Archive for the ‘Quotations’ Category
Murray on our union with Christ
In his book, Redemption Accomplished and Applied, the late John Murray presents an excellent summary of what it means that believers live in union with Christ. He writes that “if we did not take account of [union with Christ], not only would our presentation of the application of redemption be defective but our view of the Christian life would be gravely distorted. Nothing is more central or basic than union and communion with Christ” (p. 161). On the following pages he goes on to enumerate what it means to be united with Christ:
The fountain of salvation itself in the eternal election of the Father is “in Christ.” . . . The Father elected from eternity, but he elected in Christ. . . .
It is also because the people of God were in Christ when he gave his life a ransom and redeemed by his blood that salvation has been secured for them; they are represented as united to Christ in his death, resurrection, and exaltation to heaven. . . .
It is in Christ that the people of God are created anew. “We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works” (Eph. 2:10). . . .
But not only does the new life have its inception in Christ; it is also continued by virtue of the same relationship to him. It is in Christ that Christian life and behavior are conducted. . . .
It is in Christ that believers die. They have fallen asleep in Christ or through Christ and they are dead in Christ (1 Thess. 4:14, 16). . . .
Finally, it is in Christ that the people of God will be resurrected and glorified. It is in Christ they will be made alive when the last trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible (1 Cor. 15:22). It is with Christ they will be glorified (Rom. 8:17).
Lauterbach on gospel-driven living
[Peter] wants them to live by faith in the finished work of Christ. He knows that mere commands do not give hope. He is not opposed to specific obedience. He is opposed to self-sufficient obedience.
This takes me back to this point in Gospel-centrality. The Gospel is not the entry to the Christian life — it is all of the Christian life. It is not the ABC’s but the A to Z (to quote Keller). I can find no other NT method or model for ministry. I find myself asking this — do I lead my people and my family and myself FIRST in fresh faith toward the Savior and all that he has won; and only SECOND to the specifics of application?
— Mark Lauterbach
Read the whole thing. Then bookmark Mark’s blog.
Watson on humility, gratitude, and deserving
Thomas Watson draws out the connection between humility, gratitude, and a right awareness of our sins and our deserving: “A proud man complains that he has no more; a humble man wonders that he has so much: ‘I am not worthy of the least of all thy mercies’ (Genesis 32:10).”
Ramsey on Humility
John Stott quotes Archbishop Michael Ramsey in his lecture “Reflections of an Octogenarian.” Ramsey gave a series of lectures entitled “Sermons addressed to young men on the eve of their ordination,” and which are collected in the book The Christian Priest Today. Stott quotes Ramsey’s main points on humility as follows:
- Always be expressing gratitude to God: “thankfulness is a soil in which pride does not easily grow.”
- Always be aware of our sin: “take care about the confession of your sins.”
- Whether they are trivial or big, “be ready to accept humiliations, they can hurt terribly but they help you to be humble . . . these are opportunities to be a little nearer to our humble and crucified Lord.”
- “Do not worry about status; there is only one status that our Lord bids us be concerned with, and that is the status of proximity to himself.”
- “Use your sense of humor; laugh about things. Laugh at the absurdities of life; laugh about yourself and about your own absurdity . . . You have to be serious of course, but never be solemn, because if you are solemn about anything, there is a danger of your becoming solemn about yourself.”
- Lastly, “it is at the foot of the cross that humility finally grows.” Consider Galatians 6:14, “But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”
Reflections Of An Octogenarian
Notes on John Stott’s lecture Reflections of an Octogenarian, q.v..
A conviction about priorities
Stott recommends one day a month of solitude.
A conviction about people
- How can you continue to love people who do not immediately appear to be lovable? Stott recommends Richard Baxter’s The Reformed Pastor.
- Acts 20:28 — “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.” He purchased these people with his own blood.
- The only way to persevere in care is to “remember who they are, and how precious they are in the sight of God.” All three persons of the Trinity are dedicated to their welfare.
- How small is our labor in comparison with Christ’s labor for his church?
A conviction about relevance
- “the task of christian communicator, which is not to make Jesus Christ relevant but to demonstrate his relevance to the modern world.”
- “in this simple, maybe rather elementary . . . diagram, evangelicals are biblical but not contemporary, liberals are contemporary but not biblical, and almost nobody is building bridges.”
- “we have to struggle to be as relevant as we are biblical”
A conviction about study
- “In our busy lives, study is usually the first thing to be dropped.”
- Lloyd-Jones: “you will always find that the men whom God has used signally have been those who have studied most, known their scriptures best, and given time to preparation.”
- Stott recommends one hour of study per day, one 4-hour session every week, one day every month, and one reading week every year.
- We have to study on both sides of the divide… students of scripture, but we need also to be students of the modern world.
A conviction about obedience
- John 14:21 — Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.
- Jesus will reveal himself to his lovers; his lovers are proved not by their words but by their obedience.
- “The test of love is obedience, and the reward of love is the self-manifestation of Christ.”
A conviction about humility
- “insidious temptation to pride”
- “humility is not a synonym for hypocrisy; humility is a synonym for honesty”
- Michael Ramsey, ”Sermons addressed to young men on the eve of their ordination”
- “thankfulness is a soil in which pride does not easily grow”
- “take care about the confession of your sins”
- “be ready to accept humiliations, they can hurt terribly but they help you to be humble . . . these are opportunities to be a little nearer to our humble and crucified Lord”
- “do not worry about status; there is only one status that our Lord bids us be concerned with, and that is the status of proximity to himself.”
- “use your sense of humor; laugh about things. laugh at the absurdities of life; laugh about yourself and about your own absurdity . . . you have to be serious of course, but never be solemn, because if you are solemn about anything, there is a danger of your becoming solemn about yourself”
- “it is at the foot of the cross that humility finally grows”
Galatians 6:14 — But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.
Adoption
You sum up the whole of New Testament teaching in a single phrase, if you speak of it as a revelation of the Fatherhood of the holy Creator. In the same way, you sum up the whole of New Testament religion if you describe it as the knowledge of God as one’s holy Father. If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God’s child, and having God as his Father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. For everything that Christ taught, everything that makes the New Testament new, and better than the Old, everything that is distinctively Christian as opposed to merely Jewish, is summed up in the knowledge of the Fatherhood of God. “Father” is the Christian name for God.
J. I. Packer, Knowing God, Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993; p. 201.
The ideal woman
“I think [Ruth] is a picture of the ideal woman in the Old Testament. Four things characterize the ideal woman. Faith in God that goes beyond and sees beyond the present bitter experiences with God. Freedom, secondly, from securities and comforts of home and family and this life. Third, courage to venture into the unknown and into the strange. And fourth, radical commitment in the relationships that God has appointed.” — John Piper
All God's providences are good
“God’s providence is sometimes very, very hard. . . Even though the providence of God is sometimes very hard, in all his works he is purposing your happiness and your good.” — John Piper
Whether sweet or bitter, God’s providences are always good.
Mine
“There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!'” — Abraham Kuyper
Redemption Accomplished and Applied
Murray, John. Redemption Accomplished and Applied. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1984.
The late John Murray presents a brief overview of Jesus’s work of redemption. This book is divided into two parts: Redemption Accomplished, which describes our need of a savior, God’s provision of a savior, and what Jesus accomplished on the cross; and Redemption Applied, which describes how all of redemption is worked out in the life of the believer.
This book was a helpful overview of Jesus’s work on the cross and of God’s work in bringing me to salvation.
Of all of the chapters, the one that was most provocative to me was the chapter on faith and repentance. Murray presents a wonderful reminder of where our assurance of salvation is located — nowhere other than Jesus himself.
Following are this and some other quotes I’ve collected from the book.
On Assurance (pp. 107ff)
Murray reminds us that our assurance does not consist in peering into the secret decrees of God to discern whether he loves us or has elected us unto salvation (see also The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God), nor does it consist of our subjective sense of nearness to God. It consists in placing our trust here and now wholly in Jesus for mercy:
What warrant does a lost sinner have to commit himself to Christ? How may he know that he will be accepted? How does he know that Christ is able to save? How does he know that this confidence is not misplaced? How does he know that Christ is willing to save him? . . .
From whatever angle we may view [the offer of the gospel], it is full, free, and unrestricted. The appeals of the gospel cover the whole range of divine prerogative and of human interest. God entreats, he invites, he commands, he calls, he presents the overture of mercy and grace, and he does this to all without distinction or discrimination. . . .
When Christ is presented to lost men in the proclamation of the gospel, it is as Savior he is presented, as one who ever continues to be the embodiment of the salvation he has once for all accomplished. It is not the possibility of salvation that is offered to lost men but the Saviour himself and therefore salvation full and perfect. There is no imperfection in the salvation offered and there is no restriction to its overture — it is full, free, and unrestricted. And this is the warrant of faith.
The faith of which we are now speaking is not the belief that we have been saved but [it is] trust in Christ in order that we may be saved. And it is of paramount concern to know that Christ is presented to all without distinction to the end that they may entrust themselves to him for salvation. The gospel offer is not restricted to the elect or even to those for whom Christ died. And the warrant of faith is not the conviction that we are elect or that we are among those for whom, strictly speaking, Christ died but [it is] the fact that Christ, in the glory of his person, in the perfection of his finished work, and in the efficacy of his exalted activity as King and Saviour, is presented to us in the full, free, and unrestricted overture of the gospel. It is not as persons convinced of our election nor as persons convinced that we are the special objects of God’s love that we commit ourselves to him but as lost sinners. We entrust ourselves to him not because we believe we have been saved but as lost sinners in order that we may be saved. It is to us in our lost condition that the warrant of faith is given and the warrant is not restricted or circumscribed in any way. In the warrant of faith the rich mercy of God is proffered to the lost and the promise of grace is certified by the veracity and faithfulness of God. This is the ground upon which a lost sinner may commit himself to Christ in full confidence that he will be saved. And no sinner to whom the gospel comes is excluded from the divine warrant for such confidence.
On Union With Christ (pp. 162-163)
Murray presents an excellent summary of what it means to be in union with Christ. He writes that “if we did not take account of [union with Christ], not only would our presentation of the application of redemption be defective but our view of the Christian life would be gravely distorted. Nothing is more central or basic than union and communion with Christ” (p. 161). He goes on to enumerate what it means to be united with Christ:
The fountain of salvation itself in the eternal election of the Father is “in Christ.” . . . The Father elected from eternity, but he elected in Christ. . . .
It is also because the people of God were in Christ when he gave his life a ransom and redeemed by his blood that salvation has been secured for them; they are represented as united to Christ in his death, resurrection, and exaltation to heaven. . . .
It is in Christ that the people of God are created anew. “We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works” (Eph. 2:10). . . .
But not only does the new life have its inception in Christ; it is also continued by virtue of the same relationship to him. It is in Christ that Christian life and behavior are conducted. . . .
It is in Christ that believers die. They have fallen asleep in Christ or through Christ and they are dead in Christ (1 Thess. 4:14, 16). . . .
Finally, it is in Christ that the people of God will be resurrected and glorified. It is in Christ they will be made alive when the last trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible (1 Cor. 15:22). It is with Christ they will be glorified (Rom. 8:17).
I gotta have my orange juice. 