Category — Quotes

via Barb

“This very thing is no less expressly delivered concerning future glory. For since good works have the relation of the means to the end (Jn. 3:5, 16; Mt. 5:8); of the ‘way’ to the goal (Eph. 2:10; Phil 3:14); of the ‘sowing’ to the harvest (Gal. 6:7,8); of the ‘firstfruits’ to the mass (Rom. 8:23); of labor to the reward (Mt. 20:1); of the ‘contest’ to the crown (2 Tim. 2:5; 4:8), everyone sees that there is the highest and an indispensable necessity of good works for obtaining glory. It is so great that it cannot be reached without them (Heb. 12:14; Rev. 21:27).” Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 17.3.12.

Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right–a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people, that can, may revolutionize, and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit.

“A One that isn’t cold, is scarcely a One at all.”

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”
-Henry Tilney, Northanger Abbey

Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel: Wherein I suffer trouble, as an evil doer, even unto bonds; but the word of God is not bound. Therefore I endure all things for the elect’s sakes, that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. It is a faithful saying:

For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him:
If we suffer, we shall also reign with him:
if we deny him, he also will deny us:
If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful:
he cannot deny himself.

Of these things put them in remembrance, charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers. Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. But shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness.And their word will eat as doth a canker: of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus; Who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past already; and overthrow the faith of some. Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.

But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some to honour, and some to dishonour. If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master’s use, and prepared unto every good work.

A cool quote from James Jordan’s essay, Observations on the Covenant of Works Doctrine (begun here, and concluded here):

What does the Law actually say? As it stands, what the Law commands in the way of salvation is exactly what the Gospel commands. When we understand this, we can understand that many people kept the Law blamelessly, and found salvation. “And they were both righteous in the sight of God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and judgments of the Lord” (Luke 1:6).

Start at the beginning of the Law: “I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage; you shall have no other gods before Me.” What does this, the First Word, command? It tells us to put our final faith and trust in the true God, the only God there is, who has redeemed us from bondage to sin, the curse of His wrath. Now, this clearly is exactly what the Gospel commands us to do as well.

Second, the Law provides a series of orders that we are to obey. This is also the teaching of the Gospel. Those who put their trust in God are to obey Him.

But that is not the end. Suppose we sin? The Law says that when we sin, we are to come back to God through the sacrifices that He has instituted. This is exactly what the Gospel says as well: When we sin, we come back to God through the final sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

So, was it possible to be saved by keeping the Law? Certainly, in the full sense of keeping the Law. Those who kept the Law (a) put their trust in God, who had redeemed them, (b) strove to obey Him, and (c) when they sinned, returend to Him through the substitutionary sacrifices.

Thus, what the Law said is simply the preliminary form of what the Gospel says. This is why Paul so often praises the Law.

An excerpt of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, from jkrowling.com:

He looked rather like an old lion. There were streaks of grey in his mane of tawny hair and his bushy eyebrows; he had keen yellowish eyes behind a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles and a certain rangy, loping grace even though he walked with a slight limp.

In his chapter in When Shall These Things Be?, Keith Mathison writes,

In order to understand the eschatological time texts of the New Testament, it is important to understand their biblical context. We cannot simply remove a few isolated verses from their broader biblical context, interpret them apart from that context, and then use them as a hermeneutical grid through wich we force the remainder of Scripture. The eschatological time texts of the New Testament do not exist in a vacuum. We must examine these texts within the broader eschatological framework of the New Testament.

When I read that, I was struck at how applicable the principle is to the current ‘Auburn Avenue Controversy’.

Doug Phillips says on his blog,

Speaking of confused logic, have you noticed that the Christians who squawk and protest most loudly that they have discovered an “enlightened spirit of catholicity” that corrects the “excesses” of that great cloud of Reformation witnesses (including the hard talking, sound thinking Separatists, Puritans, Pilgrims, etc., who helped to found America) have anything but a spirit of catholicity when it comes to talking about their Reformed and credo-Baptist brethren. For many of these dear confused brothers “Baptist” and “Anabaptist” are synonymns, and both terms are the equivilent of a Christian swear word.

But, really, does he get it? This is probably the most common problem for the ‘reformed catholic’ guys. Because they emphasize christian catholicity and unity, it is assumed that they think everything is peachy keen. Because Baptists are members of Christs one, holy, catholic, apostolic body, it is assumed that nothing can be said about their errors. But that (obviously) is not the case. Baptists are our brothers. But they also are in error. Serious error, if you ask me. And those errors are pointed out and argued against. And that does nothing to diminish the primary goal of recognizing the catholic church as the catholic church.

It’s disheartening when these men that are leaders just don’t get it.

…everybody thinks that the government is a giant milch cow with 250 million teats.

We’re selling our car. (that is a minor point to this story… but we are selling it, a 2000 Chrysler Cirrus. We need something bigger now. You can email if you’re interested. Maybe one day I’ll put up an ad page like the Stewarts).

So, this morning I was getting the oil changed, and a man came up and asked me about the car (since he had seen it was for sale). I told him some details, and he asked why we are selling it. I told him we need something bigger, and then pointed at the two car seats in the back, and said we were expecting another. He looked at me in shock, and exclaimed “You’ve got two and are expecting another?! Don’t you know what causes that??”

I was actually quite thrilled to have this particular comment, because I got to put into practice one of the witty replies we and friends come up with to such comments.

I replied, “Yeah. And we really like it.”

He didn’t buy the car.

Thanks to Mark for pointing this out:

A Permanent Address, By Michael Horton

Augustine, one of the key sources for this invisible-visible church distinction, can be improved on by reference to eschatology. In other words, the proper distinction is not between two types of churches, one “inner” and another “outer,” but rather two eras of the one church’s existence: “this present age” and “the age to come.”