Dr. Herb Reavis



      “I believe that the world is in spiritual darkness, but I’m not going to curse the darkness. I’m going to turn on the light. The darker it is, the brighter the light shines. I think there is a great opportunity for us to preach the Gospel and to trust the Gospel to change lives.” 
      Dr. Herb Reavis, Jr. helps ‘shine the light’ as Pastor of North Jacksonville Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida and as an evangelist, preaching the Word of God. 
      The ‘lights’ in his own life have included several evangelists who have served as mentors. 
      “One of the greatest influences in my life was an evangelist who has now gone to be with the Lord,” Reavis said, in an interview with The Christian View. “His name was Eddie Martin, and he was from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He came to my church my senior year in high school. I had surrendered to the ministry, and he took an interest in me and asked me to travel with him. I went with him for three summers, and he taught me how to win somebody to Christ.” 
      Another was Dr. Bill Stafford, from Tennessee. “I learned from him the truth of spirit-filled giving,” said Reavis. “If we sow bountifully, God will bless us bountifully, so that we can again bless others.” 
      Reavis also spoke well of Dr. Junior Hill, an evangelist from Alabama. “Junior has really been an influence in my life, to realize that success is being faithful to do what God has called you to do where He has called you to do it,” he said. 
      “And there was another man who really had a big influence in my life. Leon Kilbreth taught me to have a philosophy of ministry in the areas of evangelism and church building.
       “All of those people were not only mentors, but also encouragers. I think Junior Hill and Bill Stafford have been two of my biggest encouragers in the ministry. It’s one thing to tell somebody what they ought to do. It’s another to follow up with exhortation and encouragement.” 
      His parents have been great encouragers throughout his life. “My parents always encouraged me to go to church, and, when I went into the ministry, they encouraged me in my pursuit of that vocation and have always been happy for me,” he said. 
      Reavis felt the call to the ministry as a teenager committed to the Lord and involved in his church’s youth group. “I had a friend in our youth group who was an artist,” he said. “He could do chalk drawings of Biblical scenes, but he didn’t like to talk. I had no artistic ability, but I was always able to talk. (My mother had to go to my school regularly because of my talking too much.) He and I got together. He would draw the Biblical scenes, and I would tell the story that went along with it. The Lord was stirring me about preaching, but I was resisting. We went to a church to do one of the chalk talks, but they had listed me in the bulletin as being the message. I went to the Pastor and said, ‘I don’t do messages. I give little talks, and my friend chalks.’ He said, ‘Well, you’re in the bulletin, so you’re on.’ So, I just made my talk a little longer. Several people came up to me afterward and said, ‘You’re going to be a preacher.’ I kept praying about it and couldn’t get away from it. That led me to realize that God had called me to preach the Word of God, and so I surrendered to the ministry. 
      “I feel I’ve got a divine call. Early on, I asked someone, ‘How do you know if you’ve been called?’ And he said, ‘If you can do anything else, do it.’ I couldn’t be happy doing anything else. I couldn’t even imagine myself doing anything else other than being a Pastor.” 
      Reavis was born and raised in Texas, but, for a short while, he and his family lived in the panhandle of Oklahoma. As a nine-year-old boy, he joined a little church in Oklahoma as some of his friends went forward. “I really feel I just joined the church,” he said. “I went to church regularly, but I had in my mind that God has a big set of scales, and, if you have enough good to outweigh the bad, you can squeeze into heaven. When I got into high school, I was going to church but had dropped out of the youth group. In the summers, I had a job, and I didn’t go on the youth choir tours. Suddenly, God got a hold of me. I remember telling my folks I was going on the youth choir tour the next summer. Around that time is when I believe I trusted Jesus as my Saviour and began to have some fruit in my life and sensed that Christ really had saved my soul. The evangelist Eddie Martin, who came to our church, preached a sermon called Seven Ways You Can Know You’re Saved. Through that message, I nailed it down. Every time I heard a hellfire sermon, I was concerned that I had not been saved at the age of nine. But, in his sermon on assurance, he said that Romans 10:13 promises, For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. He said, ‘That’s a promise. There’s a saying—God said it, I believe it, that settles it. But that’s not the way it should be. God says it, that settles it, whether I believe it or not.’ I got to thinking. ‘God says that whosoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And I have called out in faith and asked Jesus to save me. I’m not worrying about this anymore. I’m doing exactly what the Word has told me to do, and there is fruit and evidence in my life.’ I was later baptized, because I didn’t feel I had been scripturally baptized. I feel I had joined the church when I was nine, but had not been saved until I was a teenager. 
      “I got an appetite for God—not for religion but to be close to God. I began to see the world as lost people who need to be saved, and I began to know that I play a role in God’s plan of reaching a lost world. My values and my vision changed. I understand that this is not all there is, that we’re living for the kingdom.” 
      Reavis grew up in the First Baptist Church of Dumas, Texas. His Pastor, Dr. Ed Rogers, served more than 30 years. “He was a preacher of the Word,” said Reavis. “He was conservative in his theology, but he was a polished, dignified man. He was all that I ever thought a preacher should be. He was encouraging to me and gave me my first opportunity to preach.” 
      Reavis remembers his youth choir going to California in the 1970’s on a youth choir tour. “They were touched by the ‘Jesus movement’,” he said. “There was a revival among a lot of the ‘hippies’ on the West Coast, and a lot of them were getting saved. (Contemporary Christian music has its roots in that Jesus movement.) The youth choir came back, and we had an outdoor youth revival in the parking lot. We had a youth evangelist and music that appealed to young people. Our church had a vision to reach young people, and they were willing to expend the finances to have a good youth program. I’m a product of that youth program.”       
      After high school, Reavis entered the Moody Bible Institute, which was founded by evangelist Dwight L. Moody. “That was a defining moment in my life,” he said. “I graduated from there in 1977, and it was there I met my wife. Lisa and I were married on December 17, 1977. We went into my first ministry with her by my side as my partner.” 
      Reavis also graduated from Milligan College in Tennessee and the Southern Baptist School of Biblical Studies in Jacksonville, Florida. 
      His first pastorate was at Newark Baptist Church in Thomasville, Georgia. He then served at Calvary Baptist Church in Moultrie, Georgia, Westwood Baptist Church in Live Oak, Florida, First Baptist Church of Ormond Beach, Florida, and Spring Hill Baptist Church in Fernandina Beach, Florida, before becoming Pastor of North Jacksonville Baptist Church in September, 1991. 
      “One of the main blessings I’ve had, being in a church for 15 years, is that I’ve seen children grow up into adulthood,” he said. “I’ve had the privilege of marrying them. I’ve had the privilege of being there when their babies were born. And I have seen their children come to the age where they’re making public professions of faith. That has been a real thrill.” 
      Watching his own sons grow up and be faithful to God is also a blessing. 
      “My oldest son, Josh, is a graduate of Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary in Memphis,” he said. “He is on staff here, as Assistant to the Pastor for Pastoral Ministries. He is leading, twice a month on Saturday nights, a service aimed at 20-somethings—young adults, single and married. And he is my administrative assistant. 
      “My middle son, Jonathan, is a graduate of North Greenville University and is a student minister at Shindler Drive Baptist Church in Jacksonville. 
      “My youngest son, Joseph, is a student at the University of North Florida. He is praying about his vocation. 
      “My two oldest sons are married. My middle son and his wife are expecting, and I’m going to be a granddaddy for the first time.” 
      At age 50, Reavis said that he has been blessed to have been a Pastor for 27 years and to have preached in many revivals and Bible conferences and evangelism conferences over those years. 
      “My primary calling is to be a Pastor, so I limit the number of meetings I take outside the church,” he said. “When I do take a revival service, I know what that Pastor is going through. I know what it’s like to be a Pastor. I know the pressures he’s under. I think that helps me when I go to a church to preach.” 
      Reavis said that he loves all aspects of being a Pastor. “My favorite part is preaching the Bible,” he said. “I love to be able to minister to people, to serve them, help them, pray with them, give them counsel and encouragement. But my favorite part is to stand in that pulpit Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night and preach through books of the Bible and feed the flock. 
      “I see a real danger in getting away from preaching the Bible and trying to use other means to build churches. I think we can be creative, but there is no substitute for the preaching of God’s Word.” 
      His five trips to the Holy Land, which he calls a life-changing experience, have brought the Word of God to life for him. He plans another group trip for May, 2007, and invites those who are interested to join them. “I’ve never looked at the Bible the same way,” he said of visiting Israel. “When I read the Scripture about Jesus on the Sea of Galilee, my thoughts go back to when I have sat on a boat on the Sea of Galilee. It really brings the Bible alive.” 
      His favorite verse of Scripture is Jeremiah 33:3, Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not. 
      His favorite books of the Bible from which to preach are Luke and Acts, and he uses a Scofield Reference Bible for preaching and studying. 
      He also enjoys reading Christian books, as well as mysteries, detective novels, and spy novels. 
      His favorite song is "Holy, Holy, Holy." “I love that hymn,” he said. “It exalts the holiness of God. That is the supreme attribute of God.” 
      Reavis studies each morning in preparation for his sermons. “I decide what text I’m going to use,” he said. “I repeatedly read over that text, and read from more than one version of the Bible. Then, I look at the words in the original languages and use the tools that I have to help me do that, to find out what these words mean. Then, I begin to ponder and meditate on what the message is, and what God wants me to preach from this text. Then, with the help of the Holy Spirit, I seek to draw all of my points and my sub-points for my message from that text. I really believe in expository Bible preaching, where you get all of your points and sub-points from the text and then apply them to the lives of the people.” 
      Reavis preached his first sermon—on being happy as a Christian— at the age of 17 as a senior in high school. 
      His favorite sermon that he has preached is on The Lordship of Christ from the second chapter of Philippians. 
      Certain sermons from other evangelists are also favorites of his. “Bill Stafford has some sermons on spirit-filled giving that are just classics,” he said. “Junior Hill has a sermon that he preaches at pastors’ conferences called John Did No Miracle. I heard that back in the 1980’s and have never forgotten it. There is a sermon by J. Harold Smith, an evangelist who has now gone home to be with the Lord, called God’s Three Deadlines. That’s one of the most powerful sermons I’ve ever heard.” 
      Reavis said that, other than Christ, one of his favorite people from Scripture is the prophet Elijah. “I identify with him,” he said. “He told it like it was. And there were days when he sat under a juniper tree and said he wanted to ‘throw in the towel’, but he got over it and got right back up and went to work. So, I like Elijah, the prophet of ‘fire.’” 
      Reavis said that he would describe the ministry of preaching the Gospel as “God speaking His Word through human personality.” 
      Reavis advises other preachers to take to heart the Apostle Paul’s charge to Timothy, in II Timothy 4, to preach the Word, without compromise. He also advises them to remember God’s idea of success. “Success in the eyes of God is different from success in the eyes of man,” he said. “Success in the eyes of God is a servant of God being faithful to do what God has called him to do where God has called him to do it. Faithfulness is success.” 
      All Christians, he said, need to discover who they are in Jesus. “We need to understand what the victorious Christian life is,” he said. “It’s not me doing my best for Jesus. It’s Jesus, in me, living His life through me. That’s the Christian life.” 
      What makes Christianity different from the world’s religions is the concept of grace, he pointed out. “Only Christianity preaches grace,” he said. “Other religions say you have to do something to earn your way into the presence of whatever God you serve, but Christianity teaches that God doesn’t give us what we deserve. He gives us eternal life based on us trusting His Son as our Saviour. 
      “Everyone needs to recognize that they are a sinner, and that the consequence of sin is eternal separation from God. But the good news is that Jesus Christ paid their sin debt on the cross with His shed blood, and that He was raised from the dead to give life to those who believe. If they would simply turn to Jesus in faith and receive Him as their personal Saviour, they could be born again and really start living.” 
      Reavis said that his mission in life is the Great Commission, “to go into all of the world to preach the Gospel. 
      “I would like to be remembered as a person who was faithful to preach the Word of God without compromise and whose life backed up what he preached.” 



      Link: www.njbc.org