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FIRST-PERSON: A call to prayer


MARTINSBURG, W. Va. (BP)–A call to assemble is being issued to every state leader, pastor and layman across our nation. Please join me in prayer that the people of God will heed the call.

All of us see the cost of sin in our churches, pastors and families. We know that the only hope available is found in repentance and a return to an obedient walk with our blessed Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Thankfully, promises of God’s deliverance and help in such times are sprinkled throughout the Bible.

The call to assemble is a prayer conference entitled “Broken Before the Throne,” scheduled for Nov. 3-11 at Westview Baptist Church in Martinsburg, W. Va. The invitation is coming to you during this most desperate time of our nation, encouraging you to seek a closer walk with Christ and to lead your people to do the same.

A.W. Tozer declared, “Whatever is holy is healthy; evil is a moral sickness that must end ultimately in death.” How many times in recent days have people asked or wondered, “Why are we so morally sick?”

My belief is that we are morally sick as a nation because holiness is absent in people of faith. I’m praying and believing that we can and will return to a right relationship with God that will make us holy through Christ.

At Keswick, the location for a Great Awakening movement in the past, a few concerned believers assembled because they were deeply distressed by the coldness and deadness in the church and by the lack of holiness in Christians. John Hyde assembled the Sialkot convention in India for similar reasons. As both groups prayed and humbled themselves, they found God’s mercy and power poured out in abundance.

To my knowledge there has been no such assembly within the Southern Baptist Convention in recent years, perhaps even decades. That is not to say that there has not been a desire or attempt to conduct such events. No doubt God’s faithful servants are tucked away in many places, laboring night and day for His Kingdom and yearning for spiritual awakening.

T.W. Hunt has said, “God has His remnant always in place and among us.” I am seeking to assemble that remnant of intercessors to pray with unity. With such desperate times pressing upon us, should we not carefully consider a desperate plea for prayer and this call for a holy assembly? I am pleading with you to join me in this sincere call to assemble.

Martinsburg is accessible from the Baltimore and Washington, D.C., airports, and it’s only a few minutes from Interstate 81 in the eastern panhandle of the Mountain State.

While you may feel challenged by the distance from your home to this location, careful study of who participated in the Great Awakenings of the past shows they came from near and far to be where God was meeting with His people. It has been written that Hudson Taylor of China Inland Mission traveled specifically to Keswick, England, because that was where God was shaping men for the mission field. That was where God was speaking and anointing people for His service. We are in need of such a move of God again today.

This is my vision for the next Great Awakening in America, and I have sought to share it as clearly as I am able to do. I believe that history has taught us that God meets with His people when they come together to repent and pray. He has promised, “Draw nigh unto Me, and I will draw nigh unto you.” I believe that He will do so at Broken Before the Throne.
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Dan Biser is pastor of Zoar Baptist Church in Augusta, W. Va., and Fox’s Hollow Baptist Church in Romney, W. Va.

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  • Dan Biser