Revival and the Next Generation
If you’ve been browsing social media, listening to podcasts, or reading the news, you’ve probably encountered stories of what’s happening amongst Gen Z on college campuses. In January, Passion gathered 45,000 college students the first three days of 2026 to encounter and worship Jesus at sold-out Globe Life Field in Dallas— the largest number of people the baseball stadium has ever held!
Since Fall 2023, Unite US has gathered over 150,000 college students in basketball arenas on 24 college campuses and seen over 25,000 salvations and 10,000 baptisms in 2½ years! To add to this, 2025 marks a 21-year record high for U.S. Bibles sales, with 19 million Bibles sold last year compared to 17 million in 2024 and 9.7 million in 2019. This surge is being fueled by Gen Z young men—many of whom are first-time Bible engagers. Jesus is surely on the move amongst Gen Z on college campuses!
I believe we are witnessing the first fruits of revival and the early days of a spiritual awakening in Gen Z. As mothers and fathers to the next generation, it is imperative that we lock arms and unite our hearts in fervent prayer for all that our Heavenly Father wants to do in this hour amongst 250 million Gen Z college students globally. We need mothers, fathers, grandparents, small groups, and congregations to adopt college students and campuses in prayer, to see the flames of revival spread to 4,200 college campuses in the U.S. and to over 30,000 campuses worldwide. Because prayer not only precedes revival, but prayer fuels and sustains it!
“Because prayer not only precedes revival, but prayer fuels and sustains it!”
As parents, how do we pray and prepare our kids for all that God is doing on college campuses and in their generation? As a father of three Gen Z middle and high schoolers who grew up in church and a Christian family, we are jealous for our teenage kids to not become overly familiar and complacent with the Christian faith of their youth, but to grow in awe and wonder for the Gospel of Jesus. We don’t want our kids to hear how Jesus is reviving their generation and be nonchalant and unmoved. Rather, my prayer for our kids and other Gen Zers is that God would revive their hearts with His love, spark spiritual hunger to know Him, surround them with godly friends, protect them from the schemes of darkness, and provoke them to prayer for how Jesus may awaken their generation.
May our faith become their faith while they are still living at home, so that they can launch to college as lifelong disciples of Jesus, confident in the Gospel, praying for their Gen Z peers, and joining the reviving mission of God to their college campuses—not searching for acceptance and significance in the wrong places. As more and more unchurched Gen Zers are being awakened to faith and discovering the hope of the Gospel, may Jesus awaken and mark our kids in their teenage years, launching them as missionaries and messengers to their college campuses!
“May Jesus awaken and mark our kids in their teenage years, launching them as missionaries and messengers to their college campuses!”
