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In this bicentennial year, if
not at some other time, I'm sure some of you have stood in the
historic old church in Richmond, where long ago Patrick Henry
fired a verbal shot that was heard around the world. March
20th, 1775. A rare moment in time when centuries
were crowded into hours. That speech was so phenomenal
that one man who heard it, who was present there, expressed
a desire to be buried on that spot when he died, and that wish
was granted. Patrick Henry cut the knot that
cautious souls had been trying to untie. They had been trying
to work things out through a compromise with George III, but this red-headed
Virginian was fed up with finagling. And he saw no sense in any further
negotiation. He said, I don't know what you're
going to do, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.
I especially want to emphasize what isn't usually emphasized,
but as for me, the die was cast and the Rubicon was crossed and
all the bridges were burned and retreat was impossible. wasn't
any uncertainty about where Patrick Henry stood. He cleared the air
and stated the issue. No third dimension, no middle
ground. A speech like that's awfully
out of date now in a fuzzy day of woolly thinking, when we have
experts in double talk who specialize in the art of almost saying something
with a straightforward way of dodging the issue. Nobody coaxed
Patrick Henry on how to mix black and white into an indefinite
gray. His yea was yea and his nay was
nay. And while the contemporaries
were going around their elbows to get to their thumbs, he believed
that a straight line was the shortest distance between two
points. His speech must have shocked some people. The school
of caution, I'm sure, but it detonated that charge that blasted
tyranny from our shores. Then another man said about the
same thing. In Joshua 24, we go back to that
great day when that great leader had come through to the promised
land through many dangers, toils, and snares that had already come. but he faced a vacillating, irresolute,
hesitating multitude easily swayed this way and that, one day singing
the praises of God, and the next day dancing around the golden
calf. It was an hour of decision, and
he gave a résumé, we won't read it all, of how God had led them
to this good hour, and after all that rundown of the divine
blessing in verse 14, he reached the climax. choose ye this day
whom ye will serve, but as for me and my house we'll serve the
Lord." Now, if there ever was a weak-knit generation, swayed
by the world of flesh and the devil, we're living in it today.
And if there ever was a time when we needed fathers like Joshua,
who would say, as for me and my house, whatever the neighbors
on the block do where I live, whatever society may do, whatever
the trend may be, whatever the fashion of the in crowd, as for
me and my house, we will serve the Lord. It never has been so
difficult as now, when the law of God is disregarded, and standards
of decency and morality have gone into the wastebasket, and
our homes have cracked up until all the way from Maine to California,
it's a disaster area home-wise. Discipline is a forgotten word,
and any man who takes a stand like Joshua is puritanical and
Victorian and an out-of-date square. I'm dumbfounded at the
way a lot of parents today who used to stand with Joshua, or
who knew to stand with him in the way they were brought up,
have surrendered to this age and invented all kinds of excuses
to rationalize their defeat and the behavior of their children.
But I also know some parents and some families who are still
saying, as for us, as for me and my house, we're going to
serve the Lord, and they're making a go of it in spite of hell and
the devil. Now, if it ought to be done,
it can be done. Jacob did it at Shechem, and Joshua did it
at Shechem. Both at Shechem. Shechem. Back to Bethel was the note of
Jacob, and he said, we're going. They didn't take a vote. They
didn't go over it all with the family to find out who wanted
to go and who didn't. They weren't afraid they'd frustrate
Junior. He just announced that we're
going. And the terror of the Lord accompanied them, and the
best way to build a ring of fire around the family is to do it
this way, as for me and my house. or serve the Lord. We're all
a chicken today, and the way back to Bethel is the way that
they took. But there's a third man, and
I'm particularly concerned with him. Paul was writing to a young
preacher, and in 1 and 2 Timothy, he deals with three perils of
the preacher and perils of any Christian. The first one is the
peril of things in the sixth chapter of 1st Timothy, beginning
at verse 6, which is, Godliness with contentment is great gain. That is an unfailing recipe for
prosperity. Godliness plus contentment equals
prosperity. Now, if you want to be rich,
get rich, that's the way. For we broke nothing into this
world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out, and having
food and raiment, let us be there with content. But they that will
be rich fall into temptation and the snare, and into many
foolish and hurtful lusts which drown men in destruction and
perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil, which
while some," and did you ever try for the moment just slipping
in there the name of certain characters in the Bible, Valem,
for instance, Gehazi, which while Balaam, Gehazi, and many others, erred from the faith when they
coveted after it, and pierced themselves through with many
sorrows." Now comes the word, but that. Now, the Revised Standard
Version has it, but as for you, and I like that better, but as
for you, you can't do like that, O man of God. Flee these things. Every day is dollar day now.
in this country. William Jennings Brown said the
trouble with people who live for money is they spend the first
half their lives trying to get everything they can from everybody
else, and last half trying to keep everybody else from getting
what they've got away from them. They don't find any pleasure
in either half. Somebody asked R. D. Rockefeller how much money
will it take to satisfy a man, and he answered just a little
more. Men live for money and what it
will buy. You say well it's the love of money. Yes I know, but
if you didn't have the money you wouldn't have the love of
money, so don't try to give it a good name on account of the
way it's worded there. But as for me, as for me I will
not make things the God of my life or a man's life consisteth
not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth. I heard
about a hillbilly walking down the street in a small town some
time ago by a furrier's shop. And they had a leopard skin coat,
a beautiful thing. And he looked at it a little
bit and said, that old cat was better off before he was worth
so much. I think I've known some cats
like that. What shall it profit a man? He
shall gain the world, lose his own soul. A Christian in a Cadillac
is no more precious in the sight of God than a saint in a Jeep.
That's not the yardstick, but life's poorest investment is
to gain the world and lose your soul. God doesn't want any man
to be any richer than his soul. I don't know how rich your soul
is this morning, but that's his standard, and in these days when
we spend health looking for wealth, and then turn around and spend
wealth looking for health, we need to remember the good word,
I wish in all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health.
God's standard for health, too, as thy soul prospereth. Then
the second peril had to do with the times, and of course that's
in 2 Timothy 3, where we have that formidable list of the characteristics
of the last days. In the last days perilous times
shall come, for men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous
boasters, proud blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful,
unholy, without natural affection, truth-breakers, false accusers,
incompetent, fierce despisers of those that are good, traitors,
heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of
God." Reads like the morning paper, doesn't it? Having a form
of godliness, but denying the power thereof from such turn
away, Then he goes on with this description, but look down in
verse 10, but thou hast fully known me, and then in verse 14,
but as for you, continue in the things which thou hast heard.
Now, a man would have to be blind of his brains not to see this
on the page of every paper every morning. Paul paints no rosy
picture of the future. He doesn't foresee a converted
world, neither did our Lord. He talked about abounding lawlessness
and abating love when the son of man cometh shall he find faith
on the earth as it was in the days of noah well how was it
you know how it was the kinetic civilization in genesis 4 had
produced cities and arts and manufacturing and advancement
and culture and then came the unholy mixture in genesis 6 the
sons of God and the daughters of men, and whatever that may
mean to you as a Bible student, it's always a perilous thing
when you mix what God never mixed and separated what God never
separated. Wickedness abounded the carcass
and the vultures, ignorance and they knew not. It was educated,
but the worst ignorance in this world is educated ignorance,
and as it was, this is an old record that's been played a great
many times, as it was, so shall it be. And those intellectual
giants were soon clinging to the wreckage of a drowned world,
and today we've almost learned the secret of life. We've got
a machine on Mars and hope to send a man over there. But when
all these wonderful things happen, remember that when men say peace
and safety, we never had less of it than we have today. God's
going to intervene one of these days and come down with his bunch
of keys and say, you boys have had it long enough. I'm going
to take over. Paul hardly says Christians believe
that Jesus Christ is going to intervene and take over down
here when we have made a hopeless mess of self-government. Well, then he ought to be back
any time. Now, in the midst of all this, Noah found grace in
the eyes of the Lord. God's not out saving civilization. Civilization is not going to
be saved. God's taking out a people for
his name. Noah had the fear of God. He prepared the north. He
preached repentance. He got the famine in the ark.
He was on the right side of that door when God showed it, and
that's all that matters. Now, that's the picture of the
times, and here in 2 Timothy 3 there was ignorance, but Paul
says, but as for you, you know We ought to be like the children
of Issachar who had understanding of the times to know what Israel
ought to do. Old Josh Billings said, I'd rather
know a few things for certain than be sure of a lot of things
that ain't so. We've come to a day when people
are chasing a thousand and one things that aren't true and missing
the thing that is for certain. So, Paul goes on to say here,
in such a day you know, you know what time it is, verse 1, perilous
times, not prosperous times, not propitious times, perilous
times. And then he said, you know me,
you know how I have lived, you've had the example, thou hast fully
known my doctrine, manner of life, and so on. Thou hast known
me, and we've had the example of godly forefathers, not only
Paul, but for men of God who have passed on the torch and
kept the charge." Then he said, you know something else. You
know how you were brought up, continuing the things thou hast
learned and has been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast
learned them. Godly parentage, I thank God for it. Many of you
do. Old-fashioned family order before
the day of women's lib and the total woman. Then you know about
the Scriptures. from a child thou hast known
the holy scriptures which are able to make thee wise unto salvation
through faith which is in Christ Jesus." We know we have no business
getting into a mess in a time like this, but the schools turn
out people with loads of learned lumber in their head that don't
know how to build anything out of it, and we're taught to doubt
the Bible today as though the heights of ignorance were not
to be sure of anything. Well, they say the Bible is a
sufficient rule of faith and practice, but I wonder sometimes
if they mean all of it, if they mean all even of the New Testament.
If you've read of the bed of Procrustes, it was a peculiar
bed. If a fellow was too short, they
stretched him till he would fit it, and if he's too long they
chopped him off until he wouldn't fit it. Some people make a bed
of Procrustes out of the Bible. They stretch it out or lop it
off to suit the Procrustean ideas of their own interpretation,
judging the book, forgetting that the old book's going to
judge us. It's either absolute or it's obsolete, it's one of
the two. there's nothing else like it. I don't think any finer
thing was ever said along this line than what Dr. Phillips said.
He said when you start digging into that old book and exploring
around you will have the feeling of an electrician wiring an old
house where the power has not been cut off. You'll get a shot,
you'll get a charge, you'll get something if you go at it as
you ought. and then perils concerning the
truth. Paul said, look out for that,
because the time is coming when they can't take it. Preach the
word, be instant, in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke,
exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will
come, and we have arrived, beloved, when they will not endure sound
doctrine, but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves
teachers having itching ears, and they shall turn away their
ears from the truth and shall be turned in the favored. But
as for you, I want to warn you this morning, dear friends. Keep this in the back of your
mind. There are some things other folks may do, but if you're going
to be God's man, God's woman, God's young person, but as for
you watching all things in your reflections, do the work of an
evangelist, make full approach in ministry. Watch it. Too many Christian experiences
start out in their earlier days with heartburns. then end up
with a itch, wanting to be entertained and pleased by the sermon. Against this background you have
peril then concerning things, and concerning the times, and
concerning the truth. And the preacher and any Christian
ought to stand out in vivid contrast to all of this. You're supposed
to be something different, Now the big question is, how different
should a preacher and how different should a Christian be? Everybody
wants to be different, but we've never been more alike. It's a
most monotonous monotony. There never has been a time when
we're all about the same, and it is as though the highway signs
have all been torn down. We're free to drive as we please.
Family life is shambles, but we've wound up with the strange
similarity. Young people talk about being
different. I have a better response from young people I've ever had
in all these 60 odd years of preaching, but I say to them,
and many times when we get together and they ask questions, and of
course it's always the same questions, what's wrong with dancing and
rock and 40 other things, and I say, now wait a minute, you're
already off on the wrong foot. You're asking how much like this
world can I be and still be a Christian? Why didn't you ask how much like
Jesus can I be and how little like this world? How near the
precipice can I walk without going over? That's what it amounts
to when you go at it that way. I live across the street from
the University of North Carolina in Greensboro. And I watch I
tramp that campus a great deal. I look at that generation in
blue jeans like the country kids used to wear when I grew up and
was hoeing corn down in a creek bottom. But you could tell the
boys and the girls. And I've wondered what some charming
feminine sweetheart of the 20s would do if she met a hippie
today looking like Rip Van Winkle after his long nap. I wonder what the reaction would
be. And preachers are not supposed
of course to be that somber soul in dark attire like the movies
portray. I never saw many of those preachers
even back in those early years, but they like to play it up like
that. But at any rate, they did call him reverend. I don't approve
of that, but it did indicate some sort of respect. Now we've
gone to the other extreme, and we have the Madison Avenue go-getter
and the back-slapper type, talking, acting, looking like anybody
else, laughing at all the civic club jokes, sipping seven-up
at the country club. I'm so scared somebody will think
he's a preacher. Used to be an honor. I don't
mean that a minister has to go around looking dour, and I remember
long ago in Sunrise Bible Conference they used to have up in New York
State, John S. McComb was there on the program
with me, a very fine and distinguished and dignified gentleman, and
one morning I came down attired a little brighter than usual,
a little more color, and he looked at me and said, the prophet is
wearing snappy sackcloth. Well, of course, he meant it
in the best of humor, you know, but I'm afraid that the church
today is working overtime trying to destroy the old image of the
preacher, and we're erasing all distinctions between clergy and
laity and making the preacher just one of the boys, just as
run-of-the-mill as any John Doe in a carpool on Monday on the
way to work. Now, the devil is out to smudge
all this black and white into gray. Dr. Jowett, who is a prince
of preachers, said, we are tempted to leave our noonday lights in
our steady to move among men with a dark lantern which we
can manipulate to suit our company. We pay the tribute of smiles
to the low business standards, we pay the tribute of laughter
to the fashionable jest, We pay the tribute of easy tolerance
to ambiguous pleasures. We soften everything to a comfortable
acquiescence. We seek to be all things to all
men. We run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. There's
nothing distinctive about our character. We're wearing gray
when we mix with the businessmen of the congregation, and we talk
gray in conversation with them." Now, that was a great English
preacher. I think he's absolutely correct
in this delineation of our tragic weakness on this one. And God didn't intend for the
preacher to be one of the boys. He meant for him to be ahead
of the boys. Paul said, follow me, as I follow Christ. And if
you're going to be the life of the party all week, you can't
reprove and rebuke and exhort that crowd on Sunday with any
effectiveness. Or you say, Jesus ate Republicans
and sinners. Yes, that one's been overworked
in the last 15 years. When he came to announce the
kingdom first to the house of Israel, yes, but as he drew near
the cross he ate only with his own, and appeared only to his
own, and in the acts of the apostles they ate together, the saints
of the Lord. But the image of a preacher and
of a Christian is not a pose. Sometimes they strike a pose,
trying to act according to a dramatized version of themselves, But if
you are what you ought to be, and if the minister is what a
preacher should be, the image will take care of itself, and
it'll be said of them what the Shunammite woman said of Elisha,
I perceive that this is a holy man of God which passeth by us
continually. Oh, I have prayed that when I
have completed my trip through this mundane sphere, that that
might be the consensus That isn't popularity, that's another thing,
oh yes. We must watch, beloved, what
I talked about two years ago here, trendism. There are certain
things that are not bad in themselves, and there's no use raising a
hullabaloo about them. They're not bad in themselves,
but they're headed the wrong way. and anything that has a
question mark after it in your life, always be careful to size
it up so now let's see where, which way is this thing going
and where will I go if I go with it? Meat offered to idols was
just as good as any other meat, wasn't anything wrong with that
meat. Paul said it won't touch it because of the context. Now you watch the context. There
was a day when Spurgeon could say Many would unite church and
stage, cards and prayer, dancing and sacraments. If we are powerless
to stem this torrent, we can at least warn men of its existence
and entreat them to stay out of it, but who's warning anybody
about that? And think of A. J. Gordon, that mighty man of God
of Boston. The notion having grown up, he
said that we must entertain men in order to win them to Christ,
You know, the end justifies the means. Any kind of a show is
all right if two or three folks come down the aisle, but the
trouble is that the means determines the end. If you have an unworthy
means, you have an unworthy end. Entertainment in order to win
them, and so every invention for world-pleasing which human
ingenuity can devise, has been brought forward till the churches
have been turned into playhouses and there is hardly a carnal
amusement that can be named from billiards to dancing which does
not find a nesting place in the sanctuaries my soul." So what
would he say now? Remember this is A.J. Gordon
and he said if we don't watch we're going to
find this trouble. Is it then pharisaism or pessimism
that at the present, now listen beloved, fearful rate of progress,
the close of this decade, his decade, may see the protestant
church as completely assimilated to 19th century secularism as
the roman catholic church was assimilated to 4th century paganism."
Now, that's the kind of thinking that doesn't come just the instantly. Man has to pray a lot and think
a lot to see through the conclusions like that, but I don't care much
about it today. And even Augustine, way back
before A.J. Gordon, said when peace was made
between the emperors and the church, in order to make the
new church members, you know how it was, Constantine became
a professing Christian, everybody joined the church. It was the
end thing. And so the church said, well
now we want these folks to feel at home, so we'll mix up the
holidays and the holy day. And that's why Santa Claus got
into Christmas, and Easter eggs into Easter, and all the rest
of it down through the ages. And nobody's trying to change
it now, and I'm not about to take that responsibility on in
my later years, but I'm talking to you about trends. You have to do something about
the little serpent before it becomes a boa constrictor. Nothing's
more repulsive Nothing ever was more repulsive to my Lord than
religious play-acting and the Pharisees who were expert at
it, but they drew the severest condemnation. How we need today to remember
that you can go through all the motions and be a whirling at
heart, because a whirling doesn't mean that you dance and play
cards and smoke necessarily, that's whirliness, yes indeed,
but You cannot do that and be like a Pharisee who wouldn't
even eat an egg that had been laid on the Sabbath. Talk about
separation. And yet my Lord said the publicans
and harlots will go to heaven before you. You tie mint and
anise and cumin and have neglected the weightier matters of the
law. Theodore Roosevelt, who is just about my favorite president,
said that as a young man he was brought to serious thinking by
two lines from Browning about a young duke who was a poor descendant
by then of a noble line that once had had money, but he still
tried to act the part, and here are the two lines. All that the
old dukes had been without knowing it, this duke would fain know
he was without being it. Now, we have a lot of that. We're
raising a big crop of that today, and there's no sadder sight on
judgment day than a phony preacher or a phony Christian. I shudder
when I remember that my Lord said at the judgment day, Matthew
7, 22, 23, there'll be preachers who said, we've prophesied, we've
cast out demons, we've done wonderful work, only to be told, apart
from me, ye that work iniquity." Do you mean to tell me that a
man can be a good enough preacher to cast out demons and prophesy
and do wonderful works, and yet be a worker of iniquity? And
so this same Paul wrote to this same Timothy and said, look out
for three things, preacher. Doctrine, what you believe, it
comes to a time it doesn't matter much what people believe as long
as everybody's in good humor, said, watch it. And Gresham Machen
pointed out so well that in Philippians Paul was concerned about a sound
message with an unsound motive, but he was concerned in Galatia
with an unsound message which was worse no matter what the
motive was. That's a rather upsetting conclusion
you arrive at if you check that there. And you've got to be right,
beloved, it isn't enough to be almost right about this old book.
I heard of a girl who was getting married and some friend wanted
to send her a greeting and all that sort of thing, you know,
and wanted to send a Bible verse. So he sent 1 John 4, 18, which
is a very good verse. There's no fear in love, perfect
love casts without fear, but Western Union got hold of it. and they thank john 4 18 thou
hast had five husbands and he whom thou now asked is not thy
husband so you can't be almost right now western union was almost
right but that won't do so he said you want to watch your doctrine
you've got to watch also your dynamics stir up the gift of
god that's within you and you've got to watch your discipline
When a young preacher today says, do you have any word for me?
I said yes, the same word that Paul had for Kenneth. Get straight
on doctrine, dynamic and discipline, and that'll take care of it.
John the Baptist was a burning and a shining light. Some have
a lot of heat and no light, and some have light and no heat.
I don't know which is worse, hot-headed ignorance or cold-hearted
intellectualism. I'd rather try to cool off a
phonetic than warm up a corpse. So get the combination. You need
the doctrine that you may believe, you need the dynamic that you
may burn, and you need the discipline that you may behave. That's the
combination. I know that it's very unpopular
to be different today. Paul was, but Demas wasn't, and
so he gave way to the world. I'm going back week after next,
the Lord willing, to a preacher's retreat in East Tennessee in
the depths of the mountains, and in the heights of the mountains,
Camp Carson. Oh, that's a great place for
preachers to gather. I've been, this will be my third
trip, and I climbed one of those every morning before breakfast,
and looked over the view, and I remember the first time I tried
it. I got up partway, and there was
a break in the woods, and the temptation was to call a halt
and let it go at that. But something inside said, keep
on climbing. My legs were wobbling, my heart
was thumping. Something inside said, who do
you think you are, a teenager? Have you forgotten you were born
in 1901? But I made it, and when I reached
the summit, I said, well, the difference is worth the distance,
because there broke out before me a panorama such as I never
would have seen through that break in the woods farther down. I beg of you this morning, keep
climbing, beloved. If there's that preacher here,
a young preacher, a young person in Christian work, keep climbing.
Some of your contemporaries will say, oh, get off your high horse
and join the club. and tell them, I can't do it,
boys. Faith is cult to joyful sound, the song of saints on
high ground. I want to scale the utmost height
and catch a gleam of glory bright, and anything else as far as I'm
concerned is out of the question. Oh, Elisha was on his way to
see Elijah go to heaven in a whirlwind. You see, they just don't do that
every day, and he wanted to see that. And the theological seminary
over there at Bethel and the one at Jericho, the students
were all outside the room. And they said, Do you know your
master is going up today? Yes. He said, Be still. He wasn't
going to get upset by these theologues who were there by the side of
the road. Once in a while, some elisha makes up his mind to see
the horses and the chariots and get the prophet's mantle. The
high soul walks the high road, and the low soul walks the low,
and in between on the misty flats the rest drift. to and fro. If you're going to be different,
it won't be easy. It may mean getting up early,
earlier to be still. Oh, William Law, that great man
of God said, Who am I to lie folded up in the bed late of
the morning when the farmers have already gone about their
work and I'm so far behind with my sanctification? I think we'd all agree here this
morning that whatever else may be true, we're all behind with
our sanctification. It may mean for a minister skipping
some little church meetings of the sons and daughters of I Will
Arise that don't have anything to do with redemption anyhow.
The road's long and the climb is steep, but if you make it,
beloved, the difference is worth the distance. You may end up
with not much to show for to this world's good, but you know
what I said earlier this week. pays low down here, but the retirement
benefits are out of this world. You'll be like that Indian whose
chief called him in along with his companions and said, I want
you to climb Yonder's Mountain. You may not make it, but if you
must stop, pick up something wherever you stop, bring it back,
show me that you got that far. And away they went, And he said,
if you reach the top, you will see in the far distance the shining
sea. And they went, and about the
middle of the afternoon, one came back with a sprig of pine
in his hand. He said, I could only make it
that far. And another came back with a
bit of fir, and another with a bit of spruce, and said, I
got pretty well up, but couldn't do it. Then late in the evening
the last one came back with nothing. And the chief was indignant,
said, what do you mean coming back with nothing in your hand?
He said, where I stood there was nothing to bring back in
the hand, but I saw the sea. Now you think that went over. Live so that if you don't have
much to show for it down here, well neither did Paul. Stocks
on his feet, bonds on his wrists. It's all the stocks and bonds
he had. Bring me that old overcoat and
those books. My arthritis and bursitis and
ureitis is getting me here in this old damn dungeon. But then
I'm waiting for my reward. It's been a hard time, but it's
worth it. Because the difference is worth
the distance. I'd like to recommend to every
Christian here that you make yourself a motto. I advised that
the other day in the church, and the staff took me up on it.
Only a strange thing happened. One of the staff wrote it out,
but as for you, and put it on a little wooden stand, neatly
done. But he didn't put it on his desk,
he put it on the pastor's desk. I don't think that was appreciated
very much. I want you to keep it on your own desk. And there'll
come a time when things will tempt you. And there'll come a time when
the trend of the times will tempt you. There'll come a time when
you'll be tempted to water down the truth. Remember, you can't
live like other folks. Set that where you can see it,
but as for you. We're developing a weak-kneed
generation today, even in evangelical Christianity, altogether too
many who are so easily swayed by the things and the times and
away from the truth. Make up your mind like Patrick
Henry and like Joshua and like Timothy was bidden to do. I don't
know what others will do, but as for me, I've had my orders. God bless you. Thank you, Dr. Havner. As I sat listening, I was thinking of, along several lines,
how privileged we are to hear this man. How many more times
in future years that we would have this privilege, of course,
is a question. And we are privileged. I might suggest that you avail
yourselves of the tapes, because, you know, they can become collector's
items. Now, I'm not saying this as a
commercial, but it is a good thing to keep these messages,
share them with others, send them to some of your loved ones,
some young pastor, struggling in the ministry, some missionary.
It's a good ministry. But I was thinking along this
line. You know, there are certain men like Dr. Havner that we can
only get to Sandy Cove every once in a great while. I'm thinking
of some other men. You get them once in a while. We like to do something special
when they're with us, something a little above and beyond the
ordinary honorarium that we give. We feel we do well and generously
with our speakers, no matter who they are. But perhaps a man
will come who has a great ministry, perhaps it's a radio ministry,
maybe it's a college, some ministry that he represents. And then
to do the extra special for that person, we will often take an
offering for their work, for their ministry. And in the doing
of this, we're able to do so much more and be so much more
generous with the person while they're here ministering to us. Now, Dr. Havner does not represent
any institution. He is an institution. He has no, no mailing list that
he's pushing, he has no school that he's pushing, he has no
broadcast that he's pushing. He comes entirely on faith, no
commitment that's made with his coming, but I feel led today
to do this. We're going to make this offering
this morning just a love offering. I don't care how big it is, it
goes to him. If it's a thousand dollars, if
it's fifteen hundred dollars, it goes to him. He can use it,
he can put it into his books any way he wishes. Fair enough? Now, if you're making
checks, If you want to be properly receded and have proof of giving
that will stand up with the IRS, make those checks to morning
cheer and you'll get that proper receding. Now I'd tell you to
make them out to his if he had such and such an organization,
but he doesn't. So you can make them to morning
cheer, but every penny of this offering this morning for a love
offering to our brother. Okay, ushers, come on down. Give you a minute to get those
checks written, pray about it, what part you would have. You've
enjoyed it, you've been blessed, as I have. Here's an opportunity
to share, to have a part in a real direct way in the love offering
that we bring. Our Father, we thank you for
our brother and his faithful stand through the years, the
challenge that he brings to us, the blessing that he is to us.
We pray now that you'll give him
Serve The Lord
Series Vance Havner
Serve The Lord
| Sermon ID | 1129071334170 |
| Duration | 43:16 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Language | English |
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