Vance havner quotes

The temple of truth has never suffered so much from woodpeckers on the outside as from termites within.

Too many Christians live their Christian lives inside their heads; it never gets out through hands and feet and lips.

Don't ever come to church without coming as though it were the first time, as though it could be the best time, and as though it could be the last time.

Nothing is needed so much as a holy indignation against sin. It is true that there is not enough love for God, and one sign of it is that there is not enough hatred for sin.

At the rate America is decaying morally, we shall have to change our national symbol from an eagle to a vulture.

Too much preaching nowadays pats the back and tickles the ear, but does not get under the skin. There is no conviction and therefore no conversion. I am thinking not only of the ministry of reproof and rebuke but also of the message of inspiration, of encouragement, of comfort. People go out of church at noon with the depths unstirred, the heart untouched, the conscience unpricked.

Because the Lord loves us He chastens and rebukes us. Modern sentimentality has reduced God to a tolerant indulgent grandfatherly being who winks at our transgressions.

If they had a social gospel in the days of the prodigal son, somebody would have given him a bed and a sandwich and he never would have gone home.

We are the salt of the earth, mind you, not the sugar. Our ministry is to truly cleanse and not just to change the taste.

Adam tried to hide behind the trees in the garden. There is only one tree that can hide us from Him and that is the tree of the cross.

Satan does some of his worst work on exhausted Christians when nerves are frayed and the mind is faint.

If you stand on the Word, you do not stand with the world.

Popularity has slain more prophets of God than persecution ever did.

Men love everything but righteousness and fear everything but God.

What we live is what we believe. Everything else is just so much religious talk.

I preach on specific sins because people are not convicted by sermons on sin in general. It was when our Lord said to the Samaritan woman, 'Go call thy husband...' (John 4:16), that she really faced up to her sinfulness.

He who waits on God loses no time.

A picture of Christ was hung in the back of a pulpit. When the minister rose to speak one Sunday morning, a little boy asked his mother, 'Mother, who is that man who stands so we can't see Jesus?'

Some missionaries bound for Africa were laughed at by the boat captain. 'You'll only die over there,' he said. But a missionary replied, 'Captain, we died before we started.'

People used to blush when they were ashamed. Now they are ashamed if they blush. Modesty has disappeared and a brazen generation with no fear of God before its eyes mocks at sin. We are so fond of being called tolerant and broadminded that we wink at sin when we ought to weep.

Most church members live so far below the standard, you would have to backslide to be in fellowship with them.

I'm tired of hearing sin called sickness and alcoholism a disease. It is the only disease I know of that we're spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year to spread.

The devil is not fighting religion. He's too smart for that. He is producing a counterfeit Christianity, so much like the real one that good Christians are afraid to speak out against it. We are plainly told in the Scriptures that in the last days men will not endure sound doctrine and will depart from the faith and heap to themselves teachers to tickle their ears. We live in an epidemic of this itch, and popular preachers have developed “ear-tickling” into a fine art.

I remember when the Titanic sank in 1912, it was the ship that was supposed to be unsinkable. The only thing it ever did was sink. When it took off from England, all kinds of passengers were aboard - millionaires, celebrities, people of moderate means, and poor folks down in the steerage. But a few hours later when they put the list in the Cunard office in New York, it carried only two categories - lost and saved. Grim tragedy had leveled all distinctions.

We are suffering from a believism that never has believed, and a receivism that never has received, and it leads to deceivism.

We have always needed old people to keep things from going too fast and young people to keep them from going too slow. Youth has fire and age has light and we need both.

Faith doesn't wait until it understands; in that case it wouldn't be faith.

Abraham did not know where he was going immediately, but he knew where he was going ultimately. He did not know the Whither but he knew the Whom. He believed God, and, being sure of his destiny, he did not worry about his destination.

We need men of the cross, with the message of the cross, bearing the marks of the cross.

When the Lord's white sheep become dirty gray, all black sheep feel more comfortable.

When God's people are removed from this earth, you might as well try to dam up Niagara Falls with toothpicks as to stem the flood of lawlessness that will engulf mankind. Thank God for the restraining Spirit today!

The Word of God is either absolute or obsolete.

Real revival does not begin with joyous singing. It begins with conviction and repentance on the part of Christians.

The early Christians condemned false doctrine in a way that sounds almost unchristian today.

It is not our business to make the message acceptable, but to make it available. We are not to see that they like it, but that they get it.

I would just as soon listen to a gangster lecture on honesty as watch Hollywood portray the Bible.

The tragedy of today is that the situation is desperate but the saints are not.

A preacher should have the mind of a scholar, the heart of a child, and the hide of a rhinoceros. His problem is how to toughen his hide without hardening his heart.

When a man makes alliance with the Almighty, giants look like grasshoppers.

Our Lord sent His disciples out as sheep among wolves; now the wolves are being invited into the sheepfold.

The devil will let a preacher prepare a sermon if it will keep him from preparing himself.

Satan is not fighting churches; he is joining them. He does more harm by sowing tares than by pulling up wheat. He accomplishes more by imitation than by outright opposition.

If you see a Bible that is falling apart, it probably belongs to someone who isn't!

Where are the marks of the cross in your life? Are there any points of identification with your Lord? Alas, too many Christians wear medals but carry no scars.

Some ministers preach from notes and some don't. They have argued about it for centuries. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. Two Welsh preachers were on their way to a meeting. One noticed that the other carried written outlines. 'Ah,' he remonstrated, 'you cannot carry fire on paper.' 'True,' replied his companion, 'but you can use paper to start a fire!'

Our Lord approved neither idol worship or idle worship but ideal worship in Spirit and truth.

What gives the Word of God authority is simply the fact that it is the word of God!

No nation can last long when it stops praying and takes up playing.

The same church members who yell like Comanche Indians at a ball game on Saturday sit like wooden Indians in church on Sunday.

The devil is not fighting religion. He´s too smart for that. He is producing a counterfeit Christianity, so much like the real one that good Christians are afraid to speak out against it.

Paul was not ignorant of Satan's devices, but we are not so wise. Among his most successful devices today are these: exalting tolerance above truth; emphasizing the head more than the heart; making size more important than sort; stressing the positive to the neglect of the negative; putting happiness above holiness; majoring on this world instead of the next.

A mortician can make a dead man look better than he ever did when he was alive. So churches like Sardis may appear very much alive when they are dead in the sight of the Lord. God knows the difference.

The church is so subnormal that if it ever got back to the New Testament normal it would seem to people to be abnormal.

Let it never be forgotten that, although we may do nothing about the Word we hear, the Word will do something to us. The same sun melts ice and hardens clay, and the Word of God humbles or hardens the human heart.

The thermometer of a church is its prayer meeting.

The gospel is for lifeboats, not showboats, and a man must make up his mind which boat he is going to operate.

Some preachers ought to put more fire into their sermons or more sermons into the fire.

Worse than blind leaders of the blind are bland leaders of the bland.

There is no devil in the first two chapters of the Bible and no devil in the last two chapters. Thank God for a book that disposes of the devil!

There never has been a culture since this world began in which a New Testament Christian could feel at home.

God judges what we tolerate as well as what we practice. Too often we put up with things we ought to put out.

A preacher who is too big for a little crowd would be too little for a big crowd.

We are fighting the greatest battle of all time with the most untrained army on earth. If strict discipline is necessary in art and athletics, how can we expect to be advanced Christians and stay in kindergarten?

Our efficiency without God's sufficiency is only a deficiency.

Many people are in a rut and a rut is nothing but a grave-with both ends kicked out.

Salvation is a helmet, not a nightcap.

One man with a genuine experience with God is worth more than a library full of arguments.

The alternative to discipline is disaster

Civilization today reminds me of an ape with a blowtorch playing in a room full of dynamite. It looks like the monkeys are about to operate the zoo, and the inmates are taking over the asylum.

In other days people chose a church on the basis of their doctrinal convictions. Now, lacking doctrinal convictions, they choose for social reasons.

The real test of your Christianity is not how pious you look at the Lord's table on Sunday, but how you act at the breakfast table at home. If it takes two cups of coffee to make you fit to live with, you had better go to the mourner's bench.

A wife who is 85 percent faithful to her husband is not faithful at all. There is no such thing as part-time loyalty to Jesus Christ.

Somehow the idea has gotten around that it is unchristian to take a stand against heresy. Some of us need to read the New Testament again.

The primary qualification for a missionary is not love for souls, as we so often hear, but love for Christ.

The last word of our Lord to the church was not the Great Commission. The last thing He said to the church was 'Repent.' He said that to five out of seven.

The middle of the road is a poor place to walk. It is a poor place to drive. It is a poor place to live.

The world does not hate its own. It does hate our Lord. It hates His followers. Where do you belong in this lineup?

Nobody in pulpit or pew needs a revival more than a bitter-spirited fundamentalist with his dispensations right and his disposition wrong.

We've learned how to lengthen life, but we don't know how to deepen it.

If you are what you've always been, you are not a Christian. A Christian is a new creation.

Too many are willing to sit at God’s table, but not work in his field.

People get so used to the dark that they think it is growing brighter.

You can't preach it like it is if you don't believe it like it was.

God has a place and purpose for you, somewhere for you to be and something for you to do. You never will be happy elsewhere, nor can you please God anywhere but there.

We may never be martyrs but we can die to self, to sin, to the world, to our plans and ambitions. That is the significance of baptism; we died with Christ and rose to new life.

More Bibles are bought and fewer read than any other book.

If the devil cannot keep you from being saved, if next he fails to make you backslide, then he undertakes to keep you just an average Christian. Here he succeeds with most believers.

We are not to be isolated but insulated, moving in the midst of evil but untouched by it.

Revival is simply New Testament Christianity, the saints going back to normal.

A soft and sheltered Christianity, afraid to be lean and lone, unwilling to face the storms and brave the heights, will end up fat and foul in the cages of conformity.

Jesus Christ demands more complete allegiance than any dictator who ever lived. The difference is, He has a right to it.

To some Christianity is an argument. To many it is a performance. To a few, it is experience.

You always enter God's hospital as a charity patient. You can't pay your way.

When I pastored a country church, a farmer didn't like the sermons I preached on hell. He said, Preach about the meek and lowly Jesus. I said, That's where I got my information about hell.

If you lack knowledge, go to school. If you lack wisdom, get on your knees.

I have often been reminded of the wild duck that came down on migration into a barnyard and liked it so well that he stayed there. In the fall his erstwhile companions passed overhead and his first impulse was to rise and join them, but he had fed too well and could rise no higher than the eaves of the barn. The day came when his old fellow travelers could pass overhead without his even hearing their call. I have seen men and women who once mounted up with wings like eagles but are now content to live in the barnyard of this world.

There is a trend today that would put a new robe on the prodigal son while he is still feeding hogs. Some would put the ring on his finger while he still in the pigsty. Others would paint the pigsty and advocate bigger and better hog pens.

A revival is the church falling in love with Jesus Christ all over again.

If you are a Christian, you are not a citizen of this world trying to get to heaven; you are a citizen of heaven making your way through this world.

No man can be a Christian by knowingly and willfully taking Christ on the installment plan, as Savior now, and Lord later.

God isn't a talent scout looking for someone who is "good enough" or "strong enough." He is looking for someone with a heart set on Him, and He will do the rest.

The preacher who jests and jokes with his people all week will soon find that he cannot stand in his pulpit on Sunday with power to reprove, rebuke and exhort. He may be the life of the party but it will be the death of the prophet.

We are challenged these days, but not changed; convicted, but not converted. We hear, but do not; and thereby we deceive ourselves.

Before we can strengthen believers or win the lost, we must be converted from the self-life to the Christ-life. . . "Not I, but Christ."

There was a time when ministers spoke forthrightly and named things. We don't name anything anymore. Finney had a sermon on How to Preach so as to Convert Nobody. He said 'Preach on sin but never mention any of the sins of your congregation - that will do it.'

We need a dedicated minority who, like the apostles of old, are willing to be called the scum of the earth and a spectacle to the world for the scandal of the cross.

We justify ourselves when we should judge ourselves. If we learned humility, it might spare us the humiliation.

God is on the lookout today for a man who will be quiet enough to get a message from Him, brave enough to preach it, and honest enough to live it.

It is one of the ironies of the ministry that the very man who works in God's name is often hardest put to find time for God. The parents of Jesus lost Him at church, and they were not the last ones to lose Him there.

There are many who say they want to be victorious Christians, but few are willing to endure the discipline necessary to make one a good solider of Jesus Christ. There is a prize to possess, but before we possess it there is a price to be paid, and few will pay it.

Christians, like snowflakes, are frail, but when they stick together they can stop traffic.

It is one thing to say Jesus is all you want; until He is all you have and you discover He is all you ever needed.

Any man who takes Jesus Christ seriously becomes the target of the devil. Most church members do not give Satan enough trouble to arouse his opposition

Salt seasons, purifies, preserves. But somebody ought to remind us that salt also irritates. Real living Christianity rubs this world the wrong way.

What we love usually manages to get into our conversation. What is down in the well of the heart will come up in the bucket of the speech.

Sometimes your medicine bottle has on it, "shake well before using." That is what God has to do with some of His people. He has to shake them well before they are ever usable.

God's deepest secrets often miss the wise and prudent and are revealed unto babes. We say, "Children, be like your parents." Jesus said, "Parents, be like your children."

If you can't pray as you want to, pray as you can. God knows what you mean.

What our Lord said about cross-bearing and obedience is not in fine type. It is in bold print on the face of the contract.

Many people have the right aim in life, they just never get around to pulling the trigger. The vision must be followed by the venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps -- we must step up the stairs.

It is not that God is stingy and must be coaxed, for He "giveth liberally and upbraideth not." It is that we ourselves are so shallow and sinful that we need to tarry before Him until our restless natures can be stilled and the clamor of outside voices be deadened so that we can hear His voice. Such a state is not easily reached, and the men God uses have paid a price in wrestlings and prevailing prayer. But it is such men who rise from their knees confident of His power and go forth to speak with authority.

Too many church services start at eleven sharp and end at twelve dull.

The preacher who is concerned with gaining a reputation, rising in his profession, is always in bondage. The itch for bigness is a dangerous thing. It has made a castaway of many a man whom God once richly blessed. A man should desire to be neither larger nor smaller than pleases God. Better than that, he should not bother at all about how large or how small but rather how faithful he shall be.

We are not going to move this world by criticism of it nor conformity to it, but by the combustion within it of lives ignited by the Spirit of God.

We have suffered from the preaching of cheap grace. Grace is free, but it is not cheap. People will take anything that is free, but they are not interested in discipleship. They will take Christ as Savior but not as Lord.