The Altar of the Region

Zechariah 8:20–21

Listen to the promise. "Many peoples and the inhabitants of many cities will yet come, and the inhabitants of one city will go to another and say, 'Let us go at once to entreat the Lord and seek the Lord Almighty. I myself am going.'"

Notice first that this is a promise. God is telling us what he intends to do. It has not yet been fulfilled, not fully, but it is part of his plan to redeem the world. Something is coming. Whole cities seeking God together.

Notice next how it begins. Not with a program, not with an event, not with a merger. It begins with an agreement. The inhabitants of one city turn to another and say, let us seek the Lord together. That agreement is everything. When people align their wills, something shifts. A new reality is born. This is true even in secular matters. It is far more true for the people of God.

Notice what they agree to. They agree to seek the Lord. Not to seek his goodies, not to seek his blessings, but to seek him. His face. His glory. His presence. His Kingdom. This is God-centered, seeking prayer, the kind that chases after God himself and will not be satisfied with anything less.

And notice the last line, the humblest and most important line of all. I myself am going. Four words that carry both humility and integrity. Humility, because no one owns this thing. It belongs to God, and it belongs to all of us. Integrity, because I will not ask you to do what I am unwilling to do myself. I am not sending you. I am going too.

Friends, this is the blueprint for a regional altar. This is the very passage that gripped Jonathan Edwards in 1748 and moved him to call the church to united, extraordinary prayer. Fifty years later the church took up that call, made the agreement, and the Second Great Awakening followed.

We cannot make revival fall any more than Elijah could call down fire. But we can build the altar. And the altar of the region is built the way it has always been built: one city turning to another and saying, let us seek the Lord.

I myself am going. Will you come too?

Greg Johnson
Revive New England