Serve the Lord — Vance Havner

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 20, 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 redheaded 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. There 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 A speech like that's awfully out of date now in a fuzzy day of woolly thinking, when we have experts in double talk who specialize in the art of almost saying something with a straightforward way of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.

Joshua's Call to Serve the Lord

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. "'To Jesus day whom ye will serve, but as for me and my house will serve the Lord.'. Now, if there ever was a weak-knit generation swayed by the world, the 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 waste basket, and our homes have cracked up until all the way from Maine to California, it's a disaster area home-wise, and discipline's 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. 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.

The Peril of Loving Money

We're all at Shechem 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.

And the first one is the peril of things in the 6th chapter of 1 Timothy, beginning at verse 6, that 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? Balaam, 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 Bryan said the trouble with people who live for money is they spend the first half of 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 John 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's 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, all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health.

The Peril of the Times

That's 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. And 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 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. Then came the unholy mixture in Genesis 6, the sons of God and the daughters of men.

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 on 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 Harvey 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 an ark. He preached repentance. He got the family 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.

Oh, 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 full 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.

Oh, they say the Bible is a sufficient rule of faith and practice, but I wonder sometimes if they mean all of it. They mean all even of the New Testament. 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 was too long, they chopped him off until he would 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, and 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.

Standing Firm for the Truth

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 their favor.

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 into your afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full approach in ministry, watch it.

Too many Christian experiences start out in their earlier days with heartburn, and then end up with air 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 than 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 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 7-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 doer, 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 sack clothes.

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.

Resisting Trendism and Religious Worldliness

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 study 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 line. 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 opposed. Sometimes they strike opposed, trying to act according to a dramatized version of themselves. But if you're 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 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 beaters to dancing which does not find a nesting place in the sanctuaries.

Now, 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 Phariseeism or pessimism that at the present, now listen beloved, fearful rate of progress, the close of this decade, his decade, may see the Protestant churches 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 instantly. A 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 days, 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 experts at it, but they drew the severest condemnation how we need today.

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 whirling, 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.

Sound Doctrine, Spiritual Power, and Personal Discipline

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. He 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 her 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 sent John 4, 18. Thou hast had five husbands, and he whom thou now hast is not thy.

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.

And when a young preacher today says, do you have any word for me? I said, yes, same word as 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, and 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. Know that it's very unpopular to be different today.

Keep Climbing Toward the High Ground

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 hole 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. And 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.

Holy Elijah 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 over there by the side of the road. Once in a while, some Elijah 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 a morning when the farmers have already gone about their work, and I'm so far behind with my sanctification? Now, 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. Pay is 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. Stalks on his feet, and bonds on his wrists, it's all the stalks 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.

A Personal Decision to Stand Firm

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, and 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 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.