01UndatedOur love grows soft if it is not strengthened by truth, and our truth grows hard if it is not softened by love.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
02UndatedSocial responsibility becomes an aspect not of Christian mission only, but also of Christian conversion. It is impossible to be truly converted to God without being thereby converted to our neighbor.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
03UndatedThe truth is that there are such things as Christian tears, and too few of us ever weep them.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
05UndatedSpeaking personally, I find it helpful to detect in the four evangelists four dimensions of the saving purpose of God: its length, depth, breadth and height. Matthew reveals its length, for he depicts the Christ of Scripture, who looks back over long-centuries of expectation. Mark emphasizes its depth, for he depicts the Suffering Servant who looks down to the depths of the humiliation he endured. In Luke it is the breadth of God's purpose which emerges, for he depicts the Savior of the world who looks round in mercy to the broadest possible spectrum of human beings. Then John reveals its height, for he depicts the Word made flesh who looks up to the heights from which he came and to which he intends to raise us.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
06UndatedYour call is clear, cold centuries across;You bid me follow you, and take my cross,And daily lose myself, myself deny,And stern against myself shout ‘Crucify’.My stubborn nature rises to rebelAgainst your call. Proud choruses of hellUnite to magnify my restless hateOf servitude, lest I capitulate.The world, to see my cross, would pause and jeer.I have no choice, but still to persevereTo save myself – and follow you from far,More slow than Magi-for I have no star.And yet you call me still. Your crossEclipses mine, transforms the bitter lossI thought that I would suffer if I cameTo you- into immeasurable gain.I kneel before you, Jesus, crucified,My cross is shouldered and my self denied;I’ll follow daily, closely, not refuseFor love of you and man myself to lose.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
07UndatedUnless some people are commissioned for the task, there will be no gospel preachers; unless the gospel is preached, sinners will not hear Christ’s message and voice; unless they hear him, they will not believe the truths of his death and resurrection; unless they believe these truths, they will not call on him; and unless they call on his name, they will not be saved.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
08UndatedThe overriding reason why we should take other people's cultures seriously is because God has taken ours seriously.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
09UndatedBut the Holy Spirit is not in a hurry. Character is the produce of a lifetime.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
10UndatedBefore we can begin to see the cross as something done for us, we have to see it as something done by us.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
11Undated[E]very heresy is due to an overemphasis upon some truth, without allowing other truths to qualify and balance it.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
12UndatedAs we face the cross, then, we can say to ourselves both, “I did it, my sins sent him there,” and “He did it, his love took him there.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
13UndatedThe Christian message has a moral challenge. If the message is true, the moral challenge has to be accepted. So God is not a fit object for man’s detached scrutiny. You cannot fix God at the end of a telescope or a microscope and say “How interesting!” God is not interesting. He is deeply upsetting. The same is true of Jesus Christ … We know that to find God and to accept Jesus Christ would be a very inconvenient experience. It would involve the rethinking of our whole outlook on life and the readjustment of our whole manner of life. And it is a combination of intellectual and moral cowardice which makes us hesitate. We do not find because we do not seek. We do not seek because we do not want to find, and we know that the way to be certain of not finding is not to seek … Christ’s promise is plain: "Seek and you will find.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
14UndatedChrist’s fourth indirect claim was to judge the world. This is perhaps the most fantastic of all his statements. Several of his parables imply that he will come back at the end of the world, and that the final day of reckoning will be postponed until his return. He will himself arouse the dead, and all the nations will be gathered before him. He will sit on the throne of his glory, and the judgment will be committed to him by the Father. He will then separate men from one another as a shepherd separates his sheep from his goats. Some will be invited to come and inherit the kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world. Others will hear the dreadful words, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.' Not only will Jesus be the judge, but the criterion of judgment will be men’s attitude to him as shown in their treatment of his 'brethren' or their response to his word. Those who have acknowledged him before men he will acknowledge before his Father: those who have denied him, he will deny. Indeed, for a man to be excluded from heaven on the last day, it will be enough for Jesus to say, "I never knew you.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
15UndatedSo Jesus confronts us with himself, sets before us a radical choice between obedience and disobedience, and calls us to an unconditional commitment of mind, will and life to his teaching.John R.W. Stott / quote ↗
