We read a lot of great quotations on the retreat. Maybe we read them too fast for you to copy. If you're interested, here is the whole set:
STEVE'S MESSAGE — EZEKIEL 37
“What makes life worthwhile is having a big enough objective, something which catches our imagination and lays hold of our allegiance; and this the Christian has in a way that no other person has. For what higher, more exalted, and more compelling goal can there be than to know God?” J. I. Packer, Knowing God, 34.
“Knowing God is a matter of grace. It is a relationship in which the initiative throughout is with God—as it must be, since God is so completely above us and we have so completely forfeited all claim on his favor by our sins. We do not make friends with God; God makes friends with us, bringing us to know him by making his love known to us.” J. I. Packer, Knowing God, 40-41.
“The blazing center of his glory is seen at the cross where he accomplished what no one else could do by opening our access into a relationship so satisfying, so intimate, and so desirable that it provides a continuous offer we cannot refuse: a relationship with God that is so enjoyable it makes other pleasures appear as they really are — small by comparison.” Jerry Bridges, The Bookends of the Christian Life, 118.
“This is momentous knowledge. There is unspeakable comfort—the sort of comfort that energizes...—in knowing that God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love and watching over me for my good. There is tremendous relief in knowing that his love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself, and quench his determination to bless me.” J.I. Packer, Knowing God, 42.
JOSEPH STIGORA'S MESSAGE — 2 Timothy 3:14-17
“A doctrine is what the whole bible teaches us today about some particular topic.” Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology
JOSEPH STIGORA'S MESSAGE — Matthew 21:18-22
“If we feel that our faith is weak and wavering, the antidote is not to turn inward and to try to generate more faith from ourselves. Faith is not like toothpaste in a tube just waiting to be squeezed out. The answer to weak faith is to contemplate more closely what kind of trustworthy and sufficient Savior we have in Jesus.” Graeme Goldsworthy
“Biblical Faith is never a kind of wishful thinking or a vague hope that does not have any secure foundation to rest upon. It is rather, trust in a person, God himself, based on the fact that we take him at his word and believe what he has said. This trust or dependence on God, when it has an element of assurance or confidence, in genuine biblical faith.” – Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 384.
MEDITATION
“Now what is the food for the inner man; not prayer, but the Word of God; and here again not the simple reading of the Word of God, so that it only passes through our minds, just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what we read, pondering over it, and applying it to our hearts…” George Mueller
“Raking is easy, but all your get is leaves; digging is hard, but you might find diamonds.” John Piper, God’s Passion for His Glory, 29.
“We turn each truth that we learn about God into matter for meditation before God, leading to prayer and praise to God. Meditation is the activity of calling to mind, and thinking over, and dwelling on, and applying to oneself, the various things that one knows about the works and ways and purposes and promise of God. It is an activity of holy thought, consciously performed in the presence of God, under the eye of God, by the help of God, as a means of communion with God.
Its purpose is to clear one’s mental and spiritual vision of God, and to let his truth make its full and proper impact on one’s mind and heart.
Its effect is ever to humble us, as we contemplate God’s greatness and glory and our own littleness and sinfulness, and to encourage and reassure us—“comfort” us, in the old, strong, Bible sense of the word—as we contemplate the unsearchable riches of divine mercy displayed in the Lord Jesus Christ.” J. I. Packer, Knowing God, 23.
Posted on
Thursday, August 27, 2009
by Steve Whitacre
filed under