Will You not Yourself revive us again,
That Your people may rejoice in You?
                                           Psalm 85:6

"Joy is the very flavor of revival. We may have to go through deep humiliation to taste it, but rejoicing marks the church in revival. It must be so, for we were created primarily to glorify and enjoy God. So if he draws near to our souls with renewed life, we are wired in such a way that our natural response will be boundless joy. And this goes deeper than anything we can change about ourselves.

If we are spring-loaded to erupt in joy when God reinvigorates us, then verse 6b certifies strong rejoicing as a valid experience for the church, much to be sought after. The prayer is appealing to God on the assumption that the prospect of a rejoicing church is a meaningful argument to lay before him. This “joy unspeakable and full of glory” (1 Peter 1:8 AV) must be God’s desire for his people. John Owen helps us sense the mystery and potency of spiritual joy:

Of this joy there is no account to be given but that the Spirit works it when and how he will. He secretly infuses and distils it into the soul, prevailing against all fears and sorrows, filling the soul with gladness, exultations, and sometimes with unspeakable raptures of mind.

This is a joy that the world never can give us, a joy the world can never take away, a joy the world is waiting to see. It is very real, it is deeply felt, and it is our inheritance as the people of the living God."  Ray Ortlund Jr., When God Comes To Church, p 46