Maybe We Should Decorate the Ark...

This sermon from Leonard Ravenhill from over 20 years ago is very applicable today to churches who decide to apply man-made methods in doing God's work and purposes. Just as David decided it was appropriate to build a cart to help transport the ark of the covenant, churches today try all sorts of techniques and methods in attempts to "improve" upon God's methods, resulting in disobedience and spiritual death.

It's a sad and dangerous thing to see happening all around us.

here is an excerpt....

"... All this man did was try to steady the ark of God (Uzzah, 2 Samuel chapter 6). Oh mercy, how we’re trying to steady the ark of God these days. We don’t just want to steady it. We want to do some new thing.

We’d paint it.
We’d put a musical box inside of it.
We’d put the priest in some new garments.
We’d try to make it more acceptable!

The power and the presence of God were resting on that tabernacle. And while they were obedient, they had success. Are we steadying the ark of God in the way we are presenting the gospel these days?

The gospel is still the power of God unto salvation to all who believe. I heard somebody say, "Well, you know, there’s a different approach today". Is there? Is there really? Is there any difference between the grief of somebody who’s heartbroken today and the grief of somebody who lived three thousand years ago? We say, "Human nature is changed". Human nature has not changed! Human nature is still a sinful nature. Human nature still needs God. It seems though, God is trying to check us, but we won’t take the checking. We won’t take the warning. And again I say to you, the most distressing area, I believe, is the area of the church itself. We are trying to steady the ark.
We don’t want God Almighty to govern the whole thing.
We want a little bit of flesh in it.
We want a little bit of humanism in it.
We want a little bit of organization in it.
We want some of our skill in it.
And God holds off.
The word of God says, "Some trust in chariots, and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the Lord our God." Oh, I’m aching on the inside to see somebody that really, really, really has no confidence in the flesh."

--excerpt from a sermon preached by Leonard Ravenhill, Who's Touching the Ark? May 14, 1983