Isaiah chapter 40, reading from verse 29, He
giveth power to the faint, and to them
that have no might He increaseth strength.
Even the youth shall faint and be weary,
and the young men shall utterly fall.
But they that wait upon the Lord shall
renew their strength.
They shall mount up with wings as eagles,
they shall run and not be weary.
And they shall walk and not faint.
When God wanted to remind Israel of His
power, He said in the 19th chapter of
Exodus there, in verse 4, You've seen what
I did unto the Egyptians, and how I
bear you on eagles' wings.
But they that wait upon the Lord shall
renew their strength.
They shall mount up with wings as eagles,
they shall run and not be weary.
And they shall walk and not faint.
When God wanted to remind Israel of His
power, He said in the 19th chapter of
Exodus there, in verse 4, You've seen what
I did unto the Egyptians, and how I
bear you on eagles' wings, and brought you
unto myself.
So there God likens Himself to an eagle.
When He wanted to pay tribute to the
skill and the ability of King Saul and
his son Jonathan, He says in the second
book of Samuel, chapter 1 and verse 23,
Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in
their lives, and in their death they were
not divided.
They were swifter than eagles, and they were
stronger than lions.
A wonderful compliment.
And God says of us, His people, that
they that wait upon the Lord shall renew
their strength.
Now you remember in history we've been taught
that there was the Ice Age and the
Stone Age, and then there's this ridiculous age
in which we live.
And, you know, today men, whether they're scientists
or cynics, they're trying to write a kind
of epitaph for this age in which we
live.
Cynics are doing it, scientists are doing it,
scholars are doing it.
One person has said we live in the
most cruel age that man has ever known.
With increasing wisdom there comes increasing devilry, because
not until this age was it possible for
men to invent something that can burn a
whole city up in a matter of 60
seconds.
But we can do that in the day
in which we live, that's called progress.
But if I were to put a tab
on the age in which we live, I
would say it's an impatient age.
Everything now has to be instant.
You know, instant coffee, instant tea.
You serve coffee, instant tea.
You send an order in to Sears and
say, could you have had it delivered an
hour ago?
And we want everything doing yesterday.
It's a mark of the age in which
we live, it is a restless age.
And yet God says here that they that
wait upon the Lord, well, that's almost a
lost art.
I almost said a lost science, it's almost
a lost art in the day in which
we live.
Because, again, we're impatient.
The psalmist says, I think, in the 37th
Psalm, I waited patiently for the Lord.
We have an idea that God's on call,
immediately like that, we can rush about and
then say, Lord, you just intervene right now
and get this thing done and let me
get on my way, because I'm in a
desperate hurry.
Not only does the prophet here say, they
that wait upon the Lord shall renew their
strength.
Not only does the psalmist say, I waited
patiently for the Lord, but also he says
that they that, the patient people that wait
upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth.
Now, I think this is a stupendous thing
that God says here.
They that wait upon the Lord shall renew
their strength, they shall mount up with wings
as eagles.
Well, bless you, most of us live like
sparrows.
The eagle lives in heavenly places.
The eagle is the king of the sky.
The ox is the king of the domestic
animals.
The lion is the king of wild animals.
The eagle has more peculiarities and unusual features
about it than any other bird at all.
And God says of us that this is
what we're designed to do.
We're not made to live on this dirty
old mud ball.
Would suit none of us if he said,
they that wait upon the Lord shall live
like owls.
Most of you folks stay up half the
night.
Anyhow, it would suit you okay.
Owls live in rotten old trees and they're
quite happy to live there.
Sparrows flutter about, there are millions of them.
Dirty, messy little things they are.
And now the starlings have come back.
I wish they'd go somewhere else.
Starlings are not my darlings, anyhow.
But they come round our house in flocks.
A man said to me the other day,
there's a million starlings in your yard.
He was an evangelist, exaggerated as usual, but
there it was.
We had flocks and flocks of starlings.
And immediately I thought that God hasn't called
me a starling.
We're not roosters in a farmyard.
We're not birds that scratch on the ground
and dig up for worms and all the
junk.
But even before we get to the text,
in studying this I remember the fact that
a few years ago I watched an artist
doing a picture.
And every day that picture grew and I
opened my mouth and I saw the beauty
in the skill and I saw what the
artist was trying to get to.
And then on the final day a frame,
a gold frame was put round that beautiful,
beautiful piece of art.
And suddenly the picture took life.
It seemed as though there was as much
almost in that artistic gold frame as there
was in the picture.
The one complemented the other.
Now let's look at the framework here for
a minute or two here in this 40th
chapter of Isaiah.
Isaiah is the one who exalts God.
He shows us his majesty.
At least 21 times, 17 times in the
first half of the book.
No, 12 times in the first half of
the book, chapters 1 to 39.
He speaks of the holiness of God.
And then in chapters 39 to the end
of the book, he speaks again over and
over and over about 17 times about the
holiness of God.
I say very often to people now, let
me ask you this morning here, did you
really come here to meet God this morning
or to hear a sermon about him?
Did you expect to leave this audience kind
of drunk with the concept of the majesty
of God in a world of turmoil, a
world of restlessness, where there seems to be
no security, there's nothing you can forecast about
tomorrow?
The world's on the edge, we're told, of
an explosion.
We feel as though we're balancing on the
edge of a razor.
And if ever there was a day when
we need to lift up our eyes to
the hills, when we need to see the
majesty of God, the one who created the
heaven and the earth, that God is my
God.
He's not merely the God of Elijah, he's
not merely the God of the Old Testament
prophets, he's not merely the God, the father
of the Lord Jesus, he's my God, he's
my father.
And as a father pities his children, so
the Lord pities them that fear him.
Now this fortieth chapter begins, Comfort ye, comfort
ye, my people saith your God.
This is just the property of God's people.
The rest of the world's made up of
sparrows and unclean birds, but we're to mount
up with wings as eagles.
And if there's any comfort needed and any
comfort given, it is given through God.
It is given through the Word of God.
In the fourteenth of John, twenty-six, verse
twenty-six, Jesus says, the Comforter, who is
the Holy Ghost, will come.
Well again, he's not a nursing mother for
spiritually sick children, but indeed he is a
Comforter.
He talks in the Old Testament, in Isaiah
again, about a man doing something, and he
comforted it with nails.
Well, nails aren't too comfortable.
No, the word actually means he made it
secure, and there's comfort in security.
And there is no bird more secure than
the eagle.
He puts his nest there in an inaccessible
place, and almost inevitably in the cleft of
a rock.
That cannot be swayed, it cannot be moved.
But again, the comfort here is to God's
people.
This is the framework, I say.
Well, what kind of a God is he?
Did you this morning, with all your compassion,
have you given a passing thought that there
are millions of people groveling in the dust
this morning, and they take broken hearts to
God who have no hearts?
That they're crying, and their voices can't be
heard by their gods?
Millions of them.
And those who don't have gods of wood
and stone have got gods of materialism.
A lady called me yesterday from Houston.
She's one of the great characters in America
today.
She's been living in a hellhole there.
She's a very distinguished, gifted, young Jewish lady
who was converted, and used to run a
booking residence on the strip in California, and
God saved her.
And now, as C.T. Studwood say, she
runs a rescue shop within a yard of
hell.
And she said to me yesterday, you know,
I'm so indignant about this situation.
Our nation's humiliated by a man who seemingly
is intoxicated.
He's mad, religiously mad there in Iran.
But she says, Brother Ravenhill, people get so
disturbed when they see the flag being burned.
And yet Americans burn it every day with
their immorality.
The publication of filthy literature we send around
the world, dirty films we send around the
world.
There are countries in the world won't accept
any American films anymore.
They question every bit of literature that we
send.
And while we talk about all glory, we
cover it with shame every day, with our
divorces, and our immorality, and our sin.
We're burning the flag, never mind the rest
of the world.
Everything it stood for is being dishonored.
And yet, when you think again, the same
is true of the cross of Jesus Christ.
It seems to have lost its luster and
lost its wonder.
The Word of God clearly says there is
no God like unto our God.
What does it say here?
I need to rush on.
I have a lot to tell you this
morning, as usual.
Isaiah 40 verse 13 says, "...who hath directed
the Spirit of the Lord, or being his
counselor, who hath taught him.
With whom took he counsel, and who instructed
him, and taught him in the path of
judgment, and taught him knowledge, and showed him
the way of understanding.
This God I serve is the essence of
all wisdom, all power, all authority, all majesty,
all glory."
I was reading about those black holes up
in the sky.
It's getting worse.
I thought all the black holes were on
earth, but they've got them up in the
sky now.
And we think maybe they've burned out stars,
and they have a power of suction.
They can draw things into them.
Well, somebody has said up through there somewhere
in infinity, man is beginning to tap the
powers of creation.
Well, whether he is or not, I want
to tell you, I know the person that
put it all there.
And I've got no nerves about it.
I know he's a God of majesty.
I know he's a God of glory.
I know he never went to school.
I know nobody gave him any instruction.
That's what it says clearly, very here, here
very clearly.
Verse 17, all nations before him are as
nothing, and they accounted to him less than
nothing.
Verse 18, to whom then will ye liken
God, or what likeness will ye compare unto
him?
Well, let's leap over and find out what
it's like in verse 22.
It is he that sitteth upon the circle
of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are
as grasshoppers, that stretcheth out the heavens as
a curtain, and that spreadeth them out as
a tent to dwell in.
He bringeth the princes to nothing.
He maketh the judges of the earth as
vanity.
Yea, they shall not be planted.
Yea, they shall not be sown.
Yea, their stock shall not take root in
the earth.
And he shall also blow upon them, and
they shall wither, and the wind shall take
them away as stubble.
Verse 25, to whom then will ye liken
me, or shall I be equal, saith the
Lord?
Now lift up your eyes.
Well, isn't that where the eagle lives?
He doesn't scratch about on the earth.
He doesn't buddy-buddy with, uh, rooks and
and crows and sparrows.
He ignores them.
He lives in an entirely different world.
But he says here, you lift up your
eyes on high, and behold what created the
thing, these things.
He bringeth out the stars, their host, which
means against the stars.
I like a hymn that was written by,
uh, who wrote it now?
Oh, the man that wrote, When I surveyed
the wondrous cross, Isaac Watts.
Always reminds me of this hymn.
He says he made the stars, those heavenly
flames.
He counts their numbers, calls their names.
His wisdom's vast and knows no bound, a
deep, where all our thoughts are ground, are
drowned.
What is the creature's skill or force?
The sprightly man, the warlike horse, the piercing
wit, the active limb, all are to mean
delights for him, but saints are lovely in
his sight.
He views his children with delight.
He seeks their, sees their hopes, and he
knows their fears, and he looks, and he
loves his image there.
But again, it says the stars.
Look on high, behold he hath created, who
hath created these things, and he bringeth out
their host by number.
He calleth them all by their names.
I remember one night, I'd been to do
one of those things they do in England,
uh, at night time, after, uh, supper time
is about nine o'clock.
And there was a fish and chip shop
at the top of our street, and they
always opened at night with the leftovers from
the night before.
They threw them in the old boiling oil,
you know, of fat, and and we went,
and you got a fish for a penny.
Half a one for half a penny.
And my mother, when she was, you know,
felt good, she'd give me a half penny
for half a fish.
Sometimes she got generous, gave me a whole
penny.
And, and I go to the fish and
chip shop, and I was coming down the
street one day, and I saw the stars.
It was a frosty night, and I remember
there's a kind of a streak in the
sky, and I said, Mother, the sky's very
different tonight.
There's a kind of a streak like the
teacher makes with chalk through the sky.
Now, I don't know how she knew, but
she said, that's called the Milky Way.
Well, all I knew about milk was what
came out of a cow, but she said,
that's the Milky Way up there.
And then afterwards, I read about it.
It was estimated there were maybe a million
stars, and it is the only unique path
in the sky like that, the Milky Way.
Well, of course, since then, since I was
a boy, a generation or two ago, they,
uh, the world has changed.
They have a telescope on Mount Palomar now,
with a 63-inch lens.
I'd love to look through it.
It must have been made in Ireland, because
you're to sit inside of it to look
through it.
And once you get inside of it, and
then you begin to see all the Earth.
Do you know what science is telling us?
We live in an expanding world, a shrinking
world, and an expanding universe.
Every new plane we make shrinks the world.
They get, it took, Wesley, I was reading
this week, it took him three months to
cross the Atlantic.
You can cross it in three hours now,
if it's a British plane.
But, uh, three hours instead of three months.
Every new invention, we shrink the world, but
we expand the universe.
If you were to take a match and
strike it, what the flame of that match
is to the sun up there, that sun
is, the sun's away in infinity.
It is not true there's only one Milky
Way.
There are hundreds of Milky Ways.
It is not true there are millions of
stars.
There are billions and trillions and quadrillions.
And you know what?
He knows their names.
Well, if almighty God is interested in stars,
they can't sing his praises.
He didn't redeem them.
Are you trying to fool me and tell
me he doesn't know my name?
He doesn't know my address?
Didn't God say one day when somebody had
to go down to Ananias, Ananias, rather, go
down to a street, call straight, and knock
on the door of a certain man, and
that's Peter?
Well, if he knew the name and address
of Peter, he knows my name and address
too.
Well, thank you, there's two of us.
But, he knows our names.
What a God with such majesty and glory
that he knows the very names of the
stars.
When Themistocles was the mayor of Athens, there
were over 20,000 people lived in the
city.
And he could recite the name of every
person who lived in the city.
He was so concerned about them.
And yet it says here that this God,
he made the stars.
He calls them by names, by the greatness
of his might, that he is strung in
power.
Verse 28 says, Hast thou not known, hast
thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the
creator of the ends of the earth, he
fainteth not, neither is weary, neither is any
searching of his understanding.
Don't you think we need a new concept
of the majesty of God, as well as
of the holiness of God?
He hangs the world on nothing.
Took the American government, I don't know, 50
billion dollars to find that out.
They sent some men to the moon, and
everybody looks at the moon and wonders why
it has no props.
If we'd made it, we'd have stuck props
and all kinds of gadgets around it.
God hangs it on nothing.
But one of the astronauts says, the thing
that astonished me was, as I looked at
the moon and then looked back, the earth
was hanging on nothing.
Takes a bit of strength to hold the
world up, but God does it by the
very breath of his nostrils, as it were.
Now this is God, the God of infinite
power, the God of infinite glory, the God
of infinite mercy, the God who knows your
name, and he knows your circumstances, and he
knows everything through which you go.
The psalmist says, there's not a thought in
my mind that what thou knowest it altogether,
you say it's impossible.
Four billion people on the earth, and at
this given moment, God knows the name, and
he knows the emotion of every heart.
Well, I was reading the other day that
they've invented a new computer.
They're old, you know, about three weeks after
they invent them, but anyhow, they've invented a
new one.
The new supercomputer is called Gray One.
The new one is called Gray Two.
Do you know what it can do?
It can register 80 million things a day.
No, a second.
Now do a bit of homework this afternoon,
instead of watching the cowboys.
80 million a second?
How many is that in a, in a,
in a minute?
How many in an hour?
You don't ask for the rod before you
leave, he'll tell you.
But anyhow, 80 million a second?
And that's a machine made out of a
mind like mine, maybe a bit bigger, but,
uh, it's made by a human mind, and
yet it can register 80 million different things
in a second?
Are you suggesting the creator isn't greater than
the created?
And this is the God, I said that
as introduction, because this is the God you're
invited to wait upon.
That they that wait upon this Lord, who
hangs the world upon nothing, who has never
been, never been baffled by a situation, who
has never been beaten.
The God who cannot die, the God who
cannot lie.
He says, if I wait upon that God,
I shall renew my strength.
You see, the contrast is here.
Even the youth shall faint and be weary.
That they that wait upon the, pardon me,
verse 29, he giveth power to the faint,
and even the youth shall faint.
But there is a text that says, and
God, he cannot faint.
Now again, we're, we're to be likened again
to the eagle.
It's a beautiful bird, it's a unique bird.
Look at the 39th chapter in the book
of Job.
Job 39 and verse 27 says, Doth the
eagle mount up at thy command, and make
her nest on high?
She dwelleth and abideth on the rock, upon
the crag of the rock, and the strong
place.
From thence she seeth afar off, seeketh afar
off, and her eyes behold afar off.
Her young ones also suck up blood, and
where the slain are, there is she.
She makes her nest where?
On the rock.
Verse 27 says, She maketh her nest on
high, and she dwelleth and abideth on the
rock, and on the crag of the rock.
Say, where have you made this nest, your
nest this morning?
Have you made it on the rock, Christ
Jesus?
The rock that cannot be moved?
She always builds her nest in a place
of security.
If there are no mountains, she'll take the
highest of the trees that it's possible to
find.
I was reading recently in a certain book
there that it says that uh, when Lewis
and Carroll, you know those, Lewis and Clark,
those famous evangelist, uh, explorers, were going through
America when they came to Missouri Falls, they
reported that they saw the, the, the nest
of an eagle, and they, they made, they
pinpointed it, and said it was extremely large.
Do you know that 50 years after that,
that, that eagle's nest was still there?
There's a place called Vermillion in Ohio, and
years ago, in a high tree, I think
a cottonwood tree, the eagles built their nest.
And every year, they don't destroy the old
nest, every year they add to the nest.
Finally, after many years, a storm blew the,
the nest down.
Do you know how big it was?
It was seven feet across, it was six
feet deep, and it weighed two tons.
That's quite a nest.
The eagle builds a nest in a place
of security, and there's a lovely old hymn
that says, he hideth my soul in the,
in the cleft of the rock.
I'm not left to unexposed danger.
There's a scripture that says, your life, your
life, here it is, this is your life,
it's hid with Christ, in God.
That's pretty secure, isn't it?
Could you get it any better anywhere else?
She buildeth her, dwelleth and abideth on the
rock, on the, on the, uh, crag of
the rock, and a strong place.
The study says, the young ones also suck
up blood.
A unique feature about this, it will never
steal the lettuce out of your garden, an
eagle won't condescend to that.
It won't steal your corn, those coons do
it.
I went out for a piece of wood
for the fire last night, there was a,
a big fat possum eating the cat's meat
outside.
Don't think an eagle would condescend even to
steal that thing, it's the ugliest thing I've
seen, I think.
No, no, no, the eagle won't come round
your garden, pecking around.
He doesn't do like those birds on the
road, you know, when somebody runs over a
rabbit or something, and you see those great
big vultures, he, no, he, he scorns death,
he wants everything alive.
He's a great poacher.
Last year, they took some men over in,
uh, near, um, uh, near the Rockies, who
were going up in planes, and they were
shooting eagles.
Because what?
They were stealing the lambs.
Well, the only thing is, you shot the
eagle, you couldn't pick it up.
It dropped on the ground, and the, uh,
the forest rangers were picking them up, and
they watched these men, and they, I believe,
actually sent them to jail.
But the bird likes something live, it will
not eat garbage.
Don't you wish a lot of Christians wouldn't?
What a lot of garbage we eat.
What magazines?
Some women can't get through the months without
the Red Book, or something like that.
But the eagle doesn't go after garbage like
that.
He won't steal something dead on the road,
not unless he's totally starving.
But he goes down, and he gets a
young lamb, or he gets something else.
And he carries it squealing up there into
the, into the sky.
And then he has, he has awesome claws.
Oh, he has lovely claws.
You know, this book, I could tell you
a lot more time than I will take
this morning.
But, but this bird is so unique.
Well, of course, he has to have a
girlfriend.
And after he has a girlfriend, he has
a certain call.
He makes, which I wouldn't imitate, but he
makes a certain call.
And she may be miles away, and she
hears it.
And she goes and joins him in the
air.
And they go up, they float up in
the sky.
And when he gets up there, he grabs
her.
Not by the throat, that comes later.
He flies up there, and suddenly makes a
call, and they come together.
And he gets her claws in his claws,
and they spin over, and he rolls her
around, and takes her for a rollercoaster trip,
and says, well, sweetie, how do you like
that?
Strength.
And she delights in it.
Well, if that bird can take its female
friend, and give it ecstasy like that, God
says, I'll put underneath, underneath you are the
everlasting arms, or as he shoes there, the
everlasting wings.
He bears us on eagle's wings.
And then, of course, again, returning to the
fact that he won't eat anything that's dead.
He doesn't eat garbage.
He'll go and find a beautiful young lamb,
and he'll carry it up there, and then
he'll put his great big talons.
He's got three big hooks at the front,
and one at the back, to give him
some balance.
And he'll take his beak, and rip that
little thing open.
And what happens?
Those little things are not content, unless they
can live on warm blood, and live on
flesh.
It says here that her young ones suck
up the blood where the slain are.
And the scripture's never wrong.
It doesn't feed on garbage.
It doesn't take bits of cabbage out of
the garden.
It doesn't go to somebody's garbage can, and
take junk.
It finds something that's living.
It must have living flesh, and living blood.
And isn't it about what John says in
6, John 6 53, except ye eat of
my flesh, and drink of my blood, ye've
no life in you.
And so it compares again.
We think sometimes, beyond the sacred page, I
seek thee Lord.
But some of us find a lot more
garbage, though we call it food on the
sports page, don't we?
How much do we feed on him?
How much do we feed on his mercy?
How much do we feed until we're almost
intoxicated with his majesty, and his beauty, and
his faithfulness, his holy character.
Then look again, a little further over at
the, uh, at a psalm.
What was the psalm?
A hundred and, um, Psalm 103.
Bless the Lord, O my soul, we sang
it this morning, and bless his holy name.
Bless the Lord, O my soul, forget not
all his benefits, who forgiveth all thine iniquities,
who healeth all thy diseases, who redeemeth thy
life from destruction, who satisfies thy, sorry, who
redeemeth thy life from destruction, who crowneth thee
with loving kindness, and with tender mercies, who
satisfies thy mouth with good things, so that
thy youth is renewed like the eagle.
Yeah, the eagle's unusual.
Do you know the body of an eagle
is no larger than a, than a barnyard
hen?
Its disproportion is enormous, because it has one
of the greatest wingspans of any bird, as
even as far as seven feet, carrying a
light body on a very large, large wingspan.
But he satisfies thy mouth with good things,
so that thy youth is renewed like the
eagle.
And that bird goes up in the sky,
and he has a wail of a time,
and he finds his partner, and he builds
his nest, and he raises his young, and
then one day he says, oh, I don't
have the energy to get up there, I'm
feeling pretty tired.
Old age is coming up.
And before long, he gets a little full
of sympathy, you know, and self-interest, and
he sits away in the cleft of a
rock there, and he says, yes, look at
those youngsters up there, look at my neighbor,
he's up there too, and I don't have
what it takes to get up there anymore.
And instead of looking up, he looks down,
and when he looks down, all he sees
are his feathers that are coming out.
And then he gets distressed, and he says,
my main feathers are dropping too.
I guess my days are over.
You know, that comes in everybody's life.
Remember, Elijah had a wail of a time,
and right after that, he sent his notice
in.
To his surprise, the Lord took it.
He thought the Lord would say, Elijah, I
can't do without you, and he says, all
right, I'll take your notice.
I've got a young fellow called Elisha coming
up, one of your students, and he'll pick
it up.
This poor old eagle says, oh, my eyes
seem to be getting a bit dim too,
and my strength is going.
I don't think I'll bother to eat.
I won't go hunting.
I'll just sit here in the cleft of
the rock, and keep away from the storm,
and uh, I guess I'll get through.
Then one day, he sees a bird go
shooting past, and he says, listen, I'm too
young to die.
I'm not, I'm not going to give in
right now.
I need to wake up.
And he shakes his head, and he beats
his beak on the rock, and the beak
falls off.
And underneath, there's a new beak.
And once he realizes he has a new
beak, enough strength to go find his food,
he flies a little, and before long, the
food renews him, and before long, his youth
is renewed.
And he lives another 50 or 60 years.
He was going to give up.
His feathers are dropping down.
He's getting weak.
And he says, no sir, I'm going to
get this thing in hand.
I don't care what it costs, and you
know, getting a little agitated even knocks his
beak off.
And then he finds he has a new
beak, and can eat, and enjoy it, and
his strength comes, and out he goes.
Well, isn't that the proof there's a second
blessing?
It must be, but anyhow.
Oh my, what, what, what things God has
for us.
Um, where's the scripture?
Deuteronomy 32 11.
Look at this a minute.
Look at verse 9, for the Lord's portion
is his people.
Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.
So often you hear people say, you know,
I've been in churches, and they have a
little envelope in the uh, in the pew,
and uh, it says on the envelope, the
Lord's portion.
That's not the Lord's portion.
The scripture is clear here.
It says in verse 9, the Lord's portion
is his people.
Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.
He found him in the desert, and in
a waste howling wilderness.
He led him about, he instructed him, he
kept him as the apple of his eye.
Now, as an eagle stirreth up her nest,
fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings,
taketh them, and bare them on her wings,
so the Lord did lead him.
Verse 13, he made him to ride on
the high places of the earth.
Again, the eagle will never build his nest
in your barn.
He'll never build his nest on the side
of the wall, like the swallows do.
He won't build a nest where you can
reach him.
He builds his nest in the place which
is inaccessible, away there in the heights.
But you see, uh, the eagle usually doesn't
have more than two youngsters.
And do you know what?
The male is always hatched before the female.
If there are two eggs, inevitably the male
egg is hatched before the female.
You know, that's how the Lord made them
at the beginning.
He made Adam before Eve.
You know why?
Well, it's because he didn't want any advice.
So, he, uh, the male came before the
female.
And in the generation of eagles, the male
egg is always hatched before the female egg.
And the birds stay in that nest.
Again, I say it may be as much
as six or seven feet wide.
It could be less.
Now, the nest isn't comfortable like most nests,
but an eagle will actually go down onto
the back of a sheep, and with his
big claws, he'll tear the wool out in
order that he may put it in the
nest.
But he doesn't make it too comfortable.
Because, you see, the two birds settle down
and say, boy, isn't it great living around
here?
Huh?
Isn't it comfortable?
You know, Mother is so loving.
Remember the storm the other day, when it
seemed all the skies were breaking up, and
she just sat over us and put her
wings over us?
And you know, another drop of rain goes
through.
She shelters them from the storm.
And not only does she shelter them from
the storm, but some days the heat is
too much, and so she puts her wings
over them, and she lifts them so the
wind blows through, and they get plenty of
air conditioning in, but they don't get sunstroke.
Her wings prepare them, prepare, preserve them from
the storm, and the wings prepare, preserve them
rather even from the heat of the day.
But then the youngsters don't want to move.
You know, like some of you don't want
to leave this nice place you're living in.
You're hoping you'll get on the staff.
But anyhow, they get settled down and comfortable.
And then Mother and Father say, you know
what?
These kids have been around here too long.
Got to get them out of here.
And they make some noises, and the youngsters
say, now listen, you get your claws down,
and you don't get out of here, because
the old folk are trying to get rid
of us now.
And we're going to stay around.
And the Mother and Father say, are you
going to get out?
No, I'm going to stay here.
I enjoy the fresh meat you brought yesterday.
My, that was delicious.
Could you bring some from the same place
again?
Medium well.
And, uh, I'm really enjoying it.
But when an eagle makes a nest, she
always leaves protruding branches.
Very seldom are the branches any thinner than
my wrists.
It's an ugly looking nest, though inside it's
comfortable.
And they settle down, and so Dad says,
all right sweetie, uh, when you see me
coming in, you just hop off the nest.
Because never, they're never left undefended.
Neither are you and I left undefended.
Because if God isn't very near, He gives
His angels charge concerning us anyhow.
And so we're defended one way or another.
And so the big old boy comes down,
and he says, well I'm going to have
my fun now.
The kids aren't.
And when he comes down, he gets on
that protruding branch with all his weight, and
up goes the nest, and down go the
birds.
And they scream, and the bird watches.
Oh, the parent is so delighted.
Once he sees those youngsters, you know, flying
in the air, he says, oh isn't it
great to see your children flying around like
this?
You know, like Papa Salerno has a son,
he's always flying around.
But he comes down now and again, and
glad he's here this morning.
But you know, we'd settle down, but an
eagle stirreth up a nest.
She doesn't ask any advice.
She says, it's time you got out of
here.
And I was in a very famous church
not long ago, and the pastor said, you
know Brother Ravenel, this is the kind of
church I've always wanted.
Do you know, they pay for all the
books.
If I buy 50 dollars worth of books
every week, the church takes care of it.
And they've just bought me a new gorgeous
car, and I've everything I wanted.
And I want to stay here till Jesus
comes.
I said, boy, that's dangerous.
He said, what, Jesus coming?
I said, no, you saying you want to
stay here, it'll most likely kick you out
of the nest.
You just say, this is, Lord, where I
want to settle.
He says, no, I'm going to stir up
your nest.
Why?
To prove what's in you, that's why.
And one of those birds fly, and the
other can't make it.
He's going down, and suddenly an eagle makes
a power dive, and goes underneath, and lifts
it up.
And he says, I'll bear you on eagle's
wings.
Is God capricious?
Does God play tricks on us?
Are you going through the hottest spot in
your life?
Well, listen, he's going to bear you up.
He'll let you go, go, go, until the
very last moment.
Then suddenly he puts all his resources behind
you, and lifts you into heavenly places in
Christ Jesus.
He stirreth up her nest.
Oh, I'm sure they don't like that.
But notice again, it's no exaggeration of mine.
Verse 11 of 32 of Deuteronomy says, as
an eagle stirreth up her nest, flutterth over
her young, when she sees they're not making
it, she goes swooping down, and if need
be, he goes down, spreadeth abroad her wings,
and taketh them, and bears them on her
wings.
Do you know, I think that maybe at
that time, for the first time in its
life, that little eagle realizes how much it
loves its daddy or mummy.
You know, it just thought, well, you're here
to serve me, and you know, change my
diapers if they wear them, and give me
some food, and make me comfortable.
And suddenly, it seems what it's all about.
The little thing hasn't enough sense.
It says, I thought we were building, you
know, we're in a secure place.
The rain never gets on us, the heat
never gets on us, or the birds have
come, and that goes after them.
Boy, he shoots them down pretty quickly.
This is the greatest place of security we've
ever had.
Wouldn't it be nice to stay here the
rest of our lives, and the Lord said,
I didn't make you for that reason, you
better get out.
You better get out.
And so it's, uh, it has to go
out.
But when it goes falling down, what happens?
Well, uh, the mother goes underneath, or the
father goes underneath again, and uh, and lifts
it up.
Now let's go back to the 39th of
Job.
And verse 29 says, from thence she seeketh
her prey, and her eyes behold her far
off.
As far as I can find out, the
eagle has the most unique eye of anything
in creation.
Any animal, never mind any bird.
You thought that to use your cameras, you've
all kinds of filters.
Do you know an eagle has a built
-in filter?
Do you know an eagle can see an
object no, no bigger than a tiny dog?
It can see it two miles away.
What does it say?
From thence she seeketh her prey, and her
eyes behold her far off.
She sees something she desires.
A man in Scotland said that he, he,
he found an eagle's nest up in the,
in the hills of Scotland, the mountains of
Scotland, and he built a blind, and he
watched it, and he made detailed reports on
it day by day, and he would see
that bird suddenly stick its neck out, and
there it would point in that direction and
concentrate, and he said, I kept my glasses
on it, and suddenly it made a power
dive, and went about a mile and a
half, and it was clocked at 120 miles
an hour, and it swooped on a rabbit
a mile and a half away, and it
brought it back, and gave it to its
young.
The eagle seeth afar off, her eyes behold
afar off.
Well isn't that exactly what we're supposed to
do?
The trouble is we keep looking down too
much, and looking round too much, instead of
looking up too much, and looking beyond too
much.
The world right now, the outlook is dark,
the uplook is glorious.
The world says we don't know where we're
going.
Well goodbye, we know where we're going.
If you don't want to join us, that's
your business, but brother we're not staying round
here too long.
The lodge gonna stir the nest up for
a lot of us.
Gonna kick some of you out of here
to the uttermost.
The eagle seeth afar off.
Well isn't that what brother Tony and the
rest have been doing?
They could seeth afar off to Tacoma, Washington.
Well why not go to Dallas?
There's plenty of rotten stuff there to deal
with, but be your eyes lifted up, and
you seeth afar off.
And you go to the place of his
appointing.
Jesus says lift up your eyes and look
on the fields, look afar off.
Moses lived there, over here, more than a
thousand miles, a thousand years ahead.
It says that Moses chose rather to surrender
his place as a prince there in Egypt,
with all the wealth, and all the ostentation,
all the show, and all the servants, and
all the creature comforts.
And one day he resigned every bit of
it.
Why?
Because he says he chose rather to suffer
affliction with the children of Israel, than suffer
with the children of Israel.
Why?
Because he endured as what?
Seeing him who is invisible.
It says more than that, it pinpoints it.
It says he esteemed the reproach of Christ.
Well how in the world did he know
Christ?
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