The End-Time Harvest: Revival and Awakenings

By Riaan Engelbrecht

Volumes one and two of Revival and Awakenings (part of the End-Time Series) explore what is a real revival and a spiritual awakening. Prophetically, it delves into what God has been saying for a long time, which is that the Lord will sweep the earth with revival in the end times which will ignite many followers with His holy fire. What will this revival look like? This is the big question, and one would rather say it will not be a singular event, but a sequence of Godly movements across the globe that will be infectious, contagious and real. In an awakening, the Holy Spirit gives unbelieving people - who are dead in their trespasses and sins -a new awareness of their needs. A revival is connected to the people of God and it is when those who are in churches - those who are professing believers - are ministered to by the Holy Spirit in such a way that they are renewed in their devotion to the Lord. The time is ripe for the one final great harvest, yet this calls for the revived church, full of the fire of the Holy Spirit, to go into the fields, to awaken the lost and the forgotten and broken, and to bring them into the loving embrace of a God who is full of compassion, grace and mercy. This is the time of spiritual latter rains, and now is the time to welcome the embrace of a God who is real, alive, and who calls us all into His arms to reflect His beauty and greatness. It is not God’s Will that any soul should perish, but that all men should come to the knowledge of God and be saved. God is calling on all believers to cast their net in the deep for the harvest of souls.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Riaan Engelbrecht
• Release date: Mar 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9791222074719

Riaan Engelbrecht

Ps Riaan Engelbrecht is the founder of Avishua Ministries, the vice-president of Lighthouse Ministries International and the station manager of Lighthouse Radio. His ministry deals primarily with the prophetic, but he also has a passion to teach the Truth of the Lord Jesus and His Kingdom for only the Truth of the Lord sets us free (John 8:32).  He is also a qualified and seasoned journalist.

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Revival and Awakenings Volume One: The End-Time Harvest

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Scriptures quotes from the New Kings James Bible, Amplified, and the New International Version.

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Table of Contents

Revived to awaken the lost for the great harvest

Cast the net for the harvest

Come and drink freely!

Lessons of Biblical revivals

The move of the Holy Spirit: modern day revivals

Pure tabernacles of revival fire

Revival produces repentance and godliness

A river wild

The resurrected power of Christ

Awakening of a dark sort

Revival flowed from the Upper Room

Sent the fire again!

Alive in revival’s fire

No lack in revival

Stay hungry for God to sustain the fire

Revived to return to the embrace of a forgiving Father

Revival marked by supernatural manifestation

Revived and awakened unto purpose

The power of evangelism

Revival among the intellectual and the influential­­­

Revived to awaken the lost for the great harvest

Psalm 85:6 Will You not revive us again, that Your people may rejoice in You?

This should indeed be the prayer of all believers in this very hour! For we are living in perilous and dark days of great rebellion, iniquity, idolatry and spiritual darkness. As in the days of Israel that desperately needed to be restored to God’s ways and love, the Body of Christ needs to be revived and restored!

We desperately need such a revival for the church has over the years fallen asleep. We have been lulled into a false sense of peace because of worldly desires, the mundane nature of religion and our suffocating rituals and traditions. Are we truly making an impact anymore? Are we making disciples? Are we all leading the lost to Christ? Are we walking with God as we should?

We have become familiar with God, and we have forgotten His ways, His will, His truth and His presence. Is He truly still our first love? Can we say we are a church infused by the divine Holy Spirit fire? Do we fear the Lord? Do we still obey, and do we still stand up for what is morally true, right, and just?

In Psalm 80 (prayer for Israel’s restoration, to the chief musician. Set to The Lilies. A Testimony of Asaph. A Psalm) we read: 14 Return, we beseech You, O God of hosts; look down from heaven and see, and visit this vine 15 and the vineyard which Your right hand has planted, and the branch that You made strong for Yourself. 16 It is burned with fire, it is cut down; they perish at the rebuke of Your countenance. 17 Let Your hand be upon the man of Your right hand, Upon the son of man whom You made strong for Yourself. 18 Then we will not turn back from You; revive us, and we will call upon Your name. 19 Restore us, O Lord God of hosts; cause Your face to shine, and we shall be saved!

We find in Matthew 21 the teaching of Jesus on the wicked vinedressers, speaking of those who have rejected the Gospel and persecuted others for seeking the truth (some even crucified Jesus). Jesus remains the capstone of our faith, and He can also be a stone of stumbling and of judgment to those who refuse to believe in Him.

Jesus is the hope of salvation. He is the vine of glory. For those who are part of the vineyard – grafted in His beauty and splendour (John 15) by the New Covenant – we need to glorify, worship and adore Him all day. He deserves all our attention, time and energy. Sadly, often we fail as believers to do so, for we keep living at times more for the world or the self.

Psalm 80 is a cry for God to revisit the vineyard and to revive and restore. Yes, Lord, we need to be restored as the vineyard (the royal priesthood of believers – 1 Peter 2). How we need God’s visitation again so that we are restored in our joy! For revival is about God’s visitation, as He visited the disciples in the Upper Room. How we need a burning bush experience again, or an eye-opening encounter as the apostle Paul enjoyed on the road to Damascus.

Isaiah 57 says: 15 For thus says the High and Lofty One Who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: I dwell in the high and holy place, With him who has a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones."

Indeed, as we humble ourselves before the Lord, He shall visit and revive us! We need to be revived not only for our relationship with the Lord to be restored, so that we may know and love Him as we should, but also so that we all can fulfil the Great Commission. The commission is all about leading a lost and broken world to Christ, for He is the only true source of life and hope. It is a commission of love. Firstly, we love the Lord, and we love what the Lord loves. Yes, He loves all of us, and He wants everyone to know Him and to walk with Him (John 3:16).

As we are revived as His people, we can share the Gospel in the Spirit of God and in truth so that others may be awakened to God’s reality and everlasting grace and mercy. After all, we live in a world where so many people continue to deny the true God. Others are trapped by false religions, ideologies, teachings, thoughts and ideas. How the church needs to be revived, and how a world that is slipping deeper into darkness needs to be awakened to the light of Christ!

There has been a lot of talk of late if there will indeed be one last great revival to hit the earth before the coming of Jesus. Some argue that the Bible rather speaks of the great falling away, instead of many finding the Lord in the last days of great peril and deception.

We have seen over the years a number of great revivals and awakenings (such as with the three great awakenings in America), so will a move of God as seen in the Welsh or Azusa revivals sweep the earth once again? The Bible does speak of the great falling away (2 Thessalonians 2:1-3), but it is exactly because of such growing apostasy, lawlessness and wickedness that a last great revival and spiritual awakening is sorely needed.

It is sad to say that revival is critical in the church because it speaks of how the church has become spiritually ‘dead’, or in other words, cold and spiritually apathetic.

Revival is back in the spotlight with what is happening at Ashbury College. Some are calling it merely an awakening, others are saying this is a spontaneous outflow of adoration for God. Personally, I do believe God will sweep the earth with revival, which will ignite many followers with His holy fire. Such followers will then be active, going out in the world to bring in the harvest.

The question remains, what will this revival look like? This is the big question, and one would rather say it will not be a singular event, but a sequence of Godly movements across the globe that will be infectious, contagious and real. It will first impact the church, and then as the church fulfill the Great Commission, societies and communities will also be changed in the presence of God.

One also has to be careful with labels, because the church is so badly divided because of denominational labels.  The move of God will be exactly that – a move by God and not man! Revival is always about God. Yes, the Lord is the originator of revival, never man.

The Lord has made me understand that while revivals in the past were often limited to a certain geographical location, such as a church, or a town or even a country, the last great revival will not experience such limitations. I do believe we will see revival fires break out across the world leading up to the coming of Jesus. We will see such fires break out in homes, in small gatherings of believers, in churches and even in prayer meetings. It will not be a singular event, but spontaneous outpourings that will become connected like small rivers running into the sea.

Probably the great move of God was seen in the 1900s. For around 10 years at the start of the century, virtually no country in the world was excluded from the effects of this incredible outpouring of God. Almost every nation, on each continent, received new power from heaven, a new passion for prayer and for the lost. Hundreds of thousands came to the Lord.

All of this marked the birth of Pentecostalism, once called 'the third force in Christendom.' Some would argue that, 100 years later, it has grown into the largest and most powerful force of all Christendom.

It is clear that the last great outpouring of God will be similar to what happened in the 1900s, yet it will be even bigger. All those revivals and awakenings were characterised by the move of the Holy Spirit that brought forth repentance, a spiritual hunger, a desire for holiness and the accompanied power of God.

We will see such an outpouring again, and it will strike the globe as it did in the 1900s. It will happen. Yet this time it is not for the purpose of just awakening God’s people to the Spirit, it will be ultimately to bring in the last end-time harvest before the coming of Jesus.

As believers, we need to pray for revival more than ever. It says in Isaiah 64:1 Oh, that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down that the mountains might flow down at thy presence." Here we can see that unless God comes down, mountains will not flow and sinners will not tremble. But if God comes down, if God manifests His power, if God shows His hand, if God takes the field, then mountains of indifference, of materialism, and of humanism will flow before His presence.

Yes, we need God more than ever to shake the nations, so that the captives are set free, and people are awakened to God’s reality and love. How we need to pray for a visitation like never before so that the Body of Christ is truly again in the grips of God. A church on fire for God, and sold out to reach the lost, will shake the gates of hell and will see communities gripped by God’s presence!

It is also incredible how not even 10 years after the revivals of the 1900s, the world was thrown into complete turmoil because of World War One. This is how the devil works. He is the father of lies, and he comes to steal, destroy and kill. The incredible work of thousands of people globally to see thousands revived was put into jeopardy because of the large-scale conflict.

In Genesis 4 we read how people in the days of Enosh began to cry out to God (a mark of revival) yet in Genesis 6 we read of the great flood because of the wickedness on earth. The devil will do anything in his power to stop revivals or awakenings, as seen how quickly evil befell the world in the days of Enosh and WWI, but he cannot stop what God plants or calls forth.

The seeds of the 1900s are very much alive. Such seeds were planted throughout the world more than a hundred years ago in a very special and real way. Just as in the 1900s, the end-time revival will be marked by an incredible outpouring of the Spirit and will bring about repentance, a thirst for God, a restoration of God’s truth in the hearts of man and it will be accompanied by God’s incredible power. You have to believe many will be revived and saved.

Duncan Campbell (1898-1972), who was involved in the Lewis Awakening, Hebrides Revival, believed true revival is a moving of God in the community, where suddenly the community becomes God-conscious.

One would like to believe there such revival fire needs to first break out among believers, in whatever capacity, and then such revival fire is taken into the community. Campbell was indeed right that the community also has to be impacted, for the purpose of a revived church is to fulfil the Great Commission. And such a commission is all about reaching the lost and making disciples of the forgotten, neglected and broken.

Revival is simply making alive again those who have been alive but have fallen into a cold, or dead, state. They are Christians and have life, but they need reviving to bring them back to their first love and the heart of God. And the heart of the Father is to see not only believers awakened, but for the lost to know God as their Lord and Saviour.

What is true revival? It is not generic spirituality, mere emotionalism, or utopian idealism. True revival is marked by a rediscovery of the word of God, a restored sense of the fear of God, a return to God through confession and repentance, and a renewed spiritual commitment as God’s people. Such a revival was seen in the days of King Josiah (2 Kings 21).

We should also distinguish between two words that often get confused: ‘awakening’ and ‘revival’. There have been many spiritual ‘awakenings’ throughout history. In an awakening, as the name implies, the Holy Spirit gives unbelieving people—who are dead in their trespasses and sins—a new awareness of their need. They had ignored God, or disbelieved in Him; and then suddenly, they realised that they were sinners and turned to Jesus for salvation. An awakening is a great spreading and receiving of the message of the gospel in the unsaved world.

A revival—though a vital part of an awakening—is something distinct from an awakening. As the name implies, in order for there to be a ‘re-viving’ there must have first been a ‘viving’. The focus in a revival is upon the people of God; and it is when those who are in churches- those who are professing believers - are ministered to by the Holy Spirit in such a way that they are renewed in their devotion to the Lord.

They arise from out of their sleepiness and their worldliness, they repent of sin and of their neglect of their duty, and they are renewed in their obedience and in their devotion to proclaim the message of the gospel. You can say that the world needs an awakening today and God often gives that awakening through the ministry of a revived church.

Yes, we desperately need a revived Church to awaken a dead world! Many are perishing because their minds has been blinded by the god of this age has blinded (2 Corinthians 4:3).

The passage reads as follows: 3 But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, 4 whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. 5 For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus’ sake. 6 For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

How we need to pray for light to shine in the darkness! How we need to pray that God’s light will pierce the veil that blinds so many and causes a multitude to be lost. In God’s revival and awakening, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God will again shine in the hearts of many, and they shall know God is Lord and He is love.

Judging by what God has spoken in my spirit for the last couple of decades, and weighing such words against many other prophecies from across the world, then a global revival is a reality. Again, it could be sporadic or it could flare up in many places simultaneously across the world.

God needs to wake up the church, stirring her out of a  slumber, because this is His Body that is supposed to bring in the end-time harvest.

Isaiah 55 says, 11 So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; it shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it. So if God has spoken revival, then so it shall be!

Revelation 7 says, 9 After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10 and crying out with a loud voice, saying, Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb! 11 All the angels stood around the throne and the elders and the four living creatures, and fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12 saying: Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom, Thanksgiving and honor and power and might, Be to our God forever and ever. Amen. 13 Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, Who are these arrayed in white robes, and where did they come from? 14 And I said to him, Sir, you know. So he said to me, These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 15 Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple. And He who sits on the throne will dwell among them."

According to Revelation 7, a great multitude of people has been revived, restored and worshipped the Lord during the tribulation. That speaks of a mighty harvest at the end of all ages! The only Body that can bring about such a harvest is the church, which is the holy priesthood. For this reason, the church first needs to be revived to walk in the fullness of God as true disciples. This also challenges the theory that the church will be removed early during the tribulation. According to this chapter of Revelation, there is a great multitude who will be saved, but someone must be on earth at the time to help show them the way!

I do believe the greatest move of God is upon us. It is the last great harvest in times of great peril and danger (2 Timothy 3:1). God is going to demonstrate His power and glory in ways we have never seen before. His majesty is going to be revealed. The earth will shake and tremble with His power, His majesty, His goodness and His love. The earth will resound with the name of Jesus being proclaimed, and the Good News of the gospel will see the greatest harvest come in.

As the Lord showed me once, as darkness rises, so will the light rise in intensity. Oh yes, we are living in very intense times of great deception, wickedness, idolatry and carnality. Matthew 24 says, 37 But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. 38 For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, 39 and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. Of the days of Noah, we read in Genesis 6: 5 Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

The problem is, that the church is not yet ready to bring in such a harvest. The church is infested and saturated with worldliness, dead religion, spiritually numbing traditions and even demonic ideas and teachings. The church needs to be revived first, so it's about obedience and surrender to His way, His process and His Spirit. Habakkuk 2:14 says, For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the seas. Some regard this as a prophecy for the 1000 years of Christ, and others see this as the time of the New Jerusalem. We are not certain, but what if this speaks of a time during the end of the day’s harvest?

To bring in this mighty harvest, God is raising up a remnant that is completely and utterly set apart for His Kingdom. What is this end-time remnant? It is the true Bride on the earth, therefore, the sons and daughters who seek God, who follow Him, and who uphold God’s values, ways, and truths and will as established in the eternal Kingdom. Yes, the dawn rises of God’s end-time remnant, those who are humble, pure in spirit, and who are called to free the lost from the clutches of darkness through the Blood of Jesus. God is seeking His true worshippers who walk in love, truth and honesty, seeking no glory but only His will. The Lord is rising up those who have a heart and a voice for the Kingdom.

Oh yes, we need the Spirit of God more than ever to burn in believers for us to bring in the harvest. Indeed, the harvest is great but the labourers are few (Matthew 9:37).

Campbell said the following: "Revival is not churches filled with people, but people filled with God...In revival the church, the roadside, the hillside —all become places made sacred by the presence of God and the cry of the repentant.

"The Kingdom of God is not going to be advanced by our churches becoming filled with men, but by men in our churches becoming filled with God.

"It is one thing to shout it, it is one thing to sing it, it is one thing to talk about revival, but give me a people on their faces, seeking to be rightly related with God, and when that happens, we will soon know the impact of God-realisation in our country.

"There is a growing conviction everywhere, and especially among thoughtful people, that unless revival comes, other forces will take the field, that will sink us still deeper into the mire of humanism and materialism.

We long for revival, we are longing to see a movement in our own community, in our own church, hall or assembly, and we are crying: God send it, but heaven cries: Is your eye fixed upon Me? Get rightly related to Me".

God is the God of revival and He will revive us again. God is a God of power and He will find a willing people in the day of His power.

God is raising up an army of labourers who refuse to be silent, who will not flinch in times of trial or tribulation, who will not shy away when faced with evil and who will not compromise His Truth.  Such an army is right now being formed on the earth, the remnant that will arise out of the ruins of religiosity and carnality. They are like the 7000 faithful whom God said to Elijah refused to bow the knee before Baal.

Yes, this is a dangerous remnant, filled by the Spirit of God, for they will be like the first apostles and disciples. They are dangerous for they are not unsettled by Baal, do not fear man, and laugh along with God at His enemies. They are dangerous for they love the truth, and they know the battle belongs to God.

One of the main secrets of success in the early church lay in the fact that the early believers believed in the unction from on high, and not entertainment from men.  One of the very sad features that characterizes much that goes under the name of evangelism today is the craze for entertainment. It holds no power, for true power lies in God’s Word and nothing else.

Again, revival belongs to God. No man can manufacture revival. You can try to fake it, but the fruit of it will be evident. Revival is driven by the Spirit of God, and we cannot try and force revival through our strength or power.

In the beautiful song Show Your Power by Kevin Prosch, we read, Show Your power, oh Lord our God, our God, Your gospel oh Lord is the hope of this nation, You are the Lord, It is the power of God for our salvation, You are the Lord, we ask not for riches, but look to the cross, You are the Lord and for our inheritance give us the lost.

Yes, amen Lord! There is glorious power in the Gospel, for the truth of the Lord sets free. But then we must proclaim the whole truth of God. After all, these days there is a kind of gospel being proclaimed which conveniently accommodates itself to the spirit of the age, and makes no demand for godliness. It is a self-serving Gospel, instead of a Gospel that draws the sinner to the reality that redemption is sorely needed.

Galatians 6:9 says, Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. God is indeed reviving His people, and I believe it is happening right now. A people dedicated to the cause, therefore to the Great Commission. They are the ones who agree with the prophet Isaiah when we read in Isaiah chapter 6, 8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us? Then I said, Here am I! Send me." Yes, God is rising up a remnant – a people sold out for His Kingdom and who reflect His beauty by walking in holiness and purity. They will be sent to be carriers of God’s fire.

Matthew 9 (KJV) says, 37 Then He said to His disciples, The harvest truly is plentiful, but the labourers are few. 38 Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into His harvest." We must pray for labourers for the harvest even since the days of Jesus are plentiful! We must pray for God to revive His people who are labourers called to the harvest field, We must pray for a great awakening in this church so that many know the reality of John 3:16.

The Bible says in Revelation 14:15-18, And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap: for the time is come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe. 16 And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped. And another angel came out of the temple, which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe.

It is not God’s Will that any soul He created should perish, but that all men should come to the knowledge of God and be saved. That is why He sent His only Son, Jesus Christ to come and save the world. As He completed the work, He handed over the mandate to His disciples to continue. God is calling on all believers to cast their net in the deep for the harvest of souls. The angels are crying, calling on every believer to go into the outermost part of the earth to preach the gospel and win souls for the Kingdom of God. The trumpet will sound soon, and any soul not harvested while the grace lasts will be lost to the devil to hell fire. This is not God’s will for the man He created.

John Wesley once said, God does nothing but in answer to prayer. Prayer is not an option for the church but a necessity. Prayer is man connecting with His Creator and seeking God’s help, His counsel, His guidance and strength to secure favourable outcomes according to His perfect will. God’s plan is for mankind to desire what God desires, to will what God wills, and to ask God to accomplish God’s purposes in the world, so that goodness and truth may reign on the earth rather than evil and darkness. Praying does not mean convincing God to do your will but doing God’s will through your will.

It says in James 5:16: The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Glory to God! We live in terrible and perilous days of darkness, but those who seek His righteousness and follow God can stand upon the Word that one’s prayer avails much! Prayer of the righteous will thus be useful and beneficial, all to the glory of God. And so we can in God’s power pray for labourers, for a revival and an awakening. Prayer is not an option for the believer. It is a necessity to fulfil God’s purposes in the world and our individual lives. Time spent in prayer is not time wasted but time invested. As we embrace the will of God, as we live before Him in the righteousness of Christ, as we seek to fulfil His purposes, nothing will be able to hinder our prayers, and we will begin to understand Jesus’ saying, With God all things are possible (Matthew 19:26).

We often read about the armour of God, but so often we neglect a very important piece of the armour – prayer! A dedicated and functional prayer life is vital to see the manifestation of the end-time harvest, as we continuously seek the Lord’s will, His