Strictly speaking, therefore, we can only use this word of the bringing back of a life that had been there formerly and was lost.  Applying it to spiritual life, strictly speaking, only a person who has once had the new life in him, but lost it for awhile and regained it, can be said to be revived.  So, likewise, only a church or a community that was once spiritually alive, but had grown languid and lifeless, can be said to be revived.  On the other hand, it is an improper use of terms to apply the word revival to the work of a foreign missionary, who for the first time preaches the life-giving Word, and through it gathers converts and organizes Churches.  In his case it is a first bringing, and not a restoring, of life.

All those Old Testament reformations and restorations to the true worship and service of the true God, after a time of decline and apostasy, were revivals according to the strict sense of the word.  For these revivals patriarchs and prophets labored and prayed.

On the other hand, the labors and successes of the apostles in the New Testament were not strictly revivals.  They preached the Gospel instead of the law.  They preached a Redeemer who had come, instead of one who was to come.  It was largely a new faith, a new life, a new way of life that they taught, and in so far a new Church that they established.  Its types, shadows and roots, had all been in the old covenant and Church.  But so different were the fulfillments from the promises, that it was truly called a New Dispensation.  And, therefore, the labors of the apostles to establish this dispensation were largely missionary labors.  It was not so much the restoring of an old faith and life, as the bringing in of a new.  We find their parallel in foreign mission work much more than in regular Church work.  It is by overlooking this distinction that many erroneous doctrines and practices have crept into the Church, e.g., as to infant baptism, conversion and modern revivalism.

As to revivals, popularly so-called, we maintain, first of all, that it ought to be the policy and aim of the Church to preclude their necessity.

It is generally admitted that they are only needed, longed for and obtained, after a period of spiritual decline and general worldliness.  A Church that is alive and active needs no revival.  A lifeless Church does.  Better then, far better, to use every right endeavor to keep the Church alive and active, than permit it to grow cold and worldly, with a view and hope of a glorious awakening.  Prevention is better than cure.  We would rather pay a family physician to prevent disease and keep us well, than to employ even the most distinguished doctor to cure a sick household; especially if the probability were that, in some cases, the healing would be only partial, and in others it would eventuate in an aggravation of the disease.