Below are some quotes from Ellen White on revival. Notice the last one especially and how she describes the best revival she had seen up until that time.

I have been deeply impressed by scenes that have recently passed before me in the night season. There seemed to be a great movement--a work of revival--going forward in many places. Our people were moving into line, responding to God's call.--General Conference Bulletin, May 29, 1913, p. 34. {ChS 42.3}


When churches are revived, it is because some individual seeks earnestly for the blessing of God. He hungers and thirsts after God, and asks in faith, and receives accordingly. He goes to work in earnest, feeling his great dependence upon the Lord, and souls are aroused to seek for a like blessing, and a season of refreshing falls on the hearts of men. The extensive work will not be neglected. The larger plans will be laid at the right time; but personal, individual effort and interest for your friends and neighbors, will accomplish much more than can be estimated. It is for the want of this kind of labor that souls for whom Christ died are perishing. {ChS 121.1}


If the lay members of the church will arouse to do the work that they can do, going on a warfare at their own charges, each seeing how much he can accomplish in winning souls to Jesus, we shall see many leaving the ranks of Satan to stand under the banner of Christ. If our people will act upon the light that is given in these few words of instruction, we shall surely see of the salvation of God. Wonderful revivals will follow. Sinners will be converted, and many souls will be added to the church.--Testimonies, vol. 8, p. 246. {ChS 184.1}


A wrong conception of the character, the perpetuity, and the obligation of the divine law, has led to errors in relation to conversion and sanctification, and has resulted in lowering the standard of piety in the church. Here is to be found the secret of the lack of the Spirit and power of God in the revivals of our time. . . . {FLB 326.4}


Before the final visitation of God's judgments upon the earth there will be among the people of the Lord such a revival of primitive godliness as has not been witnessed since apostolic times. . . . The enemy of souls desires to hinder this work, and before the time for such a movement shall come, he will endeavor to prevent it by introducing a counterfeit. In those churches which he can bring under his deceptive power, he will make it appear that God's special blessing is poured out; there will be manifest what is thought to be great religious interest. . . . {LDE 158.2}


In setting aside the claims of the law of God, the church has lost sight of the blessings of the gospel. Bible conversion and sanctification,--a radical change of heart and transformation of character,--is the great need of the churches of today. Revivals in which men become members of the church without real conviction of sin, without repentance, and without acknowledging the claims of the law of God, are a cause of weakness to the church, and an occasion of stumbling to the world. {4SP 306.1}

"The interest awakened by his lectures is of the most deliberate and dispassionate kind; though this is the greatest revival I ever saw, yet there is the least passionate excitement about it. It seems to take a deep hold on the main part of the community. What produces the effect is this: Bro. Miller simply takes the sword of the Spirit, unsheathed, and lays its sharp edge on the naked heart, and it cuts; that is all. Before the edge of this mighty weapon, infidelity falls and Universalism withers; false foundations vanish, and Babel's merchants wonder. It seems to me that this must be a little the nearest to apostolic revivals of anything that modern times have witnessed." {RH, November 25, 1884 par. 14}

I have never seen a revival work go forward with such thoroughness, and yet remain so free from all undue excitement. [She is referring to the revival that occurred among Adventists at South Lancaster, Massachusetts, at meetings that started Thursday, January 10, 1889 and lasted about two weeks.] There was no urging or inviting. The people were not called forward, but there was a solemn realization that Christ came not to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance. {3BIO 427.3}
The honest in heart were ready to confess their sins, and to bring forth fruit to God by repentance and restoration, as far as it lay in their power. We seemed to breathe in the very atmosphere of heaven. Angels were indeed hovering around. {3BIO 427.4}