Gene Edward Veith Jr. > Quotes

“There is a great superficiality in today's evangelical world. Many Bible-believing Christians share the contemporary case for self-gratification, emotionalism, and anti-intellectualism. Many people who believe in the Bible have never read it.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World

“No one can violently attack something without taking it seriously in some way. No one attacks belief in Zeus anymore. No one gets emotional over the Flat Earth Society. Yet Christianity calls forth the deepest emotions -- even and especially in the ones who most reject it.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World

“It should not be possible for Christians to be disillusioned. We should have no illusions in the first place. Our faith is in Jesus Christ alone.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World

“Secular humanists of every type may ridicule the Bible, but they cannot escape it; and in their obsession with change, calls for reform, doomsday warnings, and utopian visions, they continue to steal from it.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God With All Your Mind: How to Survive and Prosper As a Christian in the Secular University and Post-Christian Culture

“So, in God’s relationship to us, we might wonder, “Am I really saved?” “Am I of the elect?” “Is God angry with me?” “Why does God allow suffering in the world?” In each case, if we leave out the Cross, questions like these can drive us to despair or insanity.”
― Gene Veith

“Luther says that vocations are a “mask from God. That is, God hides Himself in the workplace, the family, the Church, and the seemingly secular society”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“The priesthood of all believers” did not make everyone into church workers; rather, it turned every kind of work into a sacred calling.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“Realizing that one does not have to worry about what will happen, that the future is in God's hands, is liberating.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“Why is it that postmodernists, who believe there are no moral absolutes, are so moralistic?”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr.

“God is hidden in vocations that bear authority. But that puts the pressure on human beings exercise that authority to act with God's justice and grace”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr.

“Psychology either tends to glorify human beings or trivialize them, leaving out the complexity of the human soul and the demands of God.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World

“Many modern artists, philosophers, and theologians reject the knowledge of the past. Thus they must continually start over again from ground zero, their vision restricted to their own narrow perspectives, making themselves artificially primitive.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World

“Christianity, in contrast, is for all cultures. This is a theme of the New Testament, St. John’s vision of the redeemed in Revelation 7. Christianity is for every tribe, every nation, every language, every time, for every culture. That’s really quite unique from other religions because Christ died for the sins of the world.”
― Gene Edward Veith

“Luther goes so far as to say that vocation is a mask of God. That is, God hides Himself in the workplace, the family, the Church, and the seemingly secular society. To speak of God being hidden is a way of describing His presence, as when a child hiding in the room is there, just not seen. To realize that the mundane activities that take up most of our lives—going to work, taking the kids to soccer practice, picking up a few things at the store, going to church—are hiding-places for God can be a revelation in itself. Most people seek God in mystical experiences, spectacular miracles, and extraordinary acts they have to do. To find Him in vocation brings Him, literally, down to earth, makes us see how close He really is to us, and transfigures everyday life.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“The doctrine of vocation deals with how God works through human beings to bestow His gifts. God gives us this day our daily bread by means of the farmer the banker, the cooks, And the lady at the check-out counter. He creates new life – the most amazing miracle of all – by means of mothers and fathers. He protects us by means of the police officers, firemen, and our military. He creates. Through artists. He heals by working through doctors, nurses, and others whom He has gifted, equipped, and called to the medical professions.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr.

“There is a certain mysticism in the Christian's affirmation of the physical universe. There is a confidence that whatever is discovered conforms with Jesus Christ and is a manifestation of His will.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World

“One of the goals of classical education is to discern the appropriate manner by which the mistreated and oppressed can challenge their oppressors without destroying their civilization.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Classical Education: The Movement Sweeping America

“The Reformation may have resulted in a “Protestant work ethic,” but this was not due to the pressure to prove one’s election by worldly success, as certain social scientists ludicrously maintain. Rather, the work ethic emerged out of an understanding of the meaning of work and the satisfaction and fulfillment that come from ordinary human labor when seen through the light of the doctrine of vocation.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“According to the Reformers, each Christian has multiple vocations. We have callings in our work. We have callings in our families. We have callings as citizens in the larger society. And we have callings in the Church.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“When God blesses us, He almost always does it through other people.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“Rather, the doctrine of vocation encourages attention to each individual’s uniqueness, talents, and personality. These are valued as gifts of God, who creates and equips each person in a different way for the calling He has in mind for that person’s life. The doctrine of vocation undermines conformity, recognizes the unique value of every person, and celebrates human differences; but it sets these individuals into a community with other individuals, avoiding the privatizing, self-centered narcissism of secular individualism.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“the Christian life is to be lived in vocation, in the seemingly ordinary walks of life that take up nearly all of the hours of our day. The Christian life is to be lived out in our family, our work, our community, and our church. Such things seem mundane, but this is because of our blindness. Actually, God is present in them—and in us—in a mighty, though hidden, way.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“Christians—who have no patience with Darwinistic materialism—often sound as progressive as the most ardent evolutionist. They look for “new” theologies, “new” ways of worship, and “new” music, being quite willing to toss out their entire “old-fashioned” Christian heritage.”
― Gene Edward Veith

“The habit of reading is absolutely critical today, particularly for Christians. As television turns our society into an increasingly image dominated culture, Christians must continue to be people of the Word. When we read, we cultivate a sustained attention span, an active imagination, a capacity for logical analysis and critical thinking, and a rich inner life. Each of these qualities, which have proven themselves the essential to a free people is under assault in a TV dominated culture.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Reading Between the Lines: A Christian Guide to Literature

“Christians should be cultural and intellectual thermostats, exulting in opposition, iconoclasm,and balancing insights.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World

“Modern Christians should not mistake our post-Victorian sense of propriety for moral purity.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., Reading Between the Lines: A Christian Guide to Literature

“more than that, the doctrine of vocation amounts to a comprehensive doctrine of the Christian life, having to do with faith and sanctification, grace and good works. It is a key to Christian ethics. It shows how Christians can influence their culture. It transfigures ordinary, everyday life with the presence of God.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“Progress in science and technology is real, but it builds on past truths without rejecting them. Computers don’t have to be re-invented in order to keep getting better; innovations expand what they already do. Knowledge accumulates, so it can increase. Scientists and engineers know this, but artists, authors, and philosophers keep trying to start over from ground zero in the humanities. Thus, they don’t really progress—they become primitive.”
― Gene Edward Veith

“It is still God who is responsible for giving us our daily bread. Though He could give it to us directly, by a miraculous provision, as He once did for the children of Israel when He fed them daily with manna, God has chosen to work through human beings, who, in their different capacities and according to their different talents, serve each other. This is the doctrine of vocation. p.14”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr., God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life

“Propositions are true or false. Images are not.”
― Gene Edward Veith Jr.