Dear Friend in Christ,

During this Thanksgiving, our family wants to wish you a very special season as you reflect with family and friends on God’s goodness. These have been challenging days and many have faced economic hardship. Yet we have been reminded that God has been extremely good to His people in America. God’s love for us has been expressed in thousands of ways. His Spirit continues to work in people’s lives to bring salvation, setting people free. His grace toward us is fresh every morning!

This year my son Richard and I have revised and expanded the book Claude King and I wrote over a decade ago, Fresh Encounter: God’s Pattern for Revival and Spiritual Awakening. As we re-read the amazing accounts of how God revived His people and then transformed nations and the world, we were reminded of how desperately we need God to do that again. I also was challenged afresh that the revival I pray for must always begin with me. I pray that as you approach the end of the year 2008, God would refresh your spirit and give you renewed strength and spiritual vigor to undertake the assignments He will have for you in 2009. These are critical days and God is once again looking for those who will stand in the gap before Him for their land. I pray you will be among that number.

His servant and your friend,

Henry Blackaby

REVIVAL: 'Fresh Encounter' Conference

by Erin Roach

Henry Blackaby and Anne Graham Lotz will be the keynote speakers at a "Fresh Encounter" conference in February designed to show pastors and lay leaders God's pattern for revival and spiritual awakening.

The conference, Feb. 27-28 at the Atlanta-area First Baptist Church in Jonesboro, Ga., is set to coincide with the release of a revised and expanded version of a book by the same name written by Blackaby and Claude King in 1996. Other plenary speakers will include Richard Blackaby, Mel Blackaby and Will Graham, and worship will be led by Rick Stone.

"Most people would tell you that the nation needs a fresh and deep touch of God in their own life or their churches or their ministries," Henry Blackaby told Baptist Press, "but they don't know how in the world to go about it and they don't have a pattern from Scripture."

Richard Blackaby said he is looking forward to three generations of his family speaking at the conference, which will include various workshops. In addition to his father, Richard Blackaby said his brothers Mel and Thomas, his sisters-in-law Gina and Kim, his mother Marilynn and his son Mike all will share their thoughts during the gathering.

"We'll look at how you can help your children and grandchildren have their own fresh encounter with God," said Richard Blackaby, who serves as president of Blackaby Ministries International.

"We can't live with a secondhand faith," he said. "We must have our own. But how do you pass it on? We'll look at that. We are very excited about the Grahams and Blackabys teaming up to talk about encountering God and also passing on your faith to the next generations."

Henry Blackaby said that while people across the nation desire revival, they too often confuse its purpose.

"We just pray for revival, which often means that there would be many lost people saved," he said. "But revival is not for lost people. Revival is for God's people. The term revive means 'bring the life back.' In too many of the churches today, we practice religious activity but there's an absence of the power of God making life transformation or society transformation."

Blackaby said each section of the Fresh Encounter book will have been revised when it is released in February, and they're adding a chapter on revival in the family and another on revival in the workplace. The authors will address new themes such as "counterfeits to revival" and "catalysts for revival." A good portion of the book's material will be fleshed out at the conference.

"I'm convinced that God initiates what's on His heart in the life of His people," Blackaby said. "And if the leadership of the churches, both the pastors and the lay leadership and the leadership in the business community, have a sense that God is moving them to a higher level of relationship with Him and if they sense that God is saying He wants to make a huge difference through their lives, then this conference is for them."

Blackaby said the conference will relay "practical guidance both in teaching and in application.... And I think the timing, knowing that we'll have been through a presidential election, I think there's a whole new dynamic in the nation and in the world. With terrorism committed to destroy Israel and America, it is a most timely conference to help God's people to understand it's either judgment or revival, and that decision is up to us."

Read more about the conference at: www.blackaby.org/FreshEncounters. The cost is $59 for one person, $99 per couple and $49 for individuals attending in groups of 10 or more. Included in the cost is a copy of the revised Fresh Encounter book and a lunch on Saturday.

This article was first printed in BP News on July 31, 2008, and is reprinted with permission.

Please enjoy the following audio interviews compliments of Moody Broadcasting Network:

http://namb.edgeboss.net/download/namb/audio_files/evangelism/pta_11-17-08_lotz_blackaby__part_1.mp3

http://namb.edgeboss.net/download/namb/audio_files/evangelism/pta_11-18-08_lotz_blackaby_part_2.mp3