Christ Magnified in Our Bodies — Leonard Ravenhill

Christ Magnified in Life and Death

Thinking particularly of the 20th verse according to my earnest expectation and my hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed that that with all boldness as always so now Christ shall be magnified in my body.

I used to think that in the second letter to the chronic of Corinthians and chapter 5 well Paul gives us a kind of summary there of his theology. He believes that if they're absent from the body they're present with the Lord.

Knowing the terror of the Lord we persuade men. We must all appear at the judgment seat of Christ. And then verse 14 I've always considered was the thing that really motivated him. He out preached everybody out suffered everybody he out prayed everybody.

I thought that 14th verse the love of Christ constraineth me was his main motivation along and along again with the obligation to present Christ in all his majesty all his glory to remind us as dear Keith said one day in my office we were talking about the roads.

He said well all roads lead to the judgment seat which is true. They do. Whether a democrat an autocrat a plutocrat or any other cut or a liberal or what you are. Whether we're slaves or free men intellectuals or ignoramuses black or white rich or poor all roads lead to the judgment seat without exempt exception.

Now I've come to this conclusion reading recently in Philippians here that the motivation of the apostle in his zigzag course not up and down spiritually but zigzag in prison out of prison in wilderness in fastings in painfulness in tribulation in dress distress in perils of his countrymen in perils of the deep in perils of robert whatever it was.

The one thing that motivated him I believe is in this 20th verse as now always Christ shall be magnified in my body or some put it by my body whether it by being by life or by death. The thing that gripped me as I read it this week Christ may be magnified not in my ministry not in my miracles not in my super love.

I out love everybody else in the world today. I out preach them I out suffer everybody. But he says that Christ may be magnified in my body. If you turn over to the where is it chapter 4 verse 8 this explains his life.

I think he says be careful for nothing be prayerful in everything and be thankful for anything that covers a lot of territory doesn't it. The king james version. Of course the best one says be careful for nothing but in everything by prayer and thanksgiving.

Prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your request be made known unto the lord. I believe that's a territory in which he lived and moved and had his being. No this epistle is very beautiful. You know why.

Because it's a love letter. Some of you ladies remember the first one you got. I guess it's stuffed away somewhere now tied up with a ribbon. Maybe. Or it's in the garbage as soon as you're ready. I don't know but anyhow love letters are beautiful.

A fellow in our church fell in love with my sister. He wrote a letter to him boy Shakespeare couldn't have done better. He saw everything. She dies like stars and her cheeks were rosy. And she was this.

I never knew. I've lived with her 20 years. Never noticed one of the things he said she had because beauty again is in the eye of the beholder. This is a lovely epistle. For one thing there's no mention of sin in this epistle at all.

Joy in the Midst of Suffering

I think what Paul is actually saying here that in the greatest suffering you can have the greatest joy. We like the bonuses. We're not too worried too too anxious to have the burdens are we. If you read the epistle carefully you'll find that 14 times he mentions joy.

And he's in a stinking hall of a prison. We wouldn't put a dog in in these days. No bed in it no creature comforts the rottenness food. Just a hell hole. And yet here he is sending a letter of greetings and cheering to other people who should be writing letters to him.

So with all the greatness and all the pressure he says it's possible to have this uh boundless joy again. He does not mention sin. He mentions flesh once and then dismisses it. He's showing us that there's a grace of god far more exceedingly abundantly above all the weak.

And either ask or think the great old scottish saint samuel rutherford. Some of you know that great hymn the sands of time was sinking. He didn't write it. Mrs cousins extracted phrases out of his wonderful diary and put that marvelous marvelous hymn together.

I think it's maybe the greatest thing ever written. But he said i have to go into the king's cellar to find the king's wine. I remember old houses not far from where we live. We got in one. One day the oldest son was a friend of mine.

He said ever been in our huge underground cellar. I said no. We went in and out. There were all the old wine racks. We searched dozens. They were all empty. It's a blessing. They were. I'm sure i'd have got drunk that day.

I was so thirsty in that old basement. But he said look at the old wines they used to keep labels you know from portugal and spain and here and there. And champagne from france and all the rest of it.

But they're not stored upstairs in the refrigerator. They're stored or were stored in dungeons in the dark places. And we would like god to serve up as it were the wine of heaven just while we're living on the level without any interruption of trial or tribulation or testing.

But that's not the way that god works. Let me look over here a minute. I've lost my marker here. Let me see. I'll find it. Oh you can be looking right now at rome. Well you know it anyhow. You know romans chapter 12.

Presenting the Body as a Living Sacrifice

I'm thinking of places where paul talks about his body. He doesn't talk about yielding your mind. Nearly. He said in romans 12 1 and 2. I beseech you brethren. Therefore by the mercies of god that you present your body a living sacrifice.

Not your brain not your emotion not your spirit. But if i said to somebody look here's my watch. Well it's a fairly modern one you know it doesn't have a battery. I don't have to wind it up. The old one they had works in you know they were marvelous old things used to call them stem winders.

They're collector's items. Now if i give a man my watch i give him the works. I give him the hands i give him the face i get in everything. Well if i present my body a living sacrifice surely i'm presenting everything that i have my spirit my soul and my body.

For which paul prays you remember when he's praying to the speaking to the thessalonians. 1 thessalonians 5 23 he prays the very god of peace sanctify you holy. And i pray that your spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of the lord.

Faithful is he that calleth you who also will do it. So i give my body in its entirety to god. Again a girl not very well known in england years ago wrote a beautiful hymn. All for jesus all for jesus.

All my beings ransom powers all my thoughts and words and doings all my days and all my hours. She goes on to say let my hands perform his bidding. Let my feet run in his ways let my eyes see jesus only let my lips speak forth his praise all for jesus all for jesus.

Then she says so beautiful since my eyes caught sight of jesus i've lost sight of all beside. So i'm chained my spirit's vision gazing on the crucified vision is so bright in the christian life on that damascus road.

I don't believe the apostle paul ever recovered from that experience of being blinded physically he did. His eyes were open sure enough that i believe that he was blinded to all the treasures of the world.

As this girl says since my eyes caught sight of jesus i've lost sight of all beside so enchained my spirit's vision gazing on the crucified. Or if you want it in the words of isaac waltz after you've seen him my richest gain i count but loss.

But as i've said so often we use that phrase you know one day when we the things of earth after you've seen jesus the things of earth will go strangely dim. You know i like to turn that around and say when we get to heaven and look back the things of earth will look strangely grim.

We live. We spend our time gathering sawdust. Everything that we spend our lives to get is perishable outside of the spiritual. Paul says we're to what present our bodies a living sacrifice. So the body can be a living sacrifice.

In the same verse he said it can be holy and acceptable unto god which is your reasonable service. Now in its normal condition. It cannot be that a human body is corruptible. The flesh in us is corruptible.

But once he takes us in his infinite mercy and romans 5 is fulfilled and we receive the grace of god and we receive the peace of god and we begin to walk with god. Then we can present that body which he will sanctify a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto god which is only our reasonable service.

Freedom from Sin Through the Spirit

You know this is a fantastic chapter. Romans 8 verse one says. There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in christ jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit. For the law the spirit of life in christ.

Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and of death. Now come down verse seven of verse six. To be calmly minded is death. But to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Now how can you harmonize death and life.

A man called me yesterday talked i'm sure 40 50 minutes from california. Everybody's bewildered out there. That's why so many of them come here you see. But anyhow. Oh he was in despair about the carnality mastering his life.

Oh i'm a christian. I'm sanctified. I said you are yeah. But something carnal dominates me. Well that's ridiculous. How can it be calmly dominated if you're spiritual. This scripture is very clear. To be calmly minded is death.

I don't know why. I think preachers are the devils advocates. Very often they defend sin better than an atheist telling you can't get rid of sin this side of eternity. You have to have it. It has to have dominion over you.

When the scripture says it doesn't. Oh this man had just one sin of the flesh that mastered him. He could not in any shape or form get the victor of it. I said well get it nailed to the cross. That's the answer again romans 6.

If we're buried with him in baptism as i use the illustration so often if a man is standing here in the water and i bury him in under the water he's cut off from the world above. He can't see the world above.

He can't breathe the air above. He can't talk to the world. He's cut off. We saw some people baptized last week and i thought of them as they went through the wall. Symbolically they're saying look this is my grave.

I'm being buried to the world above. It's idle pomp and fading joys. As one him either says. Somehow preachers love to fall back on romans 7. Don't they here is the greatest man that ever lived. I heard g campbell morgan many times is the most amazing bible teacher i ever heard.

He gave a great message on holiness to about i guess 400 preachers. And i kept i kept squeaking out a little hallelujah because it was in a methodist church. And you know that's almost like shouting hallelujah in the morgue at times.

So i squeaked out of it. Oh people turn around and frown on me you know. So i thought well if you don't like that way until he says it again. So i said again i said hallelujah which was all right. But when he's taking us into the heavenlies he said now don't think i'm preaching a second work of grace.

Or you can be really holy in this life because even the apostle finished up he did not finish up. In romans 7 there happens to be a roman date. It happens to be in the greek that there's no difference.

There's no division. That's an artificial division. And paul says there's no answer in the law. All wretched man that surely said that who deliver me from this death. But if he stopped there we'd be in trouble.

He says i thank god through jesus christ my lord. That's why he starts romans 8. There is therefore now no condemnation to those of us who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit. For the law of the spirit of life in christ jesus has made me free.

I guess you know that i do not. That's all right. Thank you. Take courage. Well that man's walked with god many years. A dear friend of mine you know every time i get in a plane i hate planes. As i say procedurally flying is for the birds.

But every time that monster takes off and i try and estimate how many tons of up and tons of gasoline and tons of flesh and tons of baggage and it goes up like that if i had a feather here and said go up it wouldn't it just come down.

But how does that monster keep going. The law of gravity immediately leaves the ground. The law of gravity pulls on it. That's why it's harder to land the plane than take off isn't it. You see taking off you can put the thrust and blast of all the engines and up you go coming down.

Gravity's pulling this way and he's fighting that way. So he has to control the two powers gravity and the power of the plane. And it gets off because the power the thrust of those tremendous jets i suppose you know they were invented in england anyhow.

But anyhow isn't it amazing when you see that thing going down. And you look at 300 passengers in that plane. All the baggage all the luggage all the gasoline off it goes real raw. Soon. You're seeing the land this it's either dropping away or going up anyhow.

But there it is the thrust that's in there is greater than the law of the gravity. Well then what about the law of the spirit of life in christ jesus. Oh i love as you know i love resurrection hymns up from the grave he arose.

I'd like that as i said the other day when we sang it sing it with a smear. Death cannot keep its prey. Sin shall not have dominion over us. The law of the spirit of life in christ. Jesus has made me free now.

That's a very wonderful text isn't it. Look at verse uh eight romans 8 verse 8. Okay. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please god. Well there you are. There's your answer. No. The answer is in the next verse.

But you're not in the flesh. You're talking about this flesh in one place. And you're talking about a fleshy nature in the other galatians 5 where all the works of the flesh are there which are manifest are also corrupt.

But then you come down into uh the same next verse verse 9. You're not in the flesh but in the spirit. If so be that the spirit of god dwell in you. Look at verse 10. If christ be in you. Verse 11 if the spirit of him that raised up from good mercy what do you want is the spirit of god in you.

Is the spirit of life in you. Is the spirit of the son in you. Is the spirit of the spirit in you. Well how can there be room for carnality knowing this. Paul says that our old life our old man was crucified with him.

Nevertheless i led these days yet not i but christ liveth in me. And the life which i now live in the flesh. I live by the faith of the son of god who loved me and gave himself for me. In verse in romans 6 again.

And verse 11 it says. Reckon ye yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin. In the same verse he says. Reckon reckon the body to be dead indeed unto sin. But you're alive in god in christ. Jesus. The law of the spirit of life in christ.

Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and of death that christ may be magnified through my body. I never heard anybody preach on this text never preached on it myself. You remember the psalmist says.

Upon an instrument of 10 strings. Will i praise thee. What kind of a thing is that. A guitar or something harp. You say i don't have an instrument of 10 strings. Well supposing. You look at this way. You've got two feet.

You've got two hands. You've got two eyes. You've got two ears. You've got one tongue. Thank god. No more. And one heart. 10 strings. That's why the girl says it not him. Let my hands perform his bidding.

Let my feet run in his way. Let my eyes see jesus only. Let my lips lips speak forth his praise. Or an american name if you like. Take my life and let it be. What do you sing there. Take my hands and let them move at the impulse of thy love.

Take my feet and let them be swift and beautiful for thee. Take my love my lord. I pour at thy feet its treasure store. Take my will. That's the last area that we yield. Take my will and make it that paul doesn't even say that christ made me magnified by my epistles though he wrote at least i think he wrote the greatest things that any human being was ever allowed to write his magnificent epistles.

To the romans to the ephesians to the philippians. Again this is one of these jail writings. If you read it carefully we don't have time to do that. If you read carefully through this read through the first chapter you'll see the position and life of the christian.

If you read the second chapter you'll get the pattern of christ. The third chapter you'll get the energy that carries the through this world. Chapter four the christian superiority to all circumstances.

In other words this epistle is the whole character of the christian life. It shows paul show. Paul shows how to walk and work in the service of the lord jesus christ. And he of course is the fire leader.

He is the best example of it. I've said before i may be saying many times again i think that paul was the greatest genius the world ever saw. Colossal intellect. A will that never tired. The faith that never flinched.

The love that never broke down. The courage that nobody could dominate. He stands cheerfully before kings. He's as happy in jail writing the epistle of love as he's in any circumstance of life. So he shows us that the man can be complete however whatever race of genius he has that he can be completing god without even being involved in this world outside in its material concept or business concept.

He's totally god's man. I think it was spinoza that talks about a god intoxicated man. That god intoxicated man is the apostle paul. In my judgment in perils of the deep he doesn't shake. Everybody else on the ship is terrified.

He stands by and captain sends for him and comes in. What's wrong with you. Wasn't that a night last night. I can imagine the captain said i've been at sea for 50 years never gone through a night like that.

I guess you were like the rest of us cringing and holding on to your bed. Terrified. No he said a great night. I had a great time with fellowship. Fellowship is there other christian on board he says the last night.

What's he called. He said an angel from heaven. Of what he said last night i had an angel visitor in my cabin boy. Did we have a time talking about the glory and majesty of god. Everybody else is terrified.

You know i think that that experience that he had. I forget the chapter where it is in acts. I think it's typical of the end of the age. Paul got on board that uh ship as a prisoner. Haha. And he ended as a pilot.

Everybody got the jitters. Everybody was terrified. Everybody was vomiting and yelling and screaming and yelling and doing everything. And there is glorifying god. See what strange people christians are.

You know he was so amazing that when they skinned his back until it was raw he said none of these things hurt me. No he didn't. All people say if you really get saved and filled with the spirit you know you'll never be hurt.

You'll never have any troubles. And well i must be back slim because i get a lot of them. He did not say none of these things hurt me. He said none of these things move me. You could have a blast from hell and not be moved.

If you're in the will of god they'll hurt. How can you get victory if there's no battle. He said we're more than conquerors. Through him that loved us. What are you conquering. Ingrowing toenails. Charles west has a hymn in which he says.

Should all the hosts of hell and powers of should all the hosts of death and powers of hell. Unknown put their most dreadful forms of rage and malice on. I shall be safe for christ displays superior power and boundless grace.

You see paul touched the powers of the world to come to us. That's theology. Just that's something we're grasping after almost in blindness. We're so happy to get rid of a lot of rotten sins. And thank god for where we are.

But look at the territory. There is yet for us to reach for. You know god's problem with israel is getting them out of egypt. They could have got out of egypt into canaan in 11 days. They didn't even make it in 40 years.

Most of them we've got people now who have been saved 20 30 years and another day older in the spiritual life. They're no more mature. They're no more spiritual strength. They're no more spiritual understanding.

They're no more spiritual revelation. Why. Because so often they've lived on meetings instead of living on christ. I don't care where you go what school you go to. And i thank god for schools this school particularly again.

But remember you can't. What. What do you do when the schools pull away from. You see so many people get happy and blessed when they're in an association or fellowship. And then you go and stick them up the amazon somewhere they go to pieces.

Can you imagine a man going to go into pieces who let me go back here and quote this. Exactly. Oh oh. Here in romans 8 again verse 9 you're not in the flesh but in the spirit. If so be that the spirit of god dwell in you.

And verse 10 if christ is in you. In verse 11 the spirit of him that raised up jesus from the dead. I said in the class tuesday night. Well we have a class there tuesday night. If you want to come with starting with a person this week.

The Holy Spirit’s Power and the Possibilities of Grace

In hebrews 11 the holy spirit of god is totally incapable of doing anything that's small. The world in which we live is beautiful carpeted with flowers and everything. It was a ball of mud shut up in the womb of the universe.

The holy ghost brooded over it out of chaos brought cosmos out of wildness. He brought this marvelous system of the world. He brooded over chaos. He brooded over death and brought forth life. He brooded over the virgin of a little girl that nobody noticed hardly going up the street.

I've often thought of a little virgin mary going up the street pregnant and people suspicious. Did you know about her. You know she's keeping company with. You know how far along she is. They didn't think they were passing the creator of the universe in that little woman so near to her and never recognized it never knew it.

You know in fact all the people go to church they get within touching distance of jesus and they never touch him. They just go year after year week after week and never touch him. The holy ghost came and did that miracle in her brooded over her and brought forth the most amazing creature that this world will ever know.

Caught wesley again. You'll think i'm a wesley. Wesley says god was contracted to a span incomprehensibly made man. Here is the one that the heaven of heavens cannot contain it contain him. And he shut up in the little room of the woman.

He made all the food in the world. And yet he has to sustain his life by from his mother's breast. He owns the world. He made it yet he never owned a stick in it. He owns all things and yet never had a dime.

But after he brooded over the universe after he brooded over the virgin he brooded over a bunch of men in earth peru. They weren't all geniuses by a long way. One of them were cowards and now they went streaming in the power of the holy ghost.

I've puzzled over this again today. If you can help me write me a dissertation on it. We're supposed to have about what 50 million people in america today filled with the holy ghost manifesting gifts.

And nobody knows we're here only 120 in the upper room. And they turn the nation upside down. What's wrong. What's the difference between their baptism and ours. Tell me maybe you're right there. Partly right.

I'm sure. But then after the creation that the holy ghost did after the miracle of the birth of jesus after the men in the upper room then you've got this wonderful word of god the creation. Holy men of god spake as they were moved by the holy ghost.

I heard of a local preacher saying not too long ago the story of john is a fish story. Well sure it is. Isn't about a donkey is it. But all he meant is something a bit fishy about it. That's what he meant.

Which is not true because jesus said does he deny what the word of jesus. A man that denies scripture should renounce his job and go sell hamburgers. He came in as a fundamental believer and he becomes a liberal.

He should get out of the out at the back door. I'd fire him if i knew i don't need power over that guy. But here we have the holy spirit of god creating through all kinds of men. A man that climbs trees and gathers sycamore fruit.

A man of colossal intellect at the other end of the line. Like the apostle paul a shepherd like david a wise man like solomon. And yet the wonder of this book is so indestructible. Men have burned it and banned it and blamed it.

Isn't it. Tennison has a poem in which he says. Men may come and men may go. But i go on forever. Well the word of god is like that. You know one of the great contemporaries of john wesley was a very very powerful speaker in france by the name of voltaire.

He ridiculed the scriptures. One day he said in his little house a hundred years from now bibles will be museums. But he didn't miss it. By much did he except about about a thousand million copies. Bibles will be museum pieces.

People won't bother. They'll be so advanced they won't bother with the bible. One of the nice things that world war ii did was blow his little house off the face of the earth. But you know not long before.

A few years before that happened. A few years before that happened. The geneva bible society bought that house and distributed bibles all through europe after the very house where he said that the bible wouldn't even be existing in a hundred years.

Here it is. It's god's word and it will last forever. Thy throne oh god is forever and ever. Heaven and earth may pass on. My word shall not pass away. Here it is has all the power of god behind it. So come on now.

The holy spirit of god who invaded the lives of those men in the upper room according to romans 8. Here the same spirit can raise that raised jesus from the dead abides in us. He's risen us from the dead.

Spiritually we can think and move and have our being in god the father and the son and the holy spirit. Lowry. An old old nazarene had a marvelous book that's out of print. It's called the possibilities of grace.

I've never read it. I've just peeped into it. I have an old old copy. But i think of that so often it stretches out the possibilities of grace. What's a good book. Say i have not seen ear heard so that it entered into the heart of man.

What god has prepared for them that love it that he has revealed it unto us not to the world. They stagger at it. Impossible. How amazing that a human being corrupted defiled doomed damn can be forgiven cleansed and indwelt by the spirit of god and become a living vessel of god.

God has yet to produce the greatest men ever. I don't believe god went off production with wesley and finney and george whitfield. All the great men who built the old spiritual empires like hudson taylor and others that went to china and gilmore to mongolia and judson to burma.

And cary first missionary from england to india was cary. I preached in his church once there. And is it in calcutta. I think it is. And there was the other little man henry martin i said to class the other night.

I wish some of you folk would wake up and use your brains while you're young enough to use them. There was a young lady singing on tv. I love to hear these great singers. She was a great singer about 220 pounds.

Could she sing. She's born in a little shack somewhere up in the mississippi area or somewhere might have ended up serving hamburgers or somebody. Somebody took her in the home. She'd crinkle with the piano.

And then they discovered she had a voice. So they they got her to sing. I think she wanted the conservatory in milan and various other places. Now she can sing about five different languages. Did somebody suddenly suspect that in that girl was all this talent and all this ability.

No they just gave her a chance in one direction she took off in another. Now look if she can learn and i guess now she's only about 26 or 7 something maybe at 18 she began to struggle with playing struggle with singing and struggle with languages.

You know the roman church is pretty smart. There's a great college in ireland called mainouf. You can send a plow boy into that school that can hardly do his mathematics or anything. They'll turn him out in five years and he can recite the whole math in latin.

They have other convents where they take young ladies maybe average farmers daughters. They'll talk with them show the maps of the world. Tell them the need in the world. Lack of education lack of christianity.

So far those girls will get down. Oh i think i would like to go to south america. Okay. Brazil. What. Portuguese. All right. Argentina spanish some other area. You know every time they send the missionary out the missionary knew the language before they got there.

What did they do. They went into the school system and taught. Therefore the churches didn't have to support them because they were earning their money. They didn't have to wait to stammer out language for a few years.

Immediately they got off the ball. They could speak the language immediately. They were put into operation to teach in the schools and to teach religion. In other words when they went they were already accomplished in languages.

And again because of that they could sign up in government jobs and there was no support needed at home. Now here sometimes very often with people. Oh we'll take you on. But you have to go around churches begging.

Ask them to support you ask them to give you so much a month so much a month so much. I think god must be embarrassed by the church these days. What beggars we are. Why can't you use your brains now. Get a language get awakened get stirred in your spirit find out where god wants you.

There are lots of hell holes that need the light of the gospel. If you think you may have the courage why not pray about going to russia. Get behind behind that curtain there. Or the iron curtain. I don't.

I think i'm right in saying this. I'm not sure somebody can correct me. Maybe i don't think there are five missionaries in the whole of albania. Rather they purged albania somewhere in the last century.

I think they put christians in barrels and sealed up the barrels and pushed the barrels out on the tide as it was receding out to the ocean. And there they were cooped up in those horrible things the sun coming in and roasting them.

No food. No anything. They exterminated the church to that degree there. Well there's a challenge. There's nobody in albania. Why not be the first to go. What about getting behind the iron curtain. Czechoslovakia some of the other countries.

What about the what 800 million people in china this week they said there were 700 million in in india. It has about what 400 languages and dialects. The world population now is the greatest it's ever been in history.

There are more lost people tonight than ever have been in history. And yet i think there's more indifference. So we give a little bit to support a mystery. We do this we do the other. But that great dominion of satan is almost unchallenged in the day in which we live now.

The Mind of Christ and the Mission of the Church

It's in this same epistle that is yes in this same epistle where paul says let this mind be in you which was in christ jesus. Well actually that that literally is translated that the love which dominated the life of jesus the disposition of jesus be yours.

And his was at this position of love of concern. Everywhere he went he went out doing good. Well if that mind is in me i'll tell you what. I'm gonna have some restless minutes or restless hours. I'm gonna have to struggle with my own conscience.