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 Girolamo Savonarola -smithers

[img]http://www.watchword.org//images/stories/sovon.jpg[/img]

[b]Girolamo Savonarola[/b]
[i]by David Smithers[/i]

In James 5:10 we are exhorted to "take the prophets for an example". A careful study of the "Holy Men of Old" can kindle both the fires of self-sacrifice and prayerful devotion. However, prophetic examples are not confined only to the pages of the Scriptures. Though often neglected, maligned and forgotten, God's prophetic torches have always burned throughout the history of the Church. One such burning prophet was Girolamo Savonarola. Through his tears, prayers and passionate preaching, the seeds of reformation and revival took root in Italy.

Born in Ferrara, Italy, September 14, 1452, Savonarola was the third in a family of seven children - five sons and two daughters. As a boy his devotion and fervor increased as he spent many hours in prayer and fasting. At times he would kneel in church for many hours engaged in earnest prayer. He was very contemplative, and his soul was deeply wounded by the sin and worldliness he saw all around him. The luxury, splendor, and wealth displayed by the rich in contrast with the awful poverty of the lowly peasants weighed heavily on his tender heart. Italy was the prey of petty tyrants and wicked priests, and dukes and popes who strived with each other for political power and control. These things brought great sorrow to his young soul which was burning for holiness and truth. He talked little, and kept to himself. He loved to wander in lonely places to sing or more often weep, giving vent to the strong emotions which tore at his heart. "Prayer was his one great solace, and his tears would often stain the altar steps, where he sought aid from heaven against the vile and corrupt age".

One day, he saw a vision of the heavens opened, and all the future calamities of the Church passed before his eyes. He then heard God's voice charging him to warn the people. From that moment he was convinced of his prophetic calling, and he was suddenly filled with a new unction and power. His preaching was now with a voice of thunder, and his rebukes against sin were so terrific that the people who listened to him sometimes went about the streets half-dazed, bewildered, and speechless. His listeners were often so overcome with tears that the whole church echoed with the sounds of sobbing and weeping. Workmen, poets and philosophers, all would burst into tears under his passionate preaching.

Savonarola's zeal for prayer seemed to increase day by day. While engaged in prayer, he would sometimes fall into a deep trance. Often he was so completely gripped by the power of the Holy Spirit that he would be forced to retire to a secluded place. Some of his biographers relate that on Christmas Eve, in the year 1486, Savonarola, while seated in the pulpit, remained immovable for five hours, in a trance, and that his face seemed illuminated to all in the church.

The influence of Savonarola eventually grew greater than ever. The people of Florence abandoned their vile and worldly books. All prayed, went to church, and the rich gave freely to the poor. Merchants restored ill-gotten gains. All the people forsook the carnivals and vanities in which they had indulged, and made huge bonfires of their worldly books, obscene pictures, and other things of the kind. The children marched from house to house in a procession, singing hymns in the streets. Soon Savonarola's fearless sermons aroused the anger of many, and especially of the corrupt pope and cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church. He was then threatened, excommunicated and finally, in 1498, by express order of pope Alexander VI, he was beaten, strangled and burned in the public square of Florence, Italy.

The life of Savonarola exemplifies many precious qualities that our fainthearted and distracted age so desperately needs. We are barren and deficient in prayer, patience, purity and most importantly a sacrificial love for Jesus. Until we as the body of Christ return to these holy principles, true reformation and revival will not be realized; Oh Lord break our hearts and open our eyes!


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2007/1/6 22:56Profile
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 Re: Girolamo Savonarola -smithers

Quote:
The life of Savonarola exemplifies many precious qualities that our fainthearted and distracted age so desperately needs. [b]We are barren and deficient in prayer, patience, purity and most importantly a sacrificial love for Jesus.[/b] Until we as the body of Christ return to these holy principles, true reformation and revival will not be realized; Oh Lord break our hearts and open our eyes!

Quote:
One day, he saw a vision of the heavens opened, and all the future calamities of the Church passed before his eyes. He then heard God's voice charging him to warn the people. From that moment he was convinced of his prophetic calling, and he was suddenly filled with a new unction and power. His preaching was now with a voice of thunder, and his rebukes against sin were so terrific that the people who listened to him sometimes went about the streets half-dazed, bewildered, and speechless. His listeners were often so overcome with tears that the whole church echoed with the sounds of sobbing and weeping. Workmen, poets and philosophers, all would burst into tears under his passionate preaching.


I am not angry and I may be a bit besides myself here, but this whole prophetic business is just very grievous. Where is this evidential effect, this sort of prophet? Where are the reports of anything even remotely resembling this manner of things happening in the here and now? Even in recent years?

No fear, no trembling, no worry, no cause for concern, no breaking and mourning and no change. And we are to pay attention to these that are loosely making all kinds of spurious comments, crediting them to God almighty, telling us of what is coming, getting it either half wrong, half baked and it is all met with a shrug? No big deal? We have come to accept the unacceptable and a poor definition is the new translation of what the form and function is.

And the world just laughs at it all.

There are no prophets today. Maybe, just maybe the true prophet is contained in our midst, stripping away all that is false and flippant and frivolous. Demanding that there is an accountability and a proving. Rubber on the road facts and tangible evidence. Think we have given far too much slack for slackness and just sheer lack ... The level of acceptance has become one of 'close enough' and 'maybe' and 'perhaps'. In a word ... gullible.

We need a revival desperately.

Edit*

Correction. This should have been placed under
[url=https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=14096&forum=35]Prophets Playing with Fire...[/url]


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Mike Balog

 2007/1/7 10:06Profile
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 Re: Girolamo Savonarola -smithers

What a beautifull portrait of words.

"As a boy his devotion and fervor increased as he spent many hours in prayer and fasting."


"At times he would kneel in church for many hours engaged in earnest prayer."


"He was very contemplative, and his soul was deeply wounded by the sin and worldliness he saw all around him."


"The luxury, splendor, and wealth displayed by the rich in contrast with the awful poverty of the lowly peasants weighed heavily on his tender heart."


"Italy was the prey of petty tyrants and wicked priests, and dukes and popes who strived with each other for political power and control.These things brought great sorrow to his young soul which was burning for holiness and truth."


"He talked little, and kept to himself. He loved to wander in lonely places to sing or more often weep, giving vent to the strong emotions which tore at his heart."




[i]Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people![/i]


[i]Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men; that I might leave my people, and go from them! for they be all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men.[/i]






'"[b]Prayer was his one great solace[/b]..."'


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Christopher Joel Dandrow

 2007/1/7 15:15Profile
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 Re:

This came up in the random article just now...



[b]The Intercessor-Gift Of God's Grace[/b] - C. H. Spurgeon

Jeremiah interceded for the people, but we have not to seek far before we discover the reason why he did it. God gave the weeping prophet to His sinful people in order that they might not be left as sheep without a shepherd. Wherever you meet with a man who intercedes with God for his fellow men and makes this the main business of his life, you see in him one of the most precious gifts of God’s grace to the age in which he lives.

It is God who writes intercession upon men’s hearts. All true prayer comes from Him, but especially that least selfish and most Christlike form of prayer called intercession, when the suppliant forgets all about himself and his own needs--and all his pleadings, his tears and his arguments are on behalf of others. Such men are the most precious gift from Heaven.


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Christopher Joel Dandrow

 2007/1/7 17:03Profile
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 Re:

I ran across this article in the same strain:

[b]The True Minister Of God[/b]
-- Author unknown

The trumpeter has his place in the Church of Christ. The trumpeter is the true minister of God, sent to warn the people and save the nation. We today must therefore have a warning ministry. But we seem to fear such an instrumentality. We prefer the lute to the trumpet. We like to hear the harp rather than the ringing blast that calls men to arms, or wakens them in the night--to tell them there is danger in the wind. Let us pray that our ministers may be men who are not afraid to be up all night, watching unto prayer, ready to sound the alarm on the approach of the foe. Genteel efforts, and polite endeavors will never originate the kind of spiritual awakening and moral renewal this nation needs, nor sustain it if begun.

Call aloud then! Warn the people of impending judgment! Open the churches and homes to day and night prayer, and call the people to repentance!


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 2007/1/7 17:11Profile
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 Re:

One of my favourite quotes is from Savonarola:

[b]"My Lord was pleased to die for my sins; why should I not be glad to give up my poor life out of love for Him." [/b]

 2007/1/7 17:34Profile
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 Re: The True Minister Of God

"Open the churches and homes to day and night prayer, and call the people to repentance!"


[i]Open the churches and homes to day and night prayer[/i]


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Christopher Joel Dandrow

 2007/1/8 18:13Profile
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 Re:

I can relate to how Savonarola felt. Often, the only response I have to what I see and hear in today's church is to go away somewhere and pour out the pain and burden back to the One who put it there in the first place. :-(

 2007/2/15 10:24Profile





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