Stuart Piggin has given us yet another of his reflections on the subject of revival. It has been, as many will know, a special concern of his for many years and his particular brand of historical and personal reflection on the subject has both strengths and weaknesses. This latest study appears more systematic than many of its predecessors, beginning as it does with chapters on definitions of revival and revival in the Bible, continuing with two historical chapters, and including chapters on revival in the charismatic movement and in the Anglican and Catholic denominations. The last four chapters take a very practical turn, examining preaching, prayer, planning, and paying for (i.e. the cost of) revival. The book concludes with an addendum entitled ‘Revival: What can you do?’ and an epilogue which asks what the next great awakening will look like. The clear goal of the book is to stimulate us to long for revival, to pray for revival and to work towards revival.
There can be no doubt the sincerity of Dr Piggin’s longing for a great work of God in our land. That longing is written deep into every page of this book just as it is in a number of earlier books and articles. What is more, he repeatedly insists that revival is a work of God rather than something human beings can manipulate or accomplish through a particular set of techniques. This is a very helpful corrective to much writing on the subject. Nevertheless, he remains convinced that the fact these phenomena are sovereign works of God does not mean there is nothing we can do to prepare the ground. Indeed, a significant feature of Dr Piggin’s new book is a chapter on God’s sovereignty and human responsibility in relation to revival, though one is forced to admit that the level of theological reflection in that chapter is rather shallow.
The book is full are things we can do even though revival is ultimately God’s work. Early in the book he insists ‘We cannot work it up. We can only pray it down.’ (p. 14) At the other end of the book he spells out his own strategy for revival, ‘start with yourself, pray up the generals, get a committed nucleus, and then train up the troops’. (p. 203) Surely an exhortation to pray fervently, to preach fervently, and to plan strategically, and to count the cost with the goal of seeing the name of the Lord Jesus honoured throughout the land is something every Christian would want to endorse. There is much that is good in these pages.
Unfortunately some of the great weaknesses of Dr Piggin’s earlier work resurface in this latest volume. His use of the Bible is idiosyncratic, at points irresponsible, and largely unconvincing. The chapter entitled ‘Revival in the Bible’ is particularly disappointing. One gets the impression that Dr Piggin is driving his agenda through the Bible with little regard for what the particular passages are actually saying.
Perhaps the most striking example of this is found in the earlier chapter dealing with Dr Piggin’s own definition of revival. Here he lists a whole range of biblical expressions and simply asserts that these refer to the phenomenon he is discussing. He claims that revival as he understands it is ‘a visitation from on high’, ‘a time of refreshing from the Lord’, ‘a heavenly light’, ‘a divine fire’, ‘a river of water from God’s sanctuary’, ‘a dayspring from on high’, and even ‘one of the days of the Son of Man’! (p. 13). Indeed, his failure to acknowledge even the possibility that he might be misappropriating biblical language is quite troubling. Then there are the quite spectacular jumps in logic, such as: ‘Modern theologians who doubt that revival is biblical need to reckon with the fact that the vocabulary used to describe the Evangelical Revival of the 1740s was thoroughly biblical’.
There is also some cause for concern in the way stories and quotations from other writers are used. Again these are pressed into the service of Dr Piggin’s agenda. Stories are often introduced with descriptions such as ‘the revival in New South Wales in 1902/3’, ‘the Aboriginal Revival of 1979’, and ‘the Wheaton Revival of 1995’. One gets the feeling that acknowledgement of these as ‘revivals’ is the presupposition rather than the conclusion of Dr Piggin’s argument.
Furthermore, there is little critical interaction with the opinions of others (NB the way he uses the opinions of Ian Jagelman in chapter 7, see below). Repeatedly, opinions from those with vested interests are taken as fact even when there is abundant evidence to the contrary. Nor is there much of an attempt to check his sources (e.g. a quote from Calvin is taken from a sermon in a Sydney church ‘in the 1980s’ rather than checked back to the writings of Calvin himself, p. 22). Leaving aside the question of whether Dr Piggin has properly understood Jonathan Edwards (especially in the light of a plethora of studies on the latter’s theology published in the last few years), the reader is left wondering about the context of other quotations.
There are also a number of sweeping generalisations and caricatures, especially when it comes to describing those who have reservations about his general approach. For example, in his chapter on Revival in Anglican and Catholic Churches, he asserts ‘Evangelical Anglican clergy are trained to have an academic relationship with God rather than a personal one’ (p. 125). The quote from Jim Packer which follows Dr Piggin’s assertion says nothing of the sort and so the generalisation remains unsupported. I have taught in three different evangelical Anglican theological colleges in the world and have found no evidence of this at all. A vital personal relationship with the Lord Jesus ought to be, and invariably is, the concern of teacher and student alike.
It is in this same chapter that Dr Piggin quotes with full approval the opinions of Ian Jagelman (an ex-Anglican whose academic qualifications, strangely, he cites in full on page 110). Dr Jagelman apparently opined that Anglicanism inhibits revival, not because of the Prayer Book, cultural inappropriateness, or ecclesiastical structures, but simply because its leaders are ‘afraid of not being accepted by the club’ (p. 127). The function of this quotation in Dr Piggin’s argument is significant. It allows him to explain reservations about his kind of revival in terms of a psychological weakness on the part of those who disagree with him. It is certainly easy to brand opposition as a response of fear, and indeed we have plenty of evidence of how effective this rhetorical device can be (witness the currency of ‘homophobia’ and ‘Islamophobia’). But is this a responsible analysis of alternative opinions?
Firestorm of the Lord is an easy to read exhortation to pursue revival. It is written by a man who loves the Lord Jesus and longs to see him honoured in our land and in the world. But as Dr Piggin himself would admit, zeal that is not anchored in truth will mislead people. We need rigour in our study and passion in our living in the service of the Lord Jesus. In the end, the weaknesses of this book make recommending it difficult.
