Havner´s Pepper 'n' Salt I
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| Vance Havner |
Pepper 'n' Salt
Spiritual health comes before happiness...
The business of a doctor is not to make sick people happy but to make them well. When they are well, they will be happy. Christ came to earth not primarily to make everybody happy but to save us from our sins. When we have been healed, we shall be happy. Moreover, getting sick people to act as if they were well does not cure them of their infirmity. We must deal with the trouble itself.
Obedient discipleship is in bold print...
What our Lord said about cross-bearing and obedience is not in fine print. It is in bold print on the face of the contract. We have put the demands of discipleship in fine print for fear we will chase away "prospects".
There is some truth in this book...
It is sometimes said of certain unsound books and strange cults, "But there is some truth in them." Would you say, "This milk has some arsenic in it, but most of it is milk... so go ahead and drink it?" In my boyhood home we had an old clock that wouldn't run. It was right twice every day! God's Word is right all the time.
What are our goals?...
There were multitudes of converts in the Acts but they were the results and not the goals. On the day of Pentecost, the apostles did not say, "Let's shoot for five thousand next time." They witnessed in the power of the Spirit and the thousands came. If we had what they had, we would exceed all our 'goals'.
Who's in charge?...
Another memory stands out. I had finished a week's preaching in Baltimore on a Sunday night and was due to begin in La Salle, Illinois, on the Monday night following. Some said I couldn't make it on wartime train schedules. On Monday morning, I noticed that the Pullman seat opposite mine was occupied by a prominent government official. He was on his way to speak in Chicago. Pressure was brought to bear on his behalf and the train really went through on time. I sat and looked at him... a cat may look at a king... and thought, "You may think we are making this schedule because you are to speak in Chicago, but, really, the good Lord is just getting this little preacher to La Salle to begin his revival on time!" That was one time I had the government working for me! It may seem that man's plans are given the main line today, but God is seeing His own program through. The best thing we can do is to find out which way God is going and get ourselves going in that direction.
Talented or Spirit-filled?...
God's work must be done by God's people and by God's power. It is not enough to select a lawyer to teach a Bible class just because he is a good talker. Unless he is Spirit-filled, he is unqualified. A banker is not competent to handle church finances merely because he handles money all week. A soloist in the choir needs more than a diploma from a conservatory. She may sing so high that Lily Pons could sing bass to it, but if she is not endued by the Spirit, she cannot sing to the glory of God.
The need for a prophet...
Nobody saw anything wrong with religion at Bethel until Amos came to town. Nor did anybody see what ailed the Judaism of our Lord's time until He walked in Jerusalem. It takes a prophet to show up religion when it becomes a farce instead of a force.
Our devices or the Holy Spirit?...
We say that we depend upon the Holy Spirit, but actually we are so wired up with our own devices that if the fire does not fall from heaven, we can turn on a switch and produce false fire of our own. If there is no sound of a rushing, mighty wind, we have the furnace all set to blow hot air instead. God save us from a synthetic Pentecost!
Gideon had too many soldiers...
Gideon had too many soldiers for the kind of battle he was out to fight and the kind of victory he was out to win. The battle of the Lord is not fought along conventional lines by carnal weapons and human strategy. We've been trying to do it the big way... maybe we'd better try the little way. We have too many soldiers of the kind we have for the kind of battle we are in.
Isaiah 6:5 comes before Isaiah 6:8...
We are trying to get young people to volunteer and say, "Here I am", before they have ever said, "Woe is me!"
An evangelical buffett...
Salvation is not a cafeteria where you take what you want and leave the rest. You cannot take Christ as Savior and refuse Him as Lord and be saved.
And then there was the rich, young ruler...
If the rich young ruler were to apply for membership in the average church today, he would be received instantly and perhaps made treasurer, with no questions asked. But our Lord was not in a hurry; He was after disciples, not mere joiners. Joiners are a dime a dozen today. Americans would die if they couldn't join something. Give them a button and a certificate and they'll join anything.
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