Tina > Tina's Quotes

“When a newspaper posed the question, “What’s Wrong with the World?” the Catholic thinker G. K. Chesterton reputedly wrote a brief letter in response: “Dear Sirs: I am. Sincerely Yours, G. K. Chesterton.” That is the attitude of someone who has grasped the message of Jesus.”
― Timothy Keller, The Prodigal God: Recovering the Heart of the Christian Faith

“Since it is so likely that (children) will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage. Otherwise you are making their destiny not brighter but darker.”
― C.S. Lewis

“Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs.”
― Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre

“No revolving world, no shining of star, no storm, no creature moves, no actions of men, no errands of angels, no deeds of devil—nothing in all the vast universe can come to pass otherwise than God has eternally purposed. Here is a foundation of faith. Here is a resting place for the intellect. Here is an anchor for the soul, both sure and steadfast. It is not blind fate, unbridled evil, man or devil, but the Lord Almighty who is ruling the world, ruling it according to His own good pleasure and for His own eternal glory.”
― Arthur W. Pink, The Sovereignty of God

“The cumulative testimony of the four Gospels is that when Jesus Christ sees the fallenness of the world all about him, his deepest impulse, his most natural instinct, is to move toward that sin and suffering, not away from it.”
― Dane C. Ortlund, Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers

“For all of us, there is an internal bewildering that builds over time when we neglect private communion with God. Who we are and who God is both fade. It is in withdrawal from everything and everyone to be with God that we re-center. It is when we are alone with him that there is least chance for playing games, wearing a mask, hiding our sins, covering our anxieties. It is then that we can most fully open our hearts up to God.”
― Dane C. Ortlund, Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God

“If your Lord calls you to suffering, do not be dismayed, for He will provide a deeper portion of Christ in your suffering. The softest pillow will be placed under your head though you must set your bare feet among thorns. Do not be afraid at suffering for Christ, for He has a sweet peace for a sufferer. God has called you to Christ's side, and if the wind is now in His face, you cannot expect to rest on the sheltered side of the hill. You cannot be above your Master who received many an innocent stroke. The greatest temptation out of hell is to live without trials. A pool of standing water will turn stagnant. Faith grows more with the sharp winter storm in its face. Grace withers without adversity. You cannot sneak quietly into heaven without a cross. Crosses form us into His image. They cut away the pieces of our corruption. Lord cut, carve, wound; Lord do anything to perfect Your image in us and make us fit for glory! We need winnowing before we enter the kingdom of God. O what I owe to the file, hammer, and furnace! Why should I be surprised at the plough that makes such deep furrows in my soul? Whatever direction the wind blows, it will blow us to the Lord. His hand will direct us safely to the heavenly shore to find the weight of eternal glory. As we look back to our pains and suffering, we shall see that suffering is not worthy to be compared to our first night's welcome home in heaven. If we could smell of heaven and our country above, our crosses would not bite us. Lay all your loads by faith on Christ, ease yourself, and let Him bear all. He can, He does, and He will bear you. Whether God comes with a rod or a crown, He comes with Himself. "Have courage, I am your salvation!" Welcome, welcome Jesus!”
― Samuel Rutherford

“Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession...Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.”
― Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“Nothing is more often misdiagnosed than our homesickness for Heaven. We think that what we want is sex, drugs, alcohol, a new job, a raise, a doctorate, a spouse, a large-screen television, a new car, a cabin in the woods, a condo in Hawaii. What we really want is the person we were made for, Jesus, and the place we were made for, Heaven. Nothing less can satisfy us.”
― Randy Alcorn, Heaven: A Comprehensive Guide to Everything the Bible Says About Our Eternal Home

“It would upset us, but would we think it unloving if a doctor told us we had a potentially fatal cancer? And would the doctor not tell us if the cancer could be eradicated? Why then do we not tell unsaved people about the cancer of sin and evil and how the inevitable penalty of eternal destruction can be avoided by the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ?”
― Randy Alcorn, Heaven: A Comprehensive Guide to Everything the Bible Says About Our Eternal Home

“Hell is truth known too late.”
― J.C. Ryle, Practical Religion

“It is said that in some countries trees will grow, but will bear no fruit because there is no winter there.”
― John Bunyan

“Your heart is not the compass that God steers by.”
― Samuel Rutherford

“If I become content by having my desire satisfied, that is only self-love; but when I am contented with the hand of God and am willing to be at His disposal, that comes from my love to God.”
― Jeremiah Burroughs, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment

“Oh, that we could but convince men and women that murmuring spirit is a greater evil than any affliction, whatever the affliction!”
― Jeremiah Burroughs, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment

“Third, hear our loss of focus on the gospel in our songs. This is no comment on musical styles and tastes, but simply an observation about the lyrical content of much that is being sung in churches today. In many cases, congregations unwittingly have begun to sing about themselves and how they are feeling rather than about God and His glory.”
― Sinclair B. Ferguson, In Christ Alone: Living the Gospel-Centered Life

“If sinners be damned, at least let them leap to Hell over our dead bodies. And if they perish, let them perish with our arms wrapped about their knees, imploring them to stay. If Hell must be filled, let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go unwarned and unprayed for.”
― Charles Spurgeon

“We are living in an age, I believe, where preaching has fallen on hard times. There are many reasons for this, but one reason is that pastors have a limited vocabulary and ability to express God’s attributes to his people. As a result, they do not paint vivid pictures of God’s goodness, love, patience, wrath, and so forth, in order to move congregants to respond to these glorious truths. God is good. Fine! But how is God good? The preacher must creatively and convincingly unfold these perfections so Christians can understand, love, and believe God’s goodness to them.”
― Mark Jones, God Is: A Devotional Guide to the Attributes of God

“Those blessings are sweetest that are won with prayer and worn with thanks.”
― Thomas Goodwin

“‎"Measure not God's love and favour by your own feeling. The sun shines as clearly in the darkest day as it does in the brightest. The difference is not in the sun, but in some clouds which hinder the manifestation of the light thereof.”
― Richard Sibbes

“Glory follows afflictions, not as the day follows the night but as the spring follows the winter; for the winter prepares the earth for the spring, so do afflictions sanctified prepare the soul for glory.”
― Richard Sibbes

“to be well skilled in the mystery of Christian contentment is the duty, glory, and excellence of a Christian.”
― Jeremiah Burroughs, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment

“when the heart of a man has nothing to do, but to be busy about creature-comforts, every little thing troubles him; but when the heart is taken up with the weighty things of eternity, with the great things of eternal life, the things of here below that disquieted it before are things now of no consequence to him in comparison with the other-how things fall out here is not much regarded by him, if the one thing that is necessary is provided for.”
― Jeremiah Burroughs, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment

“The lament of Good Friday was answered three days later with the empty tomb. The greatest injustice in history became the greatest display of divine mercy. Tragedy became triumph. Lament was the voice in between.”
― Mark Vroegop, Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering the Grace of Lament

“The death of a beloved is an amputation.”
― C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

“I thought I could describe a state; make a map of sorrow. Sorrow, hoever, turns out to be not a state but a process.”
― C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

“We best defend the Lord's glory by speaking first TO Him about unbelieving men rather than speaking first ABOUT Him to unbelieving men.”
― Dr. Sinclair Ferguson

“Man's insulting God is not reversed by our insulting man.”
― Dr. Sinclair Ferguson

“When I am tempted and feel the power of sin and its tug on my affections, the gospel gives me something to say: 'Christ bled and died for this sin—I will therefore have nothing to do with it. I am now united to Christ by the indwelling of the Spirit—how can I drag him into my sin?”
― Sinclair B. Ferguson, Devoted to God: Blueprints for Sanctification

“Fast-forward to Calvary and the coming of the Spirit. As Moses ascended Mount Sinai and brought down the Law on tablets of stone, now Christ has ascended into the heavenly Mount, but in contrast to Moses, he has sent down the Spirit who rewrites the law not now merely on tablets of stone but in our hearts.”
― Sinclair B. Ferguson, The Whole Christ: Legalism, Antinomianism, and Gospel Assurance—Why the Marrow Controversy Still Matters