What the Psalmist asked:
"LORD, how long will the wicked, how long will the wicked triumph?" (Psalm 94:3)
Was answered long ago and to the comfort of those who love righteousness, by Zophar the Naamathite:
"Do you not know this of old, since man was placed on earth, that the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite is but for a moment?" (Job 20:4,5)
"All who have first given themselves to the Lord, should, as speedily as possible, also give themselves to the Lord's people. How else is there to be a Church on the earth? If it is right for anyone to refrain from membership in the Church, it is right for everyone, and then the testimony for God would be lost to the world!" — Charles Spurgeon in his exposition of 2 Corinthians 8:5
"Calvin was not concerned with offering to his congregation the quaint meditations of his own heart. Although it has become popular in many churches for the pastor to strive to 'pour out his heart' to his congregation, such was not Calvin's aim in his preaching, for he had offered his heart to God alone. As a result, Calvin did not think it was profitable to share the ever-changing passions of his own heart, but to proclaim the heart of God in His never-changing Word."
— Burk Parsons, in The Humility of Calvin's Calvinism
"God thunders marvelously with His voice; He does great things which we cannot comprehend. For He says to the snow, 'fall on the Earth'; likewise to the gentle rain and the heavy rain of His strength." — Job 37:5,6
"...because the Reformed churches have always had a deep appreciation for the way in which Christ through His Holy Spirit employs the organic relations of human life for the coming of His kingdom, they have from the very beginning of their history conducted family visitation. By this means the churches have been able to wield an influence in the lives of their members as well as in the life of community and nation far in excess of their numberical strength." — Rev. Peter Y. DeJong
"The sages have a hundred maps to give
That trace their crawling cosmos like a tree,
They rattle reason out through many a sieve
That stores the sand and lets the gold go free;
And all these things are less than dust to me
Because my name is Lazarus and I live"
— from G.K. Chesterton's poem, The Convert
The Gospel of Jesus Christ is not one of many competitors in Earth's marketplace of ideas, but an unparalleled offer from Heaven's great Philanthropist, Who cries out, "Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." (Isaiah 55:1)
"The corporate worship of God is meant to be the highest thing we do, and also the thing that drives the rest of what we do. It should be for all ages...failure to involve them (children) in the church's main worship may serve to sow the seeds in their minds that this worship is irrelevant." — Rob Slane, author of The God Reality: A Critique of Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion
Jewish men at Christ's time and place customarily wore short hair. It is at best a very faulty assumption that Jesus wore long hair. The apostle Peter wrote in his general epistle to Christians of all ages, "You have not seen Him" (1 Peter 1:8). We know the Logos (John 1:1) — that is the living Word, through the holy Scriptures — that is the written word, as the Spirit illumines our hearts and minds. The sacramental meal which Christ Himself ordained is all we need to see or touch this side of Heaven. Representations of Christ by painting or movies are not helps to Biblical worship and understanding, but distortions. Indeed He came in the likeness of sinful flesh, but there is no sin corrupted artist or actor who can produce a visible image of the sinless One which does Him justice.
"In his preface to his commentary on the book of Psalms, Calvin made a most remarkable statement about providence that went to the very heart and soul of the religion he embraced and counseled others to embrace. He writes that knowing the Psalter teaches Christians to suffer for God so that 'we renounce the guidance of our own affections, and submit ourselves entirely to God, leaving Him to govern us, and to dispose our life according to His will, so that the afflictions which are the bitterest and most severe to our nature, become sweet to us, because they proceed from Him'." — W. Robert Godfrey
One can search the entire Bible and never once find it recorded there that the Lord Jesus Christ was afraid or worried.
Let then those with saving knowledge of their unswerving and undaunted, perfectly courageous Redeemer be imitators of Him. Let those paralyzed by fear and anxiety flee to Christ, Who is able to save to the uttermost those who come to God by Him: the Way, the Truth, and the Life!"
"As base a thing as money often is, it yet can be transmuted into everlasting treasure. It can be converted into food for the hungry, and clothing for the poor; it can keep a missionary actively winning lost men to the light of the Gospel and thus transmute itself into heavenly values. Any temporal possession can be turned into everlasting wealth. Whatever is given to Christ is immediately touched with immortality." — A.W. Tozer
In the Watchtower Magazine, A.D. 1991, Apr 15 p.7, these words were published: "Remember, Jesus said of those living through the last days, starting in 1914: 'Truly I say to you that this generation will by no means pass away until all these things occur.' (Matthew 24:34) Yes, peace will really come within this generation but not through the nations' efforts."
Anyone BORN in A.D. 1914 will reach 100 years of age this year. And Jesus never mentioned the year 1914. In other words, that prognostication has proved completely bogus, and it is only one in a long line (1874, 1878, 1915, 1918, 1925, etc.) of FALSE PROPHECIES by a non-prophet organization which claims divine authority. Evidently Jeanne Dixon, Mayan calendar devotees, Harold Camping et. al. are not the only vendors in the E.W.P.I. (End of the World Predicting Industry.)
A quick preliminary glossary:
A-GNOSTIC — denies knowledge of whether or not there is a deity
A-THEIST — categorically denies the existence of a deity
DEIST — forms his own idea of a deity.
All three of these philosophies, originating in the human mind, are actually DENIALS of the one true God! Why? Because He is not "a deity;" He is not the intellectual ping pong ball of philosophers and their endless wranglings.
He is the Lord God Who has made knowledge of (not merely His existence) but His eternal power and divine nature inescapable to every human being. The reason for all these and other denials of God is not rooted in any failure on His part to make Himself known, but in man's natural antipathy toward his rightful Sovereign...his inexcusable refusal to own and honor his Creator.
The reason human beings have that natural antipathy, and the cure for it, are also revealed by that one true God: through His word of truth, the glorious pinnacle of which is the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ: the Word incarnate, the sinless, crucified, risen, and ascended Lord of glory!
"Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life and the world." — John Milton
"...through prayer, a Christian puts his worries bit by bit on God. We are permitted to pour into God's bosom the difficulties which torment us, in order that he may loosen the knots which we cannot untie. Prayer is the outpouring of the soul, the deepest root of piety, and the bedrock of assurance. It is the most imortant part of the Christian life, the lifeblood of every true believer." — John Calvin
"When man turns his back on God, he turns his back on the very reason for his existence. This is why death is the penalty for sin. When we turn our backs on God, when we rebel against him, there's no good reason for us to go on living." — P. Andrew Sandlin
"The comfortable cheerful using of what God has given us, with temperance and sobriety, is really the honouring of God with it. Contentment, holy joy, and thankfulness, make every meal a religious feast." — Matthew Henry
Do you use use the Internet to search for things? Consider Colossians 2:3 and remember...
"ALL unsearchable riches are stored in the Divine Person of our Lord." — Anonymous
"The lessons of history, confirmed by the evidence immediately before me, show conclusively that continued dependence upon relief induces spiritual and moral disintegration fundamentally to the national fiber. To dole out relief in this way is to administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit. The federal government must and shall quit this business of relief." — President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (A.D. 1935 State of the Union address)
In First Samuel chapter thirty, David finds the town of Ziklag plundered and burned. Amalekites had captured Ziklag's wives and children. After consulting the LORD, David pursues the captors and rescues everyone.
Two hundred of his soldiers having been too exhausted to march, David had left them behind to guard the baggage. Afterword, the stronger men did not want to share the plunder with the weaker. David, however, stood up for the baggage tenders. In his final sermon, preached from this passage June 7 A.D. 1891, Charles Haddon Spurgeon drew a parallel to Christ:
"Our Savior", he said, stands up for the weak. "We are all one in Christ Jesus. Surely this ought to comfort those of you who, by reason of feebleness, are made to feel as if you were inferior members of the body. Christ is the most magnanimous of captains."
"...if we loved God with all our heart, soul, and mind, would not our mastery of His word be different? We spend so much time filling our minds with things other than a knowledge of His word. We are lazy; we are not diligent in our pursuit of His truth. Such things contribute to the distortions we create." — R.C. Sproul
"...a comic book is never merely a comic book! It is an artifact of culture...every artifact of culture, no matter what the medium, is making a play for hearts and minds; trying to convince, and to conform the heart and the mind to the world view that is being presented.
It's very important to us to know there is no world view neutrality. And those of us who are committed to developing a Christian mind need to understand how other messages are being sent – very effectively – throughout the conduits of culture...not even the comic books are immune...not by a long shot." — Dr. Albert Mohler, in his June 10 A.D. 2014 podcast The Briefing (condensed)
"The pursuit of God is the way to overcome disappointment." — Pastor Jim Smith
"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear." — George Orwell
Artificial intelligence, you say? That's you and me! Intelligent beings are the handiwork of the great Artisan!
The uncreated One...God Triune...the Creator of human beings and angels is the Designer of minds that think. Our creative efforts with robots and apps are just feeble reflections of His divine artifice.
"In necessary things, unity; in doubtful things, liberty; in all things, charity." — Richard Baxter (A.D. 1615 – 1691), English Puritan
"The men who wrote the Bible had no special advantages. They lived in a remote corner of the civilized earth. They had, most of them, little leisure, few books, and no learning, such as learning is reckoned in this world. Yet they book they composed is one which is unrivalled! There is but one way of accounting for this fact: They wrote under the direct inspiration of God." — J.C. Ryle
"Now the layman or amateur needs to be instructed as well as to be exhorted. In this age his need for knowledge is particularly pressing. Nor would I admit any sharp division between the two kinds of book. For my own part I tend to find the doctrinal books often more helpful in devotion than the devotional books, and I rather suspect that the same experience may await many others" — C.S. Lewis
"The fear of God is that submissive awe, and that divinely created reverence that we must show to God because of His perfect holiness, His majestic sovereignty, His uncorruptible justice, and His immeasurable mercy and grace." — Bishop Theophilus J. Herter
"I think the most wise and honorable approach to our God is never to lose that sense of AWE that our Lord hears us, and to expect what is available to us from His SOVEREIGN and providential hand of grace that exceeds our expectations." — Ronald McGarry
Q. 38. Is it lawful to explain this mystery (the Trinity) by natural similitudes?
A. No; for there is no similitude amongst all the creatures, that has the remotest resemblance to this adorable mystery of the three one God. By making similes or comparisons of this kind, men have become vain in their imaginations, and their foolish minds have been darkened, Romans 1:21-26; and therefore, as this doctrine is entirely a matter of faith, it becomes us to adore it, without prying curiously into what is not revealed. — Fisher's Catechism
The Christian is not promised a life free of hardship, grief, pain, trouble, or trials...but the Christian is commanded to live free of worry.
Heavenly Father...grant to Your church, in our desperately evil day, not to emulate the world as much as it can, nor to adopt its ways, nor to be "politically correct" but to stand strong as Your peculiar people, trusting Your word, and by Your grace conforming all we think and do according to the paths of godliness.
"The idea that there can be saving faith without repentance, and that one can be justified by embracing Christ as Savior while refusing Him as Lord is a destructive delusion." — J.I. Packer
"The authority of Scripture is a key issue for the Christian Church in this and every age. Those who profess faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior are called to show the reality of their discipleship by humbly and faithfully obeying God's written Word. To stray from Scripture in faith or conduct is disloyalty to our Master. Recognition of the total truth and trustworthiness of Holy Scripture is essential to a full grasp and adequate confession of its authority." — Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, A.D. 1978
"In the Summa (Theologica), Thomas Aquinas gives us a wonderful definition of theology. He says, 'Theology is taught by God.' The Latin is Theologia a Deo docetur. Then he says, 'Theology teaches God' (Deum docet). And then, 'It leads to God' (ad Deum ducit). So, theology is taught by God, teaches God, and leads to God." — Dr. Stephen Nichols, in his excellent podcast, Five Minutes in Church History (August 12 , A.D. 2014 edition)
"...the television, that insidious beast, that Medusa which freezes a billion people to stone every night, staring fixedly, that Siren which called and sang and promised so much and gave, after all, so little." — Ray Bradbury
"An open mind is like an open mouth, it's made to bite down on something." — Unknown
"A large part of virtue consists in good habits." — William Paley
"All those stones that the Davids of God have flung at the Goliaths of satan have been taken out of the brook of Scriptures." — Martin Luther
"Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers." — John Jay, first Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court
"A religion with reasonable attainable objectives fosters self-confidence, complacency and spiritual pride – it leads inevitably to self-righteousness, but it does not give the sinner the anguish of a guilty conscience nor the frustration of trying without success to attain in practical living the requirements of an absolute moral standard." — J.G. Vos
"Bibles read without prayer, sermons heard without prayer, marriages contracted without prayer, the daily act of private prayer itself hurried over or gone through without heart, these are the kind of downward steps by which many a Christian descends into a condition of spiritual palsy, or reaches a point where God allows him (or her) to have a tremendous fall…We may be sure that many fall in private long before they fall in public." — J. C. Ryle, Practical Religion
"What sweeter outlet and vent to all these troubles can you find than prayer? This would sweeten all your labors and sorrows in the world." — John Flavel
"When God blesses you financially, don't raise your standard of living. Raise your standard of GIVING!" — Mark Batterson
"The New Testament assumes that all Christians will share in the life of a local church, meeting with it for worship (Hebrews 10:25), accepting its nurture and discipline (Matthew 18:15-20; Galatians 6:1), and sharing in its work of witness. Christians disobey God and impoverish themselves by refusing to join with other believers when there is a local congregation that they can belong to." — J.I. Packer
The Fall of Man: When malicious disinformation and re-interpretation brought about tragic deformation.
The Gospel: New information with the power to bring about transformation, namely conformation to the image of the original Communicator of all good information
"O Jesus, my Immanuel, how grateful I am that Thou art no less with me in common places than in elevated ones. He who stooped to babyhood in a stable will not defer stooping to abide in this poor, dark, stable-like heart of mine, I know!" — from the journal of Jim Elliot, Christian missionary martyred in Ecuador, January A.D. 1956
"I've read in Plato and Cicero sayings wise and beautiful, but never in either: 'Come unto me all who labor and are heavy laden.' " — Augustine (Anno Domini 354 – 430)
Unattributed quotes are the words of the web site editor.
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