The Following is a growing list of quotes that come from my weekly reading. I hope they are as much of an encouragement to you as they are to me.
- Pastor Jon
August 18, 2010
"Morebath bought a chain for its Great Bible that year, to prevent its removal from the church: the chain might have been symbolic of the restraint now set upon the Reformation, for in May 1543 Parliament passed an 'Act for the Advancement of True Religion' aimed at heretical preaching and unauthorized translations of the scripture. In addition, however, it forbade bible-reading altogether by 'women ... artificers, prentices, journeymen, serving men of the degrees of yoemen or under, husbandmen or labourers,' a prohibition which would have included most of the inhabitants of Morebath. Evangelicals were understandably bitter at this assault on the popular base of the Reformation: 'Died not Christ as well for craftsmen and poor men as for gentlemen and rich men, and would not Christ that the poor labouring men should have wherewith they might comfort their souls ...?'"
Eamon Duffy (The Voices of Morebath: Reformation & Rebellion In An English Village, 2001, p.107)
August 18, 2010
"The glory achieved through the cross is an example of divine irony, for never has something so splendid been the result of something so shameful."
Jason J. Stellman (Dual Citizens: Worship and Life Between the Already and the Not Yet, 2009, p.138)
August 18, 2010
"Like their evangelical brethren, confessional Reformed believers desire to see the Christian faith demonstrated in the lives of those who profess it. But rather than the litmus test being one's devotional life, voting record, or collection of
Left Behind novels, it should be the fact that those who confess Christ gather together each Lord's Day around Word and sacrament, confessing their sins, singing His praises, and hearing, eating, and drinking the gospel of Jesus Christ."
Jason J. Stellman (Dual Citizens: Worship and Life Between the Already and the Not Yet, 2009, p.81)
August 18, 2010
"The 'more relevant than thou' approach to ministry may fill churches, but often at the expense of the cross and all its glorious foolishness and shame."
Jason J. Stellman (Dual Citizens: Worship and Life Between the Already and the Not Yet, 2009, p.15)
August 18, 2010
"If Calvin was correct in his estimation of the human heart as an 'idol factory,' then we must conclude that God's setting of the church's agenda is His way of saving us from our own clever, idolatrous methods and self-appointed religious peddlers who try to foster on us the latest religious fad or spiritual diet plan."
Jason J. Stellman (Dual Citizens: Worship and Life Between the Already and the Not Yet, 2009, p.8)
August 18, 2010
"The church forgets that God Himself has prescribed a simple, straightforward, and easy-to-follow program for the growth of the church and the edification of believers: preaching of the Word and administration of the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper."
Jason J. Stellman (Dual Citizens: Worship and Life Between the Already and the Not Yet, 2009, p.5)
August 7, 2010
“If, then, sin will be always acting, if we be not always mortifying, we are lost creatures. He that stands still and suffers his enemies to double blows upon him without resistance, will undoubtedly be conquered in the issue. If sin be subtle, watchful, strong and always at work in the business of killing our souls, and we be slothful, negligent, foolish, in proceeding to the ruin thereof, can we expect a comfortable event? There is not a day but sin foils or is foiled, prevails or is prevailed on; and it will be so whilst we live in this world.”
John Owen (Of The Mortification of Sin, Works vol. vi, p. 11)
August 3, 2010
“Do you mortify; do you make it your daily work; be always at it whilst you live; cease not a day from this work; be killing sin or sin will be killing you.”
John Owen (Of The Mortification of Sin, volume vi in Owen's works, p.9)
July 30, 2010
"The more diligently any one examines himself, the more readily will he acknowledge with David, that if God should discover our secret faults, there would be found in us an abyss of sins so great as to have neither bottom nor shore ... for no man can comprehend in how many ways he is guilty before God."
John Calvin (Commentary on Psalm 19, Volume IV, p.329)
July30, 2010
"Loe, loe, who lyes here?
Tis I, the good Erle of Devonsheere
With Kate my Wyfe, to mee full deere,
We lyved togeather fyfty fyve yere.
That we spent, wee had;
That wee lefte, wee loste;
That we gave, wee have."
From the tomb of Edward Courtenay Earl of Devon, who died in 1509. Quoted in Eamon Duffy (The Voices of Morebath: Reformation & Rebellion In An English Village, 2001, 70).
June 22, 2010
"One of the most prominent features of the worship of the Reformed Church has always been the preaching of the biblical books in course, that is preaching through a book of the Bible or a major section of a book of the Bible starting at the beginning and continuing through, chapter by chapter or even verse by verse, in such a way that the whole message of sacred writing is presented in an orderly fashion over a series of weeks or months."
Hughes Oliphant Old (The Patristic Roots of Reformed Worship: Black Mountain, NC: Worship Press, 2004), p.194
June 18, 2010
"To set God before us is nothing else then to keep all our senses bound and captive, that they may not run out and go astray after any other object."
John Calvin (Commentary on Psalm 16, p.228)
June 6, 2010
"The idea that the Christian message is just a message to be nice and kind and friendly to one another is a travesty of the Gospel."
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Sermons on Acts, volume 1, p.78)
June 6, 2010
"Jesus Christ became a curse in order to deliver us from the curse of the law. It may seem harsh and strange at first sight that the Lord of Glory, he who has all sovereign authority, and before whom all the angels of heaven tremble and prostrate themselves, should be subject to a curse. But we must call to mind what Paul wrote in the first letter to the Corinthians, that is to say, that gospel teaching is foolishness to the human race, who regard themselves as wise (I Cor. 1:18, 23)."
John Calvin, (Sermons on Galatians, 1563, p.284-85)
May 15, 2010
“Let those who would discharge aright the ministry of the gospel learn, not merely to speak and declaim, but to penetrate into the consciences of men, to make them see Christ crucified, and feel the shedding of His own blood."
John Calvin (Commentary on Galatians, p.80)
May 14, 2010
"Now, as exercise brings benefit to the body, so deep prayer to the soul"
William Gurnall (Quoted in Spurgeon's Treasury of David; Psalm 13)
May 4, 2010
"The Reformed community thus played a lively part in the region's political and intellectual life. It reflected in this role characteristics often associated with Reformed communities in other times and places and pointed toward important continuities in the traditions as it took root in the Carolina low country."
Erskine Clark (Our Southern Zion: A History of Calvinism in the South Carolina Low Country, 1690-1990, 1996; p.57)
April 23, 2010
"If there is any firmness for our lives, any steadfastness for our souls, the cause of such constancy is the immovable throne of Christ our God."
(Patrick Henry Reardon, Christ in the Psalms; 2000, p.19)
March 20, 2010
“When it comes to heresies and wicked perversions of the truth which distort everything, we should react as if we have been punched or stabbed in the stomach or neck. For in what does the life and well-being of the church consist, if not the pure Word of God? If someone came and poisoned the meat which we needed for food, would we tolerate it? No, it would make us strike out! The same reasoning applies to the gospel. We must always raise our hands to defend the purity of its doctrine, and we must not allow it to be corrupted in any way whatever.”
(John Calvin, Sermons on Galatians; 1563, p.154)
March 9, 2010
"If our churches are not bathing us in the unfading powers of the age to come [through Word & Sacrament], why should it surprise us when people assign greater reality and significance to the age that is passing away? If we think that we can sustain ourselves and our churches simply by trying to make things more user-friendly, we have not reckoned with the enormous power of this present evil age."
Mike Horton (The Gospel-Driven Life; 2009, 205)
March 5, 2010
"When each saint passes under the review of God's judgment, and his own character is tried upon its own merits ... then the only sanctuary to which he can betake himself for safety, is the mercy of God."
John Calvin (Commentary on Psalm 7 p.84; 1557)
February 20, 2010
“The outward person of the messenger does not validate his message; rather, the nature of the message validates the messenger.”
Alan Cole (Quoted in John Stott's Commentary on Galatians, p.28)
February 20, 2010
“Men will never find a remedy for their miseries until, forgetting their own merits, by trusting to which they only deceive themselves, they have learned to betake themselves to the free mercy of God."
John Calvin (Commentary on Psalm 6, p. 70)
January 29, 2010“There must be a holy fear mixed with the Christian’s joy. This is a sacred compound, yielding a sweet smell, and we must see to it that we burn no other upon the altar.”
CH Spurgeon, (Treasury of David, vol. 1, p. 13)
January 29, 2010
"In clearly communicating to us through His living and canonical Word, God accommodates to our weakness without capitulating to our sinfulness. We need no other aids than the covenantal speech that God graciously gives us in preaching and its ratification in baptism and the Lord's Supper."
Mike Horton (Hearing Is Believing: Sound Advice; MR; volume 19.1, 2010)
January 29, 2010
"Aslan," said Lucy, "you're bigger." "That is because you are older, little one," answered he. "Not because you are?" "I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger."
CS Lewis (Chronicles of Narnia; Prince Caspian, 1951)
January 19, 2010
"As often, therefore, as we hear the gospel preached by men, we ought to consider that it is not so much they who speak, as Christ who speaks by them. And this is a singular advantage, that Christ lovingly allures us to himself by his own voice, that we may not by any means doubt of the majesty of his kingdom."
John Calvin (Commentary on the Psalms; Psalm 2; 1557), 17.
December 29, 2009
"The truth comes to us from the outside, turning us inside out. So the content and the form of delivery {i.e. preaching} are inextricably linked. We do not accomplish the victory, but are recipients of the report that it has been achieved. Salvation is not a program for us to follow; it is a gift to be received. That is the simplest and most difficult truth of the Christian faith."
Michael Horton (The Gospel-Driven Life, 2009, p.110)
December 4, 2009
"... in the Biblical perspective, that which makes sin sin is not first of all the unhappiness or shame that it brings to us and those around us, but the objective offense that it is before God. No one is eternally condemned for failing to find meaning, purpose, or fulfillment in life. "
Michael Horton (The Gospel-Driven Life, 2009, p.50)
November 9, 2009
"The children of God are distinguished from the reprobate by this mark, that they live a godly life and a holy life, because this is the design and end of election."
John Calvin (Commentary on II Peter, Calvin's Commentaries; volume XXII, 1549, p. 377)
October 25, 2009
"Shasta was no longer afraid that the Voice belonged to something that would eat him, nor that it was the voice of a ghost. But a new and different sort of trembling came over him. Yet he felt glad too."
C.S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia; The Horse and His Boy, 1954)
October 20, 2009
"Thus the Norman Conquest, though a most unhappy and disastrous event at the time it took place, rendered England, in the end, a more wise, more civilised, and more powerful country than it had been before; and you will find many such cases in history, my dear child, in which it has pleased the providence of God to bring great good out of what seems, at first sight, to be unmixed evil."
Sir Walter Scott (Tales of a Scottish Grandfather; Volume 1, 1828, p.24)
September 25, 2009
"We glorify God, by being contented in that state in which Providence has placed us."
Thomas Watson (A Body of Divinity, 1692, p.13)
September 25, 2009
“In this discourse of mine you may see much; much, I say, of the grace of God towards me. I thank God I can count it much, for it was above my sins and Satan’s temptations too. I can remember my fears, and doubts, and sad months with comfort; they are as the head of Goliath in my hand. There was nothing to David like Goliath’s sword, even that sword that should have been sheathed in his bowels; for the very sight and remembrance of that did preach forth God’s deliverance to him. Oh, the remembrance of my great sins, of my great temptations, and my great fears of perishing forever! They bring afresh into my mind the remembrance of my great help, my great support from heaven, and the great grace that God extended to such a wretch as I.”
John Bunyan (from the preface of Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, 1666, p. 5)
September 15, 2009
"But that is not called knowing God, when you believe as the Turks, the Jews, and the devil believe, that God created all things; also even, that Christ was born of a virgin, suffered, died, and rose again. The true knowledge is when you instead hold and know that God is your God and Christ is your Christ; which Satan and false Christians cannot believe. Thus this knowledge is nothing more or less than the true Christian faith. For if you know God and Christ thus, then you will also trust in Him with your whole heart, and confide in him in fortune and misfortune, in life and death. Such confidence evil consciences cannot have, for they know not God beyond that he is the God of Peter and of all the saints in heaven; but as their own personal God they know him not. Instead, they consider Him to be their taskmaster and their angry judge."
Martin Luther (Commentary on I & II Peter, 1539, p.233)
September 15, 2009
"The biblical writers demand a 'knowledge of God' that unites head and heart. We must be careful not to sacrifice the head in favor of the heart.'
Douglas J. Moo (The NIV Application Commentary: II Peter; 1996, p.39)
September 7, 2009
"The evangelical's mind needs to be renovated with biblical truth - the system of truth revealed in Scripture and summarized in Reformation confessions - if it is to be a truly Christian mind, able to withstand error's onslaughts. When Christians have a firmer and fuller grasp of the great doctrines of the faith, the church may again exert the vibrant influence on the culture that it did in Europe during the Reformation."
Dennis E. Johnson (Him We Proclaim, 2009, p.45)
August 20, 2009
"So many Christians today identify themselves with some ‘single issue’ (a concept drawn from politics) other than the cross, other than the gospel. It is not that they deny the gospel. If pressed, they will emphatically endorse it. But their point of self-identification, the focus of their minds and hearts, what occupies their interest and energy is something else”
D.A. Carson (The Cross and Christian Ministry, 2004, p. 63).”
August 10, 2009
“As documents that set forth the accumulated insights of the church over a period of centuries, the church’s confessional and dogmatic writings might be likened to a collection of maps gathered into an atlas. Instead of mapping out geographical features, they map out the doctrinal terrain of the Scriptures.”
Charles P. Arand (A Confessing Theology for Postmodern Times, ed. Michael Horton, p.19)
August 6, 2009
"Those with a biblical view of the power of preaching should not fall prey to any spirit that diminishes it. It is by means of preaching that Christ's Kingdom advances, his name is proclaimed, and his people are discipled. Nothing should restore the confidence of God's people in preaching more than the realization that it is a sign of the last days, days of opportunity and salvation."
Cornelis P. Venema (Christ and the Future, 2008, p.58)
June 23, 2009
"Now we can understand the nature of the fruits of repentance: the duties of piety toward God, of charity toward men, and in the whole of life, holiness and purity."
John Calvin (Institutes, III; iii; 16)
June 23, 2009
The cause for conflict that eventually led to Calvin's expulsion from Geneva lay in the Lord's Supper. Calvin wanted it to be celebrated on a weekly basis. As the sign and seal of the Word, it was only to be expected that the Word would be followed by the sacrament. This had been a tradition established for centuries, so why should it be changed? The city council, however, considered this too radical a departure from what Bern and Zurich were accustomed to. They also thought it a little too "Romish," and feared the people might get the same impression. Calvin cleverly suggested instead that the Lord's Supper be celebrated once every four weeks, rotating among the four churches in Geneva. The council saw right through this proposal, however, and the syndics and councillors of Geneva decided that four celebrations per year would suffice. The millions of Reformed believers throughout the world who continue to uphold this practice are thus out of line with Calvin and are actually defending the position of the much less Reformed politicians of sixteenth-century Geneva."
Herman J. Selderhuis (John Calvin: A Pilgrim's Life, 2009, 79-80)
June 9, 2009
" ... all writers of sounder judgment agree that there remains in a regenerate man a smoldering cinder of evil, from which desires continually leap forth to allure and spur him to commit sin."
John Calvin (Institutes III; iii; 10)
May 16, 2009
"A church service involving clowns or fancy dress or skits or stand-up
comedy does not reflect the seriousness of the gospel; and those who
take the gospel seriously should know better. Frankly, it is more
appropriate to liberal theology which does not take the gospel, or the
God of the gospel, seriously. Serious things demand serious idioms. I
heard recently of a church service involving dressing up in costume and
music taken from a Tom Cruise movie. Now, if I go for my annual
prostate examination, and the doctor comes into the consulting room
dressed as Coco the Clown, with `Take my breath away' from Top Gun
playing in the background, guess what? I'm going to take the doctor
out with a left hook, flee the surgery, and probably file a complaint
with the appropriate professional body. This is serious business; and
if he looks like a twit and acts like a twit, then I can only conclude
that he is a twit.
You can tell a lot about someone's theology
from what they do in church. Involve Kenny G's music in your worship
service, and I can tell not only that you have no taste in music but
also that you have nothing to offer theologically to those who come
through the church doors; indeed, what you do have can probably be
found better elsewhere. Why certain academics hanker for the approval
of the people who, when they leave the lecture theatre also abandon any
semblance of adulthood or intelligence, beats me. More seriously,
however, why certain orthodox churches strive to look like them,
worries me intensely. Look, it's rubbish. So let's just call it
rubbish, shall we?"
Carl Trueman (Look, It's Rubbish! - Article in May, 2009 issue of Reformation 21 E-zine)
May 8, 2009
"Church censures are necessary, for the reclaiming and gaining of offending brethren, for deterring of others from the like offenses, for purging out of that leaven which might infect the whole lump, for vindicating the honor of Christ, and the holy profession of the gospel, and for preventing the wrath of God, which might justly fall upon the church, if they should suffer his covenant, and the seals thereof, to be profaned by notorious and obstinate offenders."
Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 30; III, 1647
May 2, 2009
"God will always honour His truth and the man who stands for it."
Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Commentary on Ephesians 6:10-13, Volume 7, 119)
May 2, 2009
"God loves his saints as the purchase of his Son's blood. They cost Him dear, and that which is so hardly got shall not be easily lost. He that was willing to expend his Son's blood to gain them, will not deny his power to keep them."
William Gurnall (The Christian In Complete Armour, 1662, p.26)
April 2, 2009
"One simply cannot regard the significant as more important than the insignificant, and then plop himself in front of a television for two to three hours an evening. The only way the conscience can survive such a colossal waste of human life is for the individual to refuse to entertain the question of the difference between the significant and the insignificant."
T. David Gordan (Why Johnny Can't Preach, 2009, p.97 f.n.)
April 2, 2009
"I know that there are those who are terribly afraid that such Christ-centered preaching will lead to licentiousness; but I categorically deny it. I've witnessed with my own eyes the difference between believers who suffer through moralistic preaching and those who experience Christological preaching. The former are never as strong or vibrant in their Christian discipleship as the latter. In theory, we all say we believe, for instance, that good works are the 'inevitable' fruit of saving faith. I not only say this: I believe it ... I believe that as people's confidence in Christ grows, they do, ordinarily and inevitably, bear fruit that accords with faith. Thus, there is no need for some trade-off here, or some alleged dichotomy suggesting that we need to preach morality if we are to have morality. No; preach Christ, and you will have morality. Fill the sails of your hearers' souls with the wind of confidence in the Redeemer, and they will trust him as their Sanctifier, and long to see his fruit in their lives. Fill their minds and imaginations with a vision of the loveliness and perfection of Christ in his person, and the flock will long to be like him. Impress upon their weak and wavering hearts the utter competence of the meditation of the One who ever lives to make intercession for them, and they will long to serve and comfort others, even as Christ has served and comforted them."
T. David Gordon (Why Johnny Can't Preach, 2009, p.77-78)
April 2, 2009
"And since the Lord, to promote the right understanding of his holy gospel - from which alone all godliness and blessedness come - has ordained the holy assemblies and practices of the church and has so earnestly commanded his people to flee with utter abhorrence all other activities and to join and commit themselves to these assemblies and practices of the church with heartfelt reverence, with regard to the weak and [ignorant] sheep the most important thing that must be done is to point out to them and warn them that they should attend the assemblies of the church with all diligence, listen eagerly to God's Word, receive the holy sacraments, and be zealous and reverent in all the practices of the church."
Martin Bucer (Concerning the True Care of Souls, 1538, p.167-168)
April 2, 2009
"The more holy and chaste a husband is, the more wrathful he becomes if he sees his wife inclining her heart to a rival. In like manner, the Lord, who has wedded us to himself in truth [cf. Hos. 2:19-20], manifests the most burning jealousy whenever we, neglecting the purity of his holy marriage, become polluted with wicked lusts. But he especially feels this when we transfer to another or stain with some superstition the worship of his divine majesty, which deserved to be utterly uncorrupted. In this way we not only violate the pledge given in marriage, but also defile the very marriage bed by bringing adulterers into it."
John Calvin (Institutes II; viii; 18)
March 18, 2009
“Our dear Lord Jesus is truly present in his church, ruling, leading, and feeding it himself. But he effects and carries out this his rule and the feeding of his lambs in such a way as to remain always in his heavenly nature, that is, in his divine and intangible state, because he has left this world. Therefore it has pleased him to exercise his rule, protection and care of us who are still in this world with and through his ministers and instruments.”
Martin Bucer (Concerning the True Care of Souls, 1538, p.17)
March 13, 2009
"That Calvin freely poured out his life upon the altar of pastoral ministry was, ultimately, the result of submission to Christ, his Lord, a submission nurtured by the joy of salvation by grace and propelled by the majesty of his preeminent Savior. This world changing and history-transforming ministry flowed from a candle-lit study, where a man on his knees devoured the pages of Scripture, carried the burden of the needs of others, and faithfully served his Lord and Savior."
Harry Reeder (John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, and Doxology, Ed. Burk Parsons, 2008, p.69-70)
March 13, 2009
“Scripture is quite plain that it is the church, the body of Christ, which forms the organ through which and in which the glorified Christ will reveal his great work of salvation to the world.”
Herman Bavinck (An Introduction to the Science of Missions, 1960, p.59)
March 13, 2009
"We must know that God’s providence, as it is taught in Scripture, is opposed to fortune or fortuitous happenings. Now it has been commonly accepted in all ages, and almost all mortals hold the same opinion today, that all things come about through chance. What we ought to believe concerning providence is by this depraved opinion most certainly not only beclouded, but almost buried. Suppose a man falls among thieves, or wild beasts; is shipwrecked at sea by a sudden gale; is killed by a falling house or tree. Suppose another man wandering through the desert finds help in his straits; having been tossed by the waves, reaches harbor; miraculously escapes death by a finger’s breadth. Carnal reason ascribes all such happenings, whether prosperous or adverse, to fortune. But anyone who has been taught by Christ’s lips that all the hairs of his head are numbered [Matt. 10:30] will look farther afield for a cause, and will consider that all events are governed by God’s secret plan. And concerning inanimate objects we ought to hold that, although each one has by nature been endowed with its own property, yet it does not exercise its own power except in so far as it is directed by God’s ever-present hand. These are, thus, nothing but instruments to which God continually imparts as much effectiveness as he wills, and according to his own purpose bends and turns them to either one action or another.”
John Calvin (Institutes, I. xvi. 2)
March 13, 2009
"Hearing or reading, it was the Word that counted. The Reformation prescribed a new precedence of ear over eye."
Patrick Collinson (The Reformation, p.34, 2003)
January 30, 2009
"We believe it wrong that God should be represented by a visible appearance, because He Himself has forbidden it [Ex. 20:4] and it cannot be done without some defacing of His glory. ... Therefore it remains that only those things are to be sculptured or painted which the eyes are capable of seeing: let not God's majesty, which is far above the perception of the eyes, be debased through unseemly representations."
John Calvin (Institutes, I. XI. 12)
January 30, 2009
"The Puritans prepared their souls and looked forward to the Sabbath day as the highlight of the week, not because they could cease from work, but because it was the opportunity for their soul to bask in the things of God and take full delight in them. Their worship services lasted two or more hours."
R.C. Sproul (Truths We Confess, Volume II, p. 342, 2007)
January 30, 2009
"We have here a classic statement of one of Calvin's underlying interpretive principles - the direct speech of Scripture to the living church. Calvin makes the point explicit: 'the prophet, then, not only animates us to hope and patience, but adds an exhortation dictated by the Spirit, which extends to the whole reign of Christ, and is applicable to us.' [CO 18, Col. 622 on Daniel] This conviction of the direct address of the text to the church relates immediately to Calvin's entire task: it animates his preaching, it fuels his exegesis, and it is the engine that generates theological loci in his exegetical encounter with the text."
Richard A. Muller (The Unaccommodated Calvin, p.36, 2000)
January 29, 2009
"For as rashness and superficiality are joined to ignorance and darkness, scarcely a single person has ever been found who did not fashion for himself an idol or specter in place of God. Surely, just as waters boil up from a vast full spring, so does an immense crowd of gods flow forth from the human mind, while each one, in wandering about with too much license, wrongly invents this or that about God himself."
John Calvin (Institutes I. v. 12)
January 28, 2009
"Since the church is the society of those who are or who profess to be in Christ, it follows that to be outside the church is to be outside Christ, and hence, according to St. Cyprian's famous dictum, to be without salvation. For Calvin the Christian life is church life. He expands the old image of 'mother church': 'There is no way to enter into life except this mother shall conceive us in her womb, bring us to birth, nurse us at her breast, and keep us under her care and protection until we put off our mortal flesh and become like the angels of God.' [Institutes IV. i. 4] And in this case, a man does not leave his father and mother; for God is our Father and the church our mother all the days of our life. The maternal power, however, does not lie in the church itself, but in the Christ who by his spirit is present in his church in preaching and sacrament."
T.H.L. Parker (John Calvin: A Biography, p.166-67, 2006)
December 9, 2008
"Today's hedonistic creed of 'Please yourself' cannot apply in Christian worship. True worship is not about what pleases us, but what pleases God. Of course, we will often (but not always) find worship pleasant. But our pleasure, if it is spiritual in nature, will flow from the contemplation of the supreme loveliness of God, which inspires our love for Him, and from the knowledge that we are pleasing the One we love, by worshiping Him as He desires to be worshiped. We are therefore again driven back to God's Word to find out what pleases Him in the sphere of our worship."
Nick Needham (ed. Ligon Duncan, The Westminster Confession into the 21st Century, volume I, p. 241)
December 1, 2008
"There is an integral reciprocal relation between what is done in public worship and what a church comes to confess theologically."
R. Scott Clark (Recovering the Reformed Confession, 2008, 286
November 21, 2008
“Throughout his life, from the moment of his regeneration and conversion to the moment of his final elevation to heavenly glory, the Christian, by virtue of his union with Christ’s death and resurrection and through the power of God’s word and Spirit dwelling within him, will necessarily experience progressive sanctification, this process being understood negatively in terms of putting to death the deeds of the flesh which still remain and positively in terms of growth in all saving graces.”
Robert Reymond (A New Systematic Theology, 1998 p.768-69)
November 19, 2008
"Perhaps the most outstanding example ... of the subjective turn in contemporary Reformed piety is in public worship. It would not be hard to find a Reformed congregation today in which the Sunday (or Saturday night) liturgy begins with twenty-five minutes of Scripture songs sung consecutively, each song blending into the next, perhaps augmented by a Power Point or video presentation. In this increasingly popular liturgy, the singing is followed by a dramatic presentation which, in turn, is followed by congregational announcements, most of which focus on the various cell-group programs. Increasingly, the sermon is a brief, colorfully illustrated, emotionally touching collection of anecdotes, in which the hearer is not so much directed to the law and the gospel, but, in one way or another, to one’s self. Anxious to intensity the religious experience of parishioners or to make the church accessible to the non-churched, many Reformed congregations have turned to new measures, to drama, dance lessons, and even a service arranged thematically by the name of the local professional sports franchise. Such practices are rather more indebted to eighteenth- and nineteenth-century revivalism than they are to Geneva, Heidelberg, or Westminster Abbey. Such practices are also symptoms of the synthesis of Reformed worship with the emerging modern culture in which, as Philip Rieff noted, hospital and theater replace the church."
R. Scott Clark (Recovering The Reformed Confession, 2008, p.73)
November 12, 2008
"I haven't always been a Christian. I didn't go to religion to make me happy. I always knew a bottle of Port would do that. if you want a religion to make you feel really comfortable, I certainly don't recommend Christianity."
C.S. Lewis (Quoted in Michael Horton's Christless Christianity, p, 97)
November 12, 2008
"Unless Christ is publicly exhibited as crucified - placarded before us week after week in Word and sacrament - we will, like the Galatians, drift toward the view that we begin with Christ and his Spirit and then end up striving for our own righteousness before God (Gal. 3:1-3). Since even Christians remain simultaneously justified and sinful, we will always gravitate back toward ourselves: that which happens within us, that which we can measure and control, that which we can see and feel."
Michael Horton (Christless Christianity, 146)
September 17, 2008
"I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country."
Nathan Hale (Quoted in McCullough, 1776, p.224)
June 16, 2008
"The evangelical church, or at least a good slice of it, is nervous, twitchy, and touchy about consumer desire, ready to change in a nanosecond at the slightest hint that tastes and interests have changed. Why? Because consumer appetite reigns. And consumer appetite and consumer rights go hand in hand. These rights and appetites are very much alive in what used to be called the pew. Those who attend churches are now like any other customers you might meet in the mall. Displease them in any way and they will take their business elsewhere. That is the fear that lurks in many a church leader's soul because they know that is how the marketplace works."
David F. Wells (The Courage to be Protestant, pg. 36)
"G. K. Chesterton once observed that when God and his truth vanish from a society, it would be natural to think tha people would no longer lebieve in anything at all. That, however, turns out not to be the case. Now they believe in everything.
"How else do we explain the remarkable circumstances of highly sophisticated people, secularized or postmodern, who can assualt any and every religious belief but who, at the same time, can indulge fantasies about aliens? Or sightings of Elvis? Or the most far-fetched conspiracy theories, like the Bush administration actually planned and carried out the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001? Or, on a more mundane level, how can these highly sophisticated people also think that every religious belief, no matter how unlikely, has validity as long as someone holds it sincerely? However, in this atmosphere, where everything is believed and anything is believable, at least to someone, nothing can act as a norm. All that is left is power. And, in a fallen world, we do well to be cautious when all there is, is power."
David F. Wells (The Courage To Be Protestant, pg. 71)
"What we hear from many of the emergent church leaders who are most aware of the (post)modern ethos, therefore, is a studied uncertainity: "We do not know." "We cannot know for sure." "No one can know certianly." "We should not make judgements." "Knowing beyond doubt is not what Christianity is all about." " We need to be more modest." "We need to be more honest." "Christianity is about the search, not about the discovery." "Christianity is about the spiritual journey, not about arriving." They forget that Scripture is devine revelation. It is not a collection of opinions of how different people see things that tells us more about the people than the things. No. It gives us God's perfect knowledge of himself and of all reality. It is given to us in a form we can understand. The reason God gave it to us is that he wants us to know. Not to guess. Not to have vague impressions. And certianly not to be misled. He wants us to know. It is not immodest, nor arrogant, to claim that we know, when what we know is what God has given us to know through his Word."
David F. Wells (The Courage to be Protestant, p. 77)
"In Fact, when we listen to the church today, at least in the West, we are often left with the impression that Christianity actually has very little to do with truth. Christianity is only feeling better about ourselves, about leaping over our difficulties, about being more satisfied, about having better relationships, about getting on with our mothers-in-law, about understanding teenage rebellion, about coping with our unreasonable bosses, about finding greater sexual satisfication, about getting rich, about receiving our own private miracles, and much else besides. It is about everything except the truth. And yet this truth, personally embodied in Christ, gives us a place to stand in order to deal with the complexities of life, such as broken relations, teenage rebellion, and job insecurities.
David F. Wells (The Courage To Be Protestant, p.)
"It is through Christ and by his Word that we once again begin to enter the paradise we lost and that has left us adrift in a sea of endless meaninglessness. It is by this truth, as it were, that we enter a port. To change the image, it is by this truth that we enter a realm where everything is real and nothing is fake. Should this not be the church's message? Then why are we hearing so much mumbling on truth issues and so much chatter on so many other subjects? The church is, to put it charitably, very distracted right now. This may well explain why it is struggling for its very life in the West."
David F. Wells (The Courage To Be Protestant, p. 88)
May 30, 2008
"Like ancient Gnosticism, American spirituality uses God or the divine as something akin to an energy source. Through various formulae, steps, procedures, or techniques, one may 'access' this source on one's own. Such spiritual technology could be employed without any need for the office of preaching, administering baptism or the Supper, or membership in a visible church, submitting to its communal admonitions, encouragements, teaching, and practices."
Michael Horton (Modern Reformation; May/June 2008, p.19)
May 23, 2008
"The state of the unsaved man or woman is humanly hopeless. But what is impossible for men is possible with God. A radical problem requires a radical remedy, and God supplies it."
James Montgomery Boice (Commentary on Ephesians, p.50)
May 23, 2008
"I am willing to serve my country in the best way and manner that I am capable of, and as our enemy are gone from us, I expect I must follow them ... I would not be understood that I should choose to march, but as I am engaged in this glorious cause, I am willing to go where I am called."
David McCullough quoting Lietenant Joseph Hodgkins writing to his wife just prior to their march to New York during the Revolutionary War. (McCullough, 1776, p.116)
April 11, 2008
"Effectual calling is the work of God’s almighty power and grace, whereby (out of his free and special love to his elect, and from nothing in them moving him thereunto) he doth, in his accepted time, invite and draw them to Jesus Christ, by His Word and Spirit, savingly enlightening their minds, renewing and powerfully determining their wills, so as they (although in themselves dead in sin) are hereby made willing and able freely to answer his call, and to accept and embrace the grace offered and conveyed therein."
Question #67 - Westminster Larger Catechism, 1647
March 28, 2008
"The point of limited atonement is that salvation is entirely of the Lord. It comes from God's design, from his plan, from his intervention, and it comes through the work of Christ on behalf of his people. Christ's work is applied to the elect by the Holy Spirit. The Father designs it, the Son carries it out, and it gets to the elect by the Holy Ghost, who quickens us, who awakens us from spiritual death, and who creates faith in our hearts so that we come to Christ. It is a Trinitarian work, and everyone whom God intends to be saved receives the benefits of Christ, because God the Holy Spirit makes sure that those benefits are realized in us."
R.C. Sproul (Truths We Confess: A Laymen's Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith, vol. 1, 2006, p. 276-77)
March 14, 2008
"We have seen so far how St. Paul has declared that there is no other ground of our salvation than God's free goodness, and that we must not look anywhere else for the reason why he chooses one person and forsakes the other. For it becomes us to hold ourselves contented with His pure will, purpose, and unchangeable decree. And whoever goes any further must inevitably stumble into such an abyss through his own rashness, that he shall feel that such as cannot honor God's majesty and his secret counsel with all lowliness and reverence must all (I say) remain in confusion. Therefore whenever we come to search for the cause of our salvation, let us learn to attribute it altogether to God."
John Calvin (Sermons on Ephesians [1:13-14], 1562, p. 66)
February 29, 2008
"We never become duly sensible of our obligations to Christ, nor estimate aright his kindness towards us, till we have been led to view, on the other side, the unhappy condition in which we formerly were "without Christ."
John Calvin (Commentary on Ephesians, 1548, p.192)
February 15, 2008
“Read Ephesians 1. I cannot wish you all these spiritual blessings, since they already are all yours; but I pray that we may have the spirit of wisdom and knowledge to know that they are ours. It is a chapter I keep in mind every day in prayer.”
Henry Martyn writing from India to some friends back in Cornwall, England in 1810 (Cromarty, For the Love of India, 2005, 241-42)
February 8, 2008
"Reformed Theology is often nicknamed 'Covenant theology.' The concept of covenant, which provides the structure or framework of redemptive history and of the whole scope of theology, is vitally important. It provides the context within which God reveals himself to us, ministers to us, and acts to redeem us ... The language and idea of covenant pervade redemptive history and the Bible."
R.C. Sproul (Truths We Confess: A Laymen's Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith, 2006, p. 205)
February 8, 2008
"We know that the purpose of the Lord's Supper is both to confirm our assurance that he wants to live in us and us in him, and to participate in his body and blood, just as the members of the body participate in the head, which directs and controls them. So whoever wishes to withdraw from the sacrament and be content only with the word will be like a man who has a letter with a seal and wishes to break the seal and throw it into the fire, being content only with the Scripture. Yet we know it is the seal that gives the letter its authority. Such is the Lord's Supper. It acts as the seal of God's promise so that we may be strengthened. Consequently, when we do not show the Supper its proper respect, what honor will we give the word?"
John Calvin, Sermons on Acts (Quoted from Reformtion 21 blog)
January 25, 2008
"Our private and public prayers are our chief expressions of our relationship to God. It is in them chiefly that our waiting upon God must be exercised. If our waiting begins by quieting the activities of nature, and being still before God; if it bows and seeks to see God in His universal and almighty operation, alone able and always ready to work all good, then it will be the strength of the soul. If it yields itself to Him in the assurance that He is working and will work in us; if it maintains the place of humility and stillness, and surrenders until God’s Spirit has quickened the faith that He will perfect His work, it will indeed become the joy of the soul. Life will become one deep, blessed cry: “I have waited for Thy salvation, O Lord.” (Gen. 49:18)
Andrew Murray, Waiting on God, p. 17.
January 11, 2008
"God does not direct injustice toward his people. In fact, every tragedy becomes a blessing. There are no ultimate blessings for unbelievers, however, because every blessing they receive for which they remain ungrateful only redounds to their greater guilt. In the final judgment, every blessing unbelievers have received at the hands of a benevolent God becomes the foundation of their curse. So for believers there are no tragedies, and for unbelievers there are ultimately no blessings."
R.C. Sproul (On the doctrine of providence in Truths We Confess: A Laymen's Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith, 2006, p. 154)
January 4, 2008
"Dearly beloved of the Lord, how long will you halt between two opinions? If Christ is precious, then let your soul embrace Him; but if your idols are precious, then may your soul embrace them and delight in them. We may say that eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered the heart of man to conceive and ponder the endless and precious perfections that are in precious Christ. We shall never be able to comprehend the excellence and transcendent comeliness and beauty that is in His face. ‘My beloved ... is the chiefest among ten thousand … he is altogether lovely (Song of Solomon 5:10, 16). He is precious! Certainly if the angels and the saints were asked the question, ‘What do you think of Christ? – all those who are around the throne would venture this answer to the question: Christ is excellent and exceedingly precious and rather a subject of admiration than of speech.”
Andrew Gray (In a sermon entitled Jesus Christ’s Preciousness to Believers, 1655, p.88 "Loving Christ and Fleeing Temptation")
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