Quotes from Paul David Tripp

Only love for Christ has the power to incapacitate the sturdy love for self that is the bane of every sinner, and only the grace of Christ has the power to produce that love.

We forget that God's primary goal is not changing our situations or relationships so that we can be happy, but changing us through our situations and relationships so that we will be holy.

God's design in our pain enables us to look back and say: He loves me enough to take me where I would have never wanted to go in order to produce in me what I never could have achieved on my own.

We are called by God to do theology, that is, to live our lives with a moment-by-moment consciousness of God.

Only when I focus on the holiness and glory of God am I able to see myself with accuracy.

If you are in Christ, you've been chosen to transcend the borders of your own glory, to reach out toward a greater glory, the glory of God.

Our sin is what separates us from God, but it's our self righteousness that keeps us from running to Him for the grace He willingly gives to all who come.

God's grace doesn't always come in comfortable forms. But it's still grace, and it's still evidence that He loves us.

Our need is so desperate an idea, a thing, a law can't help us. It took one thing, the gift of gifts, God in the flesh, to rescue us.

How can you admit that your only hope is divine grace and then throw condemnation at another sinner when you see them struggle?

Sin is powerful, but not as powerful as the liberating power of grace.

God never intended for us to simply be the objects of His love. We are also called to be the instruments of that love in the lives of others.

Standing near someone you love in a time of trouble is its own reward.

Theology without love simply is very bad theology.

The fatal flaw of human wisdom is that it promises that you can change your relationships without needing to change yourself.

Foolishness is more than being stupid, that deadly combination of arrogance and ignorance.

We forget that God's primary goal ia not changing our situations or relationships so that we can be happy, but changing us through our situations and relationships so that we will be holy.

The church is not a theological classroom. It is a conversion, confession, repentance, reconciliation, forgiveness and sanctification center, where flawed people place their faith in Christ, gather to know and love him better, and learn to love others as he designed.

Human beings by their very nature are worshipers. Worship is not something we do; it defines who we are. You cannot divide human beings into those who worship and those who don't. Everybody worships; it's just a matter of what, or whom, we serve.

The fatal flaw of human wisdom is that it promises that you can change your relationships without needing to change yourself. Every painful thing we experience in relationships is meant to remind us of our need for God. And every good thing we experience is meant to be a metaphor of what we can only find in Him.... We settle for the satisfaction of human relationships when they were meant to point us to the perfect relational satisfaction found only with God.

We must not offer people a system of redemption, a set of insights and principles. We offer people a Redeemer.

Embedded in the larger story of redemption is a principle we must not miss: God uses ordinary people to do extraordinary things in the lives of others.

Personal ministry is not about always knowing what to say. It is not about fixing everything in sight that is broken. Personal ministry is about connecting people with Christ so that they are able to think as he would have them think, desire what he says is best, and do what he calls them to do even if their circumstances never get "fixed." It involves exposing hurt, lost, and confused people to God's glory, so that they give up their pursuit of their own glory and live for his.

Our purpose (in relationship) is to get what we want but God's purpose is to give us what we really need. We think things are going well only if we are getting along with others. But God says that it is also when we are not getting along with others that he is accomplishing his purpose. God has designed our relationship to function as both a diagnosis and a cure.