A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the “Florida Outpouring” revival being held in my old stomping grounds of Lakeland, Florida (between Tampa and Orlando). It’s still going on, and my friend Cary McMullen, religion reporter for the Lakeland Ledger has a good article about what’s going on, with the promise of more that will take a look at specifics of what’s happening.

And it could be the first revival ever to be driven by the Internet.
Attendance reached about 10,000 one night recently when the revival was held at Joker Marchant Stadium. Recent crowds have ranged from 3,000 to 7,000 per night, with about 800 in the mornings, although the numbers swell on weekends, Stephen Strader said.
Because of the crowds, revival leaders had to abandon the 700-seat Ignited Church sanctuary for evening services. They have wandered to at least four other venues to accommodate the crowds, most recently at The Lakeland Center.
Revival leaders are expected to announce today that beginning May 26, they will hold evening services on the grounds of Sun ‘n Fun Fly-in under a giant inflatable “air dome” that will hold up to 10,000 people. It will be the home of the revival “indefinitely,” said Lynne Breidenbach, a spokeswoman for the revival.
“Todd is hiring staff and renting apartments. They’re setting up camp to stay for three or four months,” Strader said.
For everyone who has attended the revival in person, there are many more around the globe who have been watching it streamed live on the Internet. Strader began sending hundreds of e-mail dispatches about the revival during the first week, and soon after Ignited began streaming the services live on Ustream (www.ustream.tv). The site has received 1.2 million visits as of Friday, Breidenbach said. More recently, the services have been broadcast by God TV, a small Christian network.
“We went global in less than two weeks,” Strader said.

Cary has good background on the previous Lakeland-rooted revival, and what followed from that.

But even before the Toronto revival, there was one in Lakeland.
In March 1993, Karl Strader invited South African evangelist Rodney Howard-Browne to lead a revival at Carpenter’s Home. Howard-Browne, now pastor of The River at Tampa Bay, a church in Tampa, is a proponent of holy laughter, and he led 16 weeks of revival services during the following 10 months, with some weeks off.
“It was a terrific revival. We had about 3,000 or 4,000 a night. The radio station would play the services, and that just had people laughing. People thought we were out of our minds,” recalled Karl Strader.
It did attract worldwide attention, Stephen Strader said, but it took about six months. Carpenter’s Home had a TV broadcast, but it was only one hour a week.
“We didn’t have Internet. There was no media coverage, no e-mails,” he said.
snip
By Stephen Strader’s own admission, the Florida Outpouring is not orderly.
“If you go to services by Benny Hinn, Joyce Meyer or T.D. Jakes, you see folks dressed up in coats and ties. This is not polished. This crowd is bikers, poor people. It’s chaotic, it’s disorganized, it’s sandlot baseball. It’s a working man’s revival,” he said.
Karl Strader said there is a difference in style from his 1993 revival.
“I think there’s quite a bit more intensity. The music is not ours. It’s too long for some of us. But it’s reaching my grandchildren, and they’re loving every minute of it,” he said.

If you’re interested in this, keep your eye on the Ledger and Cary’s work. He’s a knowledgeable, fair reporter.