*Title:* Revival and Reformation — Pastor Kyle Baldwin, October 24, 2026

“Do you think that we need more revival and more reformation in the church? I think we do.” Pastor Baldwin opens with the question, and then with an uncomfortable suggestion: these are words we barely use anymore, and we may have quietly shrunk them to fit ourselves — revival reduced to an emotional experience, reformation to agreeing with doctrines. Ellen White defines them quite differently. Revival is “a renewal of the spiritual life, a quickening of the powers of mind and heart, a resurrection from the spiritual death.” Reformation is “a reorganization — a change in ideas and theories, habits and practices.” And the two must blend: reformation will not bear the fruit of righteousness unless it is connected with the revival of the Spirit. A revival of true godliness among us, she says, is “the greatest and most urgent of all our needs” — but it is not received by waiting around. God is more willing to give His Spirit than earthly parents are to give good gifts to their children; our work is to prepare the heart to receive it, “by confession, humiliation, repentance, and earnest prayer.” You cannot be passive and be a follower of Christ.

That is how it happened in Nehemiah’s day. The returned exiles had lived with an unfinished wall for some 70 years, until Nehemiah spoke courage into their hearts and the wall rose in 52 days — the very rebuilding Daniel had foretold. Then Ezra gathered the people and read them the words of the law, and “all the people wept when they heard the words of the law” (Nehemiah 8:9), seeing how far they had fallen and how many of their troubles were their own doing. Josiah wept and tore his clothes the same way when the book of the law was read to him (2 Kings 22:11). But this sorrow, Pastor Baldwin insists, is not sent to destroy us: “godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death” (2 Corinthians 7:10). It is sorrow sent to awaken us — which is exactly what Jesus is doing in His warning to Laodicea (Revelation 3), the church that says it has need of nothing and does not know it is poor, blind, and naked. Pastor Baldwin is candid: he hoped the shaking of COVID would wake God’s people up; instead he sees a church sleeping a deeper slumber. “It is time for you and I to be broken so that we might be rebuilt. It is time for you and I to be humbled so that we may be restored.”

The sermon ends in a courtyard, by a fire. Peter has denied Jesus three times — has even used foul language to hide that he had ever been with Him — when the doors open and Jesus is led past in chains, and their eyes meet. What Peter saw there, in the moment he realized what he had done, was not condemnation: “There is only love in the eyes of the Master. There is only tender, pitying love for our frailty.” If we look up from our own fires, we will see the same look — not anger, but a longing to see us restored. Real revival, true godliness, is always accompanied by reformation: supreme love for God and unselfish love for our neighbor, a life that actually changes. So the appeal comes with the remedy of Revelation 3: come and buy from Jesus gold refined in the fire, eye salve so you can see, and the white raiment of His righteousness — you cannot pay for them with what you have, but He says, “Come anyway.” Will you recognize that you need revival? Will you choose reformation?

*Key texts:* Nehemiah 8:9; Daniel 9:25; 2 Kings 22:11, 13; 2 Corinthians 7:10; Revelation 3:14–18; Luke 22:61–62 · *Also referenced:* Ellen G. White on revival and reformation (“Revival signifies a renewal of the spiritual life…”), on a revival of true godliness as “the greatest and most urgent of all our needs,” and “We have nothing to fear for the future except as we shall forget the way the Lord has led us…”

*Watch:* https://youtu.be/ADX0JWLtJGo · *Listen:* https://cloud-1de12d.becdn.net/media/original/633a950605c72f11bd8a6f74681f8779.mp3