Finney: How great sin can precede revival

I've started a discussion group in my Biblical Studies class to read through Finney's Revivals of Religion together and to pray through what he taught. This week, the following quote caught our attention. Surely, when heresy is growing in the Church, when those giving up on the Church are increasing, and when sin is being justified, promoted, and boasted of all around, we are living in times of "outrageous wickedness."

If so, then let us repent of our "carnal policies that only make things worse," follow God's prescription, and humble ourselves and pray!

Charles Finney: Lectures on Revivals of Religion, "II. When a Revival is to be Expected":
But sometimes the conduct of the wicked drives Christians to prayer, and breaks them down, and makes them sorrowful and tender-hearted, so that they can weep day and night, and instead of scolding and reproaching them, they pray earnestly for them. Then you may expect a revival. Indeed this is a revival begun already. Sometimes the wicked will get up an opposition to religion. And when this drives Christians to their knees in prayer to God, with strong crying and tears, you may be certain there is going to be a revival. The prevalence of wickedness is no evidence at all that there is not going to be a revival. That is often God’s time to work. When the enemy cometh in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord lifts up a standard against him. Often the first indication of a revival, is the devil’s getting up something new in opposition. It will invariably have one of two effects. It will either drive Christians to God, or it will drive them farther away from God, to some carnal policy or other that will only make things worse. Frequently the most outrageous wickedness of the ungodly is followed by a revival. If Christians are made to feel that they have no hope but in God, and if they have sufficient feeling left to care for the honor of God and the salvation of the souls of the impenitent, there will certainly be a revival. Let hell boil over if it will, and spew out as many devils as there are stones in the pavements, if it only drives Christians to God in prayer—they cannot hinder a revival. Let Satan get up a row, and sound his horn as loud as he pleases; if Christians will only be humbled and pray, they shall soon see God’s naked arm in a revival of religion.