Leonard Ravenhill - Pure Heart Pure Church | Must Watch

I thought about this simple thing this morning that men's opinions of God changed very much in the passing of style in passing of time but God's opinion of man never changes they say established once and forever in his word I want us to think about a psalm which is a favorite of mine the 51st son just to remind you there are 150 Psalms in the in the Bible sometimes they call it the psalm the day it still is I believe the Jewish hymn book he still gives us the most profound expressions that can be found in song with all our modern singing no one touches the heighth saw the depths like the psalmist out of the 150 Psalms roughly half of them which is 75 in case you don't know 75 of them were written by David of the 75 18 of them an autobiographical that is they all spin around his own experiences there are seven penitential Psalms one of the master be the greatest and surely it is this fifty first son until fairly recently I guess some of you will remember anyhow Leonard Bernstein was the maverick conductor of what New York Philharmonic Orchestra very distinguished very capable you wrote that great mass that was said at the Sun rather at the funeral of Kennedy and he's a classical pianist in his own right an exhibitionist a friend of his was in Europe and he brought bought back a dog-eared manuscript took it to Leonard Bernstein's house incidentally lived in the same house where John Lennon was killed outside but the man said to him Leonard played this for me he looked at the manuscript he said I can't they said you can write Iran and he said I can't why not this is an old manuscript it's 200 years old I paid an exorbitant price for it in Europe again Leonard looked at it and said I can't play this why not he said if I could have crept up by the side of the old mist as he was working this music out and I could have caught his spirit his cadence says his expressions maybe I could have done it there's a gap of two hundred years from the time you wrote it to now and all the atmosphere has evaporated you know that's that it sure about the world of God to accept the Spirit of God takes it they like to kill us in case you haven't noticed this Psalm is a monologue David includes no one else how did he say how did he write it he shouldn't dictate it into a machine I doubt if he had a secretary in your in your Bible it's I don't know anything about type Martin is heavy might know what type this is that it's some kind of type on a white sheet it's punctuated with commas and periods it's written in ink know this Psalm was written with blood it is not punctuated if it stops and covers it's punctuated with groans and tears and agony you know if if actors were to say their lines like most preachers preach they'd never get through that audition they'd be rejected the first time years ago in Scotland an envious preacher watch the crowds trying to get into a theater and every night they were turned away in their hundreds and he thought about his empty seats in his church Sunday by Sunday so he made it his problem his task to visit the actor as a famous Shakespeare Shakespearean actor maybe with Burton that just dad was a greater sex a Shakespearean actor that ever lived he could cross almost every word that Shakespeare wrote he wrote tens of thousands if you ask Hamlet the second act he caught it like that what did Lady Macbeth say so-and-so you caught it caught it caught it hmm he was salt in Hamlet so that he knew the thing from beginning to end he was dramatic well the actor said to the preacher the reason I packed this place maybe is this and and the reason you don't pack pack your place maybe is this I make artificial things look real and you make real things look artificial I heard a preacher last Sunday I'm on TV for a few minutes he talked as though he's giving a weather report and bad weather at that he was about this taste is uncooked fish and I don't wonder people turned when Dave Wilkinson was in Detroit a few weeks ago amongst all those Muslims and other people on the streets he after those kids lust being fighting scarred as they were smelling evil and the bodies smelling badly with their breaths he asked them who is your favorite radio TV preacher time after times we don't listen to them all they want is our money he's not shocking when kids in the street under the grip of the devil can only say you want our money how did David recite this thing I say he punctuated with sobs and commas not stops and covers with sons with grief how do I know because he's come to God with that which alone is acceptable to God when we come to him as sinners let me say this first the constitution of the psalm is fascinating as far as I'm concerned in verse 1 let me say how would you say what does he say have mercy upon me O God he doesn't say pity me god I'm in trouble it doesn't say excuse me Lord I brought no commandment or two he comes pleading the only thing that we can plead have mercy upon me O God over here in another psalm of David 86 he says in verse 5 for thou Lord art good and ready to forgive and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call unto thee verse 15 that that will lord out a god full of compassion and gracious long-suffering and plenteous in mercy and in truth which he bought which is borrowed by david from the 34th chapter in exodus hmm here is a man who is bowed down in grief quote Shakespeare again remember Lady Macbeth has a black spot or a blood spot on her hand and and and what does she say about it she says well here is she says this damp spot all the perfumes in Arabia cannot cleanse it David a this black spot of murder on one hand a red spot of mud on one and a black part of the dulcis on the other hand and he comes saying have mercy upon me O God me notice that have mercy upon me O God according to the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions wash me throughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin against the the only have I sinned you say no he's sinned against mercy but I don't think he did he sinned with her but he's making confession here of his own sin he says blot out my transgressions by real definition transgression means I acknowledge my rebellion I have knowledge my disobedience he am gone into sin ignorant they had been tempted again and again with that woman and then finally he commits the horrible act of adultery so there are three words therefore sin blot out my transgressions he says wash me throughly from mine iniquity iniquity means I'm perverted because of my transgression I have let sin come and have dominion over me against the young Leah thy sin upon me wash me throughly from mine iniquity and cleanse me from my sin I acknowledge my transgression my sin that's the sum total of my transgressions of mine iniquity my sin is ever before me what a price men pay for sin is she just being poetic you mean he sees his sin every minute of the day yes he does he looks outside in his castle and there's a young man standing and on sentry duty and every time he sees a soldier he remembers the young captain he put to death in order that he might steal his wife a baby cries back in the kitchen the baby of the one of the girls that works favorite I'm anything when he hears the baby's cries haunted with the cry of the sin of the child he brought into the world my sin is ever before me against thee thee only have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight that I might just be clear on that judgest and be justified when thou speakest I was born in sin and in sin did my mother conceive me now there are two theories about the sinner then one is that we're born with sin and if somebody says we were born with it then God sent us to hell for having it no he sent us to hell for not getting rid of it are we born with saying or is this a get out when somebody says David here says I was born in sin in sin did my mother conceive me and then when Samuel went wrong the the sons of what was his name Jesse thank you thank you do think of it that they all were brought up before Samuel except one I wasn't david brought her well the third year because he was not he was born out of wedlock and they didn't want to own him in sin did my mother conceive me but whichever view you take hmm man is still a sinner if he isn't born with sin it soon admitted into his life anyhow you know it's one of the tragedies I think of our day that people when you talk about holiness they're not afraid of holiness than the other sinfulness one of the appalling things in the church now side of it is our waffle I would call it ruffle or appalling comfort with sin I don't often listen to PTL but very often do you nights I get I go to bed at 10:00 and I get up at 12:00 and work till 2:00 or 3:00 and the other night just after 12:00 I turn on the news and it slid right into the PTO and the little boy on PTL as I call him was saying some of his wisdom as usual I noticed when he called people to the author they were smiling one was chewing gum they were chewing gum I saw no broken and contrite hearts David Harris bowed down with guilties lashed with something that has a sting worse than the scorpion there's plenty of them around here if you want to try scorpion out I've had them accidentally and they're very painful but he's something that stings him worse than I cut a scorpion what is that conscience the old Methodist used to sing a hymn quick and my conscience can it feel the love some nests of sin there's not much consciousness of sin anymore the preachin of change they have a cabby Willie there's not much preaching of hellfire on TV I've heard a preacher sing two or three times do you know how I was at the White House recently that's the second time I've been I thought well I admit it do you think Obadiah would be divided Elijah to dinner do you think of a greater would've invited the Apostle Paul to dinner do you think Herod would have invited John Baptist to dinner we don't carry eternity with us as preachers anymore as far as I'm concerned we can step out of giggling in the next room and come and try to be serious and somehow we misfire there is no sense of guilt around anymore I am sure you know this there are no adulterers anymore few people having affairs of course not wickedness just weakness no iniquity just infirmity dear Lord when I read some of these old men that priests a hundred years ago let me say this we used to go to a church in Ireland where my dear wife is from and the pulpit was on a kind of a stem and it was only small or as big as this platform and right behind it was the door now that church was about 200 years old and I said well why do you have a door right behind a preacher well he needed to escape when the crowd got hostile now we spoon feed you and you think oh he's a nice priest so now he's so smooth he never hurts me now this has anything upsets me quicken my conscience till it feel the Lord some nurse of sin the background of this of course is is extremely dramatic it's the case of this man David he's got into trouble the Philistines have come up to him and he's terrified it says in Samuel 28 verse family first samuel 28 verse 5 when saul saw the host of the Philistines he was afraid and his heart greatly trembled when saw in cried of the Lord the Lord answered him not neither by dreams now by your him nor by prophets then saul said unto his servant seek me a woman with a familiar spirit that i may consider and enquire her he servant said that is a woman in Endor so disguised himself notice that he then going to see what you other disguise yourself to go somewhere I whether in balance 20 a certain place which is questionable saw these guys themself and put on another raiment and he went with the two men and they came to the woman at night what a lots done at night men love darkness rather than light why because their deeds are evil why did he's disguised himself obviously do you want to be identified why are you going the ninth time he didn't want to be identified he came at night and said I pray the Divine unto me by a familiar spirit and bring him up or my shall name unto thee O so she brought up who Samuel when the woman saw some you she cried with a loud voice I believe it is the only case in history where a genuine spirit was brought up from the other world every other is a fake but notice she put the spotlight on him why us now they see me for thou art soul that must have been quite a shock the king stood under a beam of afraid throughout the house I found the woman said them to Seoul I saw God's descending out of the earth and he said unto her what form is the oven she said an old man cometh up and he is covered with a mantle the prophets mantle and so I see that it was Samuel he stood with his face to the ground and bowed himself and Samuel said to Saul vows describe me to bring me up and Saul answered I'm so distressed the Philistines make war against me and God is departed from me Samuel said well of the others ask of me for the Lord is departed from thee isn't that something he bought it from who from a man who had the anointing of the Holy Ghost was filled with the Holy Ghost and prophesied but he died a suicide I heard a man say this week again in that same show don't you worry God will never forsake you doesn't matter you may leave him he won't leave you that is entirely against the scripture if the spirit troubles you this morning thank God is troubling you before you go to hell the spirit will leave you well this is what you can do with the Holy Spirit accept him resist him grieve him quench him now that's biblical that's a nice theology my right brother Paris the most miserable man in the world is not the man who's lost a million dollars or lost his memory or lost some other thing the most miserable man in the world is the man that God has forsaken again had Emanuel Ax this King prophesied the Spirit of the Lord of the pond he prophesied but he downed his through aside he propped his sword up in the ground and fell on it and he wasn't completely dead so who killed him off an Amalekite why was he in this trouble with the Philistines because God said gone utterly destroyed the Amalekites but he didn't destroy them he kept the best he said for God he think destroy the Amalekites or the Amalekite destroyed him if you don't let God destroy that sin in your life that sin will destroy you all the people I remember preaching in Australia and the pastor said you see the man on the right there that bald-headed man Lily the bag yet do you know 15 years ago he used the most anointed man in the whole of this vast country and it is a vast country Australia's rider from coast to coast the new than American is from New York to California that man had traveled the country left a blaze of revival behind him but he trifled with sin and he was desolate he's like a man without a country he's anything more desperate than a man without God the whole highway of Christian living is strewn with has-beens he has been a great preacher he has to bring the great Authority shall I tell you the secret to backsliding I'm sure you'd like to know neglect your devotional life and your prayer life no man is greater than this prayer life you don't care how many talks - on TV idly preachers in my office the other day I nearly mentioned their names I won't all asking about the spiritual life they thought that two students were one of the best seminaries or cemeteries if you like in Dallas what is the secret rather a deal of stability what is the secret of maturity I've told number one every preach that comes in my office has three weaknesses one isn't disciplined - he has almost no prayer life 3 he doesn't know a thing about worship no no no that's just what I am well then before you leave seminary if you don't want to learn to pray in seminary and any Bible School around here or anywhere else you haven't learned anything as far as I'm concerned do you remember when the disciples came to Jesus and said Lord teach us to preach no what did they say oh I see oh well it was it was Paul who said preach without ceasing which some of us almost do I think sometimes oh it was James who said when you're sick preach to one another there's nothing that dead will attack more than your devotional life forget everybody else God doesn't make us in groups he makes individual there's nobody could prayer at one time like David and yet here he prays this penitential prayer praising an agony again he doesn't say Lord I'm at the top of the charts and you know I'm right at the top I mean people are going down the street trapping their hands and singing Saul has slain his thousands and David his things with her and number one on the charts Oh what an amazing man what an amazing fluctuation in his life he wrote some of the most profound songs ever written you would have to go to Scotland to hear people sing 23rd psalm they have about half a dozen tunes to it one is called Krim and that was born in my days it's a long way while back there's an older one brother James is there that has a lovely little to it they have about five different tunes to the 23rd psalm but you would have to go to Wales Greenwich grant isn't here this morning she's of Welsh extraction and recent I used to love to preach in Wales oh mercy how they would sing and when they got blessed they'd sing in tongues the Wellstone and boy when they sang they're so there's a mouse always came and I don't have my back oh they were so tremendous and one great hymn that they sang was this great god of wonders all thy ways display thine attributes divine but countless acts of pardoning grace above all of the wonders shine who is a pardoning God like thee all who has grace so rich and free one of the greatest thing writers ever I think he brought more hymns that anyone else was Charles Wesley he put his brother's theology to music we think sometimes that sinners are just the derelicts those that dare david goes and he's going out again i'm told you pray for him maybe away to eat meeting head to head eyeball to eyeball as we see on a say on the streets of Detroit just recently crowds of young black Muslims they're people running followed me thought he could make an altar kneeling of his feet holding his feet weeping at his feet and he said Len do you know the most of I talked to already had an experience of God years ago I was a Baptist I was a Pentecostal is what are you doing now prostituting I say sin doesn't appear to be sin anymore the week two weeks before when he was in New York they just set up their music was singing a bunch of young ladies came around him said we love Jesus mr. wilkison you do yeah I live in New York well we weren't born here we work in here honey where do you work where prostitutes but we love the Lord not something they can live in that degradation and go to some house of worship and never be broken and contrite so that's an awesome word that he says later on he says the sacrifices of God are let me step back a minute he comes in all his disarray modernly spiritually bankrupt morally bankrupt and he said thou desirous not sacrifice as I would give it when what way was there to God don't sacrifice they brought the blood of bulls and goats goats or dogs or the ashes of an heifer but he says thou desire us not sacrifice oh I'd be glad to bring the whole herd of cattle that I have it that will let if you accept it but you won't accept it why not because sacrifice without repentance is useless what does he say thou desirous not sacrifice else I would give it and then he says the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit he mentions spirit three times just as he mentions Freeth sin three times in the first two verses and he mentions cleansing three times in different words in the first two verses he mentions sacrifice three times he mentions broken the three times he mentions offerings three times he prays three prayers he praised the prayer of a sinner have mercy upon me O God you know there was an amazing period in in history in the 1700 in fact they gave melody a little of Lee collaborating a while ago on that period that which may be will be in the news later I don't know if it classifies it's classified for that but anyhow there's an amazing period some of the greatest preachers they lived in the 1600 all the towering tech giants like John Owen and all that bunch of Puritan preachers that have never never never been equalled by the way the second edition of refiners fire is in the press now so if you not want one we've already more than ten thousand volt our orders for it you better get it it's got some tremendous tremendous stuff in it preaching with a punch preaching with authority the tragedy of modern Christianity is there even lost even in the church we've lost our sense of holiness of God come on be honest unanswered if I did you'll come here to meet God this morning why did you come to hear a sermon about him can you remember the last time you left the sanctuary and you didn't utter a word for an hour tool that happened in the Welsh revival I didn't witness it but I did preach in some of the revival churches or churches of had revival as late as 1949 there were some old ladies there that came to our meetings and said these are the most impressive meetings since 1900 and four I said whoa ha how do you gauge her because the last four nights we walked up to the crossroads and then they turn and instead of saying good night they say no star no star and suddenly realize we walked all the way from the church in the valley up to here now mrs. Griffith said last night have you noticed that not one of us has said a word any night this week after the service because there's no sense of the majesty of God we no sense of the sinfulness of sin I've been bowled over for so many mornings this week between midnight and 4 o'clock meditating on a statement that I've read so many times but it never punched me out like this read the word of John when he said I fell at his feet as dead I said it with David the other day and that's a day for how often do we get felled stoned we come into a gospel meeting as easy as coming to a political meeting and go out as easily well I guess you know yeah was it just over a year ago when David was preaching there at their gap befores cumference in in Dallas he suddenly faded out and fell to the ground and he said well Len twice I had that experience of falling of his feet as dead and all the glory of heaven has been revealed to me when revival comes that is that is something which is right in recounting the awesome right revival I guess we call it the Shang Tong revival round the turn of the century mrs. Jonathan Gopal says it was awesome to go to church you would go in the sanctuary we would stand and sing and sing and sing and sing and then realize we'd been singing for six hours he would go another day somebody would stand up with an anointing in prayer be waiting on God all night and burst out with a tolerance of Revelation you hardly dare open your eyes let you saw God in His Majesty you could feel the vibrations of eternity one day it was all sung an aberration we were lifted to the third heaven next day was prayer that was awesome sometimes it was sobbing stammering prayer it was preachers groaning on the floor it was preachers that couldn't even get down burden with guilt shame there's an old man right now 95 years of age in California I knew him 50 years ago he went through that same revival he said when I know you'll give him 50 years recently said to me you'll give more than 50 years in praying for revival I have about 60 as a matter of fact but you said let me want to tell you something when revival come the sewers burst the man you thought was the most holy man in the district gets up and confesses it's like opening the mouth and letting all the impurity out its conviction which has been writhing if you like in his bosom okay the first day mrs. Jonathan gofal said it was praise that was unspeakably glorious the next date was prayer we should tear your eyes out there was a heart out there wasn't a single bad everybody groaned in the spirit the third day she said not necessary in this order you would go and whereas we it's fun for six hours or prayed for six the next day the whole congregation two or three thousand people would sit and from morning till night not a word was uttered and you hear that was the most awesome of all beyond the awesomeness of singing or the awesomeness that the stillness beasts in the night I know that I am God doctor told you to sail and you've got to keep this in mind as Christians we're activist we think if we work till the morning till night and tumble into dead eggs or bed exhausted we've served God not necessarily I believe you in a hundred people in our to God doesn't necessarily satisfy the Heart of Jesus what is the first and greatest commandment be a missionary know thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and soul and mind and strength and if you love him you'd serve Him it's the key to the whole thing Davey that love God and he'd known the mercy of God he'd known the power of God can't you imagine him laid back as we say on the hillsides the stars twinkling as his guitar no guitars are backslidden Huff's he had a harp and there he is playing his harp and what's he doing he's singing when the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows his handiwork another statement this week made by I think an old Puritan when he said the most amazing thing in English prose is the fortieth chapter of Isaiah and I've read that over and over and over and over again he's setting that for just the fortieth chapter that God he says lift up your eyes and behold the host of the hens he call us every star by name if I have some hope let me say that if you put a 1 there and then you're booked with 23 zeros behind it those are broken down zeros Burnie huh that's a sextillion a sextillion is one with 2003 hind it and the scientists say there are 46 Chileans of stars now in England and Germany as sextillion is a one with 36 zeroes behind it but then I read more recently that that I estimated 50 billion stars in the Milky Way alone you know that shaft of light you've seen the sky sometime 50 billion and he calls them all by name not beautiful I took once as a hymn in which he says he made the stars of heavenly flames he counts their numbers calls their names his wisdoms vast and knows no bound a deeper all our thoughts of drought what is a creature skill or force the Spider Man the walleye course the piercing which the active limb all our two means that mean delights for him but Saints are lovely in his side I don't think fellowships with stars all the beautiful countryside on the rocky mountains he fellowships with individuals now david has had a marvelous relationship with God okay let's see him there with this harp again seeing that marvelous 23rd psalm as only he could sing it must have been wonderful which was a recording of it the Lord's my shepherd I shall not want so far you can turn that round work on it it's that all in meters the sounds or get a Presbyterians songbook I'll get a Presbyterian songbook and all the Psalms at the back are in meters the Lord's my shepherd are not want he makes me down to lie in pastures green he leadeth me the quiet waters by goodness and mercy all my life shall surely follow me and in God's house forevermore my dwelling place shall be it's beautiful he rides the 23rd psalm he sings it but he's in a different situation for when he said that when he caught when he when you wrote this son he says thou desirest not sacrifice doubt I would give it the sacrifice in God hadn't broken spirit what else does he say in verse eight make me to hear joy and gladness for the bones which thou hast rung he hadn't got a broken bone in his body he's using a figure of speech in 1951 I jumped out of a burning hotel we had had two weeks of revival in dr. Tozer Church which he said with the best revival in 25 years I had a prayer partner he hadn't been to bed for five nights dear old Tom hare tremendous man of intercession we went to bed on the Friday night spun me Saturday night about half us - I heard fire fire fire I thought well oh dear this is terrible somebody's out in the building on fire it's snow outside wouldn't be where I was of course I mean how would the work church go on if I died incredible surely that couldn't happen when I died the world will stop all the church will surely I mean you know I'd put so much into it well they happened to be that I was in the frying pan they thought the hotel we were in was burning few weeks ago a boy died from a 30-foot tower in the Olympics somebody said to him how high is the tower he said from the ground up thirty feet when at the top looking down three hundred feet I was thirty feet up in that hotel and I looked down in the middle of the night there's the floor down there people shouting jump I thought yeah that's fine no problem jumping he's putting the brakes on when you get Lily but I landed on my heels crush my feet what do you call the oscalus the heels crushed like fine sugar the doctor said my leg goes in three pieces my three breaks in my bag both my feet broken I'm lying in the in the gutter outside the hotel and the guy comes on the counter what are you doing here well obviously playing tennis and he said you can't stay here I said I don't want to get up and go away I said I can't and my back's broke my legs rotten my feet a rock oh I don't think it's so bad I said well I do what he said listen you can't stay here sir listen to this human something will come around the rock around the corner run over you'll get hurt that's all I need let me put you over there oh no no please don't lift me they put his hand under my legs here and my back and you know when he did all those bones just screamed up and gracious money laid me in about 18 inches of snow I wasn't ready for refrigeration I didn't want to stay there I soon began to shake and quiver but you know I'll tell you what I realized what this Sarma's mendoza meant a lot of difference since then when I got all those bones broken and there was no healing for a long while well possible to turn and David says when I'm out of relationship with God I'm from a broken bones and there's no way that they can be healed he says a broken and a contrite heart that will not despise a broken heart a contrite heart a grieving heart a heart that's restless he's not planning some temporary antidotes he wants that relationship that he had with God to be restored now look at the difference in the Psalms 23rd psalm Carmen beautiful in this Psalm he's like a boy that's to use a very simple weak argument like a little boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar here he is loathsome in the side of God but the hymn writers say quick and my conscience realities the loathsomeness of sin there are no mild cases of sin any more than any mild case of cancer they're all deadly what does he do in this son he said hide thy face ease of holier eyes than to behold iniquity how do you feel God thinks about the average congregation in our churches today where sin doesn't matter anymore full of adulterers and liars and divorced people all kinds of crimes that had been done there's no preaching against sin or once God exposed his lights on human corruption and only then the men cringe and howl for deliverance realize they've got leprosy worse than leprosy worse than cancer in their breasts David here says hide thy phrase from my sins do remember the hundred and thirty ninth storm when he said one of the bravest things I think ever written by man he says to God search me O God and know my heart try me and on my thoughts and see if there be any wicked way that was when he was leaning as close to God as he ever lived or maybe anybody else ever lived he didn't not fear the searching eyes of God he hadn't brought the commandments of God he was walking in total obedience but here he says hide thy face from my sin don't come with your searching eyes mmm and all him says search me Oh God like he is talking about himself search me O God my actions try and let my life appear as seen by thine all searching eye to my eyes thy ways make clear search all my thoughts the secret Springs the motives that control the chambers were polluted things hold Empire or the soul search till my fiery glance of castex Holy Light through all and I by greysun brought at last before thy face to fall search me O God I believe the normal Christian life is a life of holiness it's easy to sing down him holy and by the way melody there I've heard that hymn sung around the world you can't sing it without moving me to tears I think though that comes at last night and it's something better I prayed for them we never sang that him with more delight and rapture than when Keith green thumped it out on that piano in Brown's house we didn't have to sing he had his own interpretation he put additional words I was gonna say additional notes into it I heard people comment about that ok oh I remember I lately came from Arkansas one that the meetings Ravine having it down there in the last days which were going to start the last week of this month hoping well you know people have come from mobile 700 miles to come to a prayer meeting you know to two loads of them come every Friday night from auto Roberts University and say why don't we have a prayer meeting like I said ask oral you know they come from seminaries isn't it a shame that people have to drive for five six hundred miles to a meeting that solely Givens of prayer to seminary students in my office the other day and I said what seminary goes are they told me what church to go to I go to song so I go to another one well I said your church has 26,000 members how many come to the prayer meeting we don't have a planning I said that's like me saying give you my Cadillac it was given to me but I'm not giving it to but it's like me giving you the candle I can say take it friend there's only one thing wrong with it what is it it has no motor in it a church with other parameter has no motor there is no more precious thing in the whole world as for I've preached in some of the greatest churches in the world preacher some of the greatest preachers and prayed with some of the finest men I've ever met sometimes people say you've thought about produce we can we have a prayer meeting yeah we'll have it Friday night after the meeting tell all the preachers in town to come and all the Deacons and all the other needy felt brings a premium all this section is reserved for preachers we're not down on our knees 10 minutes but what they get open but actions speak louder than words they're not used to frame five minutes on their knees what that was it something we heard the other day mouth that somebody will give him walk 30 what was it a period of time for what was it I forgot something was said in knew well one thing that was said in the news was that some of the athletes in the in the Olympics had trained for eight years some of them just to run for a matter of seconds down the track one of the girls on the bastion but they are pasty but what if the other ball volleyball team was asked don't you have to discipline yourself yes do you practice a lot yeah six to eight hours every day six days a week doesn't involve sacrifice yeah you have to leave home yeah what else oh this girl said I haven't seen my boyfriend for nine months supposing you tell our students on our campuses you can't go home for nine months boy they cry their eyes out if to discipline yourself for six to eight hours every day in the presence of God remember those gold medals are already tarnished they asked one young fella what are you gonna with the gold medal do you know he said have it bronzed it shows the value we put on it but that's all it's worth that Paul says they do it for a corruptible crown remember the Olympics were there 400 years before Christ was born and they were more strenuous than even they are today they didn't add vitamins and all the other things that we have but getting back to it we're living in a day when there's little offended discipline come on go to bed at the same time every night get up at the same time every morning take time to be holy forget your friends if they want to be skeletons spiritually let them be skeletons if they want to be pushed spiritually little bit taller you're gonna be not gonna be judged for their lives you're gonna be judged for your life have mercy upon me O God according to the multitude of thy tender mercies he uses different words here now blot out my transgressions block out means like here I erase this thing here it's completely gone there you are now it's gone okay that's what the word blot means to blot out means to erase wash me if you mean you know the ental countries you've seen people women go down to the river they put clothes in the rhythm and they put them down and they them out they're tramping the dirt out and that's exactly what that Hebrew word wash means they're trample me if need be crusher we to get this thing out of me then he use it an amazing word cleanse me there was a great Hebrew scholar years ago some of you must have read though he has two great volumes doctor either Shimon Ida shine study of the life of Christ is the greatest classic ever you know still by dr. I - I'm a Hebrew scholar says you cannot translate this word cleanse into English except this way you can say that a unsend me in that beautiful cut me loose away from my sin I say again the normal Christian life is a life of wholeness we like to sing holy holy holy and then we go on and sing to all the N word holy only thou art holy that's not what the scripture says holiness originates Riga only he is originally holy he always was and always will be everlastingly holy our holiness is borrowed from him the command is to be holy which literally means to be healthy in your spirit that's why the word holy comes from an old anglo-saxon word ha League which means health or again it means purity you should be great priests in England because having a lot of great preacher in England but anyhow this old preacher used to preach in Wesley's Chapel on City Road London mostly for the life of me I can't think of his name at the moment he wrote on a great book called the burning cataracts of Christ and he but I remember his friend he said the man that only wants his sins forgiven is toying with religion the aspirations of the human heart naturally I mean when God has come to deal with them is as David Christ here created me a clean heart O Lord and in your right spirit within me and then he says in the twelfth verse restore unto me the joy of thy salvation let me give you one of my latest quits the more joy you have in the Lord the less entertainment you need entertainment is the devil's substitute for joint and where the was a king in America do you know the king is McQueen the king is sport and his wife is called entertainment and they're devouring not only the man in the street they're devouring people in the pews on another devouring preachers ask your preacher what time do you go to bed at night if he says it's none of your business eighties I want to know what kind of a man you are ask him what kind of a prayer life here I don't ask people if they're saved anymore who isn't safe from the White House to the Jailhouse I look a person in the eye say does Christ live in you I was saying it I didn't ask you that I'm asking you is tried described within your Christianity is the only religion in the world where a man's God comes and lives inside of him a Chinese scholar was given a copy of the New Testament he'd read the Koran it read the Vedas and all the sacred vote the man said to him did you read the New Testament through he said I did what's the most amazing thing he thought the man would say the most amazing thing I read was that Jesus Christ was born of a virgin that he died and physically rose again from the dead instead of that he said the most awesome thing is in Philippians chapter 2 or Ephesians chapter 2 it is yes he said in time past ye walked according to the course of this world according to the Prince of the power of the air and then at the end of that same chapter it says you are the habitation of God he said sir there's your God live inside of you if so that's the most awesome thing I've read and I read the Quran I've read the Vedas I've read all those on the sacred books but I never read where a man's God comes and makes for the man the habitation of God I preached in a big church a few years back I said Martha dearly those trees at the entrance of the church a wonderful never seen trees like that in my life I know what the leaves are but look at all the little white flowers white birds well I got to church a bit late one night well I mean late for me I usually like to get there half an hour before time now if I went in here with the boys you know while I draw this fleeting breath and then sticking the cigarette stumps in the end in the trees outside when I gave up my taste I said gentlemen I'm going to preach this a night I did on Romans II and while you're looking for it get out your cigarettes and your matches you can all smoke what deacons nudging each other we knew this guy was a crank I said smoke this building isn't a temple of God this is the temple of God you defile it you go to the door of the church defile it inside of course you start smoking I'll tell you to stop but I said this is a temple it doesn't run in temples made he dwells in a habitation Wow full of carnality full of jealousy full of pride full of anger full of secret last David said return unto me the joy I've enough pain the bones that you brought this relationship with you seven the only way that I can get my joy back is for God to come in full control first he has to cleanse the habitation in which he's going to live 19:37 was a great year in my life I met my sweet wife in the town called April's outside of Manchester England we took a tent there we didn't know anybody was our usual format take a tent to a city no backing no churches no money sleep in it praying it weeping it groan in it and figured in six weeks we could raise a church of four to five hundred people or even sometimes eight hundred and we did and those churches are still standing now 50 years after we'd no money with no backing we live like mice ate as little as we could we because we had to slept as little as we could prayed as much as we could like Michaels Martha came in with a bunch of other nurses they always look so beautiful are sitting in rows and on they were white braces and a blue cape with a red lining and smart girls what's all the red over their shoulder you know to be more attractive and distract you while you're preaching but anyhow nearly all the boys fell in love with a nurse one of them fell in love with Martha I believe I listen I want to I want to marry her can I go see her tomorrow night I said sure I said before you go and to tell you I'm gonna marry her oh well I won't um any chance I said well I won't say a word to her well I got the prize and she's been a very wonderful wonderful life that on the Friday night one Friday night one Saturday night I preached on Psalm 51 there's a woman sitting at the back I've seen some ugly women in my life but she was the ugliest one I had ever seen and I say see the nose like a banana and she was as as wrinkled as a prune she was best in black and she was sallow and at the end I said if you have some need to meet God if you've a broad man come trihard you're welcome to come and kneel here I'll pray with you the others all left the tent she came and knelt there when she sobbed and she cried and she groaned finally I said well ladies have time to do everything and it's time to quit crying it's time to talk to God well I said what's your problem he said mr. Ravenal forty years ago I was one of the leading officers in the Salvation Army one night I quarreled with my partner there were always two women in one area two men in another leading a Corps as they called it what we would call the fellowship we argued that night and I got angry I went home I took off my straw bonnet I told it to put it on the open fire I took off my tunic and cut it up put it on the open the fire took off my skirt could you put me on the open fire studied all up then I took my Bible and ripped all the pages out put it on top and he said mr. Romeo since he began to smile a little cheated it's so wonderful tonight I said well it wasn't wonderful preaching I've had a better time any time no no no I heard the voice of God the first time for 40 years after I've severed my relationship with him I heard William Booth the founder of the Salvation Army preaches only he could preach I heard Colonel drangle I hold heard all the so-called great stars but she said for 40 years God has never spoken to me about a heart of stone I've been to services I've never been moved hymns no movements preaching doesn't moving preaching to me threatening doesn't move me and he said tonight as you spoke there and said restore unto me the joy of thy salvation she said I said God that's the only thing I need in life I don't ask you live longer I don't ask you to ease my poverty I don't ask the fact I ask you to research she said you see I knew the intimacy of walking with God I had a love relationship with him I could really say personally he walks with me and he talks with me and he tells me I mean and it's all gone I said well lady two years of wasted life and when it comes you that back you can restore your piece you can restore your joy can bring you into living flamin relationship with himself you can someth underneath your feet the world of flesh and the devil but it's not going to bring 40 years of wasted life do you know after that that woman every time we open the house of God she was the first at the door we had a prayer meeting every Sunday morning at 7 o'clock and I've seen the standing there in the snow shivering a clothes of everything and you were saying mr. Rainey it is a lovely morning and they must Shepherd out so mrs. Shepherd it's not much of a morning for you you're shivering it's cold it's icy the snow oh that mr. Rainey look I have my joy I have my peace the love relationship is restored my whole world is a new world dear old Duncan Campbell I pray that you met Duncan Prather than many times you used to pray at 5:00 in the morning he couldn't pray until he had tea made us black is your shoe you can almost stand up the spoon up in it I could drink it like that I told him it was Mobil Oil her once he got anointed with his tea he got going oh how he used to pray oh when you told me about the revival in the heavily brother Duncan please you make me feel as though God has slighted me you make me feel as though Oh what's it going to say I preached around the world I preached the thumbs up forget it I never seen any brokenness like they saw never seen that a moving of the Spirit of God like he saw or how he used to say there's only one sin that God cannot forgive and that's a sin that son confessed if we confess our sin it's got a nice thing to be humiliated you know I can remember the old days this precious lady Toronto when you enter a holiness meeting of a Pentecostal meeting do you know what there were more people at the altar before the service then after the altar was lined with people praying the glory down we do an old man who uses thunder oh not now Lord you come and walk in our midst tonight and I was a kid about shroud and I was saying don't I thought God was going to come down in his glory and on and and I'd be I'd be running for the door you know we say Come Lord you come it's if the lawn came to the average Church that'd be chaos in the choir and panic in the pews and the Deacons would be running for the door we don't know the glory of God but I'll tell you what I believe it's going to come back it's going to come back we're going to discover a man testing god that we've never never ever known before and with the glory the ravine lights of god there's yonder come a consciousness of sins such as never known before just one thing somebody sent me some little books recently from Ireland their life stories with famous people abridged one of them about Jerry McCauley it was an Irish when I came to Boston he broke all records for drinking violence everything else ended up in jail if I remember was in Sing Sing that's a name for a day those things in Sing Sing spent about 15 years here but make god there came out into New York there's a famous street there just over Brooklyn Bridge on Canal Street that a famous building called the Water Street mission there were more derelicts and reprobates and sinners and criminals converted there than any place in America and Jamie I believe got saved there and then he started a place of his own you know he had a passion for the lost I did Dave Wilkerson he could stain is nice home once you want to go meet take a risk of being hit and stand on it so the abuse and sin and uncleanness or where did Jesus go preach he don't go fishing in your bathtub deal if you do you need to check with a doctor you got weather fish huh recently in pretty churches I'll tell you what they did I worked 20 years ago with a Dave Wilkinson when Teen Challenge was first starting in New York there's one thing about those guys you didn't after town they were sinners they knew you had to tell me about an answer there's a lovely hymn written in America not many great hymns were in America one great hymn written America that I love we also sing in England I admit that it was written by HD Spafford a very wealthy man yeah four beautiful daughters he waved them goodbye on a ship called the Lahav from pier 90 in New York before the ship got to England it sank off the rugged coast of Wales his four daughters perished his wife was safe they sent him used to New York sitting at his desk in his office wealthy wealthy wealthy men the ship has gone down your four daughters are lost he got a piece of paper he wrote when peace like a river attendeth my way when sorrows like sea billows roll whatever my lord thou has taught me to say it is well with my soul the second stanza says if Satan should buffet death trial should be by the third stanza I stopped a meeting in the great method Baptist Church in in in Atlanta about four years ago on the Friday night I said look everybody stand please sing this hymn sing very carefully the third stanza my sin not my sins that's the fruit my sin that's the route all the Bliss of this glorious thought my sin not in part but the whole is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more on the Sunday night doctor stablished on the platform either I don't know what happened but there's really sang Friday night brother angel said look at the third verse something snapped inside of me a deacon came to me said brother ain't know what happened to dr. Stanley happened to me Friday night and he said I told my friend at the door another deacon he said the same thing happened to me I wanted to go to deal with that roots of sin the very founding of rebellion and uncleanness there are no degrees of purity no degrees of death from the degrees of life that on degrees of death or a no degrees of purity your heart and mine is either pure or impure and it is impure it's an offense to God if I'm harboring grudges have pride if I have them there is no other message in the world like the message of the gospel it's a mandate to go to the derelicts to anybody this Psalm always remind me of this Hebrews 7:25 he's able to save to the uttermost and somebody said to the mother most and to the uppermost and to the gutter most there's no such thing as such a chronic condition of sin that God cannot cleanse that heart he's able to save to the uttermost all who come unto God by him seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for us again I say the normal condition of the Christian life is a life of wholeness he says create in me a clean out and give me thy Holy Spirit when Saul the king of Israel an evil spirit II did evil things when the mass an unclean spirit he does unclean things when a man has the Holy Spirit she produces holy things you know if Jesus could have solved ten million arguments if he just said one one one change one word if Jesus was said by their gifts he sold all of it would have killed 10 million arguments but it didn't say that I said by their fruits you know gifts I don't believe them a wood they are wonderful there are many of them but you never saw fruit strutting video people strut with gifts very often fruit is noiseless in its production noiseless in its purity in its progress and that's what God wants in our lives my sin not in part but the whole is nailed of the cross in other words when he died there I died with him taking this illustration irritate his a man standing up in the water of baptism he goes down under the water Susie goes hunger is cut off from the world above is me he can't see if he can't talk to it he can't smell it can't sense it I mean if he goes under that water it's a symbolic of the fact that he's been very good Christ therefore the world above has no fascination for it Paul says I'm crucified with Christ nevertheless I meant not only that but at the end of Galatians 5 he says and the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world now you've seen a lot of things some of you men that went to war saw some bloody things on battlefields dismembered body none of us ever saw crucifixion 5 10,000 people would follow a man carrying his crosses dr. Tozer said if you saw a man taking his cross outside of the city was sure of one thing he wasn't coming back once he went there you could throw rotten fruit of him rotten eggs and him rocks and himself pour it on him 5,000 people there at night to see that man crucified 6 o'clock in the morning not one of them they're the first to be there with the vultures that came on the cross there and stood there and picked out his eyes and picked out his body until his entrails were hanging out then the dogs came and licked up the blood there's nothing more horrible the airing of crucifixion with all those skeletons dismembered bodies there Paul says the world is crucified is it come on now is the sports world as ugly to you since you say that it still mesmerized you you spend more time watching ballgames on TV than prayer is so that's your God that's your idol the world is crucified even the fascinating world of business maybe with all its allurements to profits and success he's crucified to me and not only I'm crucified to the world they said that for here's a man with the most colossal intellect in the world he taught with the Epicureans and Stoics and poets and others in what the sixteenth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles and then marvel that he knew so much he counted philosophy with philosophy history with history poetry with poetry and then finally if dr. Stewart of Scotland said he showed them upon me he he sounded the trumpet blast of the resurrection what a man once died and rose again yeah yes a secret cousin you see if we're not saved by the death of Christ we're saved by his life if he's still dead we're still dead Buddha didn't die and rise again Confucius didn't rise again but Paul says I'm an idiot to the world think of what that man could be doing in the world he could be the greatest philosopher greatest than Socrates greatest orator than demosthenes and here he is huddled up with a bunch of people that have prayer meetings in backrooms look at his face all scarred with stones notice he limps we've been imprisoned more than any any criminal others the way Jesus glorious God gives up because he'd never heard you know the name it and claim it that was his fault all he knew was prisons and persecutions and hardship and you know he did the poor insane man this is what he said you know I'm glad God gave me grace to get through it I if it were twenty five hours in the dead never have made it well I pray this morning Lord keep me from temptation and keep me from difficulties and make me a jellyfish so he says I glory in tribulation in necessities and reproaches come on have you got so far huh when the name is cast out as an evil thing when you're really cured and despised they see once the heart is cleansed then the Holy Spirit of God comes to control makes all the difference in the world it's no longer eyes Christ that lives in me the likely time now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me there is no joy in the world like the joy of God and the man who wrote most about it was writing in a stinking lousy prison cell and he said listen I've got a word from God for you oh you have what is it within the prosper make my money no he says rejoice in the Lord they should have been writing to him he's right into them he have another square merely has another bath for weeks and months maybe yeah and here is rejoicing in adversity in tribulation in distress is in reproaches everything that we shun everything that would make carrot finis make us strong make us tough for God well have you got that joy can we glory necessities in reproaches love me then ask you to sing it either our cry masks and strike this up in the right place maybe we'll okay 139 139 let's sing the first stanza I think it's the third yeah the first in the third let's stand insane when peace like a river attendeth my way to make a new pigeon first and third yeah when peace like a river attendeth lies where's ours like see fellas to me to say it is well with my soul my soul is where here releasing a to my sin oh the Bliss Gloria's smart my part Oh grass my soul Oh Father we thank you this morning that we can say like David he brought me a part of a horrible pit and something even greater than that you say there's so many terminal pit you brought this out of darkness into light I'm sure we shall never go into eternal darkness we thank you this morning for truth in the midst of a world that's staggering and stumbling over error we thank you for light in the midst of darkness we thank you for life in the midst of death God we ask thee that we may crave this purity of heart be willing to let you detect us and show us ourselves how did as it may be to show us the secret corruption the vilest us in the secret lusts that hold Empire over our souls we thank you the blood of Jesus Christ God's Son can cleanse us from sin and not only that keep us from the same he's able to say we thank you for every voice which is the truthful voice in the world this morning think of all the mysteries think about precious brothers and sisters in Russia or China or other countries that maybe haven't been to a fellowship for years and yet maintain their integrity and they can truly say what is poetry to us though he slay me yet will I trust him God make us like the Bereans to be Noble let there be distinctiveness about us the distinction of holiness and spiritual health and life and power we pray for them and it suit around and now she doing in duplicate their power strengthen all the branches that they have across the world keep us looking to Jesus the author and the finisher of our faith and may we be able to say like the Apostle that we finished our course with joy they give you praise in Jesus name thank you bless you

Channel: Ahava Jerusalem

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Keywords: amazing, born again, eternity, freedom, God, google, Holy Spirit, hope, humble, israel, Jesus, love, Music, news, peace, revelation, video, word, Youtube, truth, christian, bible, Christ, grace, believe, youtube, facebook, free, heart, future, heaven, internet, life, overcome, holiness, joy, music, prayer, time, glory, power, destiny, cross, temptation, devil, ahavajerusalem, idolatry, time square, spiritual, amazon, sermon, Leonard Ravenhill, sermonindex, man, church, victory, pure heart, pure church, sanctification, righteousness

Id: tyvXWJOGTjY

Length: 81min 49sec (4909 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 03 2016