At age 57, I DO repeat myself now and again…;) But as we are in the midst of 40 Days of Prayer for NKY (January 24-March 5). A daily devotional/prayer guide is available on our website for each of the 40 Days: www.nkbaptist.org  These are also on our Facebook page (Northern Kentucky Baptists) as well as a newly created page 40 Days of Prayer for NKY. We also have a limited number of prayer guides for spiritual awakening published by the Kentucky Baptist Convention available through the NKBA office. Simply call Lori to set them aside for you to pick up.

We will celebrate an Association wide Spiritual Awakening Conference on Friday and Saturday night, March 2-3, at 7 PM at Burlington Baptist Church. Sam Schmidt, Lead Pastor at Edgewood Baptist Church in Nicholasville, KY and one of the bright young leaders in the Southern Baptist Convention will be our guest speaker. We will have GREAT music and testimonies about what God is doing around the NKBA. Please plan to attend! This period will culminate in our Spring NKBA Executive Board meeting on Monday, March 7 at 7 PM at First Baptist Church Highland Heights. During the day we will hold a Pastors Round Table at FBC Highland Heights from 10-2 with Pastor James Welch, Lead Pastor at Harbor Community Church in New Orleans, LA, one of our strategic partners. James is a gifted speaker and God is using he and his church to reach those who are lost and far from God in one of THE most difficult cities in the world (New Orleans is 94% unchurched)! Mark these dates on your calendar and plan to attend!

I thought this article I wrote in a previous year would be worth repeating as it strikes the tone I want to set as your Lead Follower during this 40 Days of Prayer for Spiritual Awakening in our region/nation.

Dr. Ronnie Floyd has written, “There is no great movement of God that has ever occurred that does not begin with the extraordinary prayer of God’s people. The time is now for us to come together before God in clear agreement, visible union, and in extraordinary prayer for the next Great Awakening and for the world to be reached for Christ.” 

“…and my people, who bear my name, will humble themselves, pray and seek my face, and turn from their evil ways, then will I hear from heaven, forgive their sin and will heal their land.” II Chronicles 7:14 (CSB) We need to plead with God for spiritual revival personally, revival in the church, and the next Great Awakening in the United States. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones writes:  And in movements of the Spirit the first thing that happens and which eventually leads to a great revival is that one man or a group of men suddenly begin
to feel this burden and they feel the burden so much that they are led to do something about it (Revival: Martyn Lloyd-Jones, p. 163).

It has been over 100 years since the last great move of God occurred in our nation. It was in 1857 and 1858 that a movement of prayer led to 1 million people becoming Christ-followers from 
a population of only 30 million in our nation. This movement of prayer was begun in New York City by a layperson named Jeremiah Lanphier. After failing to minister effectively to the immigrants in his church’s neighborhood, Lanphier was moved to pray.

At noon on September 23, 1857, in the Dutch Reformed Church on Fulton Street in New York City, Jeremiah Lanphier knelt alone. Before 1 p.m. six men joined him. Within a month, 100 men joined him daily. Soon, thousands of men began to pray each day at noon around New York City. This resulted in 1 million Americans coming to Christ within a two-year span, as well as another 1 million converted to Christ in Great Britain and Ireland. The church was revived. Christians were never the same. The advance of the gospel to the nations of the world was profound. Men like David Livingstone, J. Hudson Taylor, Charles Spurgeon, D. L. Moody, and William Booth were impacted and their impact is still being felt.

While it has been over 100 years since the last great movement of God upon our nation, we cannot ignore the moments when the Lord has still moved upon our nation powerfully. For example, in the early 1970s, the Jesus Movement touched a generation, including many of our leaders today. Through this work of God, thousands came to Christ, followed by many of them being called into ministry, myself included. A team from Asbury University came to my church in Midway, KY to bear witness of a REVIVAL that began in a chapel service and lasted for weeks/months and spread across America! The greatest year of reaching and baptizing teenagers in our Southern Baptist history occurred in 1972, all due to the influence of the Jesus Movement. Sadly, we now have a generation or more of people who have never experienced anything close to a movement of God with this level of impact.

It is past time for this to change. God is ready, are we?  PLEASE JOIN ME IN 40 DAYS OF PRAYER AS WE PRAY FOR EACH CHURCH, EACH COUNTY, EACH PASTOR TO SEE PEOPLE LOST AND FAR FROM GOD COME TO THE SAVING KNOWLEDGE OF CHRIST AND THAT THEY WOULD BECOME DISCIPLES THAT MAKE DISCIPLES!

Following Him,

JIM