The Towering Figure — Leonard Ravenhill

Power. Let this time of worship be a hallowed hour. Breathe thy Holy Spirit into every heart. Did all fear and sorrow from each soul depart. Thus with quickened footsteps we'll pursue our way, watching for the dawning of eternal day.

We thank you for giving us this day of rest and gladness, this day of holy joy. We come again to this amazing book that you have given to us, this book you have preserved to us down through the generations.

This book in which you have sketched the life stories of illustrious men and reminded us that they were men of like passions even as we are. They were flesh and blood. They had their temptations and their trials and their adversities and their enemies.

And yet they were able to overcome because they believed God. Because they had received the Spirit. In which again the Apostle says through that Holy Spirit we can be more than conquerors through him that loved us.

Again we thank you for the word. We're never safe when we live outside of its truth and we're never in danger when we live inside of it. Or if there are dangers there are sufficiencies indeed to make us more than conquerors in these situations.

We have sung this afternoon about those many millions who still are lying in heat and darkness without God and without hope. Sometimes we're challenged by our own contentment. We feel almost we're vulgar in our indifference.

We remember the starving millions shown on TV this week to remind the world of those who suffer physical malnutrition and mental malnutrition because they have not been taught. But most of all they they suffer from spiritual not merely malnutrition but death.

We would pray that somehow even this little meeting this afternoon might feed thy cause and hasten some to take up their cross and follow the Lamb with us wherever he leadeth. It may be this very week some in Russia or China or some other countries have been martyrs for the sake of the gospel.

And yet one of the ancients said the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. We pray Lord that we may not just bask in the sunlight of your blessing but that again we may be soldiers and put on the whole armor of God and fight the good fight of faith.

There are battles to be won in this generation that were not even there a generation ago. There are situations beyond the understanding of men who lived a hundred years from us. There are calamities round the corner which apart from divine intervention will write the most tragic history.

We believe again the answer is not in the White House or with politicians but in God's house. When we explore the possibilities of grace. When we're more eager to be spiritually rich than materially rich.

To be spiritually enlightened more than mentally enlightened. To be engaged in a warfare against the powers that would enslave the world in a more diabolical way than even we know. Give us we pray thee those eyes that see and as a writer in the Revelation says that we may have ears that hear may hear what the Spirit is saying to the Church of God.

Again we pray the words of your own word that says open our eyes that we may behold wondrous things out of thy law. Beyond the sacred page we seek thee Lord our spirit pampers thee. We cannot love a doctrine we can only love the person who gave it.

We cannot love truth we can only love the one who is the way the truth and the life. We cannot judge according to the seeing of our eyes nor the hearing of our ears. We can only judge righteous judgments as thy spirit guides our lives.

Bless any here who are distressed. Bless any who have wounded spirits comfort them and heal them we pray. Bless any who are cast down lift them up. Bless any who are weak grant that they may gain strength this afternoon.

For those who feel that they're neglected to recognize that the eternal God loves them that underneath are the everlasting arms. That if in all our ways we acknowledge thee thou wilt direct our paths.

We pray again for these young people and if Jesus carries we ask thee to take them scatter them to the ends of the earth. Let them not lift for the vanities of this life in which we live. Grant the Lord they shall see that eternal goal and that they and us may live with eternity's values in you.

Let me give you praise in Jesus name. We're going to look at the book of Genesis chapter 12 and maybe go a little bit further on in that chapter or beyond the chapter. Genesis the 12th chapter we read from verse 1.

Abraham's Call to Leave Ur

Now the Lord had said unto Abram get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred and from thy father's house unto a land that I will show thee. And I will make of thee a great nation and I will bless thee and make thy name great and thou shalt be a blessing.

And I will bless them that bless thee and curse him that curses thee and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed. So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken unto him and Lot went with him and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.

It won't be very informative for me to tell you that the book of Genesis is a book of beginnings. The first of course is the creation of God and the pardon me the creation of the earth and the creation of Adam the human family.

The second creation was after the flood when God launched a new effort in the world through Noah and his sons. And the third creation is this amazing man Abraham through whom God is going to create a new nation.

It's very interesting in those two, the first two creations I've mentioned that here in the Word of God they cover roughly a period of 2 ,000 years and yet only 11 chapters of the Bible are taken up to cover those 2 ,000 years.

Now this next story, this story of Abram, it covers, that which is the third division, it covers a period of only 400 years and yet it takes up 39 chapters of the book of Genesis. That's a disproportion but it's God's allotment anyhow.

And then we discover that actually from this 12th chapter of Genesis to the fourth chapter in Malachi verse 6, the whole of the Old Testament is really talking about the nation of Israel and then it's taken up again in the in the New Testament.

Actually of course the the whole of the scripture is really an expansion of God's dealings with Israel. The chapters 1 to 11 make one division and then chapters 12 into verse 50 could be explained like this, that as the root is to the stem, so chapters 11 and chapters 1 to verse 11 are and unto chapters 12 and verse 50.

And then as the stem is to the rest of the tree, you get chapter 12 50 right to the end of the Bible. And then as the stem of the tree is to the rest of the foliage, so the whole word of God brings us into the great human race which we're a part now.

And it speaks again continually of the perpetuity of this people that God has called. Now I think and I can only of course work in the in the limits of my own thinking. But I think that this man is in one sense Abraham is the most unique character in history.

For instance today he's revered by the Christians. We're told very clearly that we come actually, as we'll find later through the Apostle Paul. He reminds us that we're of the seed of Abraham. And the Gentiles we reverence Abraham.

The Jews reverence Abraham. The Mohammedans reverence Abraham. Now the amazing thing to me is this. It says that the Lord say come to Abraham. Where did he live? He lived in Ur of the Chaldees. Fairly modern archaeology has rediscovered part of that ancient city.

And it's very different from where it was located in the old map, in the Persian Gulf. Actually what has happened is the sea has washed up the sand. And the river has filtered up. And the ruins of that city are roughly a hundred miles from the coastline right now.

Simply again because of the changes in nature. But they have located this. And I think there's no question about the different types of things they found there. But this is the original Ur of the Chaldees.

Now originally then it was on the seacoast. It was a commercial city. It was a prosperous city. You might have said as a hymn writer says in that hymn from Greenland's icy mountains. Where every prospect pleases and only man is vile.

People have suggested that because Abraham followed God he became rich. I don't think you can prove that. I think he was exceedingly wealthy before ever he heard the call of God. We'll discover in a little later in I think about the 15th or 14th chapter.

Where Abraham you remember was going to deliver his nephew Lot out of the hands of the enemy. And he had 318 servants that he armed. Now I'm sure he didn't arm the women. So he had 318 adult members in his family.

His immediate circle of servants was 318. And it says they were of his own household. He had raised them in his own household. So I presume he was a wealthy man when he was in Ur of the Chaldees. Now please remember this.

That when you hear that God says, it says the Lord had said unto Abraham. In this 12th chapter it's dealing with something that happened somewhere at the end of the 11th chapter. Now the 11th chapter gives us one of those great tragedies of men.

The Tower of Babel and the Call of Abraham

You see God had said to Noah and his son you go out and be fruitful and cover the earth. And they decided to get together and do the job themselves. And they built the first skyscraper. Which happened to be called the Tower of Babel.

There are ancient pictures of it which show story after story winding way, way there maybe 50 or a hundred stories up in the sky. Now in that country, that country was given over to idolatry, to paganism, to soothsayers, to astrologers.

They got far, far, far from any revelation of God and any commandment of God. And so they set up business for themselves. And the great ruler, which you'd like to call him such the dictator, was a man by the name of Nimrod.

He was surely very smart, he was very wise. And God decided again to come in judgment. You know it's an awful thing that God has to keep judging nations. As I said to you sometimes, my definition of a fool is a man that falls in the same hole twice.

You think by all the scourgings and times that the children of Israel went into captivity, they'd learned their lesson. That they were in captivity for 400 years. The prophecy was given to this man Abraham.

That if people were going to captivity for 400 years, they were in captivity to the Babylonians, they were in captivity to others, they were in captivity for 400 years between the old and the New Testament.

They never learned their lesson. But don't clean your feathers and think we do, because you see I'm old enough to remember the first world war was a war to outlaw all wars. And all that men are saying in political circles today, they said 50 years ago, 60 years ago, when I was a little boy.

We can do it, we'll change this, we'll change that. But again as Einstein said after he had invented or split, helped to split the atom and so forth. We can denature the atom, we cannot denature men. There's something rebellious in men and they rebelled against God and they built their power.

Now how in the world of a man, in a commercial area, a heathen area, where there are temples to strange gods, where he sees heathen practice. How does he hear God's voice in the rush of the traffic as it were.

And yet the word of the Lord came unto Abraham. I want to know why, why, why Abraham? So maybe a million people there. God isn't arbitrary we say. There's nothing in you that commend yourselves to God, I seriously doubt that.

Well of course we're sinners and there's a lot in us that's wrong. But you see God is eternally the same. And if he revealed the truth in the, in the New Testament, it wasn't because he suddenly invented that new truth.

God is eternally the same. And you know God says, blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness. And I believe that this man, this wonderful man Abraham, he saw the conditions of the nature, nation until he was physically sick.

The conditions of heathenism and paganism and godliness. Physically sick. I believe that spiritually he was lovesick for God. I believe that in the deepest part of his disposition, he was already homesick for heaven.

The word of the Lord came unto him. Now that again, how did he know it was God's voice? Why didn't somebody suggest it was all just a suggestion? Wasn't it a creation of his own thinking? Wasn't it going to be an economic collapse?

Weren't they surrounded by enemies? Weren't there a hundred things he'd be glad to disown and get away from? How did he know it was the voice of the Lord? I don't think I'd really know. Except a few centuries after, there was a new group of people around.

They were considered fanatics. They followed a carpenter who said he was the son of God. He had been crucified and raised up. And still a bunch of stupid people were following after him. And they had established little fellowships like this in back alleys.

Where, not that nobody could see them, but because it was so inexpensive to meet. And most likely anyhow they met in home. And then they discovered in their growth, that they needed some government in the church.

And they selected young men and, well no women I'm sorry, but they selected young men to be deacons and elders in the church. And the first man on the list was a young man, who I guess wasn't 20 years of age by the name of Stephen.

Stephen's Witness and the Glory of God

Now I want to see him when I get to heaven. I want to see a man who isn't 20 years of age, put in a corner and cut his flesh torn with rocks. And jagging his eyes out and breaking his teeth. And his face is as luminous with a divine light as that lamp is.

And they saw his face as the face of an angel. Do you know why they did that? Because for the second time, those Jews that crucified the Lord of glory, they thought they'd have it pretty easy. You see the man that was the the fore leader apart from Jesus, was a man called Peter.

And he turned yellow and he ran away. But he happened to go to a place where God bathed him in love, and bathed him in redemption, and bathed him in power. And the man that ran away from the finger of the girl, stands up and he points his finger at the whole nation.

He says, you crucified the Lord of glory. Man he rehearsed their history to them until they were cut as though he had a knife and he slashed into their spirits. As though he had a sword that stabbed their consciences.

As though he had some kind of key that would open their memories. And they were haunted with fear. The second time God did a whipping on that people, was when little Stephen stood up there. Full of faith, full of the Holy Ghost, full of wisdom, full of courage.

God in heaven send us some new folks like this these days, in the Church of the Living God. Full of everything except fear. Full of everything except what will it cost me to follow the Lamb. And Stephen begins to rehearse.

When he backed up everything that Peter had said, it said, then he said to the, then the high priest said in the seventh of Acts, are these things so? And Stephen said, men brethren and fathers hearken, hearken.

Listen, the God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham. That answers all my problems. There's no question as to why he followed. It isn't even recorded in the Old Testament, it says God appeared. Do you know that's the first time that God appeared to anyone after the Garden of Eden?

In all the thousands of two thousand years before, he had never appeared to anyone until he came to Abraham. And he appeared to Abraham because Abraham was sick of materialism, he was sick of the world and he longed for a revelation of the Eternal God.

And he says the God of glory appeared. You know what, I think he's giving them a thrust there that, unless you read between the lines you won't see. He's saying to them you know what, God has already appeared in glory to you and you crucified the Son of Glory.

Because he said, father I want to get back to heaven. I'll stay here, I'll bear the cross, I'll bear the sin of the world, they can crucify me. But I'm longing for the glory that I had with me before the world was.

I think one real proof that you and I love God, you'd rather die this afternoon than live. Not to get out of your problem. You see there's a little subtle word, I've never heard anybody preach on it in the book of the Revelation.

It says the Spirit and the bride say come. Have you said come to Jesus this week? Would you really like to quit everything? Not just because you've got problems or you're in debt or some other crazy thing.

But really out of sheer love to him. I so want to see him. Now I don't know how often the bride, the Spirit says come. But I kind of figure not too many of the brides say come. Oh I want to see him, look upon his face.

Okay, okay, okay. But you see this man, here is testifying. He says the Father of glory, the God of, the Lord of glory appeared unto our Father above. Oh, I wonder if we could stand it. You think of the she kind of glory there in the temple of old.

When the priest went in, you know in the outer court there was daylight. In the inner court a seven-branched candlestick. In the Holy of Holies no light at all. And one man went once a year for one nation that's all.

He, if he must it or missed it, he finished for a year. And yet we sing a hymn don't we, I need the every hour most gracious Lord. And mysteriously maybe while you're typing in the office and the boss is breathing down your neck.

Or some other situation you can shoot a prayer to heaven like that and feel an inflow of divine life and power. There's a quickening of the Spirit of God. Of course it's not the glory which will yet be revealed.

But he says that the Lord of glory appeared unto our Father Abraham. And you know what, it doesn't tell you whether it was midnight or midday. He might have been milking, I nearly said a sheep, but with a goat herd here.

So a goat. Maybe he was milking one of the goats and the glory of the Lord came upon him. Maybe his wife was angry with him, I don't know. But some other situation and suddenly he's developed in majesty.

And I'm sure he fell on his face to the ground and said this is God. The God of glory appeared unto our Father Abraham. When he was in Mesopotamia he says. In the most worldly place in the whole world, God appeared.

Well isn't that just like God. Didn't God appear to a man they shut up in, in a lion's den one day. Appeared in his own way. Didn't the man run away because he committed murder and he was terrified. And he walked up and down that desert till he knew every rock in the place and the color of every sheep's eyes and how long their tails were and every blessed thing about them.

And he's gone up that road for 40 years, year after year. He said oh suddenly the bush burns with the glory of God. You think he ever forgot the place? Think of that elaborate tabernacle. Ours isn't too elaborate, I love it because it's so plagued.

I think the stable Jesus was born in was a bit of an old barn like this. And I like it. We don't have any stained glass windows, not even stained with bad money. There's just no windows anyhow. But we've got some light.

But oh when you think of that tabernacle, that temple that Solomon built. The most costly building ever in history I'm sure. And yet he has a sense to know that even if he overlays the desk with gold and the walls have gold and you splash diamonds in and they're lustrous and beautiful.

He says Father this is no good, this is no good. There's one thing that will prove your majesty and your presence. And he prayed and a fire fell. Because fire is the proof again. Our God is a consuming fire and the glory of God filled the temple so the priests were speechless they couldn't their word.

I long for that day when God will invade us. Oh I'll quit preaching it will be hard for sure. But I'll quit preaching just let the glory come and tie my tongue up. Let the glory come and we all fall on our faces in speechless adoration.

Viewing his majesty, viewing his beauty, seeing the King in all his glory. Father the God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham. While he was yet in Mesopotamia of all places. And that again is the reason why he was never never in doubt that it was the voice of God.

Because it was accompanied with all the majesty of the eternal God. The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham. That's what little Stephen says as they're slaughtering him. But again I say I believe in subtleties saying listen the God of glory appeared to you.

He was here in flesh and blood and you never recognized him. The God of glory appeared in the upper room when he came on those men and turned them out. Such amazing men a bunch of cowards revolutionized by the power of the Spirit of God.

And I think he's saying in essence said you know the God of glory is here as well. I don't think we gaze on the glory of God enough. Do you know how many advantages this man Abraham had? He had all the advantages in the world in heathen heathendom.

Do you know why? Because he'd no magazines, no newspaper, no TV, no telephone, no radio, no stupid automobiles. I was reading what a great American preacher said a hundred years ago on the on the east coast of America.

He said this is a day of devastation. He said the most horrible thing that Satan has invented is the bicycle. Because he said people aren't coming to church Sunday mornings. They're riding around New York down the waterfront.

I wonder what he'd say with the invasion of the automobile. And the mobile home unless you're going on vacation. Our blessings have become a curse. We're not snowed under merely with inventions. Most of us are snowed under with with church magazines and even books.

Oh they're a curse if they if they get in the way of the word of God. Why just this week I got so many magazines I stuck them all up on one side and said forget you for a while. Oh there are some little nuggets in them too enough.

But it's bad when you have to, you have to chew through you know. My mother used to make bread and she'd say sometimes now this loaf we're keeping it. It's got currants in it. Or somebody would give her a loaf with currants in it.

I never got the slice with the currant in it. I say mother but you've cut six slices and there's no currant. And she used to smile and say Len it was windy when the lady made the loaf. They blew away.

You don't want to eat the whole loaf of bread to find one currant. You don't want to read a whole magazine to find one truth necessarily. And then if you don't put your magazine down you get in your automobile and you turn on the radio.

And if you have no radio you put a tape on. If you have no tape you're bored to death. Hmm. If I make a version of the scripture I'm going to put on how shall they hear without a tape recorder. We're snored under.

We're hearing a hundred voices. Listen did you this week hear his voice? It's his voice that makes the difference. Andrew Bonner I think it was, were three Bonner brothers in America. They were, if I'm in Scotland.

They weren't Bonners they were Bonners. B-O-N-A-R. And one of them wrote that lovely hymn. I heard the voice of Jesus say. I think it's in our hymn book we ought to sing it. Sing it to the tune drink of me only with thine eyes.

It's very beautiful. I heard the voice of Jesus say come unto me and rest. Lay down thou weary one lay down thy head upon my breast. I came to Jesus and I found in him my star and my sun and so forth he goes.

I heard the voice of Jesus say come unto me and rest. I heard the voice of Jesus say I am this dark world's light. I heard the voice of Jesus say. So he goes on verse after verse. He heard the voice. You remember in the book of the Revelation John says I turned to see the voice of the one that spake with me.

Disguised. No he wasn't disguised. Mary was shattered. At least she got there to the tomb before the men got there. And all Jesus did. He didn't turn the light on and become as transformed as he did on the Mount of Transfiguration.

He stood behind the bush and he just said one word and it set her all alight. He just said Mary. I think that must have been the most thrilling moment. I'm sure it was the most thrilling moment of her life.

You might have said you know were you there when Peter came out of the upper room and he turned the heat on and he preached that dramatic sermon in Acts 2. And she says yes. You know the greatest sermon I ever heard?

No it had one word. One word yes. He said Mary. I don't believe that Moses or anybody else had had this revelation. Oh yes yes. God appeared unto our father Abraham. The God of glory appeared in Mesopotamia.

I don't know how maybe with blinding light. But God has strange ways of manifesting himself. You remember when God said the 70 could go so far. Then after them the 70 only one or two. Adab and Abihu could go so far.

And then finally Moses must go up the mountain by himself or just with Joshua. And then finally the Lord won't let anybody go another way. Another inch of the way. You know if you're going to really walk with God.

Somewhere on the road you'll leave the pack behind. It's not that they're less worthy. It's because God you want you by yourself. And then when he got in the mounds. There was blazing blood. No no no no.

On the mountain God was wrapped in thick darkness. And the mountain trembled beneath his feet. And the lightning flashed. And the thunders roared. You know I believe that Moses was less afraid than the people down in the valley.

Watching that strange sight and saying. I don't know what God's doing. But Moses isn't coming back. We better make a God of our own. Again they wanted Moses out of the way. They wanted to make a God of gold.

A God with eyes that couldn't see. And ears that couldn't hear. And a God that couldn't feel and understand. But Moses is wrapped in the mount. Sure sure Moses is wrapped in the mountain with God. The same Moses that was there at the burning bush.

Now sees God in all that. And you know what? He'd been on the mountain what 40 days? No he'd been on the mountain here six days by himself. And on the seventh day God spoke to him. God kept him waiting.

Again these are classics from the word of God itself. As to how these men heard God. How these men had revelations of his majesty. Sure I think I'd like to have been on the mountain with Moses. It must have been a terrible experience when God revealed himself in majesty.

I'd like to have been with Abraham when he he revealed himself to Abraham in a way that I don't know of. I haven't a clue. I'd like to have been with Moses when God revealed himself at the burning bush.

I sure would have liked to been in the upper room when he came with what sounded like wind and the tongue of fire that sat on each of them. But don't worry I've got no self-pity. I'm going to see the greatest manifestation of his glory.

If you put all those together they won't make a single thing compared to the glory that shall yet be revealed. Because he's coming. Oh like he came on the Damascus road. And when he came you remember Peter says afterwards, Paul said afterwards he was Saul then.

There shone round about me and them that journeyed with me a light from heaven. But that's only a foretaste of glory. The glory that shall yet be revealed. His coming is in glory and majesty brighter than a million suns.

Why? The place I'm going to live I'm going to have my vacation there forever. It has no need of sun. There's no energy shortage. There are no problems. It's going to be eternal bliss. It's going to be eternal light.

It's going to be eternal progressive revelation. We're going to know him and we're going to see his face. And his kingdom again is a kingdom that can never, never, never, never end. This man heard the voice of Jesus.

Heard it in a heathen country. Say do you know how to visualize how difficult it was? You see he did have a wife. And he did have relatives. And he did have associations. And he did have business connections.

And he did have a culture that he'd lived in all his life. I remember one day we were sailing with some friends out in the Bahamas. And the captain, we weren't really sailing we were in a yacht. The captain turned on one, one, one of the big motors and I heard him blump, blump, blump away.

Then he turned the key for the other and that went. And he said somebody said okay, okay, okay skipper. He was on the upper deck. And he said hey somebody loose that rope. They'd loosened every rope except one.

And you know what that, that good beautiful yacht wouldn't move even with one rope tied to it. And you know if you and I going to launch out into the deep, you can cut every rope but it's the last one that's the hardest to cut.

You've still got connections with the shore. And he had to cut them all. If you're going to launch out into the deep. Now remember that day when that man took that last rope like that. You know that yacht backed off like that.

The mother of Hudson Taylor, the man who founded the China Inland Mission said I never understood John 3 .16 until my boy stood on board that ship and they threw the last rope off. And the boat began to pull away.

And every inch that it got wider and wider and wider and wider. She said now I understand what it meant for God to give his only begotten son. Because I'd only one son to give and God had only one son to give.

You see this man has to cut every shoreline. He has to leave his country. He'll have to leave his people except one or two he can take. He has to leave the land he inherited. He has to leave the customs.

He has to leave the language. Now this is kind of a one-sided benefit this man has. Maybe next week I'll talk about all those things that are supposed to be involved in a, in an agreement between two people.

And you can find them all here in the Word of God. But you see God says get up. And you know what at that moment he didn't offer him a thing. He didn't offer him any reasons. All he offered was promises.

But what do you need reasons for if you have promises. Again I ask you, do you often see yourself, your darling self, and you're so beautiful. Do you ever see yourself standing on a dais before the Eternal God, before a billion billion people.

No preacher to lean on, no wife, no husband, no friend. Just there and you're to give an answer to God. That you lived in a dispensation with the total revelation of God. I say so many things we have now.

They deaf now the ears to the voice of God. We're so busy, we're so industrious. You know we read about the Bible instead of reading the Bible. We preach so often about the Bible instead of preaching the Bible.

God is still looking for men. Men of the caliber of this amazing man Abraham. The man that God said get up and go. God called him go into this country. He says in this first verse of chapter 12. The Lord said unto Abraham get thee out of thy country, number one, from thy kindred, number two, from thy father's house, number three, unto a land that I will show thee.