The Fire that Never Sleeps Quotes

“THE TWO CROSSES Many years ago, A. W. Tozer said that whereas the old cross killed the sinner, the new cross redirects the sinner. Consider his timely words: The new cross does not slay the sinner, it redirects him. It gears him into a cleaner and jollier way of living and saves his self-respect. To the self-assertive it says, “Come and assert yourself for Christ.” To the egotist it says, “Come and do your boasting in the Lord.” To the thrill seeker it says, “Come and enjoy the thrill of Christian fellowship.” The Christian message is slanted in the direction of the current vogue in order to make it acceptable to the public. It would seem that in twenty-first century Christianity, there are two crosses—the authentic and the counterfeit. The authentic cross calls us to surrender all while the counterfeit pats us on the back and assures us that we can take the world along for the journey. This is why true, sustained revival continues to evade us. We are becoming like the system we have been commissioned to transform. In compromising with the world by embracing another cross, we offer a great disservice to the very people who are desperately in need of God.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“It would seem that in twenty-first century Christianity, there are two crosses—the authentic and the counterfeit. The authentic cross calls us to surrender all while the counterfeit pats us on the back and assures us that we can take the world along for the journey. This is why true, sustained revival continues to evade us. We are becoming like the system we have been commissioned to transform. In compromising with the world by embracing another cross, we offer a great disservice to the very people who are desperately in need of God.”
― Michael L. Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“Believers, do you have the courage to get alone with God and say to Him honestly, “If what I have is all the Christianity there is, then the thing is a fraud!” God”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“We are suffering today from a species of Christianity as dry as dust, as cold as ice, as pale as a corpse, and as dead as King Tut. We are suffering not from a lack of correct heads but of consumed hearts. —VANCE HAVNER T”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“To teach God’s glory as a theological idea, not as active and available experience, is to shortchange the very truth of His presence. To fully know a person, closeness is essential. There is only so much you can receive through secondhand information. The same is true for God. Sadly, many are teaching secondhand information about a person we are called to know and experience. For example, a lot of people preach a theology of the baptism of the Holy Spirit, but unless you’ve experienced the Spirit’s baptism for yourself, you cannot fully preach it. You have to taste and see that the Lord is good! (See Psalm 34:8.) I”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“the grace that God gives you is grace that comes with responsibility.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“God must be more valuable to us than anything. We must put God first as opposed to just trying to to squeeze Him into our lives.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“To seek the fulfillment of ourselves in God—that is, to seek only the blessings and refreshing of God, but not seek God for himself—this type of spirituality is the enemy of the cross of Christ. —ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“There can be no possible return to God without repentance. Repentance speaks of turning back. The notion that repentance is merely a change of mind is a deficient definition. It is a change of mind and heart and life. It is a deliberate turning away from that which is wrong and destructive and a turning back to God and His mercy.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“There is hardly anything more fundamental to the life of a believer than repentance—hardly anything more life-giving, more liberating, more glorious. That’s why the devil has sought to discredit it.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“If the way we live outside the building is not characterized by holiness and sacrificial love for the Lord and the lost, that is not revival. And if everything that happens in our revival meetings comes through the hands of human vessels—without the supernatural visitations outside the church, without the abiding presence, without the clear evidence that God Himself has “stepped down from heaven” in power—that is not revival.2”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“I remembered reading that Christ had to purify the temple first. After he’d cleared away all the debris that was not supposed to be there, He could make it a house of prayer where people from all backgrounds and circumstances could come to pray. As the people began to pray, God turned His house into a house of power where He could heal the sick and deliver the troubled in heart. That power would then quite naturally draw praise and thanksgiving from the people, making it a house of praise. Upon reflection, these four steps—purity, prayer, power, and praise—are essential if we are going to see God’s glory revealed in the Church today.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“If we want to experience a powerful visitation of the Holy Spirit, prayer is not an option—it is a necessity.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“Some mistakenly assume that a prayer meeting needs to be spontaneous and unstructured in order to be Spirit-filled and dynamic. Spontaneity is usually birthed in structure. Without structure, there is no direction or vision for where you want to go. One of the problems we have all experienced with prayer meetings is feeling purposeless in our prayer efforts. If there is no system, order, or clear plan for a prayer meeting, it is easy for even the most “spiritual” people to pray for about ten minutes, and afterward feel bored. However, when you start with a plan, you have clear purpose in how to move forward.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“Recognize the importance of prayer in this hour. We can talk about revival all we want, but historically, landscape-changing revival has been preceded by tenacious men and women of prayer.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“Rest assured, if you feel directionless in your personal walk with God or your congregation when it comes to prayer, ask the Holy Spirit for divine strategy. He wants to make it practical and accessible. This is exactly what He did for our community as we sought to make prayer our great quest.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The idea that the Lord wanted me to make prayer such a driving emphasis seemed counterintuitive to positioning the church for revival. How could it be that quite possibly the most unpopular activity in church culture could become a birthing center for a history-making move of the Holy Spirit?”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The test of how people will steward revival when it comes is revealed in how faithfully they cry out for it before it gets there.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The Spirit doesn’t require our perfect performance to work with; He simply needs willingness to yield to whatever the Father wants to do.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The world outside there is not waiting for a new definition of Christianity, it’s waiting for a new demonstration of Christianity.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The chief danger of the Church today is that it is trying to get on the same side as the world, instead of turning the world upside down. Our Master expects us to accomplish results, even if they bring opposition and conflict. Anything is better than compromise, apathy, and paralysis. God give to us an intense cry for the old-time power of the Gospel and the Holy Ghost! —A. B. SIMPSON”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The problem is that when we refrain from telling people what they need to hear, we spiritually misdiagnose the dying.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The big issue for us was not whether people cried, shook, fell, or experienced some kind of physical manifestation. These are quite neutral in the scheme of revival. We place too much emphasis on them to the positive and negative.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“Just take one step in faith toward God and be confident that He has made the ten-million-mile journey that you could never make. Then take the next step and the next step, and before you know it, dramatic change will come in your life.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“Revival is a divine confrontation. Heaven extends us an option—continue as normal or recapture God’s definition of normal.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“We are suffering today from a species of Christianity as dry as dust, as cold as ice, as pale as a corpse, and as dead as King Tut. We are suffering not from a lack of correct heads but of consumed hearts. —VANCE HAVNER”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“There have been more people saved in the past twenty, thirty, or forty years around the world than at any other time in recorded church history.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“It is deception for us to believe that in order to bring people to Christ, we need to water down the message and make it palatable.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“today, even when we preach on the love of God, if we neglect preaching about sin, the wrath of God, and humankind’s need for a Savior, we are promoting imbalance. When we preach God’s mercy without the reality of sin, one must ask the question: Why must God be merciful? Why do I need mercy from Him at all? If we preach a Savior without giving context for what we need saving from, our grasp of salvation is limited. It all comes together when we present the complete, full Gospel—nothing missing, nothing lacking.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival

“The New Testament Gospel starts with God and tells us what we must do to please Him. The contemporary Gospel starts with us and tells us what God can do to please us. No wonder we are in such spiritual confusion and moral malaise.”
― Michael Brown, The Fire that Never Sleeps: Keys to Sustaining Personal Revival