There are moments in history when everything seems to be falling apart, and yet at the very same time, God is quietly at work doing something that changes everything.

You can see it in different places and different times. In the 1700s, both Britain and America were facing deep social and moral decline. Tensions were rising, and in France those tensions eventually erupted into violent revolution. But in Britain and in the American colonies, something very different happened. Instead of a political uprising, there was a spiritual awakening. A series of Christian revivals swept through the churches and permanently affected Christianity in the Protestant denominations primarily. Evangelicalism became a movement in many denominations and ordinary people began turning to Christ in massive numbers. Lives were changed. Families were restored. Society itself began to shift—not from the top down, but from the inside out. It became known as the Great Awakening.

There's a movie out right now in theaters that highlights the relationship between one of the major leaders of the revival - a man named George Whitefield and Benjamin Franklin. Revival leaders like Whitefield and John Wesley and Jonathan Edwards presented a theology that changed people's hearts as they relied on the power of the Holy Spirit - which brought about a deep personal conviction of the need for salvation through Jesus, and a new standard, then, of personal morality.

It was an incredible movement - but it wasn't the first time something like that had happened.

The very first "great awakening" actually took place in the Roman Empire, in a small and seemingly insignificant corner of the world, in the city of Jerusalem. There was no political power, no cultural influence, no economic strength — it was just a small group of about 120 people gathering together in prayer. And yet within a couple of centuries, the message that began with that small group had spread throughout the entire empire.

That’s the story that the New Testament Book of Acts tells. It is the story of how God takes a small group of ordinary, often broken people, draws them into connection with Himself, fills them with His presence and His power, and then works through them to change the world.