“An idol is whatever you look at and say, in your heart of hearts, “If I have that, then I’ll feel my life has meaning, then I’ll know I have value, then I’ll feel significant and secure.” – Tim Keller
“When we cannot see God’s hand, we must trust God’s heart.”
"The branch of the vine does not worry, and toil, and rush here to seek for sunshine, and there to find rain. No; it rests in union and communion with the vine; and at the right time, and in the right way, is the right fruit found on it. Let us so abide in the Lord Jesus.” –Hudson Taylor
"We are the Bibles the world is reading; We are the creeds the world is needing; We are the sermons the world is heeding." –Billy Graham
"Though the light shines on things unclean, yet it is not thereby defiled." –Augustine
"Our love to God is measured by our everyday fellowship with others and the love it displays." –Andrew Murray
"The greater perfection a soul aspires after, the more dependent it is upon divine grace." –Brother Lawrence
"Some want to live within the sound of church or chapel bell; I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of hell." –C.T. Stud
"Catch on fire with enthusiasm and people will come for miles to watch you burn." –Charles Wesley
"By perseverance the snail reached the ark." –Charles Spurgeon
"If I leave behind me 10 (pounds), you and all mankind bear witness against that I lived and died a thief and a robber" –John Wesley
"Nobody seriously believes the universe was made by God without being persuaded that He takes care of His works." –John Calvin
"God cannot be comprehended by us, except as far as he accommodates himself to our standard." –John Calvin
"Salvation is from our side a choice; from the divine side it is a seizing upon, an apprehending, a conquest by the Most High God. Our accepting and willing are reactions rather than actions." –A.W. Tozer
"The devil is a better theologian than any of us and is a devil still." –A.W. Tozer
"We must meet the uncertainties of this world with the certainty of the world to come." –A.W. Tozer
"They gave our Master a crown of thorns. Why do we hope for a crown of roses?" –Martin Luther
"When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die." –Dietrich Bonhoeffer
“In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.” –Augustine
“An atheist staring from his attic window is often nearer to God than a believer caught up in his own false image of God.” -Martin Buber
Everyman, in his own mind is Bonhoeffer, Luther and Paul. I see myself in them…in their writings; in the leaving of the old and searching of the new, in the forsaking of tradition for tradition’s sake, and the pursuit of a higher calling; in the rejection by their religious groups and in the acceptance by God alone, by faith. These were men who were hated in their time by many, yet from their time to now, they have become a light to so many more. They cannot be judged by any man; God alone is their sovereign. Our only view of them should be their motives... not their mistakes. When we see through actions and mistakes and catch a glimpse of the heart of someone, we are less apt to judge them. This is a lesson to be learned.
I would that I could leave behind a legacy such as these. What accomplishment of mine will I be remembered for? Eloquent words? Passionate pursuits or revivalist revolutions? A well-examined faith that has discipled untold millions? No. Not for me. I will accomplish no significant thing lest it be by God’s hand. When I hold the pen, my fingers tremble. When I’m given a choice, my ideals crumble. When I’m faced with life, my faith waivers. There is nothing to ground me and steady my aim, save the gospel. There is no good in me, save this cracked imago dei that helplessly wants to do good, only to be overthrown, time and again, by evil. There is no hope for greatness! No, not in myself. If I look elsewhere, I see great men who have shaped history, but they were scoundrels in their own right and fell shorter than any of us like to imagine possible for our heroes. So if hope is not to be found within or without me, what then is left? Where is greatness to be achieved? Where is love to be practiced? Where is perfection to be reached? Nowhere else... save Christ.
This is the good news, that Christ uses the imperfect to bring about His perfection. He works His reconciliation through those of us who are not yet fully reconciled. He brings His message of salvation through those who are still being saved. Just as He loved us when we were unlovable and had mercy upon us when we deserved His righteous wrath, He now chooses us to be His representatives of reconciliation. Oh mystery of mysteries! To what do we owe this great privilege? Christ! And what then do we owe Him? All! Then the weakest and most beggarly of us join humbly in the ranks of Bonhoeffer and Luther and Paul. For He sees us through the cross as loving, perfect, honorable and righteous, and it is in that power that we may stand happily in His presence, and by His power alone, work out His will in this sphere. If we receive any honor it rightly goes to Him, for all we have gained has been by His power alone.
So If I stand in His presence, may it be by His power alone. If I write, may it be His hand that steadies mine. As I face life, with its decisions and struggles, may it be by His grace alone that I am left standing in my faith. And in that glorious day, all our great works will turn into dust in the light of His grace, and I will be no different from Bonhoeffer and Luther and Paul, as we all - the strong, the tempted, and the weak - stand as one in Christ, vindicated by his earthly rejection, forgiven by His horrific suffering, and made alive by His glorious resurrection!
Here are some amazing quotes from my reading so far this year...
"The blessing of mission is ours while the burden of mission is God’s." -Jonathon Dodson
The Four G's : -Tim Chester
1. God is great – so we don’t have to be in control 2. God is glorious – so we don’t have to fear others 3. God is good – so we don’t have to look elsewhere 4. God is gracious – so we don’t have to prove ourselves
"All of us are living out the story of our lives and to often we do that unconnected to the meta narrative of our Creator God who has brought us into relationship with Himself through Jesus, and is redeeming his creation even now." -Rick McKinley
"Jesus: the One exposed, ravaged, ruined and resurrected for us." -Tullian Tchividjian
"An idol is when we turn a good thing into an ultimate thing." -Caesar Kalinowski
"To be a person of truth is to live before God in the reality He created rather than to settle for illusions, even those of our own making" -Lael Arrington
"God is the expression of the very thing we seek in each other... What we have sought, what we have tasted in part with our earthly lovers, we will come face-to-face with in our True Love. The incompleteness we seek to relieve in the deep embrace of our earthly love is never fully healed." -John Eldridge
"The Kingdom is to be in the midst of your enemies. And he who will not suffer this does not want to be of the Kingdom of Christ; he wants to be among friends, to sit among roses and lilies, not with the bad people but the devout people. O you blasphemers and betrayers of Christ! If Christ had done what you are doing who would ever have been spared?" -Martin Luther
"It is in the ordinary duties and labors of life that the Christian can and should develop his spiritual union with God."-Thomas Merton
"He who loves his dream of community more than the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter" -Dietrich Bonhoeffer
"Are we responding to the love of Jesus concretely and consistently in our love for one another?" -Brennan Manning
"Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love." -Martin Luther King Jr.
"Our static, self-centered structures are "heretical structures" because they embody a heretical doctrine of the church. If our structure has become an end in itself, not a means of saving the world it is a heretical structure." -John Stott
"In reality the only call in the Bible is the call to the way of the cross, the way of service, sacrificial love and suffering." -Tim Chester
"We ought not to grow tired of doing little things for the love of God, who regards not the greatness of the work, but the love with which it is performed." -Brother Lawrence
"I want to prepare like an evangelical; preach like a Pentecostal; pray like a mystic; do the spiritual disciplines like a Desert Father; art like a Catholic; and social justice like a liberal." -Mark Driscoll
"The god of whom no dogmas are believed is a mere shadow. He will not produce that fear of the Lord in which wisdom begins and therefore will not produce that love in which it is consumated….There is in the minimal religion nothing that can convince, convert, or (in the higher sense) console; nothing therefore which can restore vitality to our civilisation. It is not costly enough. It can never be a controller or even a rival to our natural sloth and greed." -C.S. Lewis
