(Hebrews) 7-Power in Weakness (is.41_14-15) — Leonard Ravenhill

I guess most people that use it don't know where it comes from. The tumult and the shouting dies, the captain and the kings depart. Saying that because I was thinking a few minutes ago of the tremendous stir around the world when the Olympic Games were on.

Meekness as Strength Rather Than Weakness

And I guess one of the main secrets in those performances, whatever you're doing, is strength. Be strong. Strong legs to run. Strong arms to wrestle. Strong arms to swim, so forth and so on. The captains and the kings have departed.

They've gone to the ends of the earth. Nobody lays much capital on either weakness or meekness. Often meekness is identified with weakness and it's the very opposite. Meekness is strength. Blessed are the meek, they shall inherit the earth.

There's a tremendous emphasis on meekness in the Word of God. But it's the other thing I want to talk about tonight. I'm breaking in this sequence of speaking on Hebrew because some of the folks said we don't want to miss Tuesday night, we can't come.

So I hope it's as good. And then next week, by the grace of God, we'll take one of the major characters in history which of course will be Abraham. Tonight I want to take a verse that's very dear to me and very stirring in the prophecy by Isaiah.

Isaiah's Worm and the Threshing Instrument

Martin Luther called this the Gospel of Isaiah because you get that perfect picture of the crucifixion in the 53rd chapter. But I want to take a verse out of the 41st chapter. Isaiah 41. Let me take it out of 40 here and use some of the other.

Isaiah chapter 40. Let me change again. I'm repenting a lot. Again 41. We'll use the other context in 40 in a minute or two. Chapter 41 and verse 14. Fear not thou worm, Jacob, and ye men of Israel. I will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.

Behold, I will make thee. Make who? The worm. Or will he make it? Well, more powerful than an instrument of war because in verse 15 he says, I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument having teeth.

Thou shalt thresh the mountains and beat them small and shalt make the hills as chaff. We don't think of worms as having much might, do we? And yet if you think of it here, I want to give you one of my masterpieces.

Here you've got a mountain, okay. Here's the wriggling little thing called a worm. The Lord says that this thing can shake that thing. Well, how does it do it? Now, I don't know much about worms. My sister used to call me one when she was angry.

She knew to get me furious, she'd say, you worm. Boy, I squiggle like a worm too. But you know, a worm is the only thing that can go in this side of a mountain and come out at that side. A lion can't do it, an elephant can't do it, but a worm can do it.

What happens? When it goes through everywhere it goes, obviously it leaves a hole behind it. What happens? The wind comes in and drives the substance, and then the stronger wind comes and drives the mountain away.

And this is likened, God likens this amazing man. Fear not thou worm Jacob, and ye men of Israel. I will make thee, saith the Lord, the holy one of Israel. I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument having teeth.

Thou shalt thresh the mountains and beat them small. And the whirlwind shall carry them away. It shall fan them, and the whirlwind shall carry them away. The whirlwind shall scat them. They shall rejoice in the Lord and glory in the holy one of Israel.

Waiting on the Lord for Renewed Strength

Now, one of the best known verses most often preached on in, out of the Scripture is in the end of the 40th chapter. Oh, everybody can quote that nearly. They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.

The question is, how well do we know the Lord to wait on him? The 40th chapter, I consider the 40th chapter of Isaiah one of the most majestic chapters in the whole of the Word of God. They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.

Who is this God that we wait on? Verse 22 says, it is he that sitteth on the circle of the earth. The inheritance thereof are as grasshoppers. Verse 23, he is the one that brings princes to naught. Verse 28 says, hast thou not known, hast thou not heard?

That the everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary. He is talking about those that are weary in that last verse. They shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, and walk and not faint.

The thing that gets me here is this, that when God dealt with Jacob, he changed his name from Jacob to what? Israel. Since with God. Now if you haven't learned this, you better learn it tonight, because you might learn it in rougher circumstances.

God never flatters us. We can do that very well ourselves. Your grandmother comes and hears you preach for the first time, she says, you know Spurgeon couldn't have done better. Well he couldn't, he's dead.

But I mean, she meant when Spurgeon was alive he couldn't have done better. Oh, that was a marvelous sermon you preached. And we can get conceited. I remember G. Campbell Morgan, Dr. Campbell Morgan, maybe the greatest Bible teacher in the world 60 years ago, I heard him often.

Fantastic teacher. And he said, you often hear a preacher when you say, how did you get on Sunday? How did you get on preaching? Oh, I enjoyed myself. That's what he did. He enjoyed himself. Enjoyed his eloquence.

Enjoyed the stuff he was giving up. Oh, these people should really feel, you know, very, very, very favor that they're listening to me. There's a very famous atheist in Italy, let me think, I guess about 1925.

One of the outstanding atheists in a Catholic country, which is pretty unusual. He got marvelously saved. His name was Giovanni Papini. He has a thick volume, The Life of Christ. It sold out just almost as fast as they printed them.

It was reprinted 25, 26, 27, 28, 29. Every year it spread and spread. And he was a genius. He went into one of the great libraries there. Some of the libraries in Europe, you know, they have a ladder that runs on a, what do you call it, a rail.

You move it over. And he would climb up there. And like the absent-minded professor that they say put his, he put his watch in the pan and timed it with his egg. Well, this is what this man did. He'd get up the top of the ladder and get a book and forget where he was.

And he studied at the top of the ladder. Then he put that between his knees to hold it so he wouldn't lose it. Then he'd reach for another. Before long he'd have one under his arm. And here he is. And people would look and say, oh, he's crazy.

But, oh, you should hear him teach. He's a genius. He's another prophet. But, you know, he had an answer. He said, the thing is, it's not that I'm such a good preacher. He said it's the fact that all the other preachers in Italy are so bad.

You know, if I walked into the Arturi forest in the middle of Africa, a forest which you could drop England into and lose it. If I walked in there, everybody would look up to me. The average people are not more than about four feet six.

The tall men are five feet six. But when I was out in Australia, there's a race of men in the north of Australia and women, just elegant. Jet black. Walk as straight as you could ever imagine. Beautiful looking people.

But there's hardly anybody under seven feet. Now, if I went into the Arturi forest, I'd be looking down on the folk. When I go in north Australia, I've got to look up and say, well, how are you doing?

Is it cold up there, brother? Glad to see you. It all depends where you are. It's the same with teaching. It's the same with so many things. Fear not thou worm, Jacob. Well, you can't get much lower than a worm, can you?

It's an amazing little thing. I've looked at them. I can't find that they have any eyes. They have no legs. They have no wings. They have no hands. They can't run away. They've no speed. They're victims of almost everything.

And yet they do a job again that nothing else can do hardly, except some other creature in that realm. They can take the mountain and go through the mountain. And then the wind goes in and drives up the soil, and then the other wind comes and drives the mountain away, noiselessly.

Does it work without being seen? Does it work without any proclamation? Again, it can be trampled on. It doesn't fight back. It's a perfect picture of someone else. Who? Jesus. Look at Psalm 22. Psalm 22 is the psalm of the cross.

Like Isaiah 53, it's a picture of Jesus. So let's say here it is. Let's say here it is. It's the psalm of the cross. The next psalm is the psalm of the crook. Oh, that's not a good going. Let me do it this way.

That's a shepherd's crook. He gets this under the leg of the creature that's down there, the lamb usually, and he can lift it to safety and not hurt it. He can even get that around the neck of the sheep, so it heads out here, and lift it to safety.

Psalm 22 is the psalm of the cross. Psalm 23 is the shepherd's psalm. The Lord is my shepherd. So you get the cross in 22, the crook in 23, and 24 is the psalm of the what? The crown. Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?

Who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath three hands. The seven-lipped lift up your heads, O ye gates. Be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors. The King of glory comes. It's the triumphant march of Jesus in glory.

The resurrected Christ, King, has dominion over everything. Now look at this 22nd psalm here. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Isn't that what he said on the cross? Why art thou so far from helping me and from the words of my roaring?

O my God, I cry in the day of time, that thou hearest me not. And in the night season, and I am silent, that thou art holy. O thou that inhabitest the praise of Israel. Verse 6, I am a worm and no man.

A reproach of them, of men, and despise of the people. You know, that's a fascinating word. The Hebrew word there is Tolah, which is T-O-L-A-H, which is hard, difficult to pronounce in English. It's mentioned at least 31 times in the Old Testament.

The same word is also translated Scarlet, though your sins be as scarlet. There's a little thing in Mexico in the, some of the cactus or cacti I suppose you say, a conchineal, you know what a conchineal is?

It's a tiny little bug. And it works in the, it works in the cactus. And the people get them and they shake them until all these things come out. And then they crush them. When you're in Mexico, you see they've got vivid colors.

Often the garments they wear, they have a brilliant red. They're made out of conchineal. It's all, in fact they used to use it for lipstick at one time, for coloring. Now I guess they use other things.

So you ladies that use it, remember your lips are covered with bugs. But anyhow, that's what it's used for. It has to be crushed. He had to be crushed in order that he didn't have to be crushed. The scarlet came from him.

His blood, his red blood like crimson, was shed in order that you and I might be purified and made white. Have a garment of righteousness. He says, I'm a worm and no man. A reproach amongst men. Now this psalm actually is divided.

It's got two portions. Psalm 21 divides it. Save me from the lion's mouth, for thou hast stirred me from the horns of the unicorns. Now as you read up to verse 21, it's all pain, suffering. From 21 and onward, it changes from pain to praise.

All the agony comes right down to verse 21. Again, verse 6, I am a worm and no man. Verse 7, all they that see me laugh me to scorn. They shoot out the lip and shake their head, saying, he trusted in the Lord that he would deliver him.

Let him deliver him, seeing that he delighted in him. Verse 12 says, many bulls have compassed me. Strong bulls of Bashan have beset me. They gaped upon me with their mouths. Now Amos uses the same word there, for the fury of the priests and others.

And he's using this figure here, just like those people who were baying for the blood of Christ when he was there in the judgment hall. They wagged their heads, they went past, they ridiculed, they scorned him.

Verse 16 says, the dogs have compassed me. Verse 20 says, deliver my soul from the sword, my darling, from the power of the dogs. Verse 15 says, my strength is dried up like a pot third, and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws.

And thou hast brought me into the dust for death. Well, that's exactly the picture of Jesus on the cross when he thirsted, and somebody put a potion on a spear and held it up to him, and he refused it.

In other words, he wouldn't take a drug, he wouldn't take a narcotic to ease his pain. He took it raw, as raw as men could give it. And the dogs were all around there. All the priests and others were barking for his death, crying for him to end in misery.

In verse 21 again he says, save me from the lion's mouth. Now, notice he talks about all these beasts here. The bulls of Bashan. He talks about the lions. Verse 15, my strength is dried up like a pot third, and my tongue cleaveth to the roof of my mouth, or to my jaws.

The dogs have compassed me, the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me. They pierced my hands and my feet. Now, come on, let's remember. Crucifixion was not invented until nearly a thousand years after this psalm was written.

How could it be such a perfect picture except by divine inspiration? The dogs are barking round about me, they're crying for my blood. They've nailed my feet there, they've pierced my hands and my feet.

In verse 21 he says, save me from the lion's mouth. For thou hast heard me from the horns of a unicorn. I've never been such a creature. Creatures of unicorns in Greek mythology, you know, like a horse with one horn.

So I wonder why. Why should that word be used here? Because in the early translation around 1611, I guess the Hebrew wasn't as good as it should have been. The same word which is used here of unicorns, the Hebrew word is reem, r-r-r-e-e-m.

It means a wild ox. Or the same word is used for those wild bulls that they have there in Africa, you know, those enormous bulls they have with great horns. But the wild ox was unique in this. It had a tremendous span of horns, something I guess like the, what do you call them here, long horns?

But they came to a needle point, sharper than any other horns that are known. There are still some of them in the world. And the way to make a criminal suffer was to impale him on the horns at one end, maybe pierce his feet right through that horn, and then at the other end it was into his back.

And then the thing was turned loose in a field and it was whipped until it jogged and jogged and jogged and turned that man into incredible pain and suffering until he was bloody and half mad with pain.

Maybe it was something that he hadn't done, could be falsely accused. Or even if it were right, it was the most lingering form of death that there could be. And yet prophetically, again, nearly a thousand years before this thing was done, there's a word picture of that crucifixion here.

They pierced his hands and his feet in that excruciating pain. They used to take a copper spike and they drove it right through the tender part of the hand, crossed the feet and drove it right through the most tender part of the feet.

So this is a description, a perfect description of the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse 18, they part my garments among them and cast lots upon my vesture. The whole picture again, if you read it careful and it's worth a lot more time than we can give to it, is that this is almost a photograph, it's a word picture, let me put it that way, of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Christ's Moral Courage in the Temple

There's a hymn that talks about thy bloody sweat, thy grief and pain, thy cross and passion on the tree. I tried to preach Sunday night in a country church. On a subject I'd like to preach on for 50 Sundays, I'd get something new out of it.

Again, on the Lord Jesus standing there in the temple. I think one of the most courageous things he ever did. My Sunday school teachers told me about heroes in the Bible. Who? Every teacher told me the same.

Daniel in the lion's den, David slinging a stone, Samson pulling the house down. I never remember a Sunday school teacher describing Jesus in his moral majesty, in his glory. He was a victim. But remember again when he goes there in the seventh chapter of John, on the last day, the great day of the feast.

There had been six days before when the priest went down to the pool of Siloam. They had a big vessel made of pure gold and they dipped it in the pool, put it on his shoulder and then the whole choir and orchestra followed him there into the temple.

Singing Psalms 135 into Psalm 150, the great Hillel as they call it. Unsurpassed glory and majesty. What were they doing? They were remembering when God split the rock and the water went out. And it followed them with us wherever they went.

A type, the word of God says the rock that was smitten was Christ. It was a type of the Lord Jesus. God gave them manna from heaven. It was called angels food in the scriptures. He gave them water. They would have died without bread and without water.

Now in John 6, Jesus says I am the bread of life. That made them angry. It says in the second chapter of John that he went into the temple. In the first part of John 2 it says what? That he turned water into wine.

In the latter part it says he went into the temple. And what did he do? He cast out the money changers. If you take the same story as it's recorded by Matthew, he says not only did he go in and kick over the money chambers, tables of the money changers, he pointed to all the celebrities there, the high priest, the hierarchy of the Jewish religion and he called them a den of thieves.

How in the world does he dare to go through Jerusalem, there's a million people there, get past the temple guard, go up to the desk and take his place there in authority and it says he taught. As I came up the road I was thinking of that.

We haven't got a clue as to what he taught them. I know it was amazing. How do you know it was amazing? I know they were stunned. Why? Because the scripture says they were all amazed. And they said when saith this man letters, having never learned.

In the next chapter it says I am taught of my father. In the sixth chapter they said who is this man in the temple? He's arrogant. He's a usurper. He isn't ordained. Why does he stand in the place of the high priest?

It's sacred. And then they sneered at him. They got their, you know, vengeance. Why? They said we know who he is. We know his father and his mother. They were ridiculing the virgin birth like the big shots do in seminaries today.

We know his father. We know his mother. You know, I've often thought of that little girl. Some people give too much credit to Mary. I think we don't give enough sometimes. How did she explain her pregnancy to her relatives?

To her parents? To other people? Come on now, that's about the most ridiculous story we've ever heard. She said I have no relationships with that boyfriend she's been going... I know he's a very lovely man.

But listen, come on, there's no exclamations. Either he was the one that impregnated her or someone else. No, we know who her father was. We know who his father was. We know who his mother was. Now he had said to them before this, before he walked in the temple on this occasion, he'd been in before, and he says this is a den of thieves.

You know, in the first verse of chapter 7 in John there, it says what? They had a contract as we would say on them. As soon as we get the chance we're going to kill him. He walks up there, he has no bodyguard, unless there's invisible angels, and he stands there, and yet in the middle of the chapter again it says the people said you said when the next time you saw him you'd kill him.

He's standing there, why don't you kill him? I think this is one of the most amazing... I see this as being more... demanding more courage than Daniel in the lion's den. I think it's the most beautiful picture in one sense that we have of the Lord Jesus Christ.

He was the meekest of all men, but meekness is strength. What does it say of Moses? Moses stood up against that wild battalion, hundreds, thousands, maybe two or three million people, and it says he was the meekest man in all the earth.

But remember there came a moment when that meekness kind of turned sour. What does it say? The anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses. Why? Because the anger of Moses was kindled against the people.

I am meek and lowly of heart, but Revelation talks about the wrath of the Lamb. You see, the option that people have today is to accept the blood of the Lamb, or at the end of the trail accept the wrath of the Lamb.

And people never think of that. When God's fury is turned, it's the most devastating thing that man has ever known at all. You know, Robert Louis Stevenson that wrote those wonderful children's storybooks, he took that little phrase out of Hebrews where it says, I'm trying to get the connection, OK, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

I only know of one thing more fearful, he says, that's when you fall out of the hands of the living God. When God says of an individual, thy spirit won't strive with him anymore, or God says of a nation, my spirit will not strive.

There's a cut-off point. I think America, England and so-called Christian countries are very near to that cut-off point. We've sinned, violated laws, the news tonight was shocking. Murders, explosions, all these embassies around the world being dynamited, and we've got to sit and watch it, there's not much we can do about it.

This wife beating, children being sent even to Christian schools where they're sexually molested, two of them on TV recently named, two types of Christian schools. Iniquity is flooding, and the only thing is a massive repentance or the judgment of the living God.

Paul's Weakness and the Power of Christ

There's no alternative. Well, there is an alternative, there's only one alternative, of course, and that is that God in infinite mercy pours his spirit out upon us. Meekness, weakness. Who's the strongest man in the New Testament?

Surely after Jesus, the Apostle Paul. He goes out and he has one of two things, and then he says, you can tell when he's going on his trip, he's going to have a riot or a revival. Nothing less than either.

What kind of riot? Was it Colossus? No, he quotes. You see how much he cares for public opinion? He said, when they saw me, they said, his bodily presence is weak. He could have left that out of his monthly letter, couldn't he?

Why tell everybody what your enemies are saying? Flatter yourself. His bodily presence is weak, his speech contemptible. Paul wasn't an orator. The orator of the early church was Apollos. Some say I'm of Paul.

He's the wizard, he's the genius, he has a colossal intellect, he writes wonderful epistles. Oh, he loses me, he's too profound. I'm of Apollos. I love his eloquence, his cadences, his perorations. Oh, well, I'm not of Paul, and I'm not of Apollos.

I'm of Cephas, because he's the only one that actually saw Jesus alive. He walked around with Jesus, personal friend of his. And I happen to be a personal friend of a personal friend. Isn't that lovely?

I don't know why I thought of it. One day, about my second trip to America, an old lady came to me and said, Can I touch you? I said, Sure. Some folk will kick me without asking, so since you asked, Yes, sir.

Stroke. Oh, she stroked me. Could I shake your hand? Yes. My great hero was Dr. Tozer, and I never got near to him. But now I can say I shook hands with a hand that shook hands with Dr. Tozer. We were up in the hills of Kentucky, went to an artist's home, a big, beautiful home.

He had an art gallery outside. Wonderful. I like an art gallery, too. Don't buy me one for Christmas, but anyhow, the lady said, oh, the man that took us in said, I'd like you to go in the house. It's full of gorgeous American antiques, and it was loaded.

Did you happen to see my old uncle at the back? He's, I don't know, 18, 19? No. Oh, please go and see him. So I went in here. He's sitting there, you know, wrinkled, roughed up. I said, Hello. You're the uncle?

Yeah. I shook hands with him. He said, now you can tell people you shook hands with the hand that shook hands with Jesse James. Oh, wasn't I happy? I didn't want to shop, wash it for a week. I touched him, and he touched Jesse James.

Oh, wonderful. Now, don't tell anybody you have a friend who once shook hands with Jesse James. You've got it mixed up. But we glory in strength, don't we? Physical strength, intellectual strength, verbal strength.

If a man has a great vocabulary, if he gesticulates wildly, if he expresses himself through his personality, he's got strength. We adore strength. Who adores weakness? Paul, you know, tradition is not very trustworthy, I know.

Tradition says that he had a slide hump on his back, he was five feet two in height, and he was pretty ugly. Well, in the name of the Lord, what do you expect? You put him in a corner and let everybody throw rocks at him.

What do you think, he was tall and dark and handsome? I guess he'd slits all over his face that healed up. Most likely, he had an eye that was sagging. Most likely, he limped. His bodily presence, weak.

His speech, weak. They called it contemptible. But come on, has there been a man ever walked the earth like him since? He minimizes himself on every occasion that Christ may be exalted. All he says I want to do is that Christ may be magnified by my body, whether by life or death.

But to me, if you like, if it will bring glory to God. Now, look how he emphasizes this. In 2 Corinthians, chapter 12, or let me go back, same 2 Corinthians, but chapter 11, and verse 29. Who is weak and I am not weak?

Who is offended and I burn not? If I must needs glory, I will glory in the things concerning mine infirmities. Paul, come on, forget it. Drop it out of your vocabulary. Nobody needs to know. Let everybody after this think you're a superman.

You've got a greater brain than Aristotle. You may not be as eloquent as Demosthenes, but you're certainly smarter than Plato. Leave a record of your genius. Come down into chapter 12, and verse 9, or verse 7.

Lest I should be exalted above measure, through the abundance of the revelations, that's the only clue you get. Why in the world didn't he write a whole book on the period he spent in heaven? It would have been a bestseller, wouldn't it?

I was caught up in the third heaven. I saw things that blinded me with their glory. I saw things that my vocabulary, I can't reach for anything to tell you about them. He covers it up so beautifully. No, he doesn't boast of his trip to heaven.

He doesn't write a book on it. He keeps emphasizing, for your sake and mine, in this 9th verse of the 12th Corinthians, 2nd Corinthians, my grace is sufficient, my strength is made perfect in weakness, most gladly therefore will I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

Therefore I take pleasure in taking world trips. I take pleasure in what? Standing before kings. Oh, I don't always stand in the street and have a riot. I go to royal palaces, I talk to Felix, I talk to Festus, I talk to Agrippa.

Do you know when I talk, men tremble, kings tremble, terrified. These stalwart men with their breastplates and bodyguards and here's a man who hasn't got a sword or a breastplate or anything, and he speaks, and they're terrified.

They shake. You're almost persuading me to be a Christian. He said, I would to God you were except for these bonds. That's the only thing I don't like about it, for your sake. For my sake, they're no handicap, they're no impediment.

I glory in what? In my infirmities. Anybody else do that? That's verse 10 of this chapter 12. I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions. Oh, Lord, come on, don't pile it on.

Spare us something. Paul, you're talking a language we don't know. If we get a hangnail, we expect the church to have a night of prayer for its healing. People don't know that before I suffer with this hangnail and have an ingrown toenail that's worse.

Oh, if only we could have a night's prayer over the thing. No, forget it. He isn't appealing for prayer, is he? Isn't it Wesley that says in his hymn, Jesu, lover of my soul, thou of life, the fountain art, freely let me take of thee, spring thou up within my heart.

Jesus says to the woman at the well, I'll be in you a well of water. Wesley got hold of that. Paul already knew it. He says, Christ liveth in me. So I can embrace infirmities and reproaches and necessities.

Again, this is language we don't use. We can't, we didn't. I'm weak. I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses. For when I am weak, then am I strong.

See, what we want, we want God to keep pouring in the strength, pouring the strength. He says, you don't use what you've got. What do you need more strength for? You dissipate it. Sometimes I think when I'm preaching, I'm adding condemnation to people.

They've listened to preaching for 25 years, done nothing with it. I'm adding to their condemnation every day. They get more like, oh, the Lord said something, the Lord showed, somebody said this weekend, oh, I saw something I've never seen.

I've been puzzled about it for years. And like that, it opened up when you were speaking. So what? You've got more responsibility. But he says, if you want strength to be made perfect in weakness, he could have left that out.

I need more strength. I need more help. Instead of that, he says, I take, I take what? Joy? I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses. But what does that bunch of things do?

It does what the hammer and the file and the furnace does. It purifies, it brings into shape, it builds character. Do you think anybody else was ever brave enough to plead and say, let me fill up the sufferings of Christ?

We expect to become six feet tall and muscle and athletic by two weeks or two months or two years in the seminary. It doesn't come that way. It comes through obstacles. It comes through trials. It comes through infirmities.

You know, I think sometimes, oh, wouldn't it be wonderful, supposing the world ended today. Boy, I'm not in much shape for it to do that. Benefit day. And God suddenly took away the veil that's been hiding all the saints in Russia for the last 30 years.