Steady, Gradual Growth—Vance Havner (1901-1986)

Vance Havner was a beloved and influential American preacher, known particularly for his pithy, insightful quotes. Of him, Billy Graham once said, “I do not know of any man in my generation who has stirred revival fires in the hearts of so many people throughout the nation as has Vance Havner . . .”¹

 

The following quote, taken from a collection designed for daily devotion, brings Havner’s sharp mind to bear on the problem of spasmodic discipleship. And though he was known as a revival preacher, whose meetings were marked by dramatic spiritual encounters with the Lord, it was his conviction that sanctification comes typically in orderly fashion.

We do not grow in grace and the knowledge of Christ by leaps and bounds but some try. They bounce from one mountain peak of Christian experience to another. Every year or so they make a new start, turn a new leaf, have a new thrill. Children do not grow by suddenly gaining a few inches or adding a few pounds now and then. They grow gradually, daily, by food, rest, and exercise. Christian growth comes the same way by feeding on the Word, resting in the Lord, and exercising unto godliness. It has been said that nothing is more detrimental to Christian experience than too many Christian “experiences.”²

<sup>HT: Bible Mesh 

See Also: The Crushing Weight of Glory</sup>

THE EVILS WITHIN THE CHURCH

JUDE, “the servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James,” speaks to us in the tone of an ancient prophet. His voice is that of Elijah or John the Baptist. It is “the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” He speaks to the declining churches of his day. He speaks to the Church of the last days. It is against the evils within the Church that he specially warns. What a picture does he draw of error, licentiousness, worldliness, spiritual decay, and ecclesiastical apostasy! Who could recognize the image of the primitive Church in the description he gives of prevailing iniquity? The world had absorbed the Church, and the Church was content that it should be so…
It is a picture for the Church in our day to study, for we are rapidly becoming part of the world and falling into the snares of “the god of this world” (2Co 4:4). Nay, and we glory in this as “progress,” “culture,” and “enlightenment,” as freedom from the bigotry of other centuries and the narrowness of our half-enlightened ancestors, who did not know how to reconcile contraries and to join what God has put asunder; how to believe everything alike; how to combine earth’s pleasures and gaieties with the joy of God; how both to pray and to dance; how to revel and to weep for sin; how to wear both the “white raiment” and the jeweled ball dress; how to maintain friendship both with God and with His enemies; how both to pamper and to starve the flesh; how to lay up treasure both on earth and heaven; how to drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of devils; how to be partaker of the Lord’s Table and the table of devils. Continue reading HERE