Politically, the turning point of this last week could all but destroy the power of the Democratic Party for the foreseeable future. There will always be charlatans out there like James Talarico who wrap themselves in a cloak of faith but try to convince you that Jesus would be a progressive if He were still around, God is binary, and Mary is proof that God is okay with abortions. But we need to be honest here, and do so in a way that's receptive. The Republican Party as constituted now is the only political party in America that allows you the space and freedom to pursue religious curiosity, if you so desire, and protect your rights even if you don't. The left is hive mind. If you don't subscribe to their point of view, they hate you and work to silence or destroy you. 

The progressive left is also in despair the last few days, because some people who stupidly made public their celebrations over the murder of Charlie Kirk were stunned when they were removed from their places of employment. I have not joined in that fray, but I certainly do understand why it's taking place. 

The left set the new rules for the culture and society they wanted. If you said something they didn't like, they attacked you online, doxed you, and wouldn't relent until they had your professional head on a plate. That's the rule. There's only one. The left figured they owned all of social media at the time cancel culture started, all the networks and major press, and had the Democratic Party at their disposal. They never imagined a scenario in which this rule would eventually boomerang back on them. Now that it has, they're apoplectic. For most secular people on the right, there's no compassion. There's only revenge and retribution. It's very hard to blame those angry at last week's events for hoisting the left on their own petard. But revenge isn't enough. That's not what is going to carry this country forward.  

That's why I'm focusing so intently on the spiritual revival underway. Even though I'm very much a conservative Republican and have spent a little over three decades professionally working for conservative candidates and causes, conservatism alone isn't enough. Not by a long shot. 

Awakening people from the progressive, anti-God spell they're under, even if took a horrific murder in public to rupture the fault line, is the only way forward. You want to lower the temperature? Civilize the rhetoric? Appeal to better angels? Build a society that will counter the nihilistic impulse in far too much of the next few generations of people here and around the world? Get the faith part right. If people plug in and start absorbing the God of the Bible, believe in the claims that He makes, and allow themselves to be molded and shaped by their Creator, the politics will work itself out. 

How long will this revival go on? Only God knows. It could last one more day, one more week, a month, or it could go on for years. What we're witnessing is literally unprecedented due to the light speed with which technology and messaging spreads these days. 

But if you're still on the bubble, seeing what is playing out all around you, hearing the knock on your heart's door but still haven't decided to open it, thinking that you can get around to the issue of God later, my question to you is this. What if there isn't another revival later? What if this really is your last chance before it's too late? 

It all begins with a simple prayer acknowledging that you are a sinner, like all of us are, and that you need a Savior. Ask God to forgive you and reveal Himself to you. Publicly or privately, if you are sincere with that prayer, you will have changed sides and left evil behind.

And God and the entirety of Heaven will celebrate. 

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CHARLIE KIRK CHRISTIANITY DEMOCRAT PARTY REPUBLICAN PARTY

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