PENTECOST by Leonard Ravenhill

Pentecost
Lord Montgomery, that unpredictable British field Marshall, said recently that England went into the Second World War equipped to fight the First World War. This was a polite way of saying that in World War II England was way behind the times in battle equipment and strategy.

When Sir Christopher Wren designed the great St. Paul's cathedral in London, he planned a thing of lasting beauty and unfading charm, but did not order it air-conditioned.

When George Stephenson built his rocket engine, it was not smooth, herculean diesel, but a low-powered hissing machine. In other words, both Wren and Stephenson underestimated the needs of our day, and designed for their day.

Many today have a benevolent patronage of the church of Jesus Christ (or what they mistakenly think is the church of Jesus Christ). These "wise ones" think that the psalm-singing saints are as much out of line with the atomic age as a penny-farthing bicycle would be on a motor-crowded four-lane highway.

Was Jesus Christ guilty, then, of underestimating the need of this twentieth century? Is the Church which Christ founded a cumbersome, slow-moving thing, badly needing a gigantic overhauling and a government subsidy to get her up to date and moving? No! The church does not need state support... (Continue reading)