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Word and sacrament define the task of the pastoral office in simple, beautiful, and powerful terms.
How easy it is to read the Scriptures and give a kind of nominal assent to the truth and yet never to appropriate what it tells us!
Luther's doctrine of justification depends upon two things: the constant preaching of the wrath of God in the face of sin; and the realization that every Christian is at once righteous and a sinner, thus needing the hammer of the law to terrify and break the sinful conscience.
O my soul, is it possible for thee to hear the excellency of Scripture thus opened to thee, and not to burn in love to it? Hast thou been all this while in such a host bath, and still cold and shivering?The Christian Man\'s Calling
The theology of the cross is not a cerebral thing; it profoundly affects our Christian experience and existence, making demands upon our whole lives and turning theology into something which controls not just our thoughts, but the very way in which we experience the world around and taste the blessing and fellowship of God himself.
A Christian without a Bible is a soldier without a weapon.The Christian\'s Reasonable Service 1:76
God will condemn those by his Word, who will not judge themselves by it.
Theology masters the man; the man is never to master the theology.
We must allow the Word of God to confront us, to disturb our security, to undermine our complacency and to overthrow our patterns of thought and behavior.
Do not look for the Church nearest to your house. Look for the Church closest to the Bible.
The body of Scripture is a doctrine sufficient to live well. It comprehends many holy sciences of which one is principal, and the others are handmaids or attendants.https://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/sdg/perkins/A%20Golden%20Chain%20-%20William%20Perkins.pdf
Christians need to remember that the sufficiency of Scripture gives us a comprehensive worldview that equips us to wrestle with even the most challenging ethical dilemmas of our time.
A world, and a church, which is hooked on novelty like some cultural equivalent of crack cocaine needs the cold, cynical eye of the historian to stand as a prophetic witness against it.
If the church as a whole is losing its ability to be "salt and light" in the culture, it is not because its members have no opinion of the films of Bernardo Bertolucci, no appreciation for the poetry of Emily Dickinson, and no regular slot on The Charlie Rose Show. More likely, it is because they do not have a solid grasp of the basic elements of the faith, as taught in Scripture and affirmed by the confessions and catechisms of the church.
In short, I will preach it [the Word], teach it, write it, but I will constrain no man by force, for faith must come freely without compulsion. Take myself as an example. I opposed indulgences and all the papists, but never with force. I simply taught, preached, and wrote God's Word; otherwise I did nothing. And while I slept, or drank Wittenberg beer with my friends Philip and Amsdorf, the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that no prince or emperor ever inflicted such losses upon it. I did nothing; the Word did everything.
The task of the preacher, therefore, is to take the Bible and to do two things in every sermon: destroy self-righteousness and point hearers toward the alien, external righteousness of Christ.Luther on the Christian Life: Cross and Freedom
The collapse in evangelical doctrinal consensus is intimately related to the collapse in the understanding of, and role assigned to, Scripture as God's Word spoken within the church.Reformation: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
Many have and many do miserably pervert the Scriptures by turning them into vain and groundless allegories. Some wanton wits have expounded Paradise to be the soul, man to be the mind, the woman to be the sense, the serpent to be delight, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil to be wisdom, and the rest of the trees to be the virtues and endowments of the mind. O friends! It is dangerous to bring in allegories where the Scripture doth not clearly and plainly warrant them and to take those words figuratively which should be taken properly.
Search the Scriptures daily, as mines of gold wherein the heart of Christ is laid.
The reading of the Scriptures is nothing else but a kind of holy conference with God, wherein we inquire after and He reveals unto us Himself and His will; we shall manifest more fully hereafter, when we shall show that these holy writings are the Word of God Himself, who speaks unto us in and by them. Wherefore when we take in hand the book of the Scriptures, we cannot otherwise conceive of ourselves then as standing in God's presence to hear what He will say unto us. Way to the Tree of Life
He that is mighty in Scripture is the man that can hit this unclean bird in the eye and wound it mortally with one blow (Acts 18:28). Even women, that are the weaker sex, with this sword in their hands, having learned from the Spirit how to use it, have encountered with great doctors, disarmed them of all their philosophical weapons, and shamefully foiled them.
Jewels do not lie upon the surface; you must get into the caverns and dark receptacles of the earth for them. No more do truths lie in the surface and outside of an expression. The beauty and glory of the Scriptures is within and must be fetched out with much study and prayer.
The testimony of the church is highly to be reverenced because to it are these oracles of God delivered to be kept as a sacred deposit; yea, it is called "the pillar and ground of the truth" (1 Tim. 3:15) and the candlestick (Rev. 1:12) from whence the light of the Scriptures shines forth into the world. But who will say that the proclamation of a prince hath its authenticity from the pillar it hangs on in the market cross or that the candle hath its light from the candlestick! The office of the church is ministerial, to publish and make known the word of God; but not magisterial and absolute to make it Scripture or unmake it, as she is pleased to allow or deny.
The reading of the Scriptures with general instructions, admonitions, reprehensions, exhortations, and consolations I grant are most necessary, being the groundwork and matter of the cure. But what sound conversion is wrought thereby in any man, without discreet application, let every man that hath profited anything in the school of Christ be judge.
When a man's mind is empty, as in temptation and want of comfort, it is empty of Christ and full of fear. Then it grinds itself, as in a quern or mill when empty of corn, one stone grinds another. The more full a man's mind is, the more free from temptations and fears. Now Scripture matter is the most filling matter.
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1. Thomas Watson (196)
2. Charles Spurgeon (135)
3. J.C. Ryle (117)
4. Thomas Brooks (113)
5. John Calvin (107)
6. John Flavel (96)
7. J.I. Packer (95)
8. William Gurnall (93)
9. George Swinnock (88)
10. John Piper (87)
11. John Owen (74)
12. Thomas Manton (70)
13. A.W. Pink (68)
14. Louis Berkhof (63)
15. C.S. Lewis (59)
16. B.B. Warfield (59)
17. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (58)
18. R.C. Sproul (55)
19. Richard Baxter (54)
20. Matthew Henry (54)
2. Charles Spurgeon (135)
3. J.C. Ryle (117)
4. Thomas Brooks (113)
5. John Calvin (107)
6. John Flavel (96)
7. J.I. Packer (95)
8. William Gurnall (93)
9. George Swinnock (88)
10. John Piper (87)
11. John Owen (74)
12. Thomas Manton (70)
13. A.W. Pink (68)
14. Louis Berkhof (63)
15. C.S. Lewis (59)
16. B.B. Warfield (59)
17. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (58)
18. R.C. Sproul (55)
19. Richard Baxter (54)
20. Matthew Henry (54)
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