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“I have tasted for the first time in my life what it is like to be”despised and rejected of men” from the hands of Christians. I will not whine or even care for my own sake. It is still true that love without righteousness is only sloppy agape.”
“The weakest meeting in the church, without exception, is the prayer meeting. If we’re not strong in prayer, we’re saying to God, “We can manage fine, thank you.” The man who bows the knee to the Father will never bow the knee to men.” -Leonard Ravenhill
“The difference between Leonard Ravenhill and most preachers today is he was willing to speak that way so as to expose things for what they truly are, but we are not. Ministers today do not have such courage. Most want to address sin and compromise with kid gloves. Very few are willing to speak so plainly. Many want to be viewed as positive, non-critical, and accepting of everyone, so they are careful to phrase their language so as to not offend.
Not Leonard. He was loyal to the truth regardless of what people thought and was not concerned about political correctness in the church. He spoke plainly, in the manner the Apostle Paul says true ministers are to speak: “We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth, we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God” (2 Corinthians 4:2). He would not be silent, even if his words were offensive. He was like Isaiah in this regard: “For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet until her righteousness goes forth as brightness and her salvation as a burning torch” (Isaiah 62:1).
Ravenhill spoke clearly, honestly, plainly, soberly, and with conviction.”
“The professing Christianity of America bothered him very much – the false, self-promoting, money-grabbing TV evangelism was something he was strongly against. His was a message of holiness, prayer, and the true preaching of Christ.
What Ravenhill exemplifies for us is summarized in one word – priorities. He focused on the right priorities spiritually. He would tell yong men, “You don’t have to go to seminary necessarily to be used by God. If you give yourself to prayer and to the Word of God deeply, and take six books and get alone with God, it will do you more good than anything else.””
“He exhorted me to keep praying, to be sincere with the truth, and not back away from speaking the truth. One of the things he said to me was very important: “Don’t let anyone or anything rob you from the Word of God that’s in your mouth. You’ll be offered things by some people. You must shun them all.” He began to weep and kept saying, “Shun it all, shun it all! Don’t let anything come into your life to take the Word of God out of your mouth. Shun it all!” He said that phrase so often that it branded something into my heart.”
“We are forever being told by preachers that Christ is coming for us, but why do they not tell us more than He took us with him to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus? The real object of his mercy toward us was not just to redeem us, vast as this is, but that he might also put us on exhibition for all eternity as his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, and to make known to all men the fellowship of the mystery of Christ, to the intent that now unto principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord. What a day when God puts all the work of redemption on exhibition for all men to see.”
-In Light of Eternity, The Life of Leonard Ravenhill
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