Quotes from Lesslie Newbigin

Ministerial leadership is, first and finally, discipleship.

If the logos had become part of history in this man Jesus, then two dualisms which were fundamental to classical thought were no longer tenable. One was the dualism between the "sensible" and the "intelligible," or--as we might say--between the material and the mental or spiritual.

the Spirit himself is sovereign over the mission, the church can only be the attentive servant. In

The church is witness insofar as it follows obediently where the Spirit leads. The

The light cast by the first rays of the morning sun shining on the face of a company of travelers will be evidence that a new day is coming. The travelers are not the source of that witness but only the locus of it. To see for oneself that it is true, that a new day is really coming, one must turn around, face the opposite way, be converted. And then one's own face will share the same brightness and become part of the evidence. This

But we do not reach truth unless we allow ourselves to be exposed to and drawn by a truth which is beyond our present understanding.

Clearly, therefore, the preaching is an explanation of the healings. On the one hand, the healings — marvelous as they are — do not explain themselves. They could be misinterpreted — as in fact they were by Jesus' enemies, who attributed his healing works to Satanic power. The works by themselves did not communicate the new fact. That had to be stated in plain words: "The kingdom of God has drawn near.

There is surely no part of Christian teaching which has been the subject of so much ridicule and indignant rejection as the doctrine of election.

The business of the church is to tell and embody a story

Our confidence...is not in the competence of our own knowing, but in the faithfulness and reliability of the one who is known.