Of First Importance

A jealous husband

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 13:10:48 +0000

“The Lord Jesus Christ, of whom I now speak, is very jealous of your love, O believer. Did he not choose you? He cannot bear that you should choose another. Did he not buy you with his own blood? He cannot endure that you should think you are your own, or that you belong to this world.

He loved you with such a love that he could not stop in heaven without you; he would sooner die than that you should perish; he stripped himself to nakedness that he might clothe you with beauty; he bowed his face to shame and spitting that he might lift you up to honour and glory, and he cannot endure that you should love the world, and the things of the world.

Be careful, Christians, you that are married to Christ; remember, you are married to a jealous husband.”

— Charles Spurgeon
"A Jealous God"

The chief cause of our bliss and joy

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 13:18:54 +0000

““In your presence,” says David, “is the fullness of joy.” (Ps. 16:11)

And this joy shall arise chiefly from the vision of God, and partly from the sight of all the holy angels, and blessed souls of just and perfect men, who are in bliss and glory with them; but especially from the blissful sight of Jesus, the Mediator of the New Testament, our Emmanuel, God made man.

The sight of Jesus will be the chief cause of our bliss and joy.”

— Lewis Bayly
"Meditations on the blessed state of those reconciled to God in Christ"

To progress is always to begin again

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 16:41:38 +0000

“We become Christians through faith and repentance, and we grow as Christians through continual faith and repentance. We don’t graduate from the gospel to some advanced way of holiness or progress. Martin Luther said, ‘To progress is always to begin again.’”

— Tim Chester
You Can Change
(Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 2010), 107

God made visible

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:58:31 +0000

“The power of the incarnation is that it makes the presence and glory of God visible. By taking flesh and blood, Christ made known the unseen God.”

— Paul David Tripp
Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands
(Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R Publishing, 2002), 97

The goal of our salvation

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 04:17:46 +0000

“Forgiveness of sins and justification are good news because they remove obstacles to the only lasting, all-satisfying source of joy: Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is not merely the means of our rescue from damnation; he is the goal of our salvation. If he is not satisfying to be with, there is no salvation. He is not merely the rope that pulls us from the threatening waves; he is the solid beach under our feet, and the air in our lungs, and the beat of our heart, and the warm sun on our skin, and the song in our ears, and the arms of our beloved.”

— John Piper
"What is the Christian Gospel?"
(Minneapolis, Minn.: Desiring God Ministries, June 5, 2002)

A taste of Christ’s extravagant love

Sun, 29 Jan 2012 16:17:21 +0000

“How can any of us who have tasted the extravagant love of Christ be stingy with our resources? Doesn’t His compassion toward us make us naturally disposed to help those in need? If we see someone who has a need that we can meet, how can our heart not want to help them? Won’t we love the fatherless, and the widow, and the shut-in, and the homeless, since we know that we once were fatherless, estranged from the Father, disabled, and headed for eternal separation from God?”

— J. D. Greear
Gospel: Recovering the Power that Made Christianity Revolutionary
(Nashville, Tn.: B & H Publishing, 2011), 133

The conscious focus of all saving faith

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 20:25:54 +0000

“God’s will is to glorify his Son by making him the conscious focus of all saving faith.”

— John Piper
Let The Nations Be Glad
(Grand Rapids, Mi.: Baker Books, 1993), 115

As Christ would stand

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 08:01:55 +0000

“We deserved eternal death; we deserved exclusion from the household of God; but the Lord Jesus took upon himself all the guilt of our sins and died instead of us on the cross.

Henceforth the law’s demands have been satisfied for us by Christ, its terror for us is gone, and clothed no longer in our righteousness but in the righteousness of Christ we stand without fear, as Christ would stand without fear, before the judgment seat of God.”

— J. Gresham Machen
What Is Faith?
(Edinburgh, UK: Banner of Truth, 1991), 164-65

An ever fuller understanding

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 08:01:43 +0000

“Some men seem to devote most of their energies to the task of seeing just how little of Christian truth they can get along with. We, however, regard it as a perilous business; we prefer, instead of seeing how little of Christian truth we can get along with, to see just how much of Christian truth we can obtain.

We ought to search the Scriptures reverently and thoughtfully and pray God that He may lead us into an ever fuller understanding of the truth that can make us wise unto salvation.”

— J. Gresham Machen
What Is Faith?
(Edinburgh, UK: Banner of Truth, 1991), 159-60

Jesus’ primary concern

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 17:12:13 +0000

“The first two petitions of the Lord’s Prayer are perhaps the clearest statement of all in the teachings of Jesus that missions is driven by the passion of God to be glorified among the nations. ‘Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come’ (Matthew 6:9–10). Here Jesus teaches us to ask God to hallow his name and to make his kingdom come. This is a missionary prayer. Its aim is to engage the passion of God for his name among those who forget or revile the name of God (Psalm 9:17; 74:18). To hallow God’s name means to put it in a class by itself and to cherish and honor it above every claim to our allegiance and affection. Jesus’ primary concern — the very first petition of the prayer he teaches — is that more and more people, and more and more peoples, come to hallow God’s name. This is the reason the universe exists. Missions exist because this hallowing doesn’t.”

— John Piper
Let the Nations Be Glad
(Grand Rapids, Mi.: Baker Books, 1993), 35