Yes, the Spirit was moving powerfully in the early church. But like the Spirit often does, he was moving in response to people’s faith, which was heightened because of the overwhelming needs and adversity they were facing. Again, when have you experienced the Spirit most powerfully in your life? I imagine it’s typically happened when desperation drove you to need and seek him.
We should not romanticize persecution or affliction. They are evils. However, throughout biblical and church history, we find a consistent pattern: “glad and generous hearts” (Acts 2:46) tend to grow best when adversity, often in the forms of persecution and affliction, is part of the church’s life. Persecution and affliction provide the gracious and sanctifying opportunities for Christians to experience the love of Christ in very personal ways, as we extend it to and receive it from one another — the opportunities to demonstrate the gospel visibly to a watching world.
The gospel becomes more real to us the more we feel our need of it.
So let’s keep praying for revival, and keep longing to be like that radically loving, generously giving, passionately praying, boldly witnessing community of first-generation saints. But let’s remember the hostile, painful, desperate context in which the church was born. And as we pray, let’s “not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon [us] to test [us], as though something strange were happening to [us]” (1 Peter 4:12). It is altogether likely we are experiencing God’s unexpected answers to our prayers.
