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Appearances
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I say that a Christian congregation
can survive and often appear to prosper in the community by the exercise
of human talent and without any touch from the Holy Spirit! All that religious
activity and the dear people will not know anything better until the great
and terrible day when our self-employed talents are burned with fire and
only that which was wrought by the Holy Ghost will stand forever!
Tragedy in the Church: The Missing
Gifts, 30.
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Bored?
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Man is bored, because he is
too big to be happy with that which sin is giving him. God has made
him too great, his potential is too mighty."
Who Put Jesus on the Cross, 170
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Character
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"Whatever a man wants badly
and persistently enough will determine the man's character."
The Root of the Righteous, 116.
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Complacency
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"Complacency is the deadly enemy
of spiritual progress. The contented soul is the stagnant soul."
The Size of the Soul, 22.
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Conduct
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"We modern Christians are long
on talk and short on conduct."
Born After Midnight, 32.
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Content
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"The average Christian is so
cold and so contented with His wretched condition that there is no vacuum
of desire into which the blessed Spirit can rush in satisfying fullness."
Born After Midnight, 7.
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Cross
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"We must do something about
the cross, and one of two things only we can do--flee it or die upon it."
The Root of the Righteous, 63.
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Devotional Life (distractions)
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"Modern civilization is so complex
as to make the devotional life all but impossible. It wears us out
by multiplying distractions and beats us down by destroying our solitude,
where otherwise we might drink and renew our strength before going out
to face the world again."
Of God and Men, 103.
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Discipleship
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"The New Christian is like a
man who has learned to drive a car in a country where the traffic moves
on the left side of the highway and suddenly finds himself in another country
and forced to drive on the right. He must unlearn his old habit and
learn a new one and more serious than all, he must learn in heavy traffic."
Of God and Men, 63.
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Embarrassed
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"Many of us Christians have
become extremely skillful in arranging our lives so as to admit the truth
of Christianity without being embarrassed by its implications. We
arrange things so that we can get on well enough without divine aid, while
at the same time ostensibly seeking it. We boast in the Lord but
watch carefully that we never get caught depending on Him."
The Root of the Righteous 39.
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Failure
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"No man is worthy to succeed
until he is willing to fail. No man is morally worthy of success
in religious activities until he is willing that the honor of succeeding
should go to another if God so wills.
God may allow His servant to succeed
when He has disciplined him to a point where he does not need to succeed
to be happy."
Renewed Day By Day, Vol. 1. March
24
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Faith
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"In the Book of Acts faith was
for each believer a beginning, not an end; it was a journey, not a bed
in which to lie while waiting for the day of our Lord's triumph.
Believing was not a once-done act; it was more than an act, it was an attitude
of heart and mind which inspired and enabled the believer to take up his
cross and follow the Lamb whithersoever He went."
Born After Midnight, 16.
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"Faith never means gullibility.
The man who believes everything is as far from God as the man who refuses
to believe anything."
The Root of the Righteous, 120.
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'...Faith is not a once-done
act, but a continuous gaze of the heart at the Triune God. Believing,
then, is directing the hearts' attention to Jesus. It is lifting
the mind to "behold the Lamb of God," and never ceasing that beholding
for the rest of our lives.'
The Pursuit of God, 90.
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Faith as Paul saw it, was a
living flaming thing leading to surrender and obedience to the commandments
of Christ. Faith in our day often means no more than a meek assent to a
doctrine.
Paths to Power, 56-57.
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Faith and Obedience
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In the
New Testament there is no contradiction between faith and obedience.
Between faith and law-works, yes; between law and grace, yes; but between
faith and obedience, not at all. The Bible recognizes no faith that
does not lead to obedience, nor does it recognize any obedience that does
not spring from faith.
Paths to
Power, 24
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Fear
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The only fear I have is to fear
to get out of the will of God. Outside of the will of God, there's
nothing I want, and in the will of God there's nothing I fear, for God
has sworn to keep me in His will. If I'm out of his will that's another
matter. But if I'm in His will, He's sworn to keep me."
Success and the Christian, 80.
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Fear of God
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The greatness
of God rouses fear within us, but His goodness encourages us not to be
afraid of Him. To fear and not be afraid--that is the paradox of
faith.
The Knowledge
of the Holy, 84.
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Foolishness
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"The notion that the careless
sinner is the smart fellow and the serious-minded Christian, though well-intentioned,
is a stupid dolt altogether out of touch with life will not stand up under
scrutiny. Sin is basically an act of moral folly, and the greater
the folly the greater the fool."
Man The Dwelling Place of God,
48.
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Forgiveness
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"The idea that God will pardon
a rebel who has not given up his rebellion is contrary both to the Scriptures
and to common sense."
The Root of the Righteous, 43.
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Future
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"We must face today as children
of tomorrow. We must meet the uncertainties of this world with the
certainty of the world to come."
-- Of God and Men, 132-133 --
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God
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"We are
called to an everlasting preoccupation with God."
That Incredible
Christian, 46.
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"It is impossible to keep our
moral practices sound and our inward attitudes right while our idea of
God is erroneous or inadequate."
The Knowledge of the Holy, viii
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Much of
our difficulty as seeking Christians stems from our unwillingness to take
God as He is and adjust our lives accordingly. We insist upon trying
to modify Him and to bring Him nearer to our own image.
The Pursuit
of God, 101.
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"What
comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing
about us."
The Knowledge
of the Holy, 7.
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God-centered or Man-centered?
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"Christianity today is man-centered,
not God-centered. God is made to wait patiently, even respectfully,
on the whims of men. The image of God currently popular is that of
a distracted Father, struggling in heartbroken desperation to get people
to accept a Saviour of whom they feel no need and in whom they have very
little interest. To persuade these self-sufficent souls to respond
to His generous offers God will do almost anything, even using salesmanship
methods and talking down to them in the chummiest way imaginable.
This view of things is, of course, a kind of religious romanticism which,
while it often uses flattering and sometimes embarrasing terms in praise
of God, manages nevertheless to make man the star of the show.
Man: The Dwelling Place of God,
27.
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Grace
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Nobody ever got anything from
God on the grounds that he deserved it. Haven fallen, man deserves
only punishment and death. So if God answers prayer it's because
God is good. From His goodness, His lovingkindness, His good-natured
benevolence, God does it! That's the source of everything.
The Attributes of God, 47.
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