John Crowder > Quotes

“God didn't come to fix anybody. He came to kill them and resurrect them from the dead.”
― John Crowder

“The cross was not about some mythical pagan deity demanding a blood sacrifice – destroying his own son like Molech. Someone may ask … but wasn’t blood required for the forgiveness of sins? Yes, but not in a paganistic Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom sort of way. Yes, blood was needed for the forgiveness of sins. Not because the Father needed it, but because we did. We were running from God; He was never running from us. In Hebrews 10:22, Paul writes, “let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience. …” The blood was for us. The sure solid proof and substance of God’s love. God did not need the blood for Himself. It was His blood. He poured it out for us.”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“You are hardwired for the pleasure of God. And this works for marriage. Imagine sole sourcing your pleasure receptors to be conditioned habitually to find satisfaction in one person. You build deep-seated emotional, spiritual even biological connection to that one person — this is what you are designed for. Do not build deviant behaviors that cause destruction. Porn is like crack. We can lie to ourselves about it – that we can casually dabble around with it. If you think you are not addicted, try going three weeks without it. You”
― John Crowder, Money. Sex. Beer. God.: Ditching Religion for the Joy of Incarnation

“Let your days become a fragrant song where heaven and earth continually collide”
― John Crowder, The Ecstasy of Loving God

“Let go into His arms untill you find yourself obsessed with things devine”
― John Crowder, The Ecstasy of Loving God

“How can we lead the blind, if we are blind ourselves? His wine is coming to blur our vision, so that we can receive His vision.”
― John Crowder, The Ecstasy of Loving God

“God made you for His pleasure. And He made you intrinsically needy and dependent on His unspeakable joy. If you are struggling with sin our addiction, don’t try to kill your appetite for pleasure. It is impossible. Just direct it to the source of all pleasure. You will be amazed to find that He has perfectly and supernaturally designed you to have all your deepest needs met in Him”
― John Crowder, The Ecstasy of Loving God

“Christianity was originally called good news. It used to be a happy message that people wanted to be a part of. The original version of the gospel seemed too good to be true. That’s why it spread like wildfire. Heaven as a free gift. Your sinfulness abolished. Effortless union with God. Amazing benefits! Easy, instant soul purge. Let me tell you, if the gospel you’ve heard is not too good to be true, it probably isn’t. The frequency of the gospel always inspires, always brings life and hope. The flavor and sound of the true gospel never puts rule and regulation and heavy trips on you. Never makes you feel you have to live up to any systematic expectations for acceptance. It always encourages, always hopes, always trusts, and always loves.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“God is reveaing Himself in this hour as the supreme elation of the soul. True love of God is evident in those whose only pleasure is derived fom drawing near to Him.”
― John Crowder

“He didn’t just give you a pretty screen saver, ignoring all the viruses, porn and spyware on your hard drive. He wiped the whole hard drive out.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“We completely affirm Christian growth. Even Jesus grew in wisdom and favor. We grow in lots of things. We are going from Glory to Glory. From light to light – for in His light we see light (Ps. 36:9). The expression of His faith is always growing in us. And primarily, we are growing in the renewal of the mind. What does that mean, to have the mind renewed? It is being continually awakened to the truth of what Christ has already accomplished. It is being renewed to something. And that “something” is a Reality that has already arrived. We are realizing Him in us. We are realizing what He has done.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“God is good, not in some abstract, religious definition of the word "good." Not a "sit still, shut up and say your prayers" good. Not just "good for you" like cough medicine. God is really sweet, yummy to the tummy, delectable and exquisite-taste and see that the Lord is good!”
― John Crowder, The Ecstasy of Loving God

“God wants a people addicted to His pleasure, a people who serve Him for no other reason than the delight they take in Him. This is the very heart of worship. It is not self-centred. It is putting God at the very centre of self so that self cannot possibly be satisfied without Him.”
― John Crowder, The Ecstasy of Loving God

“Jesus stepped into our blindness. He moved fully into our darkened state of mind and turned the lights back on. Not turning His Father toward us, but turning us back to His eager loving face that had always been set like flint to redeem us. “All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ …” (2 Cor. 5:18).”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“There may be an initial fear and trembling when we first realize the futility of rejecting Him. But it is ultimately the kindness of God that leads men to repentance. Fear may be the “beginning of wisdom,” but it is not the end of wisdom. That place is reserved for love. We must take the final word given us in scripture regarding fear. “There is no fear in love. Perfect love casts out all fear …” (1 John 4:18). The fear of God is one of the most highly misunderstood principles on planet earth. We fear God not because He is bad, evil, malicious or untouchable. We fear Him because He is a billion volts of beauty, gladness, happiness and sweetness – and we are mere two-volt fuses! We can’t handle the goodness!”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“Salvation is not about believing that you are a believer. How do you even know you’re a believer? If you’re looking to your own subjective experience or an encounter – who’s to say you didn’t misinterpret your conversion experience, or that it didn’t go deep enough? You’ll go headlong into an endless spiral of navel-gazing. There may be a valid moment of encounter, but you can’t bank on that. And if you are banking on it, you’re still having faith in your own experience. The only thing you can bank on is that Christ was crucified to save you. Done deal – you’re in!”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“news was never about your human response to God. It was always about Jesus responding to the Father on your behalf. Our response is merely a response to His response! It is our “amen” to a prior completed act. The two-dimensional unitarian view throws us back upon ourselves to make the appropriate responses to God. Jesus is merely a “potential savior” if you make the right response. It denies the incarnation and work of Christ as being the very substance of our union with God. He is our true Mediator and High Priest continually offering intercession before God. Even our worship is merely a glorious echo of the perfect worship of our High Priest before the Father. Sharing His Sonship The non-Trinitarian view always puts the burden of relationship back into our lap: “Jesus did His part, but you’ve got to do your part!” The focus ultimately denies Christ’s substitutionary work on our behalf – and instead it becomes “what you do with Jesus” or “how you get to Jesus.” This approach ignores the entire purpose of the incarnation, death and resurrection of Christ.”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“Repentance is not the price tag for salvation; it is a first fruit of salvation.”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“He is your sanctification. Any system that tries to draw your attention away from the person of Christ and onto your own efforts is antichrist in nature. Your union with God is not an incomplete relationship that comes progressively. Time is not the magic formula that makes you holy. Jesus’ sacrifice made you holy. Christ’s work was enough to purify you, spirit, soul and body.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“I am fully aware that the things I do are construed as absolute craziness. But in actuality, we are just having fun in God’s presence. We enjoy the happy presence of God and people get free from religion, so they stop taking themselves so seriously. Freedom from pride is liberating and empowering. The Lord loves to mock religion through us, because religion grieves Him tremendously. What we are never doing is trying to make a formula out of these crazy antics. In fact, most of these antics are gloriously deriding religious formula! Our antics are so crazy in fact that you would have to be a complete nutjob to think smoking a baby Jesus doll is the latest tool to get you to a new level with God. These silly acts don’t get us filled with the Spirit, nor are we trying to start a new denomination with this stuff. We do lots of fun, goofy things because we are already in the Spirit by His grace, and we’ve been set free from the performance-oriented version of Christianity.”
― John Crowder, Seven Spirits Burning

“I’m not pressing in anymore. I’ve been pressed into. I’m not contending anymore. I’ve been contended for. I’m not a God chaser anymore. I’ve been chased down, roped, hogtied, bagged and dragged. I’m not appropriating what I have. It’s mine. I’m not getting closer to God. He’s like a Siamese twin. I’m not even seeking God anymore. He found me.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“The Church is obsessed with her own transformation, evidenced by a mountain of self-help books. The contemplative journey is not a path of becoming. It is a path of realizing what we’ve already become in Him. We are awaking to a transformation that has already taken place. Our journey is a discovery of the True Self. And this is but a byproduct of something much greater – the discovery of Christ in us – the only means by which we ever know ourselves anyway. Self-discovery in itself is vanity. A chasing after the wind. What self? He is your Life. “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me … ” (Gal. 2:20). Beyond simple – the Gospel is an absolutely effortless unveiling of the truth of the Godhead in you. We are not arriving into Him, but realizing He arrived into us. This is the drastic difference between a process of frustration and a process of never-ending fun.”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“God is never looking at your performance as the indicator of His pleasure toward you. So many people live on an emotional rollercoaster ride. They think God is happy with them one day, then disappointed with them another day. It depends on whatever subjective rubber ruler they judge themselves by at the moment. Perhaps you didn’t read your Bible enough this week, or lead enough people to Jesus. Oops! You were a little too lazy this week! People tend to judge themselves by all manner of silly criteria like this then project those feelings onto God. If they are having a bad day, they assume God is upset with them. All of this is irrelevant. God is continually looking at one thing, and that is the perfect sacrifice of His Son. Even if you have committed a gross sin, it is acknowledging Christ’s mercy toward you that picks you up and moves you forward. Not beating yourself up and trying to change yourself.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“Grace does not cause a man to retreat from work, but to find the deepest satisfaction of God’s presence amid the otherwise most wearisome of tasks. It was even for the joy set before Him that Jesus endured the cross! Doesn’t mean He enjoyed the nails – but He was thrilled with what those nails would accomplish. You may not enjoy getting up at 7 a.m. Monday morning, but it’s for the joy of the paycheck set before you that you endure the alarm clock! And He even invades the tasks at hand.”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“Though He may allow you fellowship in them at times, stop seeing the sufferings of Christ as something you are called to imitate. He suffered for you. Embrace humility and admit your need for Jesus to become your substitute in all things. He became sin so you could be holy. He was broken so you could be whole. He was a man of sorrow, so you could have joy. He was bruised for your iniquity. He fasted so you could feast. By His stripes, you were healed. He bore poverty, so you could righteously prosper. He felt orphaned so you could be adopted as sons.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“You need to know who you are. You are a pure, holy child of God. There is no effort or work involved for you to be who you are. A tree does not labor or strive to be a tree. In the same way, you do not labor or strive to be holy. Holiness is simply your first and primary nature. Just be yourself. In the same way, your union with Christ is an effortless state of being. It takes no more work for me than being a natural born citizen of America. Being an American is simply who I am. The moment you decide to do something to be holy, you have trusted in yourself, instead of Christ, for salvation.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“The Lord tells us in the book of Ezekiel that, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezek. 36:26, NIV). God removed the old, hardened heart that was cold and unloving. He gave you in its place a new, tender, touchable heart. Now, wouldn’t God be a cruel masochist if your entire life were a long, bloody open-heart surgery, where He removed your heart bit by bit? This heart transplant was a one-time transaction. The old is gone; the new has come.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“Your union with God in Christ is instant and effortless. It happened on the cross and was realized the first moment you believed. It is from this vantage point of being “in Christ” that all other doctrines of the church must be built.”
― John Crowder, Mystical Union

“A complacent satisfaction in God may cause you to accidentally outwork all your religious friends.”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn

“I am well aware that various movements have taken “Ye are gods” theology to bizarre conclusions. But the fact remains, as we are told in Psalm 82:6, “I said, ‘You are gods, and all of you are children of the Most High.’” Some have tried to mitigate this verse to suggest we are simply “judges” or “mighty ones.” But the literal word here is Elohim – gods. And to further bolster the point, Jesus quotes this passage – the New Testament Greek using the word Theoi – which is clearly translated as “gods.” “It is a serious thing,” says C.S. Lewis, “to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship.”95”
― John Crowder, Cosmos Reborn