1 Samuel 1:2-16 — Leonard Ravenhill

Hannah and the Nature of Intercessory Prayer

First book of Samuel, the first chapter. First book of Samuel in the first chapter. This is what I call the classic on intercessory prayer. It's, I think, outlined for us what the necessary ingredients, unless that sounds too much like making a cake or something, the necessary constituents of prayer, intercessory prayer at least, are all found in this chapter.

Let's read it. We'll skip the first verse with all the funny names. Come to verse 2. This man, verse 2, he had two wives. The name of one was Hannah, the name of the other Penina. Penina had children but Hannah had no children.

This man went up out of his house or city yearly to worship and to sacrifice. And to the Lord of hosts in Shiloh and the two sons of Eli, Hosni and Phinehas, the priests of the Lord were there. When the time was that Elkanah offered, he gave to Penina his wife and to all her sons and her daughters portions.

But unto Hannah he gave a worthy portion, for he loved Hannah. But the Lord had shut up her womb. Her adversary also provoked her so off or to make a fret, because the Lord had shut up her womb. And as he did so year by year, when she went up to the house of the Lord, so she provoked her.

Therefore she wept and did not eat. And then said Elkanah, her husband to her Hannah, why weepest thou? Why eatest thou not? Why is thy heart grieved? Am I not better to thee than ten sons? So Hannah rose up after they had eaten in Shiloh and after they had drunk.

Now Eli the priest sat upon a seat by a post of the temple of the Lord. And she was in bitterness of soul and prayed unto the Lord and wept sore. And she vowed of her own said, O Lord of hosts, if thou wilt indeed look on the affliction of thine handmaid and remember me, and not forget thine handmaid, but will give unto thine handmaid a man child, then I will give him unto the Lord all the days of his life.

And there shall no razor come upon his head. And it came to pass as she continued praying before the Lord, that Eli marked her mouth. Now Hannah she spake in her heart, only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard.

Therefore Eli thought she had been drunken. And Eli said unto her, how long wilt thou be drunk and put away thy wine from thee? And Hannah answered and said, no my Lord, I am a woman of a sorrowful spirit.

I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but have poured out my soul before the Lord. Count not thine handmaid for a daughter of Belial, for out of the abundance of my complaint and grief have I spoken hitherto.

Worship Requires Sacrifice

Now notice in this reading in the first place here, in verse 3 that this man went up to the temple, he went from his city, yearly to worship and sacrifice. I do not think there's any true worship that does not have sacrifice in it.

When that wonderful man Abraham went up the mount, took his child, his son with him, if I'd been doing that I would have said, I am the lad a-going yonder to sacrifice. But he said, I am the lad a-going yonder to worship.

And worship involves giving God not something good, but giving God the best. In the Christian life the good is always the enemy of the best. The Lord normally, pardon me, Satan won't tell you to get drunk or do something like that.

He'll get you to waste time other ways. You can do good things which are not the best things. They're not the most essential things. And the good thing in the Christian life is so often the enemy of the best thing.

So Abraham went up the mountain and he took his son with him. Now if God had said, take your son, that would have been wonderful. It would have got him off the hook because he had a son. He had a child of the flesh by the name of Ishmael.

But God did not want Ishmael. God never wants that which is of the flesh. And so he said specifically, not only take thy son, but take thine only son. God didn't even recognize Ishmael. He wasn't the gift of God.

He was the work of the flesh. He was the product of somebody trying to help God out. And very often people do that. They try to help God out and then we get stuck in a mess and we've got problems. So again if we're going to sacrifice, if we're going to worship, worship involves sacrifice.

Now notice that again this man went up out of his city yearly to worship. And this is mentioned again in verse 7 as he did so year by year. You see this is not an emotional outburst. This woman doesn't suddenly realize that there's something missing in her life.

She's been provoked and irritated and scorned and ridiculed and all the time there's been a wearing down in her life. Now again it says that this man had two wives. Notice what Hannah did in verse 7. It says her adversary provoked her but it says she wept.

Now if you go down to the end of verse 10 it says she wept sore. If you go down to the end of verse 15 it says I have poured out my soul before the Lord. Now when I read that automatically I think of one person.

I think of the Lord Jesus. Obviously going into the garden of Gethsemane he walked into the garden. A little later he knelt in the garden. A little later he's prostrate in the garden. And sometimes even our physical attitude is a sign of our spiritual condition.

And so Hannah she wept. She wept sore. She wept until she couldn't stand it. I think she hadn't even the energy to stand and therefore she prostrates herself. Her husband says why eat us Lana. So obviously in this situation she was fasting.

Now her adversary provoked her. So there you have provocation. In the middle of verse 8. Why is that heart grieved and so obviously she was grieved. First line of verse 10 she was in bitterness of soul.

In the middle of verse 11 she has an affliction. Come down to the 16th verse she has a complaint and a grief. Now that that's quite a load isn't it. She has bitterness. She has grief. She has an affliction.

She has a complaint. And she has bitterness. You see that there is a bitterness which is justified. There is a bitterness which God condemns of course. But then there's a jealousy that God condemns. The heart the word of God says can be cleansed of jealousy.

And yet God himself is a jealous God. I think we forget that sometimes. There is a bitterness which which is the result of us. Well some some injuries come to us. Somebody's hurt our feelings. Some other things and something rises up bitterness comes.

The same with anger. The Lord by God is a jealous God. Every time I see an automobile with a sticker on. Smile God loves you. I think well you you could smile people to hell. You need a balance on the other side of the of the bumper.

You need a sticker that says God is angry with the wicked every day. God gets angry. And if there's nobody can love like God. There's nobody can get angry like God. One of the great sayings in the book of the Revelation is that the Lord Jesus the Lamb of God.

He's mentioned I think 17 times as the Lamb of God in that in that book. But also he speaks of the wrath of the Lamb. And I'm told I remember talking with some men in New Zealand about sheep and about rams.

And one of them said well when a ram is angry it maybe is more angry even than a than a lion. It takes a lot to provoke a ram to to anger but once it gets angry it will tear up everything destroy everything.

So so God is a God of love. God is a God of anger. God forbids that we should be jealous and yet that we should covet for instance. And then again Paul says covet earnestly the best gifts. So nobody loves like God nobody gets angry like God.

God says we're not together I shall not covet. Then he says covet earnestly the best. There's always a balance in the Word of God. Today we've got what I call a glamorous interpretation of the spirits in life.

It's all sunshine and no shadow. It's all kisses and no crosses. Blessings and no burdens. Which is totally unacceptable. It's totally it's ridiculous. If you want to know about the greatest man I think that ever lived at least in New Testament days after Jesus you study of course the life of the Apostle Paul.

And you can get the background of his life. What he endured by just reading one Corinthians four and then two Corinthians four. One Corinthians four we're the offscarring of the earth. Nobody wants us.

That's not the ambition of most of us. So the preachers and big evangelists don't want to be considered the offscarring. We want a position. We want to be esteemed. We want to be regarded as one of the top five best preachers, top five best evangelist, top something.

And that's pure nonsense. In the light of the Word of God again. You know God never flatters us. He flattens us sometimes but he doesn't flatter us. We're so good at flattering ourselves we don't even need anybody help.

And his help usually. God does the opposite thing. He keeps us down. So again this woman has all these things which we would say inwardly are eating her up. She's bitterness, she has grief, she has sorrow, she has tears, she's fasting.

You can't offer anything that will satisfy her. Now what's her problem? Well she's just got one problem. And that is she's a barren woman. Consider the reproach. Now again you notice that it says that when the time was that Elkanah offered he gave to Pinninah his wife and all her sons.

It kind of emphasizes all her sons and daughters. She must have had a whole tribe maybe had as many as Mrs. Wesley, 19 children. And she said well finally this beautiful lady Hannah says well look I'm at the end of the line.

I'm not interested that you buy me the best clothes or the best jewels or I'm accepted. She says you're asking why I fast, why I weep, why I pray, why I grieve, why I have bitterness, why I have heaviness of spirit.

One thing only. I have everything the world can give me, everything you can give me, but one thing I have no children. And so she prayed. It's so interesting again that the man of God who sat in his position there in the temple and yet even he did not understand the woman.

Someone talks about the contradiction of sinners. That's not difficult to take. It's the criticism of saints that's a difficult thing. Yeah well who do you think you are? Do you think you're better than the pastor?

He doesn't this. Do you think you're better than so-and-so? She doesn't do that. She's the most spiritual woman in church. And we set up our standards and we judge by people instead again of judging by the Word of God.

And Eli marked her mouth. Well why, why, why, why does she keep coming here? Why does she mutter? She never says a word. And so he said well I guess the real thing is she's drunk. Well that's not a very nice criticism to say about somebody who's really honestly praying, she's drunk.

But it didn't disturb her, why should it? You know actually the church never does anything when it's sober anyhow. We need to get the church drunk. That's what they said about the men who came out of the upper room, these men are drunk.

That's what they said when Festus was, was standing up with, with a gripper and Festus was a guest, he should have kept his mouth shut. But he jumped up and he said Paul, Paul what's wrong with you? Much learning has made you mad.

In other words what he implies is you're intoxicated. He says I'm not intoxicated with knowledge, I'm intoxicated with desire. Now again Eli looks at the woman and says well she's drunk. Well that's hard to take.

But you see the great thing about this is this, that, that prayer is so simple that a child can do it and it's so profound nobody can do it. Prayer will exhaust language, exhaust vocabulary. I hear people say sometimes about Romans 8, well you know where it says groanings which cannot be uttered, it's praying in tongues.

It isn't, if it was God would say so, he's got more sense than we have. If he was praying in tongues he'd say well right you pray in tongues, that's it, he does not say that. He talks about groaning, the whole creation groaneth, we groan, the spirit groans.

I believe that's the highest form of prayer, when you have no language at all, it's the spirit. You might say did you see the pastor this morning? I say no. Well he's sitting there, well I can't see him, why can't I?

Well I can see the thing he lives in, his body, but I can't see him, he is a spirit, he has a body. His body can't live without his spirit, his spirit can't live without his body, he is a spirit, God is a spirit, God is a spirit.

And because he's a spirit he communes, he is a spirit and his spirit communes with my spirit. And therefore in Romans 8 it's talking about groanings which cannot be uttered, it really is talking about praying in the Holy Ghost.

There's a little verse in, I was going to say the almost the smallest book in the Bible indicates, it's an epitome of the Bible, and that's in the epistle of Jude where it talks about praying in the Holy Ghost.

The Holy Spirit and the Depths of Prayer

Now we don't emphasize that usually, but I'm suspicious of any experience, whether you call it sanctification like the Nazarenes or baptism of the Spirit or fullness of the Spirit, I'm suspicious of any experience in which we identify with the spirit that did not revolutionize our prayer lives.

Only the spirit knows the mind of God, I do not know the mind of God. The spirit knows the mind of God, he'll communicate with my spirit which is beyond my natural intelligence or your natural intelligence, and he'll put something that Wesley described as an impression upon his spirit.

You can't explain it. I talked with a man not too long ago somewhere up this area and he said well if you can't explain it I won't accept it. So I said that's fine. Are you married? He said yes. Do you love your wife?

Yes. I said well I've got five minutes to spare, let's sit down, explain love to me. Before you start talking about spiritual things, there are lots of things you believe. You believe those lights are shining but you can't explain electricity.

Marconi couldn't do that, Edison couldn't do it. There are things we use, there are things we have, there are things we know, we know. I'm thinking of Pascal, what did Pascal say? I forgot how he said it, I didn't start meditating this morning.

No, no, this is what he said, the heart knows reasons, the heart, the heart knows reason, that reason doesn't understand. It's a bit complicated but it's difficult but it's true. There are things you know in your heart, you can't rationalize them, you can't put them into the language of a vocabulary but you know.

Maybe you call them convictions. They're not opinions, a man often changes his opinions. He doesn't change his convictions very often, maybe never, but he changes opinions. Now again Hannah is praying, Hannah is weeping and Hannah is sorrowful and she prays and she says nothing.

There's a poem, I don't know who wrote it, I don't know why he wrote it but to me it's always very expressive in this area. The poet said this, what am I? An infant crying in the night, an infant crying for a light with no language but a cry.

All right you mothers say well I think I know what you mean. You know a baby comes along and everybody's thrilled. He wakes up about two o 'clock in the morning and the husband says what's wrong with him?

Oh he's all right dear, he just needs feeding. I hope he doesn't wake every morning at two o 'clock. And then an hour after he cries, is he not feeding again? No dear, he doesn't, he's uncomfortable. He wants changing.

Wakes up two or three hours after, what's wrong? Is he not changing again? No, no, no, he's frightened. I put the light on, he stopped crying. Now the old boy may have a PhD but he doesn't know a thing about baby language.

The mother has an instinctive knowledge of the need of that child. Now if you put your baby to bed, you've got some lovely children here, one of those little ones say six weeks old and in the middle of the night it yelled out I'm hungry.

You'd be scared to death wouldn't you? And if you fed it and then an hour after it shouted, I'm wet through, come and change me quick. You'd say, oh goodness what in the world have we got here? Is this a babe or a reincarnation of some old man or something?

How come the baby can talk at this age? Now while we're there, let's say this again. I think that, I don't just think of it, I'm convinced that spiritual growth is about the slowest growth of all growths.

I don't think it has to be but it is. There are degrees in the spiritual life. Again, I have seen people that have been saved only a year and at the end of that year they were more mature than some people who've been saved thirty years.

And I've seen people who have been saved thirty years that I don't think are six months old yet. You see, we put so much stress on Bible knowledge and all this other stuff which is not necessarily growth.

We're exalted to grow in grace and in the knowledge. Now some people grow in knowledge but not in grace, some people grow in grace not in knowledge, but the combination is growing grace and in knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Again the school of experience is the most expensive school in the world. You can't buy your way in it, you can buy degrees these days, but you can't buy any degree in the spiritual life. You've got to merit, you've got to earn everything.

You see, we live in what some of you must have read Bonhoeffer, doesn't he? He has a chapter in one book I think on cheap grace, doesn't he? It's a very starting chapter, I think a very beautiful chapter.

Cheap grace. And if you say to people, well you know, what you should do if you're not satisfied with the spiritual life, you should get up early in the morning when God opens his business and go buy some things.

And they say, what? You don't buy things from God? Well maybe that's why you're poor, you should have done. Because it says in the book of the Revelation, I counsel thee to what? To buy. Buy what? Buy of me gold, buy of me white raiment.

You know we've a lot of flimsy floppy songs about heaven, mansion over the hilltop and all that jack, and we kind of figure that, well almost modern evangelism says if you come to this altar and weep for five minutes, tell God you're sorry, number one you'll get a mansion on Main Street, number two you'll get a five-decker crown, number three you'll get a free ticket to the marriage supper of the Lamb, number four you'll rule over five cities, number five you'll have immunity from judgment.

You couldn't get a better deal than that anyway. Except it's not true. How many virgins were there? Did they all get in the wedding? Why not, they're all virgins. How many disciples were there? Did they all go on the Mount of Transfiguration?

Why not, they're all disciples. He called them all, they all left all. Why didn't they all go on the Mount of Transfiguration? All right, there were twelve disciples. Did they all go into Gethsemane? Certainly not.

Well then I counsel thee to buy me, how do we buy from God? Well in my judgment the way we buy from God is by obedience. You see, we're all looking for more light and somewhere back there we didn't obey the light we had and so we aborted something.

Oh well I'll look over that pass back, no no no God says, you go back. Remember the man who came, he said I lost my axe head. Well the modern evangelist, miracle worker, would say well just throw an old branch in the water here, it'll come up the river four miles.

That's not what the scripture said. The scripture said go back where you lost it. That's where you find it. Well this is true in the spiritual life in every case. You go back to that situation where you lost ground or you lost blessing or you lost something else, go back to that place, make a thorough job of repenting and buy from God that which he wants to give.

I counsel thee to buy and I'm convinced, you may not be and that's all right, I'm convinced we buy by our obedience. When we get to heaven we're not all going to be the same. Not everybody's going to rule over five cities or ten cities or wear the same garments or have the same crowns.

That's clearly outlined for us in scripture. There will be degrees in heaven. John Wesley was converted at 35. If you turn 35 round it's 53. If you add them together it makes 88 when he died. He lived on a hundred dollars a year.

He disciplined himself. The dying thief, the songwriter says, rejoiced to see that fountain in his day and there have I, thou vilest of men, washed all my sins away. Are you going to suggest that the dying thief who got in on the last tick like that, is going to have the same reward as John Wesley?

Doesn't make sense. Well then you say David Brainerd died at 28 and Wesley died at 88. So this man had 60 more years to gain merit or gain reward more than, no he didn't. No he didn't. I believe at 28 years of age or 29, at 28 years of age David Brainerd could say, I have finished the work thou gavest me to do.

Now that's the key to the whole thing. It's not how long you live, it's how you live. It's not quantity, it's quality. It's not positions and possessions and all the other crazy things that even Christians live for.

See there are only two kingdoms, the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this world, and they don't run together like that, they're opposite. You see the New Testament and the world couldn't exist together.

The church can exist with the world now, the world can put up with the church. We're not salt in it anymore, we don't rub into its wounds, we're not a protest organization. Now remember this too, that the church was born in a totalitarian world, a sophisticated world.

It was born in a slave system. Jesus was born in a slave system, so was Moses born in a slave system. Jesus went to Egypt, Moses stayed in Egypt. Okay, there's a lot of parallels there. But, Jesus never said a thing about slavery.

The Apostle Paul never said anything about slavery, except he said, be a good slave. That wouldn't suit George Meany, but the Apostle Paul stressed it. Be a good servant. But also he said, you'll be a good master.

You won't exact on that man anything more than you would exact from Jesus, or Jesus would exact from that person. You see, we've got this idea we're going to make heaven. How do you know we're going to heaven anyhow?

Could you prove we're going to live in heaven? Scripture says God's going to make what? A new heaven and a new earth. What's the new earth for? Rabbits? I believe God's going to restore the whole earth like the original Garden of Eden, and it'll be heaven.

Now, we may live here and maybe go shooting up to heaven sometimes, according to the way the Lord wants it. But you see, it's a new heaven, there'll be no curse. The removal of the curse in every form.

Death, sickness, everything else, tyranny, everything will have been abolished, so it'll be heaven, whether it's up there on the cloud. I believe there's a heaven, sure. But I don't know what period of time we're going to live there.

There'll be no time anyhow, or what our residency will be, and so forth and so on. But we're not going to be the same. We're not all going to be the same. That's the point when we, if you want to say it like Shakespeare, shuffle off this mortal coil.

I hear people say sometimes, you know, boy, I've got everything God wants me to have. I'm saying, filled with the Spirit, God gives. I say, good for you, I have. I'm looking for the last payment. I've got one or two down payments, but I haven't have a body that's pretty rough.

And the last thing I'm going to get is a body like unto his glorious body. Brother, when you have a body like unto his glorious body, and you have his presence, and he's there, does it matter whether you live on earth or heaven?

It doesn't make any odds at all. The geography doesn't matter at all. So, again, there are degrees of spirituality. There are degrees of spiritual knowledge. You can be sure about this, there's nobody this side of eternity that has arrived spiritually.

Spiritual Maturity and Wholehearted Devotion

The second thing, and I think of a lady that tours the world preaching now. I was preaching in New Zealand once, and she just came through the door as I happened to point this way, and I said, you are as spiritual as you want to be.

I wasn't saying it to her, I was saying it to congregation. And it kind of knocked her out for a while. She couldn't get over it. I am as spiritual as I want to be? Sure, you've got as big a Bible as John Wesley had.

You've got as big a Bible as Finney had. You've got as big a Bible as Adam Clark had, the pastor was telling me he likes to read Adam Clark. He said, always read Englishman. But, so what? You are just as spiritual as you want to be this morning.

Can't blame the devil, the in-laws, the outlaws, mother-in-law, anybody. You have the same access, the same Holy Spirit, the same teacher, the same resources. Now, why is this woman crying? This woman is weeping, she's full of grief, bitterness, sorrow, heaviness, everything, for one reason only.

That she can see somebody, a woman who is more mature than she is. She may not be as good-looking, she may not have the nicest jewelry and clothes, but there's one thing that angers her. She's not functioning as she should function.

She's not creative. There's a time in a girl's life she's too young to have children, there's a time when she's too old. I'm convinced that's true of churches. A church can get too old to bear, get stuck in the mud, get satisfied.

God passes it. I believe it's the same in our individual lives. You can't offer for the mission field when you're 70. Not usually, I know a man that's going to the mission field now, he's 70 by the way.

Just packed up his farm and he's a brilliant man, he's a Lutheran. Just a farmer, he has a library of about 3 ,000 books, I'd like to get them. He's a lot of old masterpieces, complete sets. He's a wonderful teacher.

God got a hold of him some years ago and he kept on his farm, fed the hogs, the dogs, and everything else. I went to University of Minnesota and took some studies in Greek and a little Hebrew. And at night when he comes in, all he does is goes out, I wouldn't give him, honestly, I wouldn't give him $10 for everything in the house, his furniture and everything.

I wouldn't give him $10. That'd be about $9 too much. But he has a room with these wonderful volumes in it and at night, immediately he's had supper, he goes in that room and stays to him in there. He has a bench, he has a Bible, he has two or three different versions of at least Hebrew and Greek and so forth and he studies and studies and studies.

He's what I call one of God's millionaires, not material. There's nothing wrong in having money. Doesn't worry me what a man possesses, it's what possesses the man that's the problem. I know some very wealthy men, I think I know about 15 millionaires, never helped me but they're nice people.

They got it made on one level but I know some spiritual millionaires too. Like someone I mentioned last night, the old man now, 95, 96 this year I guess, in England, who says he finds it difficult to pray from midnight till five in the morning.

I think he's a millionaire, spiritual. The old man that died last year at this time on the 8th or 9th of February who had never been through the door of his house for 12 and a half years, never been out of the house.

Just prayed, lived in intercession. Wonderful man. All right, well Hannah is not satisfied. She only wants one thing. I believe that's the secret of Paul's life, he only wanted one thing. He said this, one thing I do.

He had no sidelines, he had no secondary jobs. Maybe there's a time when a preacher has to work and help things out, I'm not so sure it's right. I'm sure it isn't in my own mind. You see, the book stands and God says, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added.

I believe you can stand on that scripture and defy the devil, your feelings, everything else, and believe God to supply your needs. I know there are degrees of faith too. Hannah wants one thing, Paul says, this one thing I do.

Just one thing, he lived for it, he died for it. He had no sidelines, he had no secondary interests. It wasn't God first, it was God only. People say put God first, no no, it's God only. If God's first, you've got some secondary things.

People say of the Lord Jesus he was the second Adam, no he wasn't. Cardinal Newman said that in his lovely hymn, Praise to the holiest in the height, the second stanza I guess, he says all loving wisdom of our God when all was sin and shame, a second Adam to the fight.

Jesus was not the second Adam. If he was a second Adam, you can have a third or a fourth or a fifth. Jesus was the last Adam. He was the end of the line. Alright, when Hannah is grieved, Hannah is fasting, weeping, broken, and she's praying.

Hannah's Desperate Prayer for a Prophet

Now if I say to you what did she pray for, you'll say a child. Well she didn't pray for a child. You say what did she pray for? She prayed for a man child. You say she got a man child, I say she didn't.

She didn't get a girl, no she didn't. What did she get? She got a prophet. God did more for her than she could ask or think. Now she prayed. Remember the glory had departed, the glory returned when this child was born.

And afterwards I guess she had other children, but she prayed for a child. And you know so often when we pray and God answers prayer, we say well you know in our own limited way, we say God answered prayer and therefore he, he did this for me.

I don't really think God does much for us. I don't think God gave Hannah a child just to satisfy Hannah and because she prayed and so forth. He wasn't meeting her need, he was meeting his own need, because up the road, 20 years up the road, he needed a prophet by the name of Samuel.

And he was solving his problem, not her problem. Oh he solved hers, you know, kind of in the, in the, in the whole compass of the thing, but actually he was solving his own problem. He needed a man there up the road.

Well who better than this woman? You see, again and again you discover in the Word of God, and this gives me hope for the hour in which we live, that the barren women brought forth the best children. Now again remember, I've said this and people misunderstand sometimes, but I'll still say, God does not answer prayer.

Or this thing, people say sometimes prayer changes things. Well sometimes. Prayer doesn't change things, prayer changes people, and people change things. We sing sometimes, sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour of prayer, that calls me for a world of care, from a world of care.

And when the meeting's over, the world of care is still there, you didn't shift it by praying. All you did is get yourself more adequate to meet that world of care. God doesn't steamroll at every hill hour.

He doesn't fill in every valley, doesn't make every crooked places straight. The weakness about the modern charismatic stuff is this, to me, that it made us on charisma and not character. Now I don't care how many gifts you have, and you can exercise them and be an adultery.

Remember that the gifts and callings of God are without repentance. Of a man that had mass meetings, he'd every miracle, he'd make your hair stand up. And on the way to his hotel he called a call girl.

He had a call girl every night, still kept up his ministry. He died tragically, sure enough. The gifts and callings of God. You see, whether people have tongues or any other, well, I must be, I mean, God can't be too grave with me, I still have my gift.

That doesn't prove anything. That doesn't prove anything. You see, it's character that God wants. And you don't make a character overnight. Who are the towering, towering figures in the Old Testament or the New Testament?

They're the men who endured the most hardship, most difficulty. Somebody says, you know, if you read this book and did this and did this, you'd be a, you'd be a great preacher. God isn't interested in making great preachers.

He's interested in making you a great character. By the same token, you say, God answered my prayer. God didn't answer your prayer because you're going to be a nice little guy down here for 20 years preaching.

God had in view what you're going to be in eternity. Those things you went through that were as black as hell and as hot as hell and as dark as could be, God, God knew the alchemy. God knew what he was doing.

God knew what he needed to purify you. You see, the heart is purified by blood. The head is purified by a rod. Whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth. My father believed that. And he exercised it too. But anyhow, you see, our idea is that you just get saved, sanctified, saved, filled with the Spirit, and then it's all the way home.