Quotes About Grace

We will not find a frustrated, gloomy, irritable Father who wants to be left alone, but a Father whose heart is so full of joy that it spills over unto all those (Christian Hedonists) who are thirty.

H]ealing displays the works of God in John 9, and sustaining grace displays the works of God in 2 Corinthians 12. What is common in the two cases is the supreme value of the glory of God. The blindness is for the glory of God. The thorn in the flesh is for the glory of God. The healing is for his glory, and the non-healing is for his glory. Suffering can only have ultimate meaning in relation to God.

The point here is that there is no true knowledge of God and no salvation apart from childlike dependence on the grace of God in Christ crucified. If we are not willing to see ourselves as helpless, ungodly sinners and cast ourselves for mercy on the grace of God in Christ, we will not know God or be saved by him.

In all his self-glorifying acts in the world, God is revealing and giving himself to all who will receive him as their portion and their treasure. His self-glorifying is not only a "show," but a gift of himself.

A non-treasured Christ is a nonsaving Christ.

I also saw, moreover, that it was not my good frame of heart that made my righteousness better, nor yet my bad frame that made my righteousness worse, for my righteousness was Jesus Christ himself

Miqueas 7:18-19:

The most glorious thing about God is that he is so completely, fully self-sufficient that the glory of the fullness of his being overflows in truth and grace for his creatures. He doesn't need us. And therefore in his fullness he overflows for us. Such is the grace we receive at Christmas.

In Jesus Christ, he says, meet infinite highness and infinite condescension; infinite justice and infinite grace; infinite glory and lowest humility; infinite majesty and transcendent meekness; deepest reverence toward God and equality with God; worthiness of good and the greatest patience under the suffering of evil; a great spirit of obedience and supreme dominion over heaven and earth; absolute sovereignty and perfect resignation; self-sufficiency and an entire trust and reliance on God.

Therefore, Christ crucified is the foundation of all honest and everlast- ing joy. No self-deception is necessary to enjoy it. Indeed all deception must cease in order to enjoy it to the full.

Don't dwell on your corruption to the degree that it keeps you from joy, freedom, and love.

Salvation is not mainly the forgiveness of sins, but mainly the fellowship of Jesus (1 Corinthians 1:9).

This is the great ground of joy in the word of the cross: Justification is by grace alone (not mixed with our merit), through faith alone (not mixed with our works), on the basis of Christ alone (not mingling his righteousness with ours), to the glory of God alone (not ours).

Pray with me for that touch. If it comes with fire, so be it. If it comes with water, so be it. If it comes with wind, let it come, O God. If it comes with thunder and lightning, let us bow before it. O Lord, come. Come close enough to touch. Shield us with the asbestos of grace, but no more. Pass through all the way to the heart, and touch. Burn and soak and blow and crash. Or, in a still, small voice. Whatever the means, come. Come all the way and touch our hearts.

Justifying faith is not merely alongside good works, but is also the agency employed by the grace of God to give rise to good works. Thus good works are the evidence of authentic faith.

Christians pass through so many difficulties, doubts, temptations, and sins that we need to be consciously anchored in the gospel every day, if we are to "rejoice . . . always" (Phil. 4:4). That is, we need continual reassurance that our sins are forgiven for Jesus's sake, that God is for us and not against us because of Christ, and that we are not destined for wrath, but for everlasting joy, because of the death and resurrection of Jesus.

The faith that justifies gives rise to lives of obedience—not perfection, but growing holiness.

We live under the new covenant. But the mark of that new covenant is not the absence of commands, but the blood-bought power to obey them.

Lo que merecemos de su parte es juicio. Por eso, cada vez que respiramos, cada vez que nuestro corazón late, cada vez que amanece, cada vez que vemos, oímos, hablamos o caminamos, disfrutamos de un inmerecido regalo por ahora dado a nosotros, los pecadores, que lo único que merecemos es juicio.

Who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able thus to offer willingly? For all things come from you, and of your own have we given you" (1Chronicles 29:14). This is the way we should speak of fasting. There is no ground of boasting here. Who am I that I should be able to fast? Nobody. There is nothing in me that would choose this for your glory apart from your transforming grace.

God responds to prayer because when we look away from ourselves to Christ as our only hope, that gives the Father an occasion to magnify the glory of his grace in the all-providing work of his Son. Similarly, fasting is peculiarly suited to glorify God in this way. It is fundamentally an offering of emptiness to God in hope.

Father, I am empty, but you are full. I am hungry, but you are the Bread of Heaven. I am thirsty, but you are the Fountain of Life. I am weak, but you are strong. I am poor, but you are rich. I am foolish, but you are wise. I am broken, but you are whole. I am dying, but your steadfast love is better than life" (see Psalm63:3). When God sees this confession of need and this expression of trust, he acts, because the glory of his all-sufficient grace is at stake.

I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Lord GOD" (Ezekiel 18:32).

The only sin that we can defeat is a forgiven sin.