believe that there are too many accommodating
preachers, and too many practitioners in the church who are not believers.
Jesus Christ did not say "Go into all the world and tell the world that it is
quite right." The Gospel is something completely different. In fact, it is
directly opposed to the world.
C.S. Lewis
Let us stand to our preaching like soldiers to their guns. The pulpit is the
Thermopylae of Christendom where our foes shall receive a check, the field of
Waterloo on which they shall sustain a defeat. Let us preach, and preach
evermore.
Charles Spurgeon
First, I believe it to be a grave mistake to present Christianity as something
charming and popular with no offense in it. Seeing that Christ went about the
world giving the most violent offence to all kinds of people it would seem
absurd to expect that the doctrine of His Person can be so presented as to
offend nobody. We cannot blink at the fact that gentle Jesus meek and mild was
so stiff in His opinions and so inflammatory in His language that He was thrown
out of church, stoned, hunted from place to place, and finally gibbeted as a
firebrand and public danger. Whatever His peace was, it was not the peace of
an amiable indifference.
Dorothy Sayers
He it is Who won victory from His demon foes and trophies from the idolaters
even before His bodily appearing -- namely, all the heathen who from every
region have abjured the tradition of their fathers and the false worship of
idols and are now placing their hope in Christ and transferring their
allegiance to Him. . . . He it is who was crucified with the sun and moon as
witnesses; and by His death salvation has come to all men, and all creation has
been redeemed.
Athanasius
Without Christ, sciences in every department are vain, and that the man who
knows not God is vain, though he should be conversant with every branch of
learning. Nay more, we may affirm this, too, with truth, that these choice
gifts of God -- expertness of mind, acuteness of judgment, liberal sciences,
and acquaintances with languages, are in a manner profaned in every instance in
which they fall to the lot of wicked men.
John Calvin
What is the reason for Paul's broad tolerance in Rome, and the fierce anathemas
in Galatia? The answer is perfectly plain. In Rome, Paul was tolerant,
because there the content of the message that was being proclaimed by the rival
teachers was true; in Galatia he was intolerant, because there the content of
the rival message was false.
J. Gresham Machen
The kingdom of death so reigned over men, that the deserved penalty of sin
would have hurled all headlong even into the second death, of which there is no
end, had not the undeserved grace of God saved some therefrom. And thus it
came to pass, that though there are very many and great nations all over the
earth, whose rites and customs, speech, arms, and dress, are distinguished by
marked differences, yet there are no more than two kinds of human society,
which we may justly call two cities, according to the language of our
Scriptures. The one consists of those who wish to live after the flesh, the
other of those who wish to live after the spirit.
Augustine
The basic problem of the Christians in this country in the last eighty years or
so, in regard to society and in regard to government, is that they have seen
things in bits and pieces instead of totals. . . . The shift has been away
from a world view that was at least vaguely Christian in people's memory
toward something completely different. . . .These two worldviews stand
as totals in complete antithesis to each other in content and also in their
natural results. It is not that these two world views are different only in
how they understand the nature of reality and existence. They also inevitably
produce totally different results. The operating word here is
invariably. It is not just that they happen to bring forth different
results, but it is absolutely inevitable that they will bring forth
different results.
Francis Schaeffer
[In the future] there shall be a wonderful unraveling of the difficulties in
the doctrines of religion, and clearing up of seeming inconsistencies.
Difficulties in Scripture shall then be cleared up, and wonderful things shall
be discovered in the word of God, which were never discovered before. So great
shall be the increase in knowledge in this time, that heaven shall be as it
were opened to the church of God on earth.
Jonathan Edwards
As conquerors of old in their solemn triumphs used to lead their captives
fettered with iron chains, so Christ having spoiled principalities and powers,
made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them. . . . It is certain that
Christ fought and overcame all his enemies: he gave them the last blow upon the
cross, he seized on the spoil at his resurrection, and led them in triumph at
his ascension into heaven, and by his peaceable possession of this throne His
subjects enjoy the benefit of all.
Thomas Boston
Let your dealing with those you begin with be so gentle, convincing, and
winning, that the report of it may be an encouragement to others to come.
Richard Baxter
Screw the truth into men's minds.
Richard Baxter
A hard heart is impenitent, and impenitence also makes the heart harder and
harder. If you would be rid of a hard heart, that great enemy to the growth of
the grace of fear, be much with Christ upon the Cross in thy meditations, for
that is an excellent remedy against the hardness of heart; a right sight of
him, as he hanged there for thy sins, will dissolve thy heart into tears, and
make it soft and tender. "They shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and
they shall mourn." Now, a soft, a tender, and broken heart is a fit place for
the grace of fear to thrive in.
John Bunyan
There is no doubt then that Christianity is imperiled by great and serious
dangers. Two life systems are wrestling with one another, in mortal
combat. Modernism is bound to build a world of its own from the data of the
natural man; while on the other hand, all those who reverently bend the knee to
Christ and worship Him as the Son of the living God, and God Himself, are bent
upon saving the "Christian Heritage." This is the struggle in Europe,
this is the struggle in America.
Abraham Kuyper
The liberty which Christ hath purchased for believers under the gospel,
consists in their freedom from the guilt of sin, the condemning wrath of God,
the curse of the moral law; and in their being delivered from this present evil
world, bondage to Satan, and dominion of sin, from the evil of afflictions, the
sting of death, the victory of the grave, and everlasting damnation; as also in
their free access to God, and their yielding obedience unto him, not out of
slavish fear, but a child-like love, and willing mind.
Westminster Confession
The church, though she has been reformed, must be constantly re-formed,
semper reformanda. Always reform! The church is always to be under the
Word; she must be.
D.M. Lloyd-Jones
For the truth's sake, Paul withstood and blamed Peter, though a brother. Where
was the use of unity when pure doctrine was gone? And who shall dare to say he
was wrong?
J. C. Ryle
