Quote 3789
Other Quotes from the Author & Topic
The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us.
Justification takes place by works and by faithโby the works of Christ and by our faith.
God loves all in some ways, and God loves some in all ways.
If hatred of sin is necessary to God, then penal justice is equally necessary because the hatred of sin is the constant will of punishing it.
To know that God knows everything about me and yet loves me is indeed my ultimate consolation.
When the apostle says that 'faith is by hearing' (Rom. 10:17), he does indeed give us to understand that the ministry of the church ought to come in as the ordinary means of producing faith in adults. He does not teach, however, that the church is clearer and better known than the Scriptures.
Good works are required as the means and way for possessing salvation. Even though they don't contribute anything to the acquisition of our salvation, they are necessary to the obtainment of it. No one can be saved without them.
We do not deny that the church has many functions in relation to the Scriptures. She is: (1) the keeper of the oracles of God to whom they are committed and who preserves the authentic tables of the covenant of grace with the greatest fidelity, like a notary (Rom. 3:2); (2) the guide, to point out the Scriptures and lead us to them (Is. 30:21); (3) the defender, to vindicate and defend them by separating the genuine books from the spurious, in which sense she may be called the ground of the truth (1 Tim. 3:15*); (4) the herald who sets forth and promulgates them (2 Cor. 5:19; Rom. 10:16); (5) the interpreter inquiring into the unfolding of the true sense. But all these imply a ministerial only and not a magisterial power.
The reading and contemplation of the Scriptures is enjoined upon men of all languages, therefore the translation of it into the native tongues is necessary. Since men speak different languages and are not all familiar with those two in which it was first written, it cannot be understood by them unless translated; it comes as the same thing to say nothing at all and to say what nobody can understand. But here it happens by the wonderful grace of God that the division of tongues (which formerly was the sign of a curse) becomes now the proof of a heavenly blessing. What was introduced to destroy Babel is now used to build up the mystical Zion.
It was not necessary for the apostles to write a catechism so as to deliver their doctrines professedly. It was enough for them to hand down to us those doctrines in accordance with which all symbolical books and catechisms might be constructed. If they did not formally write a catechism, they did materially leave us either in the gospels or in the epistles those things by which we can be clearly taught the principles of religion (katรฉcheisthai).
If theology takes some things from other systems, it is not as an inferior from superiors, but as an superior from inferiors (as a mistress freely using her handmaids). Theology does not so much take from others, as presupposes certain previously known things upon which it builds revelation.
Institutes of Elenctic Theology
That God is the object of theology is evident both from the very name (theologias and theosebeias), and from Scripture which recognizes no other principal object.Institutes of Elenctic Theology
Thus that all things are discussed in theology either because they deal with God himself or have a relation (schesin) to him as the first principle and ultimate end.Institutes of Elenctic Theology
But the divine dayspring from on high is adored, Christ the Lord, who is our sun and shield; the sun of every blessing, asserting the glory of religion; the shield of the most safe protection, affording an invincible and inexpugnable guard to liberty.
There is tremendous relief in knowing his love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery can disillusion him about me.
It is the love of Christ, i. e. his love to us which passes knowledge. It is infinite; not only because it inheres in an infinite subject, but because the condescension and sufferings to which it led, and the blessings which it secures for its objects, are beyond our comprehension. This love of Christ, though it surpasses the power of our understanding to comprehend, is still a subject of experimental knowledge. We may know how excellent, how wonderful, how free, how disinterested, how long-suffering, how manifold and constant, it is, and that it is infinite. And this is the highest and most sanctifying of all knowledge. Those who thus know the love of Christ towards them, purify themselves even as he is pure.
For since His will can have for its object nothing but good, it cannot will evil as evil, but as terminated on the permission of that which is good. God, therefore, properly does not will sin to be done, but only wills to permit it.
Effectual calling is an act of the grace of God in Christ by which he calls men dead in sin and lost in Adam through the preaching of the Gospel and the power of the Holy Spirit, to union with Christ and to salvation obtained in him.
The liberty of reading the Scriptures does not take away either oral instruction, pastoral direction or other helps necessary to understanding. It only opposes the tyranny of those who do not wish the darkness of their errors to be dissipated by the light of the divine word.
By the beatific vision... God will be seen without end, loved without cloying, praised without weariness.Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 3.612
The right of discipline belongs to the Church; those who despise this discipline are rejecting not just men, but God, who has appointed such ordinances for our edification.
Those who are always contending and disputing, rather than seeking to edify in love, do harm to the church. The truth needs no wrangling, but a firm and humble assertion.
The foundation of all true theology is humility, for when pride takes root in a theologian, the entire system of his doctrine becomes corrupted
God loves us more than father, mother, friend, or anyone else could love, and even more than we are able to love ourselves.
Although the church is more ancient than the Scriptures formally considered (and as to the mode of writing), yet it cannot be called such with respect to the Scriptures materially considered (and as to the substance of the doctrine) because the Word of God is more ancient than the church itself, being its foundation and seed.
Top Authors
1. Charles Spurgeon (130)
2. Thomas Watson (119)
3. J.C. Ryle (116)
4. John Calvin (104)
5. J.I. Packer (89)
6. John Piper (86)
7. George Swinnock (74)
8. A.W. Pink (68)
9. Louis Berkhof (63)
10. John Flavel (58)
11. B.B. Warfield (58)
12. C.S. Lewis (55)
13. John Owen (53)
14. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (51)
15. Gerald Bray (50)
16. Francis Schaeffer (49)
17. Thomas Brooks (46)
18. R.C. Sproul (45)
19. Matthew Henry (44)
20. Francis Turretin (43)
2. Thomas Watson (119)
3. J.C. Ryle (116)
4. John Calvin (104)
5. J.I. Packer (89)
6. John Piper (86)
7. George Swinnock (74)
8. A.W. Pink (68)
9. Louis Berkhof (63)
10. John Flavel (58)
11. B.B. Warfield (58)
12. C.S. Lewis (55)
13. John Owen (53)
14. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (51)
15. Gerald Bray (50)
16. Francis Schaeffer (49)
17. Thomas Brooks (46)
18. R.C. Sproul (45)
19. Matthew Henry (44)
20. Francis Turretin (43)
Top Topics
1. Sin (192)2. Scripture (125)
3. Prayer (124)
4. Preaching (107)
5. Faith (105)
6. Gospel (90)
7. Suffering (77)
8. Sabbath (76)
9. Church (71)
10. Salvation (69)
11. Law (63)
12. The Law (54)
13. Truth (52)
14. Justification (50)
15. Christ (45)
16. Love (42)
17. Theology (42)
18. Grace (41)
19. Creation (40)
20. Fear (36)
21. Holiness (35)
22. Pride (34)
23. Sanctification (34)
24. Children (33)
25. Ten Commandments (33)
26. Worship (33)