The language of “our land,” “this season,” and “the nations” introduces an apocalyptic element into the worship, and this is associated with a pessimism concerning society and also the wider church. In the sermon the need for revival is linked to a world that is seen as groaning and disintegrating morally. The rector speaks about the present time as a “winter that will soon be over,” a time when the “temporary madness that is over our city will soon be over.”
