Wisdom is the right use of knowledge. To know is not to be wise.
Many men know a great deal, and are all the greater fools for it. There is no fool so great a fool as a knowing fool.
But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom.
Grace is when somebody hurts you and you try to understand their situation instead of trying to hurt them back.
When you start debating which sins are really bad…consider the FIRST sin was just a bite of fruit.
If you’re running to Jesus for fame and fortune, you’re reading the wrong book (The Bible) about him.
False Teaching:: Come to Jesus to get health/wealth/prosperity. Correct Teaching: Come to Jesus to get Jesus.
It is not the uniqueness of 'Christianity' as a system that we defend, but the uniqueness of Christ. ... So,
because in no other person but Jesus of Nazareth did God first become human (in his birth), then bear our sins (in his death),
then conquer death (in his resurrection) and then enter his people (by his Spirit), he is uniquely able to save sinners.
Nobody else has his qualifications.
There is not one marriage in today's culture that is not vulnerable. Why? Because we've allowed the culture to seep into our
souls. ... Clearly we can no longer pattern our marriages after the people around us — if we ever could.
Not only does the world not know how to divorce-proof its marriages, it is well on the way to making broken relationships the norm!
There is a big difference between mishearing and hearing only what we want to hear, right? We, the people of God, seem to have chronic 'itching ears,'
and we can usually find somebody to scratch till we say 'Aaahh'
(2 Tim. 4:3).
Given the option, we will usually choose bigger barns to serve ourselves over bigger hearts to serve others
(Luke 12:13-21).
The purpose of your life is far greater than your own personal fulfillment, peace of mind, or even your happiness.
It's far greater than your family, your career, or even your wildest dreams and ambitions. If you want to know why you were placed on this planet,
you must begin with God. You were born BY his purpose and FOR his purpose.
There is not a hint of one person who was afraid to draw near him [Jesus]. There were those who mocked him.
There were those who were envious of him. There were those who misunderstood him. There were those who revered him.
But there was not one person who considered him too holy, too divine, or too celestial to touch.
There was not one person who was reluctant to approach him for fear of being rejected.
Any woodsman can tell you that in a broken and sundered nest, one can hardly expect to find more than a precious few whole eggs. So it is with the family.
To be forged upon the anvil of God's purpose, to be at once His hammer, His tongs, and His molten iron; to hear words that rend the heart,
see visions that pierce the chest; to be emptied like an urn, again and again and again until one desires only rest, only an end to the
refilling — and to know one cannnot live without the refilling. To be given words that one dare not speak, and to feel those words churning
and boiling in the belly until one must speak them aloud, or die. To be despised, soon or late, by everyone except Adonai — and to desire it so,
while hating it. This is to be a prophet.
A lie goes half way around the world before the truth can get its pants on.
[John the Baptist said] 'He must increase, but I must decrease.' ... No driven person could ever say what John said,
because driven people have to keep gaining more and more attention, more and more power, more and more material assets.
The seductions of the public life would have led to a competitive posture, but the original call to commitment from within spoke louder.
[Jesus said] 'I am the resurrection and the life ... Do you believe this?'
This is a canyon question which makes sense only during an all-night vigil or in the stillness of smoke-filled waiting rooms.
A question that makes sense when all of our props, crutches, and costumes are taken away. For then we must face ourselves as we really are:
rudderless humans tailspinning toward disaster. And we are forced to see him for what he claims to be: our only hope.
He is not great who is not greatly good.
It seems to me, as time goes on, that the only thing that is worth seeking for is to know and to be known by Christ — a
privilege open alone to the childlike, who, with receptivity, guilelessness, and humility, move Godward.
One who receives this Word, and by it salvation, receives along with it the duty of passing this Word on...
Where there is no mission, there is no Church, and where there is neither Church nor mission, there is no faith.
We must always be on our guard lest, under the pretext of keeping one commandment, we be found breaking another.
It is impossible for a man to be a Christian without having Christ; and if he has Christ he has at the same time all that is in Christ.
God's redemptive revelation in Scripture is necessary to saving faith and peace with God.
Faith in a risen Savior is necessary if the vague stirrings toward immortality are to bring us to restful and satisfying communion with God.
Next to the wicked lives of men, nothing is so great a disparagement and weakening to religion as the divisions of Christians.
Purity of heart and simplicity are of great force with Almighty God, who is in purity most singular, and of nature most simple.
Steadfastness in believing doth not exclude all temptations from without. When we say a tree is firmly rooted, we do not say the wind never blows upon it.
God is not a power or principle or law, but he is a living, creating, communicating person — a mind who thinks, a heart who feels, a will who acts, whose best name is Father.
The chief pang of most trials is not so much the actual suffering itself as our own spirit of resistance to it.
We implore the mercy of God, not that He may leave us at peace in our vices, but that He may deliver us from them.
I am not what I ought to be. I am not what I want to be. I am not what I hope to be. But still, I am not what I used to be. And by the grace of God, I am what I am.
The loving service which God sends His people into the world to render includes both evangelism and social action,
for each is in itself an authentic expression of love, and neither needs the other to justify it.
It is through dying to concern for self that we are born to new life with God and others; in such dying and rebirth, we find that life is lent to be spent; and in such spending of what we are lent, we find there is an infinite supply.
He does not believe, that does not live according to his belief.
Other sins find their vent in the accomplishment of evil deeds, whereas pride lies in wait for good deeds, to destroy people.
Do not desire crosses, unless you have borne well those laid on you; it is an abuse to long after martyrdom while unable to bear an insult patiently.
Living for others, commitment to God's redeeming purposes, is a means of grace. We give because of our faith, and it deepens as we give. If we permit ourselves and our people to give casually, we are really teaching contempt.
God has promised forgiveness to your repentance, but He has not promised tomorrow to your procrastination.
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