Classic Sermons

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11 Oct: The Price of Revival

By Hyman Appleman (1902-1983)

In the first part of this article, Appleman looked at the three reasons for revival, as well as the personnel of revival. In this next part, he explores the price of revival. Let's listen in:

We have considered the purpose and the personnel of a revival. Now let us think about the price of a revival. What is the price of a revival? What did Moses have to pay? What did Samuel have to pay? What did Elijah have to pay? Isaiah? Hezekiah? What price did Joshua have to pay? What price did Peter and Paul and Luther and Wesley and Whitefield and Spurgeon and Moody and Billy Sunday have to pay? Each of us has to pay the same price—exactly the same price. There is no difference. There never will be any difference. God has never changed His terms. Power is costly. The most expensive power in all the world is the power of Pentecost. The price is high—but we can pay it. Here is how.

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By Jenifer LeClaire Ministries Classic Sermons Spirit Life

10 Oct: Three Reasons for Revival

By Hyman Appleman (1902-1983)

Some people think the need for a revival is a sign of decadence in a church. This is not always so. In the New Testament, in the Old Testament, in Christian history, revivals have been a part of God’s plan for the advancement of the kingdom. This is natural. This is spiritual. This is psychological. It is impossible for a farmer to be always harvesting. The same is true of the Lord’s work. We cannot have a perennial revival. It is impossible to have a perpetual harvest, physical or spiritual. We are so constituted that it is impossible for us to be always on the heights. We would go mad with the strain. We could not endure it. The flesh is still with us.

What many people call revivals are not revivals at all. You have heard of revivals with supposedly great singing, with supposedly great preaching—and with few if any noticeable results. Such meetings are not revivals. They may be extended seasons of singing and preaching, but that is all. A revival is a revival. You do not have to be told you were born. You know it. You were there, not consciously, but you were there. The same is true of a revival. You will know it. You will witness it when it comes. Mere preaching is not enough.

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By Jenifer LeClaire Ministries Classic Sermons Spirit Life

17 Dec: Classic Sermon: Delight in the Will of God

John A. Broadus lived from 1827-1895. Some consider him the father of American expository preaching. Noteworthy is the fact that he was personal friends with Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee and ministered to the Southern Troops in the War Between the States. Let’s listen in to one of his class sermons entitled, “Delight in the Will of God.”

I delight to do thy will, O my God! (Psalm 40:8)

This psalm tells of one who has suffered, been graciously relieved, and now responds in grateful praise and grateful obedience. This is not shown by mere externals of worship, but by delighting to do God’s will, by having his law in the heart, by proclaiming his glorious character and gracious dealings (verses 1-10).

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By Jenifer LeClaire Ministries Classic Sermons Jennifer LeClaire Exclusives Spirit Life

13 Nov: Grieving the Spirit

This is a classic sermon from J. Wilbur Chapman. Chapman pastored several Presbyterian churches before entering evangelism in 1893. He preached with D. L. Moody, Billy Sunday and “Praying” Hyde. Here is an excerpt from this class sermon.

Of all the epistles that ever came from the heart of the great Apostle Paul, this letter to the Ephesians seems to me about the sweetest and best. It is the epistle in which we find “the heavenly places” mentioned so many times; it is the epistle in which we find so many different names applied to our Father in heaven; and I suppose it is the letter in which we find the very highest spiritual truth presented in all the Bible.

But while we find the very highest idea of spiritual things, we also find the Apostle Paul turning to give us instructions concerning the most ordinary affairs of daily life. Some rules are here concerning Christian conversation. Some suggestions are made touching the relation which the husband sustains to the wife, and
the wife to the husband. Indeed, if one should live in the spirit of this letter to the Ephesians, he would do nothing less than live what has been called by some “the life of surrender,” and others “the victorious life,” but which Paul calls “the life in the heavenly places.”

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By Jenifer LeClaire Ministries Classic Sermons Jennifer LeClaire Exclusives Prayer & Spiritual Warfare Spirit Life

22 Oct: Prayer and Fervency by E.M. Bounds

PRAYER, without fervour, stakes nothing on the issue, because it has nothing to stake. It comes with empty hands. Hands, too, which are listless, as well as empty, which have never learned the lesson of clinging to the Cross.

Fervourless prayer has no heart in it; it is an empty thing, an unfit vessel. Heart, soul, and life, must find place in all real praying. Heaven must be made to feel the force of this crying unto God.

Paul was a notable example of the man who possessed a fervent spirit of prayer. His petitioning was all-consuming, centered immovably upon the object of his desire, and the God who was able to meet it.

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By Jenifer LeClaire Ministries Classic Sermons Jennifer LeClaire Exclusives Spirit Life

25 Sep: How to Avoid Falling into Error

Our blessed Lord, though he was the eternal God, yet as man, he made the scriptures his constant rule and guide. And therefore, when he was asked by the lawyer, which was the great commandment of the law, he referred him to his Bible for an answer, “What readest thou?” And thus, when led by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil, he repelled all his assaults, with “it is written.” A sufficient confutation this, of their opinion, who say, “the Spirit only, and not the Spirit by the Word, is to be our rule of action.” If so, our Savior, who had the Spirit without measure, needed not always have referred to the written word. But how few copy after the example of Christ? How many are there who do not regard the word of God at all, but throw the sacred oracles aside, as an antiquated book, fit only for illiterate men? Such do greatly err, not knowing what the scriptures are… Have Christ, then, always in view when you are reading the word of God, and this, like the star in the east, will guide you to the Messiah, will serve as a key to every thing that is obscure, and unlock to you the wisdom and riches of all the mysteries of the kingdom of God.

Search the scriptures with an humble child-like disposition.

For whosoever does not read them with this temper, shall in no wise enter into the knowledge of the things contained in them. For God hides the sense of them, from those that are wise and prudent in their own eyes, and reveals them only to babes in Christ: who think they know nothing yet as they ought to know; who hunger and thirst after righteousness, and humbly desire to be fed with the sincere milk of the word, that they may grow thereby.

Search the scriptures, with a sincere intention to put in practice what you read.

A desire to do the will of God is the only way to know it; if any man will do my will, says Jesus Christ, “He shall know of my doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself.” As he also speaks in another place to his disciples, “To you, (who are willing to practice your duty) it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to those that are without (who only want to raise cavils against my doctrine) all these things are spoken in parables, that seeing they may see and not understand, and hearing they may hear and not perceive.”