The Logic of Revival: An Argument for Mercy Text: Psalm 85:4-7
Introduction: Arguing with God
There is a kind of piety that is really just a thinly veiled unbelief. It is a timid, shuffling sort of faith that would never dream of being bold with God. It approaches the throne of grace as though it were the principal's office, expecting a stern lecture and perhaps a suspension. But the Scriptures teach us a different way. We are invited, commanded even, to come boldly to the throne of grace. And when we come, we are to come with arguments. Not the arguments of a petulant child demanding his own way, but the arguments of a blood-bought son pleading the covenant promises of his Father.
The psalmists are experts at this. They have a robust, masculine faith that knows how to lay hold of God. They reason with Him. They bring His past faithfulness into the present crisis as evidence. They appeal to His character, to His name, to His established patterns of mercy. They are not quarreling with God; they are engaging in high-stakes covenantal litigation, and they expect to win their case because the Judge is their Father and the law is His own book of promises.
Psalm 85 is a master class in this kind of prayer. The first three verses lay the groundwork by reminding God of what He has already done. "Yahweh, you have been favorable to your land; you have brought back the captivity of Jacob. You have forgiven the iniquity of your people; you have covered all their sin. You have taken away all your wrath." This is the foundation of their appeal. They are not coming to a distant, unknown deity. They are coming to the God who has a track record of redemption. They are saying, in effect, "Remember who You are. Remember what You do."
Having established this precedent of grace, the psalmist then pivots in our text to the present distress. The nation is under a cloud of divine displeasure. The joy of that past salvation has faded, and the anger of God is a felt reality. And so, they begin to argue. They plead for a fresh outpouring of the very mercy God has shown them before. This is not the prayer of a people trying to twist God's arm. This is the prayer of a people who know God's arm is mighty to save, and who are desperately pleading with Him to extend it once more.
The Text
Turn us back, O God of our salvation, And cause Your vexation toward us to cease.
Will You be angry with us forever? Will You prolong Your anger from generation to generation?
Will You not Yourself return to revive us, That Your people may be glad in You?
Show us, O Yahweh, Your lovingkindness, And give us Your salvation.
(Psalm 85:4-7 LSB)
The Necessary Turning (v. 4)
The prayer begins with a profound recognition of where the problem lies and who the only solution is.
"Turn us back, O God of our salvation, And cause Your vexation toward us to cease." (Psalm 85:4)
Notice the two-part plea. First, "Turn us back." The Hebrew word here is shuv, the great Old Testament word for repentance. But look at the grammar. It is not, "We will now turn ourselves back to you." It is a petition: "God, You turn us." This is a bedrock principle of Reformed theology, and it is right here in the Psalms. We are so dead in our sins, so bent in our rebellion, that we cannot even turn back to God on our own initiative. Our repentance is a gift of His grace. He must grant it. He must work it in us. As Jeremiah would later pray, "Turn us back to You, O Yahweh, and we will be turned" (Lam. 5:21).
This demolishes all forms of cheap, man-centered revivalism. True revival is not something we work up; it is something God sends down. We cannot schedule it, organize it, or manipulate it into existence with the right emotional atmosphere. The first step toward revival is the humbling admission that we are unable to take the first step. We are like a car with a dead battery, stuck in a ditch. We don't just need a push; we need a jump start from an external power source. The prayer is, "O God of our salvation, do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Turn us."
The second part of the plea flows from the first: "And cause Your vexation toward us to cease." God's anger is not a petty, irritable mood. It is His holy, settled opposition to sin. When His people wander, His vexation is a form of fatherly discipline. It is a mercy. It is the warning light on the dashboard of the covenant. The psalmist understands this cause-and-effect relationship. If God turns them from their sin, His anger against that sin will naturally cease. He is not asking God to simply ignore their sin. He is asking God to cure their sin, so that the reason for His displeasure is removed. This is a prayer that honors God's holiness while desperately pleading for His grace.
The Covenantal Appeal (v. 5)
Having asked for the grace of repentance, the psalmist now presses his case by appealing to God's covenant character.
"Will You be angry with us forever? Will You prolong Your anger from generation to generation?" (Psalm 85:5)
This is a rhetorical question, and the implied answer is a thunderous "No!" Why? Because God has promised not to be. This is a direct appeal to God's own self-revelation. He is the God who is "slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness" (Ex. 34:6). His anger, for His covenant people, is a temporary, corrective measure. His mercy is eternal. To prolong His anger from generation to generation would be to act contrary to His revealed nature. It would be a violation of His own covenant promises.
The psalmist is not accusing God of being unfaithful. He is using God's faithfulness as the very basis of his argument. He is saying, "Lord, this current state of affairs, this prolonged anger, does not seem like You. It does not fit with what You have told us about Yourself. You are a God who forgives. You are a God who restores. Will you not act according to Your own name?" This is not insolence; it is Spirit-inspired logic. It is taking God at His word and holding Him to it. This is what it means to pray with faith. We are reminding God of His own resume.
The Ultimate Source of Joy (v. 6)
The prayer now moves to the heart of the matter: the desire for revival, for new life from God Himself.
"Will You not Yourself return to revive us, That Your people may be glad in You?" (Psalm 85:6)
Again, the initiative lies entirely with God. "Will You not Yourself return to revive us?" The word for revive means to restore to life, to quicken. It is a divine action. When a people are spiritually dead, lethargic, and joyless, the only remedy is a direct intervention from God. He must return. He must breathe life into the dry bones. This is the essence of revival. It is not just getting more religious. It is not just a new program at church. It is God showing up.
And what is the purpose of this revival? "That Your people may be glad in You." This is crucial. The goal of revival is not primarily our comfort, or our national prosperity, or even the moral improvement of society, though those things are often blessed byproducts. The ultimate goal of revival is the joy of God's people in God. Sin steals our joy. It makes our worship a duty instead of a delight. It turns our relationship with God into a dreary, formal affair. Revival restores the gladness. It makes God the supreme treasure of our hearts again. It makes us rejoice in Him for who He is, not just for what He gives us.
This is a direct challenge to the therapeutic, self-centered counterfeits of our age. We are constantly seeking gladness in our circumstances, in our achievements, in our relationships. But the psalmist knows that true, lasting joy can only be found in one place: in God Himself. And so he prays for revival, because revival is the great joy-restorer.
The Foundation of It All (v. 7)
The prayer concludes with a summary plea, grounding everything in God's covenant love and His saving action.
"Show us, O Yahweh, Your lovingkindness, And give us Your salvation." (Psalm 85:7)
Here we have two of the greatest words in the Bible. First, "lovingkindness." This is the Hebrew word hesed. It is a rich, untranslatable word that combines the ideas of love, mercy, loyalty, and covenant faithfulness. It is God's steadfast, unrelenting, never-giving-up love for His people, a love that is not based on their performance but on His promise. To ask God to "show us" His hesed is to ask for a tangible, undeniable demonstration of His covenant commitment.
Second, "salvation." This is the Hebrew yeshua, the very name of our Lord. "Give us Your salvation." They are asking for deliverance, for rescue from their current state of spiritual malaise and divine displeasure. They are asking for Jesus. And of course, this is where the entire psalm finds its ultimate fulfillment. How can God cease His vexation (v. 4) without compromising His holiness? How can He turn away His anger (v. 5) when our sin is real? How can He revive dead people (v. 6) and show them mercy (v. 7) while remaining just?
The answer is found at the cross. A few verses later, the psalmist prophesies, "Mercy and truth have met together; Righteousness and peace have kissed each other" (Ps. 85:10). Where did this impossible meeting take place? They met at Calvary. At the cross, God's truth about our sin was fully declared. His righteousness was fully satisfied by the wrath poured out on His Son. And because truth and righteousness were satisfied, His mercy could be freely released, and His peace could be granted. In Jesus Christ, God can "turn us back" and "give us salvation" without ceasing for one moment to be a holy and just God. The cross is the only place in the universe where God's vexation against sin and His lovingkindness for sinners can be displayed at the same time, in the same act.
Conclusion: Praying for Rain
This prayer is a model for us. We live in a day of widespread spiritual drought. Our churches are often lethargic, our witness is compromised, and our joy is thin. Our nation is under the manifest vexation of God, groaning under the consequences of its rebellion. What is our recourse? It is to learn how to argue with God like this.
We must begin by acknowledging our utter helplessness. "Turn us, O God." We must abandon all our fleshly, programmatic attempts to manufacture revival and cast ourselves entirely on His sovereign mercy.
We must then plead His promises. "Will You be angry forever? This is not Your way!" We must hold up the mirror of His own Word to Him and ask Him to act consistently with His revealed character.
And we must aim for the right target. "Revive us, that we may be glad in You." Our ultimate goal must be the glory of God and the joy of His people in Him. Not our own comfort, not our own reputation, but His.
And finally, we must ground every plea in the finished work of Christ. "Show us Your hesed; give us Your Yeshua." We have a greater basis for our argument than the psalmist did. We can point not only to the exodus, but to the cross. We can point not only to past revivals, but to the empty tomb. Because of Jesus, we can come with even greater boldness and ask our God to open the heavens and send the rain of revival upon His thirsty land. And we can be confident that He will hear, and in His time, He will answer.