Revival in My Backyard

Revival is happening 15 to 20 minutes from my house, and Sunday night my two-year-old stood in our bedroom watching the livestream from SEU and kept saying, “I want to go to church. I want to sing with Jesus. I want to worship.” She said it like it was obvious. Like of course that’s what we should be doing.

This is the same little girl we’re taking to a psychologist because of sleep struggles and separation anxiety. The same strong-willed, deeply feeling child who has stretched us thin on more than one night. The same one who wakes up just to make sure we’re still there.

And there she was, steady, reaching toward the screen.

There was a laundry basket in front of her by the dresser. A half-drunk Coke Zero nearby. Jimmy standing beside her in Tennessee orange. Completely ordinary. Completely normal.

But the room did not feel normal.

Because something is happening in Lakeland.

Chapel at SEU turned into extended worship. Students stayed. Leadership didn’t shut it down. What could have been a scheduled service quietly became something people didn’t want to leave, and you can feel it ripple beyond campus. Not spectacle. Hunger.

And here is the part I have not said out loud yet.

I have not been okay.

Not losing my faith. Not walking away. But stretched thin. Work heavier. Responsibility higher. My brain constantly on. Motherhood beautiful and relentless. Sleep inconsistent. Marriage navigating real conversations. I have been operating in survival mode, competent and efficient and steady.

Calloused.

Sunday morning at Lakeland Vineyard, I was on stage singing like I have for years. I know how to lead. I know how to execute. I know how to hit the mark.

But yesterday something shifted.

At one point, I pulled out my in-ears and the instruments dropped out completely. The entire congregation sang an anthem to Jesus so loudly you could have heard it outside the building. No production cushion. No mix management. No buffer.

Just voices.

And standing there, I felt something crack open.

It wasn’t hype. It wasn’t adrenaline. It was the realization that I had been leading from strength instead of surrender. That I had quietly tightened my grip on parts of my life because control felt safer than trust. That I had built systems to survive but hadn’t left much room to soften.

Pulling out my in-ears felt symbolic in a way I didn’t expect. It was like God was saying, “Stop managing the sound. Stop filtering the experience. Stop trying to control the mix. Just listen.”

And for the first time in a while, I did.

Then Sunday night, my daughter asked to sing with Jesus.

She doesn’t understand revival language or campus movements. She barely sleeps through the night some weeks. But she knows when something is sacred. She knows when Jesus is being lifted high. And something in her wanted to be part of it.

Formation starts earlier than we think.

I don’t know how long this moment at SEU will last. Revival movements have arcs. They ignite. They swell. They settle. Sometimes they spread. Sometimes they fade. But what matters most is not how long the singing continues. What matters is what kind of people this produces.

Will we repent faster?

Will we confess quicker?

Will we soften where we’ve hardened?

Will we let God dismantle the pride we built survival systems around?

Revival isn’t measured in hours of worship. It’s measured in surrender. And Sunday morning, on a stage I’ve stood on for years, I surrendered something I didn’t realize I was gripping.

So here is my invitation:

If you’ve been surviving spiritually instead of surrendering, strong but not soft, functioning but not fully alive, come.

Come worship with us at Lakeland Vineyard on any given Sunday. You don’t have to have it together. You can come tired. Curious. Skeptical. Barely holding it together. If you can’t attend in person, we livestream every week. Join from your living room. Raise your hands in front of a dresser and a laundry basket if that’s where you are.

And if you’re in Lakeland and just need someone to talk, reach out. I mean that. No pressure. No agenda. Just conversation.

Because revival doesn’t stay on a campus. It moves into churches. Into living rooms. Into marriages. Into exhausted mothers. Into hearts that didn’t realize they were hardening.

Sunday night, my daughter reached toward a screen and said she wanted to sing with Jesus. Sunday morning, I pulled out my in-ears and realized I did too.

Maybe revival doesn’t begin with noise.

Maybe it begins the moment we loosen our grip.

Meanwhile, ordinary life keeps going. And maybe that’s exactly where revival belongs.