#182 Special Report - Looking Back and Looking Forward

So, my encouragement to be to our listeners, as you look back in your account and look forward, just get in the greatest position possible for the move of. Music.

God that's coming for you and your church and in our land these days. Welcome to the One Cry Podcast, a nationwide call for spiritual awakening. The goal, accelerating the movement of God through sharing revival truth, stories, and reports. Well, hello, One Cry family, and this is Byron Paulus, and I'm on podcasts from time to time. But today, I am so blessed to be able to be on a podcast with the co-host of the regular One Cry podcast, all the way from Mississippi, Kyle Reno.

Kyle, this is a privilege for me, man. I don't get to hang out with you on podcasts like this, like Bill Elif gets to. So, man, thank you for joining us. Yeah, man, live from Brandon, Mississippi. Honored to be a part of it, and it's good to see you, too. Well, it's great to be together. And I just thought, as we come to the year end here in 2024, to be able to reflect about the podcast this past year, because it's really been an amazing year of impact among pastors and leaders particularly.

And I think, Kyle, we're somewhere around, hovering around 175 podcasts. Most of which you have been a part of, which translates to about, what, three and a half years. From Mississippi, you can do good math. That's a lot of content. Yeah, it is. That's way out of my pay grade, man. Don't ask me to do the math on how long it is.

It's been a lot. But the beauty of it, it's all things that come out of Bill's heart and my heart and things that I know that One Cry is passionate about and a heart for personal revival and see it spread across the nation. And we're in real-time moments where we've got testimony of things God's doing. So it's been a fun three-plus years, and I believe that there's more to come. And I think at the outset, we just kind of had a byline accelerating the movements of revival.

And now it's not a matter of any form of having to initiate them.

I mean, they are happening and they're happening in so many different places and so many different arenas. And I think obviously on campuses and Gen Z, it's amazing what we're watching God do. And then as we also look beyond that and the sports world, I mean, I don't want to mention any football teams from South Bend, Indiana, but the quarterback goes to my church and the coaches are meeting for Bible study.

And that's happening in campuses. I mean, on sports programs everywhere, it seems like, and even in media and Christian films. And it just seems like that there is a movement and you and Bill and the whole podcast that the OneCry family has been able to accelerate those movements. What a blessing.

And that's what I want to talk with you about today. Kyle, looking back on all the podcasts in 2024, I would think some of them kind of stand out where you would say, man, I just sense God's hand was on this, or I just sense it resonated with the pastors and particularly in leaders that are watching and listening to this.

And I just wondered if just off your heart, Kyle, as you look back, what are some of those themes, and maybe a little cliff note, one takeaway maybe from that theme that just keeps lingering in your own heart. Yeah, I mean, I think the series that really Bill led through around the present-centered life, and man, if you've been around the One Cry podcast, you've heard this a lot, that everything flows from the presence of the Lord.

I mean, like the desire to so position ourselves as personally, but as a people, as a church, as a nation to experience the presence of the Lord. And Bill had several teachings that led us to pray and to believe for God's presence personally. And the centrality of that, you see in Exodus, a lot of moments that he shared about where the desire to be distinct because of the manifest glory and transcendence and presence of God.

So that was a teaching that I sat under and thought, man, yeah, that is so true. I think personally for me in 2024 and recounting just some of the podcast and really a word that God gave me for our church was looking at the moment where Jesus clears the temple and things that the Lord showed me about his why behind that. And that the desire was for the temple to be a place where people could experience the presence of God.

And that the religious leaders had made it harder for far-from-God people to experience the presence of the Lord by setting up in the court of the Gentiles all the different merchandise things.

It wasn't wrong for them necessarily to provide these things for people to bring for sacrifice, But where they did it had made it harder for far-from-God people to get as close to God's presence as possible, and that that was the one place that the Gentiles could come and pray and worship and make their offerings to the one true God. And it struck me that Jesus was irate at the idea that religion would make it harder for people to be in his father's house.

And the correlating passage in Matthew 11, it shows us that moment again that Jesus has run people out of the temple. And once he's run everybody out, and I've referenced this in the podcast—. That when they're all run out, Gentiles, people that were sick and those that needed healing, came to Jesus in the temple. So defiled people that would not normally be able to come into the temple came into the presence of Jesus and he healed them there. Wow.

And it's like when he got religion out of the way and real people that are desperately panting for God could come, they come. and then Jesus does what he does. He helps people in a profound way. And it just, for me, it made me as a pastor say, I want to remove all the obstacles. I want to make sure that there's no religious barriers. Instead, we're building bridges so that people far from God could come into the presence of God, into the presence of Jesus.

And when that happens, Jesus changes lives. So that was probably a takeaway moment that I'm still, I'm leading in light of that truth still today. And you know, that reminds me, Kyle, of Duncan Campbell, I think it was, when asked, how do you define revival? He says, it's a going of God among His people. And I've often wondered, when you walk into churches today, most churches, most times, that it's the going of programs.

It's a going of plans. It's a going of the charisma or the popularity of a particular individual. And how many times do I step in the church and I just say, God is here? And when it does happen, it's like we just fall on our faces and surrender. So I so appreciated that whole series on the presence of God. And I think you and Bill sometimes talk about a friend of Bill's called Richard Owen Roberts which is his name, and a real historian on revival.

And he gave us a definition one time as revival being an extraordinary movement of God that produces extraordinary results. But then years later, he said, I changed my definition. And I remember thinking to myself, how can you do that to me? I've been quoting you all these years, you know? And he says, I'm shortening it. It's just God. It's the presence of God. And I so appreciated that whole series on that emphasis.

And I think it's probably redirected the thinking of pastors as they prepare and plan and pray with their leadership for what even the Sunday worship service should be like. And they may be asking the questions, are we doing what the Bible says we need to do to evoke, to bring about the presence of God? So thank you for doing that series.

It was so rich and so grateful for that. Any other particular series? I know you did a series on fasting and just numerous others. And I know there were special reports, even that I did a number of this last year, on stirrings and movements of God, especially with, we interviewed campus leaders like Drew Humphrey from Baylor and Jay Anderson, I think, from the POS movement.

And my favorite was David Thomas from Asbury, who I think laid out more quality, I guess you would say, principles of revival, perhaps of any single one-hour message I've heard. So, so grateful for all those podcasts this last year. Yeah. Yeah, and I would just echo that with, I think, the building. I've, and this is mine. so everybody don't have to agree with me on this.

I believe that revival has begun. And I'm not speaking from a hope so. I'm speaking from is here statement. And now, do I think it's at the magnitude yet? No. But I'm watching too much of what God is doing. If we're looking into the future, looking in 25, ending 24, I would just say to our listeners, Man, there is no overestimating. I guess you could underestimate what God has been cumulatively doing here for a couple years. And my faith for 25, and God doesn't work on calendar years.

I believe our God's a God of seasons, and He's strategically putting things together. But practically for me and for my local church, the state of Mississippi, what we're seeing, I have great faith that the tide is swelling and that there's more to come. So my encouragement to be our listeners, as you look back and recount and look forward, just get in the greatest position possible for the move of God that's coming for you and your church and in our land in these days.

And I remember, Kyle, when we launched these podcasts, we said, you know, this may not be the season where they'll be in the greatest demand, but when God begins to move, they're going to be looking for resources from those who have walked the pathway and sensed and have gotten to know the nature and the character of God and the ways of God in revival. And so I do believe this is a divine moment. It is a season, as you said, and what a season it is.

And I would just add, and I think, Kyle, I'm sure you and Bill and others are picking up on this, just online on social media, the stories of revival that are happening. And I just picked up one this morning where at the North Carolina University of North Carolina, North Carolina State, I guess, they actually took chalk and wrote the whole Gospel of John on the sidewalks there at North Carolina State University. I mean, no one told them to do that.

God's spirit had to come to the hearts of those students and say, hey, here's something that will attract other students. And it's the gospel of John written literally in chalk on that campus. So those are stories, right? Stories of where God is at work. And I'm with you. 2025, I believe, could be the explosion year of where God takes all these little pockets of revival and just above and beyond anything we could ever think or imagine. And I'm excited about that.

So, Kyle, talk to me a little bit about a vision maybe that you've had. Why did you ever get involved in the One Cry podcast? What has been your hopes and desires? How would you like to see God use it? And I just love hearing your heart on that. Yeah, I mean, a statement I've used often in the podcast is, revival ruins you, and in the best ways possible.

So for me, I didn't grow up in the faith, around the things of God. I walked into church, Garden of First Baptist in 1999, as a far from God 18, 19-year-old. And experienced the presence of God. And seven days later, was born again and immediately discipled by men that were white hot for God in the midst of a little r revival in a local church. And so I tell people all the time, I was ruined. I never knew, I didn't grow up in church around the things of God, so I didn't know church at all.

But when I came to Christ, all I knew was a church fully alive. And it wasn't until later when surrendering to ministry and getting out a little bit more that I realized that wasn't normative, that that was abnormal. And so it ruined me. And by God's grace, I've been very blessed to be at churches that believe in the power of the Spirit and to be a Word and Spirit church and believe that the presence of God can change any person's life and heart and city and beyond.

And so I guess my hope around the One Cry podcast is to take things that was invested into me through men like Steve Gaines and David Jett and Bill Eliff and in my generation to help hand those off to future leaders to rightly position the church for the future. I guess one of the greatest fears I have for the local church in the future is I'm I'm about to be 44 years old. There's a lot of guys like me that are starting to lead in different local churches, every expression, size, scope.

But a lot have never experienced the manifest glory of God in a local church. They know church, but have never had the opportunity maybe to know a move of God. And I think the past generation's leaders, I take Steve's. And, you know, I go across the spectrum of they were shaped and their leadership was shaped by the Jesus movement. And the way they led in local expressions of the church. And I think that the church, Big C, in our nation have been led by men that were really marked by that era.

Well, if we don't have a similar experience in our nation, will there be leaders that know how to lead and believe for more than merely doing church, a move of God? So I think our heart around this, I know, and my involvement was just to be able to maybe have a moment to share some things that I've caught with others. Wow, Kyle, I so appreciate that and what you said about not being satisfied with less than the manifest presence of God.

I think the fear that I would have, and I'm sure you would join me in this, is that we would relax, that we'd say, hey, this is really cool what God's doing, and we would just sit back and watch instead of saying there's so much more, that the outpouring of God's Spirit, echoes of Pentecost, if you will, could change the world forever, and that we would believe Him and trust Him for that.

And then finally, Kyle, as we wrap up here, if we can, here in a moment, but I just want to, I just want to say, and I think I sent you an email of, um. Conversation I had with a pastor in Uganda who said that he has listened to 70 podcasts of the One Cry podcast, and he is leading 500 churches, I think it is, there in Uganda and bringing other denominations and streams into this One Cry movement, Uganda.

And now One Cry leaders are going over there to just come alongside of him and to see it spread in other nations, apparently an influential leader there in a different stream than Kyle. You're in maybe, and I'm in typically, but a stream of just godly pastors seeking him. So we can never lose sight of the impact of how God uses digital world podcasts to impact entire nations. Kyle, I just thank you. Thank you for being an anchor on the podcast.

Thank you for what your heart is and that you are speaking and pouring out your heart through a life message of something that you experienced. And therefore, the fire is coming forth. And I'm so grateful for that.

So would you close in prayer and just close this time? Let's just cry out to God for revival and ask him to use not only one cry, obviously, but all the stirrings and movements that are taking place right now. Yeah, let's do it. Well, let's lean in together, as we always say to our listener, not to merely hear a prayer, but to participate, be a part of it. That's right. So join us in this as we pray. Lord, thank you. Thank you that there's no revival without a real God.

And I thank you that you're real and that you're moving and doing in our day, that you're not done. You're not done in our nation and in the nations. So I ask for every listener and for every follower of Christ in the United States of America, God, would you give us faith? To believe, Lord, for the wind of your Spirit to blow, for the fire to fall, Lord, to see Jesus rightly glorified and exalted, and that, Lord, our nation and future generations changed, Lord.

So, Father, I pray for the message of hope, Lord. I think that the enemy loves that doomsday message, Lord, But I pray for the hope that we have, that you're a rebuilder, a restorer, Lord, that you renew things, God, that the story in redemptive history is the fallenness and brokenness and how we just break things. But you can bring things to life. You can restore and renew and breathe. So, Lord, breathe on us as we look back over 24. Thank you for all you've taught us this year.

And as we look forward into 25, help us to believe as big as our God. So, Lord, we look to you and ask that you would send a mighty movement of your spirit. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, amen and amen. And thank you, Kyle. And you listeners out there and viewers, I just want to say thank you for being faithful this past year. So many of you, week after week after week, just like that pastor in Uganda, are tuning in. You're listening.

You're downloading. and many of you are just pushing the share button and sending it to others so they can listen. And if there's a moment in history that this is the time to get anything about revival out there to accelerate the movement. We just encourage you to do that and pray with us as we're trusting God for a major miracle to keep the One Cry podcast going forward and to multiply it during this moment.

I remember just the Asbury revival, the one in the 70s, Dennis Kinlaw just wrote a little book, One Divine Moment, and this may be that one divine moment. So thank you, and God bless you, and thank you, Lord, for joining us. Music.