Great Quotes

John Owen: The excellency of genuine Christian faith

Tony Reinke Cross of Christ, Faith, Great Quotes, Humility, John Owen, Obedience to Scripture, Unbelief

“Herein consists the excellency of faith above all other powers and acts of the soul – that it receives, assents unto, and rests in things in their own nature absolutely incomprehensible [Trinity, incarnation, Cross, etc.] … The more sublime and glorious – the more inaccessible unto sense and reason – the things are which we believe; the more are we changed into the image of God, in the exercise of faith upon them … faith which is truly divine, is never more in its proper exercise – doth never more elevate the soul into conformity unto God – than when it acts in the contemplation and admiration of the most incomprehensible mysteries which are proposed unto it by divine revelation.”

– John Owen, The Glory of Christ, Works 1:50

Why one church in Minneapolis defines herself as ‘Cross-Centered’

Tony Reinke Churches in Minneapolis, Cross of Christ, God, Gospel, Great Quotes, Sovereign Grace Ministries

After recently listening to a great sermon on the Cross I have been convicted. Convicted because I have not been spending enough time studying the Cross. So over the next few weeks and months I am planning to study through John Stott’s, The Cross of Christ (IVP: 1986). I am a big fan of Stott but admittedly have never read the entire book through (please don’t email, I know the shame of this admission). So for the coming weeks I am going to center my attention and affections upon the Cross through this study.

The quote that brought conviction came from a sermon entitled The Glory of the Cross delivered by Rick Gamache, the senior pastor of a neat church in Minneapolis (April, 2006; Sovereign Grace Fellowship). Itself is a wonderful sermon well worth your time this weekend (listen in .mp3). Here is a short excerpt:

“I want to try and articulate briefly for you why we are very careful to refer to Sovereign Grace Fellowship as a ‘Gospel-centered’ or ‘Cross-centered’ church. If you have been around here for any amount of time you know we don’t refer to ourselves mainly as a ‘God-centered’ church though I definitely use those terms. We use that term on occasion because we are thoroughly centered on God here. But we don’t even use terms to refer to ourselves namely as a ‘Christ-centered’ church. Now, again we sometimes use that phrase because here we are thoroughly centered upon Christ. But we prefer to be even more precise so we use the term ‘Gospel-centered’ or ‘Cross-centered’ church … Because the Cross is the centerpiece of the good news, the Apostle Paul says in Galatians 6:14 that he ‘boasts in’ (‘exults in,’ or ‘rejoices in’ – that one Greek word can have all those meanings), he ‘rejoices in’ nothing except the Cross of Jesus Christ because it’s where our salvation was purchased and where God was revealed in glory. So Martin Luther was correct when he wrote this: ‘The Cross alone is our theology. There is not a word in the Bible which we can understand without reference to the Cross.'”

– Rick Gamache, sermon on The Glory of Christ; April, 2006, Sovereign Grace Fellowship; Minneapolis, MN

(sermon on The Glory of Christ; April, 2006, Sovereign Grace Fellowship; church in Minneapolis, MN)

Spurgeon on earnestness (Pt. 2)

Tony Reinke C.H. Spurgeon, Earnestness, Great Preachers, Great Quotes, Pastoral Ministry, Preaching, Pupit Seriousness

“Those who attend our ministry have a great deal to do during the week. Many of them have family trials, and heavy personal burdens to carry, and they frequently come into the assembly cold and listless, with thoughts wandering hither and thither; it is ours to take those thoughts and thrust them into the furnace of our own earnestness, melt them by holy contemplation and by intense appeal, and pour them out into the mold of the truth. A blacksmith can do nothing when his fire is out and in this respect he is the type of a minister. If all the lights in the outside world are quenched, the lamp which burns in the sanctuary ought still to remain undimmed; for that fire no curfew must ever be rung. We must regard the people as the wood and the sacrifice, well wetted a second and a third time by the cares of the week, upon which, like the prophet, we must pray down the fire from heaven.”

– C.H. Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students

Psalm 14:1 – “No God”

Tony Reinke Atheism, Biblical Quotes, Doctrine, Exegesis, Great Quotes, Sinfulness, Unbelief, Wickedness of the heart

I think many of us know Psalm 14:1 by heart: “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’” But apparently I did not know the meaning of this verse by heart. Actually the two words, “there is” are not in the Hebrew text. The verse should more accurately be translated: “The fool says in his heart, ‘No God.’” It’s not that the fool does not believe in God’s existence but that for him/her God is unnecessary. As Lawson writes,

“The term is a synonym for sinner, and it describes everyone who has no place for God in his or her life. The fool’s problem is that his heart refuses the knowledge of God. To be sure, he is not an intellectual atheist, denying the existence of God, but a practical atheist, living as if there were no God (Pss. 53:1; 74:18,22; Isa. 32:6).”  [Holman Old Testament Commentary: Psalms 1-75, p. 75]

Sin makes man a destroyer

Tony Reinke Great Quotes, Octavius Winslow, Sin, Sin in Culture, Sinfulness

“Man is a suicide – he has destroyed himself; a homicide – his influence destroys others; a deicide – he would, were it in his power, annihilate the very being of God. What a proof of this have we in the crucifixion of the Son of God! When God brought himself as near to man as Infinity could approach, he exclaimed, ‘This is the Heir; come, let us kill him!’ and they proceeded to consummate the crime by nailing him to the tree.”

Octavius Winslow, No Condemnation in Christ Jesus (Banner of Truth: 1853/1991), p. 93. Online edition.

Spurgeon on earnestness

Tony Reinke Boldness, C.H. Spurgeon, Earnestness, Fresh preaching, Great Preachers, Great Quotes, John Angell James, Preaching, Pupit Seriousness

This week I am hoping to complete the wonderful book on earnestness by John Angell James. Spurgeon also has much to say on this topic in Lectures to My Students. Here is just one example …

If I were asked – What in a Christian minister is the most essential quality for securing success in winning souls for Christ? I should reply, “earnestness”: and if I were asked a second or a third time, I should not vary the answer, for personal observation drives me to the conclusion that, as a rule, real success is proportionate to the preacher’s earnestness. Both great men and little men succeed if they are thoroughly alive unto God, and fail if they are not so. We know men of eminence who have gained a high reputation, who attract large audiences, and obtain much admiration, who nevertheless are very low in the scale as soul-winners: for all they do in that direction they might as well have been lecturers on anatomy, or political orators. At the same time we have seen their compeers in ability so useful in the business of conversion that evidently their acquirements and gifts have been no hindrance to them, lint the reverse; for by the intense and devout use of their powers, and by the; anointing of the Holy Spirit, they have turned many to righteousness. We have seen brethren of very scanty abilities who have been terrible drags upon a church, and have proved as inefficient in their spheres as blind men in an observatory; but, on the other hand, men of equally small attainments are well known, to us as mighty hunters before the Lord, by whose holy energy many hearts have been captured for the Savior. I delight in M’Cheyne’s remark, “It is not so much great talents that God blesses, as great likeness to Christ.” In many instances ministerial success is traceable almost entirely to an intense zeal, a consuming passion for souls, and an eager enthusiasm in the cause of God, and we believe that in every case, other things being equal, men prosper in the divine service in proportion as their hearts are blazing with holy love.

C.H. Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students (Passmore and Alabaster: London), 1881. 2:145.