“God is light and God is love, and when you put those two together you get fire. Fire is both light and warmth. As someone has well pointed out, fire will destroy what it cannot purify, but it purifies what it cannot destroy. That is the whole explanation of life in this present hour. We are passing through fire which is designed either to destroy that which can be destroyed, or to purify that which can never be destroyed. God is leading us through these trials and through the difficulties of our day, in order that we may learn to cry with old Job, back there in the oldest book of the Bible, He knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold (Job 23:10).”
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Raymond Charles Stedman was an evangelical Christian pastor, and author. He was a long-time pastor of Peninsula Bible Church in Palo Alto, California, and author of several books.
Peninsula Bible Fellowship had begun two years earlier as a small Bible study. By 1950 it had grown to the point of needing pastoral care. The directors of Peninsula Bible Fellowship offered the position to Ray in 1950. Peninsula Bible Fellowship became Peninsula Bible Church, and Ray's leadership here was to last forty years, culminating in his retirement as a pastor and elder on April 30, 1990.
Ray was known for his humor and warmth. His gentle personality allowed all those who met him to feel instantly at ease. At the height of his career, when he was speaking internationally; Ray often would return home to Palo Alto and listen to Peninsula Bible Church interns preach from the church pulpit. Regarding Ray's impact, Chuck Swindoll said "Ray Stedman is what I want to be when I grow up."