Christian - Awake from Your Slumber

The Judgment Seat of Christ - Leonard Ravenhill

Oh God, stamp eternity on my eyeballs! But you know if God should stamp eternity or even judgment on our eyeballs or if you’d like on the fleshy table of our hearts. I am quite convinced we’d be a very very different tribe of people, God’s people, in the world today.

We live too much in time, we are too earth bound. We see as others men see. We think as other men thinks. We invest our time as the world invests it. We invest our money. We are supposed to be a different breed of people. I believe that the Church of Jesus Christ needs a new revelation of the majesty of God. We’re all going to stand one day… can you imagine it?.. At the judgment seat of Christ to give an account for the deeds done in the body.

This is what – this is the King of kings and He’s the Judge of judges and it’s the Tribunal of tribunals and there’s no court of appeal after it. The verdict is final.

Listen, when you see Jesus, you’re not going to go up and say “Hey buddy, I’m glad You died for me.” When you see Jesus you will be almost paralyzed with fear unless you have a glorified body and a glorified mind.

You say, “Well Mr. Ravenhill, I won’t be in serious trouble because you know, I don’t have a good memory.” Well, I’ll tell you what, you’ll have one that day. In Malachi, it says that God has a book of remembrance. And I think it would do you good before you go to bed every night this week to ask God, “What did you put in Your book today for my life?”

Did you get up this morning and thank God you are pure, huh? Did you thank Him that the devilish fever you use to have for sniffing cocaine or drugs of something that He broke the shackles of it? Are you really glad you’re not a prostitute now, you’re going to be a part of the Bride of the Lamb? Are you glad He had remove from your heart covetousness and bad temper and all those creepy horrible things that use to master you?

The most shattering thought I’d ever had is my personal accountability to God one day. We are not going to be judged just because of what we’ve done, we’re going to be judged for why we did it! Not for the action, for the motive. What motivated your giving? Why? What’s the motive behind it? He doesn’t just take your sins, he takes your self, He takes the government of your life. And it is not only true we live in a world of bankrupt politics, we live in a world, and this is the tragic of all, of a bankrupt church.

When in God’s Name is the church going to open her heart again and open her mind again and see again? Can God forgive every sin I’ve ever committed? I said, He sure can. That is if you repent of your sin and you plead for the Blood of Christ and you ask for mercy. That tender Christ who went about doing good and He kissed little babies and blessed people… Now, ahh… there is nothing more beautiful than a little lamb. There is nothing more terrible than the wrath of the Lamb.

God should bring every work into judgment with every secret thing. The dead, small, and great are going to stand before God in that awesome day. But say, Am I just a showman? What’s my secret life like? ‘Cause God has not merely given us Jesus Christ, He has given us all things. And because there isn’t enough joy in the house of God, we need entertainment. Because entertainment is the devil’s substitute for joy.

I think before we point the finger at the world, we better turn to the church and say: “Look we’d better all get sackcloth and ashes and humble ourselves and say Almighty God.”

When I see the church in the New Testament, the didn’t have stately buildings, they didn’t have paid evangelists. They didn’t have a lot of money. They didn’t have organization. They couldn’t get on TV and beg. But I’ll tell you what they did – they turned the world upside down!! And I’m embarrassed to be a part of the church of Jesus today because I believe it’s an embarrassment to a Holy God.

Most of our joy is clapping our hands and having a good time and then afterward, we’re talking all the dribble of the world.

Oh to be lost in Him! To be consumed in Him!

You get so near to the heart of God, that you share His grief over a world and over a backslidden church that we have today. Because if you’re going to get mature in God, all the dwarfs around you will criticize and sneer at you and say, “You’re trying to be holier than the rest of us, huh?”

You’ll discover this – the men who have been most heroic for God have been the men with the greatest devotional life. The only thing that will tie me in victory continually through the Blood of Christ is my personal devotions to Him, the Son of God. My adoration that I give Him my tribute everyday. It’s more than my service, it is more than giving my money. That I love Him and I adore Him and I magnify Him and I take Him as it were by the feet.

You know why the world is poor and sick outside? Because we really don’t know how to pray, that’s why.

I’ve said it many times, so I say it again this morning – that no man is greater than his prayer life. Let me live with a man awhile and share his prayer life and i’ll tell you how tall I think he is or how majestic I think he is in God.

It’s going to be an awesome day. You see there is no possible… no possibility of any rehearsal. And what, there’s no possibility of any repetition. Because again this is the final judgment.

I think again of a statement Dr. Tozer made to me once. He said, “Len you know what?” He said, “We’ll hardly get our feet out of time into eternity and gaze on eternity that we bow our heads in shame and humiliation and say: “My God, look at all the richest there were in Jesus Christ and I come to the judgment seat almost a pauper.”

Master forgive, and inspire us anew. Banish our worldliness, help us to ever live with eternity’s values in view.

Said that great man who birthed that revival – “God stamp eternity on my eyeballs.”

You know, if we can’t live as a different breed of people on this earth, we have no right to live here. And if we get back to a people who are really baptized with obedience, submissive to the total will of God. Not concerned about human opinion, not asking for more to spend prodigally on ourselves but say, “Oh God, I want this life of mine adjusted so when I stand in Your awesome presence.” As James says – we shall not be ashamed of His appearing.