Editor’s Note: Our ministry received this letter recently from Ray Lucas, a student during the revival that broke out at Wheaton College in 1949. The following is his description of his experience during those days. 

Several weeks before the revival came to campus, I was praying alone in my dorm room. I realized that I had lost some fire and zeal for the Lord, and as I was on my face before the Lord I could see the light from the hall shining under the door. I prayed, “Lord, please revive my heart. I’ll do anything if You will stir me anew. I will even stand before the student body and confess my need.” 

Several weeks later on a Wednesday evening, I was off campus ministering among a group of young people in southern Chicago. When I returned to the dorm late that evening, all was strangely silent. I went to bed and slept. In the morning there was still no one moving in the dorm and I thought it strange, but upon hearing a radio I believed there was someone still in the dorm. 

Since I did not have classes before chapel that day, I decided to skip chapel (I had five cuts that semester and hadn’t used any of them) so that I could do some schoolwork in my room. It was then that I realized I was resisting something—and that something was going on at the college! 

I got ready and walked up to the chapel. When I got inside, it was packed with students. I found a seat and noticed that the choir loft was full of students weeping and taking their turn confessing sin. I thought to myself, “This is just a bunch of emotional slush,” and became very cold and critical at what was happening. 

Then the Holy Spirit reminded me of my experience two weeks ago in my dorm room when I cried out for renewal. I immediately confessed my rebellion and found myself instantly in God’s presence. 

The Holy Spirit then reminded me that I had cheated on a final exam when I looked across the aisle and stole an answer from a fellow student. I saw my professor sitting up near the front and went to her to confess my sin. She asked me, “Ray, what did you receive for a final grade?” I said a B+. She asked if I would settle for a C+. I said I would and proceeded to the choir loft to take my turn at confessing my sin. 

When I finished my confession I quoted the words, “He breaks the power of cancelled sin, He sets the prisoner free. His blood can make the foulest clean; His blood availed for me.” With this the whole student body began almost simultaneously singing “Oh, For a Thousand Tongues to Sing”—and on and on went that great revival for some 72 hours there in the chapel. 

I remember that when classes finally started back up, I went to one particular class where the professor opened his book and said, “Today we will be studying about . . .” and he could say no more. He just laid his head on his book and wept like a baby. The whole classroom was filled with soft murmuring and weeping. We were in His Holy Presence. . . .