Inspirational Quotes by D.A. Carson

“Now they could see that the Old Testament temple, the meeting place between God and his covenant people, pointed to the ultimate "meeting place," the ultimate Mediator. Jesus would occupy this role by virtue of his death and resurrection-the "temple" would be destroyed, and rebuilt.”

“Has the smoothness of the performance become more important to us than the fear of the Lord? Has polish, one of the modern equivalents of ancient rhetoric, displaced substance? Have professional competence and smooth showmanship become more valuable than sober reckoning over what it means to focus on Christ crucified?”

“This is breathtaking. God has not arranged things so that the foolishness of the gospel saves those who have IQs in excess of 130. Where would that leave the rest of us? Nor does the foolishness of what is preached transform the young, the beautiful, the extroverts, the educated, the wealthy, the healthy, the upright. Where would that leave the old, the ugly, the introverts, the illiterate, the poor, the sick, the perverse?”

“They create entire structures of thought so as to maintain the delusion that they can explain everything. They think they are scientific, in control, powerful. God, if he exists, must meet the high standards of their academic and philosophical prowess and somehow fit into their system, if he is to be given any sort of respectful hearing. In both “Jews” and “Greeks,” there is profound self-centeredness. God is not taken on trust. Both the demand for signs and the pursuit of “wisdom,” and all the countless progeny they have spawned, treat God as if we have the right to approve him, to examine his credentials. This is the most reprehensible wickedness, the most appalling insolence, the most horrific mark of our deep rebellion and lostness.”

“The heart of our wretched rebellion is that each of us wants to be number one. We make ourselves the center of all our thoughts and hopes and imaginings. This vicious lust to be first works its way outward not only in hatred, war, rape, greed, covetousness, malice, bitterness, and much more, but also in self-righteousness, self-promotion, manufactured religions, and domesticated gods. We”

“Our self-centeredness is deep. It is so brutally idolatrous that it tries to domesticate God himself. In our desperate folly we act as if we can outsmart God, as if he owes us explanations, as if we are wise and self-determining while he exists only to meet our needs. But”

“The gospel is not simply good advice, nor is it good news about God’s power. The gospel is God’s power to those who believe. The place where God has supremely destroyed all human arrogance and pretension is the cross. Paul”

“1. Radical religious pluralism: Under the direct impact of philosophical pluralism, this stance holds that no religion can advance any legitimate claim to superiority over any other religion.”

“Building the church with superficial “conversions” and wonderful programs that rarely bring people into a deepening knowledge of the living God will do it. Entertaining people to death but never fostering the beauty of holiness or the centrality of self-crucifying love will build an assembly of religious people, but it will destroy the church of the living God.”

“2. Inclusivism: This stance, while affirming the truth of fundamental Christian claims, nevertheless insists that God has revealed himself, even in saving ways, in other religions.”

“Among “knowing” beings—humans, angels, God—there are high barriers that keep one knowing being from understanding fully what another knowing being is thinking about. No matter how well I know you, I will never know all your thoughts; no matter how well you know me, you will never know all of mine. How much less shall we understand the thoughts of the angel Gabriel when, say, he spoke to Mary (Luke 1:26–38). However, the one “knowing being” who knows all thoughts, even the thoughts of God, is God himself. Or, to put it another way, “The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God” (2:10b).”

“3. Exclusivism: This position teaches that the central claims of biblically faithful Christianity are true. Correspondingly, where the teachings of other religions conflict with these claims, they must necessarily be false.”

“Without it, no one would ever have understood what God had revealed of himself and of his wisdom in the public arena. Our obtuseness, our deep self-centeredness, our love of pomp and power and prestige, simply would not have allowed us to understand the cross or our need of it. In short, our very lostness demanded the work of the Spirit of God, to the end that we might “understand what God has freely given us” (2:12).”

“5. Although Sanders and especially Pinnock often speak of the importance of faith, they rarely listen to what the New Testament has to say about the content of faith, about the object of faith. Consider, for example, the following statements: “people can receive the gift of salvation without knowing the giver or the precise nature of the gift.”77 Inclusivism “denies that Jesus must be the object of saving faith.”78 “‘Saving faith’…does not necessitate knowledge of Christ in this life. God’s gracious activity is wider than the arena of special revelation. God will accept into his kingdom those who repent and trust him even if they know nothing of Jesus.”79 “Faith in God is what saves, not possessing certain minimum information.”80 “A person is saved by faith, even if the content of faith is deficient (and whose is not?). The Bible does not teach that one must confess the name of Jesus to be saved.”81 “The issue that God cares about is the direction of the heart, not the content of theology.”82 Some of this argument is slanted by the form of the proferred antitheses. For example: “Faith in God is what saves, not possessing certain minimum information.” At one level that is surely correct: merely possessing information, minimal or otherwise, does not save. Christians are not gnostics. On the other hand, the form of the antithesis may allow the unwary to overlook the fact that faith has content, or an object. Does faith in, say, a ouija board save? How about sincere faith in astrology? Pinnock says it is “faith in God” that saves. But which God? The Buddhist impersonal God? And even if we assume we are dealing with the true God, does all faith in this God save, when we are told that even the devils believe? Again: “The issue that God cares about is the direction of the heart, not the content of theology.” At one level, I would strenuously agree. Yet at the same time, I would want to add that if the direction of the heart is truly right, one of the things it will be concerned about is the content of theology. Does Paul sound as if he does not care about the content of theology in Galatians 1:8-9? Does John, in 1 John 4:1-6? Far from resorting to antitheses, John purposely links sound doctrine, transparent obedience, and love for the brothers and sisters in Christ, as being joint marks of the true believer (and thus of true faith!).”

“Nevertheless Hebrews 1:8-9 quotes 45:6-7 to prove Jesus’ essential superiority over mere angels. Only the Son is directly addressed as “God.” Why does the writer of Hebrews feel he can use Psalm 45 in this way? The surrounding verses show he has reflected long and hard on several passages and themes: 2 Samuel 7 (see vol. 1, meditation for September 12), which promises an eternal Davidic dynasty; several passages that link the Davidic king to God as his “son” (2 Sam. 7; Ps. 2—on which see meditation for August 4); an entire pattern or “typology” in which David is understood to be a shadow, a type, an adumbration of a still greater “David” to come. If Scripture (and thus God) addresses an early Davidic monarch as “God,” how much more deserving of this title is the ultimate David?”

“Of the many distinctions that have been attempted between modernism and postmodernism, perhaps this is the most common: modernism still believed in the objectivity of knowledge, and that the human mind can uncover such knowledge. In its most optimistic form, modernism held that ultimately knowledge would revolutionize the world, squeeze God to the periphery or perhaps abandon him to his own devices, and build an edifice of glorious knowledge to the great God Science. But this stance has largely been abandoned in the postmodernism that characterizes most Western universities. Deconstructionists have been most vociferous in denouncing the modernist vision. They hold that language and meaning are socially constructed, which is tantamount to saying arbitrarily constructed. Its meaning is grounded neither in “reality” nor in texts per se. Texts will invariably be interpreted against the backdrop of the interpreter’s social “home” and the historical conditioning of the language itself. Granted this interpretive independence from the text, it is entirely appropriate and right for the interpreter to take bits and pieces of the text out of the frameworks in which they are apparently embedded (“deconstruct” the text), and refit them into the framework (“locatedness”) of the interpreter, thereby generating fresh insight, not least that which relativizes and criticizes the text itself.”

“This tension between God’s sovereignty and human responsibility is not to be despised or rejected, but seized with gratitude, for it will preserve us both from denying the reality of evil and from imagining that evil could ultimately triumph.”

“1 PETER 4 CONTINUES THE THEME of Christian conduct, including unjust suffering. This theme is now increasingly tied to identification with Christ (e.g., 4:14), to final judgment (4:5-6, 7, 17), and above all to the will of God: “So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good” (4:19, italics added).”

“. It is ever so. Satan takes no vacations. The moment we are content in this fallen world, the dangers return—not least the danger of over-contentment. Without being contentious, prepare for conflict; without being combative, equip yourself for the “good fight” (2 Tim. 4:7). It will last at least as long as you live.”

“The imagery taps into a large biblical-theological theme that runs almost the entire way through Scripture: Yahweh is the bridegroom of the bride Israel; Christ is the bridegroom of the church; the ultimate consummation is the marriage supper of the Lamb.”