Who's Touching The Ark - Part 3 — Leonard Ravenhill

Diluting the Gospel with Worldly Decorations

Why do you need to defend the Bible? All this man did was put his hand up to stay the ark, and immediately he was slidden. What do you think we're doing with the gospel today? Dressing it up? Painting it up?

Somebody told me this week of a Christian group, a rock band, a Christian rock band. But anyhow, whatever they are, they go around, and now they've got sequins on their coats. Well, why not? Johnny Cash has them.

Renaming Sin and Weakening Biblical Language

And all the other guys have them. I mean, if the world can have them, can't we? Glitter? I mean, if we've no other glitter, we may as well stick it on the outside if it's not on the inside anyhow. And we try to study the ark of God.

We're trying to put some improvement on the ark of God. We try to do that, I think, with the translations we make of the word of God. We try and make some of those words just a little bit more easy. As I said to some preachers I've preached with this week, that if we go back, and maybe mentioned it here before, if we go back to Bible language and call sin what it really is.

Instead of saying somebody, you say, that girl's a whore, you say, no, no, she's a call girl. You say about a dirty, filthy sodomite, oh, no, no, he's not a sodomite, he's just gay. There's nobody wicked, they're just weak.

There's no iniquity, it's just infirmity. No backsliders anymore, that's a dirty word. A lot of people out of fellowship, but backsliders, you don't use that word. Oh, how smooth. I remember reading a story of Mr. Whitfield where he was particularly angry one day.

George Whitfield's Arrows and Convicting Preaching

I'd like to have heard Whitfield, I think it'd have been right up my alley. He got mighty furious about the possessions the devil had. He was always running the church to pull down strongholds. He was always seeing the enemy doing his evil work, getting people to submit to him.

And one day he says, I'm going to shoot the arrows of God into your hearts. And he mentioned an arrow and he pulled the arrow back like this, and the congregation ducked, you know. Well, that's the way to preach.

If you can get them to do that, at least you've got them halfway down to the ground, and maybe when you get them halfway down, you can push them the other half. But the anger of the Lord was kindled against this man, and not only smote him, but killed him.

Recovering Awe Before God's Holiness

Come on, in God's name, what are we doing with the gospel today? Hmm? Isn't it getting more emasculated? Isn't it getting more Hollywood style? Don't you miss the absence and the glory of God? Why, they've got the very presence of God inside, and that's all we need.

There's an old hymn that says, God's presence and his very self, an essence all divine. I'll ask you again, I've asked you before. When did you last go out to the sanctuary? Tiptoe, because God had revealed his holiness and his majesty.

We go out very much the same way we came in. Go out, we say, hey, I like it. Someone like that in Sears myself. Wish I'd have got it. Or I like some other trivial thing, that's got nothing to do with eternity and nothing to do with God.

David's Joy Turns to Fear Before the Ark

Oh my. Notice in verse 5 now. Go back a minute here. David and all the house of Israel played before the Lord, and all instruments made of fir, wood, even hearths and psalteries and timbrels, and coronets and ensembles.

Now there's his ecstasy. Now come down to verse 9. This same David was afraid of the Lord that day, and he said, how shall the ark of the Lord come to me? That's a big switch. He's excited, they have their band, music, everything, they're having a whale of a time.

And then suddenly God intervenes, and suddenly his all emotional life does a somersault. He realizes what an awful God he serves. What a God of majesty, what a God of glory. One minute everybody's excited, the next minute, wouldn't that be something?

Ananias and Sapphira: When God Judges Hypocrisy

It'd be like going into that experience, you know, when Ananias and Sapphira went to church. That must have been a great morning. I would have enjoyed that, I think. I said, well Lord, why did you stop with two hypocrites?

I'm sure half the congregation could have wiped them out at the same time. It would have been more spectacular. But God doesn't do it that way. But what I'm trying to say, rough as and tumbled as it may be, because I've had such a hectic day today, but the anger of God was kindled for a very simple thing.

The Ark as a Sign of God's Testimony and Habitation

He did not take a hammer and break the ark. He didn't say, this old piece of furniture we can do without. Do you know the ark is the only thing that was taken out of the original tabernacle and went into the temple of the Most High God?

Do you know afterwards in the book of the Revelation it says they've preserved the testimony of God in an ark? Now scholars will tell you that the ark was destroyed in the second invasion and the burning of Babylon and what have you got, but maybe it was.

And yet God's presence, and that's what matters. It isn't a case of having a wooden box here. What it's telling us is that God makes their place His habitation. Now, as I said to somebody today, this is awesome, this is breathtaking.

When you say, well I'd like to go and I wish we had a box, and you can say God's presence is there. He's there in His wholeness, He's there in His majesty, He's there in His glory. Be careful how you handle this thing.

The Holy Spirit as God's Dwelling Place

Well, we don't need a box, we don't need a presence. Why? Because it says you're the habitation of God. There's only so much of God's wholeness in this meeting as you and I fill with the Holy Spirit of God, the pure Spirit of God.

He doesn't dwell in temples, oh you can make Him a thousand crystal palaces like they've done on the west coast there, so what? You can't sanctify a building in the New Testament sense, they didn't do that.

Solomon's Temple and the Necessity of God's Presence

Why, even Solomon said, and I guess he built the most expensive building ever made, mind you, he used gold to walk on, he used gold on the walls, he was the most extravagant building ever made. He used gold more easily than we use cement.

And he built the altar, and he had all the priests in total correct display there. And yet when he made this intercession to God, he says, look, I put up this building, I've done everything according to your commandment.

We've even got an altar, we've even got a sacrifice on the altar. Now what's missing? Nothing, except the fire of God. What good is a house that I've built if God's presence isn't there? What's the good of making a showpiece and saying, we've got the best scribe, we've got the most brilliant preacher, we've got this son, so what?

In God's name, does it matter? Don't you think we're putting our hands on so many things these days? You've got to start this way and finish that way, and do something else. We're getting so mechanical.

Resisting Mechanical Additions to the Gospel

Since when did the gospel need trimming up? I had to go to a meeting this week, there was a five-piece band there. It was band, B-A-N. If I had the heart to do it, it would be B-A-N-N-E-D, band.

I had to band the whole thing. Oh, how they swerved and jazzed and what not. They didn't do that too long after I really got going.