G.H. Gerberding > Quotes

“When we come to deal with an institution of His, we dare never expect to fathom or test it by our poor, short-sighted and sin-blinded reason, philosophy, science, or common sense. "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." Whenever, therefore, we come to deal with anything that comes from His hands, it is no longer of the earth, earthy, and is not subject to earthly laws and human rules.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“And should any one be ashamed of this public profession and refuse to make it, Jesus clearly tells such an one that of him He also will be ashamed in the judgment day. The Bible nowhere recognizes a secret discipleship. There are no promises to him who does not confess.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“We cannot separate the water from the Word. We would not dare to baptize with water without the Word. In the words of Luther, that would be "simply water, and no baptism.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“People are made to realize the uncertainty and unsatisfactoriness of the affairs of this life. By losses, diseases, bereavements, or bitter disappointments, God seeks to wean them from their worldly idols.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“Every lesson that does not make sin more hateful and Christ more precious, is in so far, a failure.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“Christian parents, if you desire your sons and your daughters to become steadfast and useful members of the Church of Christ, see to it that you do your part in their religious instruction. Insist on it, and even use your parental authority, if necessary, that your children learn the Catechism and regularly attend the pastor's instructions.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“A true Lutheran pulpit cannot be a sensational pulpit, for discoursing wordly wisdom, philosophy, poetry, or politics. It must expound the Word, and never gets done preaching repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“Truly it required a divine mind to originate a scheme by which God "could be just and yet justify the ungodly." All the wisdom of the world could never have answered the question: "How can mortal man be just with God?”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“In our Lutheran Church, with her deep, significant and inspiring doctrine of this holy Sacrament, with her solemn and searching preparatory service, every such season ought to be a time of refreshing. What an auspicious opportunity is here offered for special sermons to precede the Holy Communion, for recalling the wanderer, awaking the drowsy, stirring up the languid, instructing the inquiring, and establishing the doubting! What pastor, who has a Christ-like interest in the spiritual welfare of his people, and who has used his communion seasons to this end, has not often realized that they are indeed times of refreshing from the Lord?”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“In justification, God imputes or counts over to the sinner the righteousness of Christ. In sanctification, God imparts the righteousness of the new life. Justification is what God does for the believer; sanctification is what His Spirit does in him. Justification being purely an act of God, is instantaneous and complete; sanctification being a work in which man has a share, is progressive. Justification takes away the guilt of sin; sanctification gradually takes away its power. Sanctification begins with justification. So soon as the sinner believes he is justified; but just so soon as he believes, he also has the beginnings of a new life.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“It would indeed be blasphemy for any man to claim that he had power in himself to forgive sins. If he can have any power at all, it must be Christ's power.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

“Nowhere in the whole Bible is it even intimated that it is God's desire or plan that children must remain outside of the covenant of Grace, and have no part or lot in the benefits of Christ's redeeming work until they come to years of discretion and can choose for themselves. This modern idea is utterly foreign and contradictory to all we know of God, of His scheme of redemption, and of His dealings with His people, either in the old or new dispensation.”
― G.H. Gerberding, The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church