Healing Rain of Revival

HEALING RAIN REVIVAL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT  

When Peter said on the Day of Pentecost that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit was what the prophet Joel was speaking about, he quoted from Joel - ‘And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, that I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh (all people). That is what happened. That was the start of the ‘last days’ outpouring, but Peter did not quote what Joel finally said in his prophecy about the end of the last days outpouring of his Spirit. Joel said that a greater outpouring of his Spirit would precede the event of ‘The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood, before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord.’ The Holy Spirit did not tell Peter to quote that part about the end-time final outpouring because that was not the time of the Lord’s second coming, so there is a gap of time between the first outpouring and the final greater outpouring and we are still living in that time gap.

Joel does explain the gap between the two outpourings however when he compares the outpouring of the Spirit to the falling of the former and latter rains upon the earth that occurred every year agriculturally for Israel. Every year there was a long period of the dry months from one harvest festival to the next, when the land weathered and became hardened, and it needed a moderate former rain to fall to soften the earth before sowing and then there would be a latter rain that would ripen the crop before harvesting. Joel says in his prophecy that the final outpouring of God’s Spirit would bring both former and latter rains to come at the same time - He has appointed you the former rain moderately, And He will cause the former rain and the latter rain to come down in the same month. That Is a double portion outpouring.

It is clear that we have not seen the final great and awesome day of the Lord – and we have not seen the final and great outpouring of the Spirit, even though we have had times of refreshing and revivals through many former rain outpourings of God’s Spirit since Pentecost. When the former and latter rains fall upon us in their due time as a double portion of the Holy Spirit the former rain will soften the hearts of people and the latter rain will ripen the fruit of the Spirit of love and peace and joy and bring healing to our souls.

The story in Joel about God’s people going their own way and then being drawn back to God is the archetype or the model of our journey of life for all of us as individuals. We start off on the right track relatively speaking, and then we make our way on our own journey with our own ideas of what is best for us, despite what anyone else’s version is of what we should do. That can get us into trouble and grief – we make wrong choices through lack of wisdom, and we also get wounded through lack of understanding about relationships - and our heart can become hardened over time and the seed of God’s word of life cannot penetrate it – the seasons of dryness of the heart. Sometimes God has to break up that parched weathered ground with tough love (the dealings of a loving Father God), but his preferred remedy is his mercy and grace in sending the rain of the Holy Spirit to soften our hearts and draw us back to himself. 

The book of Hosea is also a story of both Israel and the Church as God’s people who go through times of falling away from God and being made desolate - and they too then turn back to God in their time of affliction and are revived. God says to Israel after they have been stubbornly going astray that he is going to leave them to themselves to go their own way and that he will go and return to his place (Heaven) - and that In their affliction they will earnestly seek Me. 

Hosea 5:15 God says, I will return again to My place till they acknowledge their offense.
Then they will seek My face; In their affliction they will earnestly seek Me. And then they will say "Come, let us return to the LORD. He has torn us but he will heal us; he has afflicted us but he will bind up our wounds. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will restore us, that we may live in his presence. Let us know, let us pursue the knowledge of the LORD. His going from us is established as the morning, and He will come to us like the rain, like the former and latter rain to the earth.

Hosea is also talking about the outpouring of the Holy Spirit that Joel spoke of. 
When God left Israel and returned to his place (Heaven) he was giving them time to consider their ways in their afflictions and to seek his face and return to him. In due course Israel will receive the healing of their souls from the former and latter rains of the Holy Spirit so that they can be revived and live in his presence.

The last time that God said to his people that he would return and go to his place was when Jesus spoke to his disciples before his ascension into Heaven.
John 14:2 I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also… the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you… These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world… My prayer for all of them is that they will be of one heart and mind, just as you and I are, Father—that just as you are in me and I am in you, so they will be in us, and the world will believe you sent me.
 
The great and awesome day of the Lord is always getting closer no matter when you say it but we're living in days when there are worse things happening in the world than ever before. We will see not only more darkness and tribulation in the earth than ever before, but I have an expectation to see more spiritual activity of the Holy Spirit than we have seen before in past visitations of God since Pentecost, and I believe we're in the beginnings of that right now. Too many good words have been spoken and have fallen on deaf ears and hard hearts, but the works of God are going to become more manifest and that will open people’s eyes and give them ears that are ready to hear in the days in which we live. And while the double portion of healing rains is softening the wounded hearts the fruit of the Spirit will speedily become evident in transformed hearts and minds.
The Bible says that Workers will still be harvesting when it is time to plough the fields again. They will still be trampling the grapes when it is time for a new crop. Sweet wine will drip from the mountains and pour from the hills (Amos 9:13).
As you walk your steady path of grace and truth and love you can expect God to overtake you and go ahead of you.