Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
You are so amazed by grace, you're not picking a fight with anyone, you're just crying tears of amazement that should lead to a heart for lost people, that God does indeed save, when he doesn't have to save anybody.
The inevitable result of borrowed faith is lost faith. People born into a family anchored in Christendom tend to assume they're right with God, regardless of whether they personally turn from sin and trust in Jesus.
Grace-driven effort wants to get to the bottom of behavior, not just manage behavior. If you're simply managing behavior but not removing the roots of that behavior, then the weeds simply sprout up in another place.
The third big idea is that we confess our sins to someone close to us--a friend or our spouse. I don't mean a public declaration of our shortcomings; I mean confession in the security of a trusted and living friend.
When you understand the values of God's kingdom, you will best understand His agenda.4 However, it is my conviction that the message of the kingdom, and the values therein, are sorely lacking in understanding today.
The problem is that God is being dismissed from the culture, and that vacuum is allowing, or is the basis for, the deterioration of society. That is because Christians have not kept Him in the center of the culture.
I ended up dropping out of high school at 16 and getting kicked out of my home. My parents told me, sadly, that because I was so disruptive to the rest of the household, that I could no longer live under their roof.
When we are weak, we can still be strong. When we're under the greatest stress and facing the greatest challenges, it may be the best day of our lives, for God is working to make us into the people he wants us to be.
A pastor should never complain about his congregation, certainly never to other people, but also not to God. A congregation has not been entrusted to him in order that he should become its accuser before God and men.
Each morning is a new beginning of our life. Each day is a finished whole. The present day marks the boundary of our cares and concerns. It is long enough to find God or lose Him, to keep faith or fall into disgrace.
Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous. So we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy...He who is alone with his sins is utterly alone.
While the Christian message is increasingly becoming less acceptable in fashionable society, we must be always living according to Scripture and prepared to be apologists for Jesus Christ in all aspects of our lives.
Don't you know you are the only Jesus many people will ever see? In compromising your lifestyle, you forfeit your capacity to accurately reflect God's image and endanger an entire generation's understanding of Jesus.
Jesus says in Matthew 25, no man knows the day nor the hour, neither the angles nor the son but only the Father which is in heaven. Now if Jesus didn't know when he was coming back, it's crazy for me to try to think.
Many people spend their lives trying to create a lasting legacy on earth. They want to be remembered when they're gone. Yet, what ultimately matters most will not be what others say about your life but what God says.
America was built on rugged individualism, and today that has evolved into a culture of narcissism. But God didn't create you to live for you. If you want to follow Jesus, you have to put aside your selfish ambition.
The flag of your nation - wave it! Begin to separate your nation from whatever covenant your forefathers must have had. Break the covenant of corruption/ stealing/ killing/ destruction/ idolatry - break it right now!
Sigmund Freud was the apostle of disbelief. He was the one who made psychoanalysis a part of our culture, and in so doing he kicked out a flying buttress that had been essential for holding up our cathedral of faith.
When it comes to politics and elections, far too many Christians spend more time appealing to family, history and tradition, culture, racial expediency, and personal preference than they do to what the Bible teaches.
To be Biblically balanced is to let our theology and preaching be proportioned by the Bible's radically disproportionate focus on God's saving love for sinners seen and accomplished in the crucified and risen Christ.
When you pray, pray so that you may know Him. When you seek to simplify, do it as a means of knowing Him more. When you surrender, or behave with humility or sacrifice, do it with the sole purpose in mind to know Him.
When we stray from His presence, He longs for you to come back. He weeps that you are missing out on His love, protection and provision. He throws His arms open, runs toward you, gathers you up, and welcomes you home.
God's arrows of affliction are sharp and painful so He can get our attention. He won't let His beloved children get away with sin because He knows it robs us of blessings, opportunities, and even character refinement.
The church I lead could have the least gifted people, the least talented people, the fewest leaders, and the least money, and this church under the power of the Holy Spirit could still shake the nations for his glory.
What is it about tears that should be so terrifying? the touch of God is marked by tears...deep, soul-shaking tears, weeping...it comes when that last barrier is down and you surrender yourself to health and wholeness
Confession of sins is not meritorious: to confess sins as a way of placing God in your debt is not dealing with sin; it is committing another sin. The context of all confession must be the free grace of justification.
People who are obsessed with Jesus live lives that connect them with the poor in some way or another. Obsessed people believe that Jesus talked about money and the poor so often because it was really important to Him.
And the fact that Emmett Till, a young black man, could be found floating down the river in Mississippi, as, indeed, many had been done over the years, this set in concrete the determination of people to move forward.
Government is not a human institution. It is a divine institution that humans are to run on His behalf. When they create their own rules, then they become against the creator and what He intended for government to do.
Anxious. Intriguing word. It literally means, "to be divided" or "distracted." It conveys the idea of being so mentally ill at ease that you cannot do what you need to do because you are so distracted in your thinking.
At first, He shook us very tenderly but now His shaking has become violent, because He has not succeeded in awakening us... God is going to shake everything in sight so that He is revealed as the only unshakable power!
The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes, the more will everything else between us recede, the more clearly and purely will Jesus Christ and His work become the one and only thing that is vital between us.
The church becomes irrelevant when it becomes purely a human creation. We are not all we were made to be when everything in our lives and churches can be explained apart from the work and presence of the Spirit of God.
Churchgoers in America are notorious for jumping into movements, even ideas that are hard to listen to. But when they actually have to change their lifestyle and do something about it, it rarely translates into action.
Whoever is sitting in the White House, especially in their second term, when gas goes up to $3 a gallon, and Katrina, and whenever we're at war, that person sitting in the White House gets the brunt of the accusations.
It is very clear that the heavens declare the glory of God. We learn a lot about the glory of God without even Scriptures. We know God is organized. We know God likes variety. We know God is powerful. All these things.
I contend the state ought to do its thing and provide legal rights for all couples who want to be joined together for life. The church should bless unions that it sees fit to bless, and they should be called marriages.
Remember, if you want to love your life and live it to the fullest, don't let the sun go down on your anger. If you don't have a solution to the issue, agree to disagree and focus on the importance of the relationship.
Sometimes God presents opportunities that look insignificant or rather ordinary. Perhaps you don't see how they fit into the big picture for your life. But if God is asking you to do something, He has a purpose for it.
We only have a certain amount of energy for each day. If we use it for the wrong purpose, if we focus on the negative or dwell on whoever hurt us, then we're not going to have the energy we need for the right purposes.
When sermons start where people live - their questions, struggles, and concerns - and then offer a timely and helpful word from the Scriptures, people are more interested in hearing what else the Scriptures have to say.
The crisis of physical hunger is essentially a crisis of faith. What or whom will you trust to meet your most basic needs? Will you trust the God who made human bodies, or will you seek your own way? (Deuteronomy 8:1-3)
If you take away the Jewish contribution to Christianity, there would be no Christianity. Judaism does not need Christianity to explain its existence; Christianity, however, cannot explain its existence without Judaism.
As I look back on my own life, I recognize this simple truth: The greatest opportunities were the scariest lions. Part of me has wanted to play it safe, but I’ve learned that taking no risks is the greatest risk of all.
Find the things that stir your affections for Christ and saturate your life in them. Find the things that rob you of that affection and walk away from them. That's the Christian life as easy as I can explain it for you.
The greatest gift God gave us is also our greatest curse, which is the free will. We are made in God's image, the Bible says, which means we have the ability to love him or not love him, to reject him or not reject him.
For the life of the believer, one thing is beautifully and abundantly true: God's chief concern in your suffering is to be with you and be Himself for you. And in the end, what we discover is that this really is enough.
As you keep your mind and heart focused in the right direction, approaching each day with faith and gratitude, I believe you will be empowered to live life to the fullest and enjoy the abundant life He has promised you!
The Song is a gritty, realistic, and powerful film. The acting and production quality are excellent, and the story is captivating. Although not for children, the story is a good reminder to adults of what really matters!
Things will happen that seem to be totally contradictory, but these are God's arrangements. It was a wonderful day when I finally realized I don't have to explained or defend the will of God. My job is simply to obey it.