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What irks us more than to be classified with unlearned and ignorant men?—though an unlearned and ignorant man wrote ‘‘the Revelation,’’ which still baffles the learned. We are suffering today from a plague of ministers who are more concerned that their heads should be filled than that their hearts be fired. If a preacher leans toward headiness, let him spend his years of schooling before he enters the pulpit. Once he gets there, he is in it for life. Added degrees will not matter, because twenty-four hours a day are not sufficient for him to bear the names of his flock before the Great
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A Christian, dreaming before his television night by night, has a dead brain and a bankrupt soul. He would do better to persuade God to let him quit this world if he is so out of touch with this lax, loose, licentious age that blindness of the sinner no longer tears his soul. Every street is now a river of devilry, drink, divorce, darkness, and damnation. If you are taking a stand against all this, marvel not, brethren, that the world hate you. If ye were of the world, the world would love its own.
Revival is no more a miracle than a crop of wheat. Revival comes from heaven when heroic souls enter the conflict determined to win or die—or if need be, to win and die! ‘‘The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.’’ —CHARLES G. FINNEY
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN Prayer as Vast as God
Our preaching is much diseased today by borrowed thoughts from the brains of dead men rather than from the Lord. Books are good when they are our guides, but bad when they are our chains.
Vital preaching and victorious living must ‘‘come out of’’ sustained watches in the prayer chamber. Some one says, ‘‘We must pray if we want to live a holy life!’’ Yes, but conversely, we must live a holy life if we want to pray.
‘‘Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart’’ (Ps. 24:3-4).
‘‘In God’s name, I beseech you, let prayer nourish your soul as meals nourish your body!’’ said the faithful Fenelon. Henry Martyn spake thus: ‘‘My present deadness I attribute to want of sufficient time and tranquility for private devotion. Oh that I might be a man of prayer!’’ A writer of old said, ‘‘Much of our praying is like the boy who rings the door bell, but then runs away before the door is opened.’’ Of this we are sure: The greatest undiscovered area in the resources of God is the place of prayer.
If John Knox had prayed, ‘‘Give me success!’’ we would never have heard of him; but he prayed a self-purged prayer—‘‘Give me Scotland, or I die!’’—and his prayer scored the pages of history.
That which is born in prayer will survive the test. Prayer does business with God. Prayer creates hunger for souls; hunger for souls creates prayer. The understanding soul prays; the praying soul gets understanding.
CHAPTER NINETEEN As the Church Goes, So Goes the World
The Church began with these men in the ‘‘upper room’’ agonizing—and today is ending with men in the supper room organizing. The Church began in revival; we are ending in ritual. We started virile; we are ending sterile. Charter members of the Church were men of heat and no degrees; today many hold degrees, but have no heat! Ah, brethren, flame-hearted men are the crying need of the hour!
The preacher should give at least one day a week to prepare his sermons and yet another day to prepare the preacher to preach the prepared sermons.
Is life’s span so dear and are home comforts so engrossing as to be purchased with my unfaithfulness and dry-eyed prayerlessness? At the final bar of God, shall the perishing millions accuse me of materialism coated with a few Scripture verses?
CHAPTER TWENTY Known in Hell
Listen, too, to the testimony of the demon, ‘‘Jesus I know, AND PAUL I KNOW, but who are ye?’’ (Acts 19:15).
That I believe is the masterly argument of the Apostle—to be dead and alive at the same time. ‘‘Ye are dead,’’ Paul wrote the Galatians. Suppose we try this on ourselves first. Are we dead?—dead to blame or praise? dead to fashion and human opinion? dead so that we have no itch for recognition? dead so that we do not squirm if another gets praised for a thing that we engineered?
Paul was so conformed to the image of the Son that he could say, ‘‘What things ye have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do’’ (Phil. 4:9).
What percentage of your prayer is done privately?
Are you willing to endure life-altering agony and suffering to receive God’s vision and passion?
Would you prefer God to have partnership with you or to have ownership of you?
What things would change immediately in our world if the Church lived constantly ‘‘in the light of the judgment seat’’?
How do humility and confession relate to Spirit anointing?
Why is saying ‘‘Lord, You can do this’’ not an example of faith?
What parts of ‘‘self’’ do you recognize as hindering your union with Christ?
Would Satan tremble if he considered your prayer life?
At what times in your daily life is your focus more on the things of this world than on eternity?
What would you change immediately if you had six months to live?
Why are we often more willing to pray for and contribute to people around the world than to help the people across the street?
What marks people who are ‘‘branded by devotion’’?
Does our spiritual childlessness come more from sterility or from lack of union with God? Or both?
In what areas of life are you still in harmony with the world?
In the realm of prayer, are we most concerned with the changing of God, the changing of circumstances, the changing of others, or the changing of ourselves?
If the final judgment were today, would you be confident in or ashamed of your prayer life?
