Category Archives: Quotes
Clever Clarity
- On a Septic Tank Truck Sign: “We’re #1 in the #2 business.”
- At a Proctologist’s Office: “To expedite your visit, please back in.”
- On a Plumber’s Truck: “We repair what your husband fixed.”
- At a Tire Shop in Milwaukee: “Invite us to your next blowout.”
- On a Plastic Surgeon’s Office Door: “Let us pick your nose.”
- At a Towing Company: “We don’t charge an arm and a leg. We want tows.”
- In a Nonsmoking Area: “If we see smoke, we will assume you are on fire and take appropriate action.”
- On a Maternity Room door: “Push. Push. Push.”
Worth Reading: A Few Links
- “As I read the Gospels and see Jesus, I am increasingly stumped how we determined sermons and songs are what makes us most like Him” from Shaun King on transitioning his church to be more transformational.
- “Since they do not see themselves as ‘evangelists,’ they decide to leave such Kingdom labors to the ‘professionals.'”JD Payne interviewed about why Christians don’t evangelize.
- “Know that just because I married a pastor does not mean I enjoy singing, playing the piano, running the nursery, or leading the women’s program. I am willing to use my talents, but please don’t expect me to fulfill a role that I am not designed for.” Amber Woller on What Pastors’ Wives Wish Their Congregations Knew.
- Japan Tsunami: Is God Still Good? by Jonathan Dodson – “God has done, is doing, and will do something about the problem of evil and suffering. He defeats evil at the cross, releases “aid workers” at the resurrection, and promises total peace at his return.”
- Why I’m Thankful for Popular False Teachers by Jared Wilson.
My Favorite Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotes
From a recorded conversation with friend and colleague Andrew Young:
“I think the Good Samaritan is a great individual. I of course, like and respect the Good Samaritan….but I don’t want to be a Good Samaritan…you see, I am tired of picking up people along the Jericho Road. I am tired of seeing people battered and bruised and bloody, injured and jumped on, along the Jericho Roads of life. This road is dangerous. I don’t want to pick up anyone else, along this Jericho Road; I want to fix… the Jericho Road. I want to pave the Jericho Road, add street lights to the Jericho Road; make the Jericho Road safe (for passage) by everybody….”
I think of this analogy quite often. I love thinking past helping people, which can become a selfish thing, to transforming scenarios.
And from his famed last speech, “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” –
the first question that the priest asked — the first question that the Levite asked was, “If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?” But then the Good Samaritan came by. And he reversed the question: “If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?”
That’s the question before you tonight. Not, “If I stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to my job. Not, “If I stop to help the sanitation workers what will happen to all of the hours that I usually spend in my office every day and every week as a pastor?” The question is not, “If I stop to help this man in need, what will happen to me?” The question is, “If I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?” That’s the question.
He Loves Us Anyway
We basically have two choices to make in dealing with the mysteries of God. We can wrestle with Him or we can rest in Him. We can continue searching the unsearchable or relax in the reality. What exists at the end of all our searching will be a God who knows absolutely everything … and chooses to love us anyway.
Calvin Miller in The Christ of Christmas
Let None Despair
If you will select me the grossest specimen of humanity, if he be but born of woman, I will have hope of him yet, because Jesus Christ is come to seek and to save sinners. Electing love has selected some of the worst to be made the best. Pebbles of the brook grace turns into jewels for the crown-royal. Worthless dross he transforms into pure gold. Redeeming love has set apart many of the worst of mankind to be the reward of the Saviour’s passion. Effectual grace calls forth many of the vilest of the vile to sit at the table of mercy, and therefore let none despair.
… by that love looking out of Jesus’ tearful eyes, by that love streaming from those bleeding wounds, by that faithful love, that strong love, that pure, disinterested, and abiding love; by the heart and by the bowels of the Saviour’s compassion, we conjure you turn not away as though it were nothing to you
– C.H. Spurgeon
Good Words on Emotions in Church Planting and Ministry
Church Multiplication can seem similar to warfare. There are lots of days filled with single motive of perseverance. They are punctuated by threats to the very existence of the new congregation and rewarded with outbursts of blessing and growth. The process never actually gets to “feeling right.” If you wait until it all feels right, you probably won’t do much of anything…
From my perspective, each season has only looked victorious as we looked back on it. But it never feels quite right while we are going through the day-to-day activities of evangelism and church multiplication.
Ralph Moore in his great book How To Multiply Your Church.
In other words, “Just Do It.”
Deeply Loved, Definitely Flawed
Quotes from today’s message on God’s love.
“I am more broken and sinful than I ever dared to believe and at the same time because of Jesus, I am more loved and accepted than I ever dared to hope.” – Tim Chester
“There is tremendous relief in knowing that His love is based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion Him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself…” J.I. Packer in Knowing God
God’s love for you is not based on anything that you can do or not do. It’s based completely upon the work of Christ.
Message audio, notes, and discussion guide here.
“… the gap holding back most believers is not the gap between what they know and what they don’t know. It’s the gap between what they know and what they’re living. Many Christians are trafficking in unlived truth. They are educated beyond their obedience.”
Dave Browning in Deliberate Simplicity: How the Church Does More by Doing Less
Good Friday Quotes
“We can cut ourselves, or throw our children in the sacred river, or give a million dollars to the United Way, or serve in a soup kitchen on Thanksgiving, or perform a hundred forms of penance and self-injury, and the result will be the same: the stain remains…The only answer in these modern times, as in all other times, is the blood of Christ.” – JOHN PIPER
“The concept of substitution lies at the heart of both sin and salvation. For the essence of sin is man substituting himself for God, while the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for man.” – JOHN STOTT
“When Satan attacks you, command him in the Name of Jesus to bend his neck. On the back of it you’ll find there’s a nail scarred foot print!” – E. STANLEY JONES
“Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe, sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow.” – ELVINA HALL
“Apart from the cross, condemnation is normal. Without Jesus, we all deserve to be condemned and punished for sin. But here’s the good news: ‘There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus’ (Romans 8:1).” – C.J. MAHANEY
“The debt was so great, that while man alone owed it, only God could pay it.” – ANSELM
“…He made you alive with Him and forgave us all our trespasses. He erased the certificate of debt, with its obligations, that was against us and opposed to us, and has taken it out of the way by nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and disgraced them publicly; He triumphed over them by Him.” – Colossians 2:13-15 (Holman Christian Standard Bible)
“In the case of false reports against yourself…”
A great lie, if unnoticed, is like a big fish out of water, it dashes and plunges and beats itself to death in a short time. To answer it is to supply it with its element, and help it to a longer life. … Your blameless life will be your best defense, and those who have seen it will not allow you to be condemned so readily as your slanderers expect. Only abstain from fighting your own battles, and in nine cases out of ten your accusers will gain nothing by their malevolence but chagrin for themselves and contempt from others. …our best course is to defend our innocence by our silence and leave our reputation with God.
– Charles Spurgeon in Lectures to My Students
Lane Corley 