Stopping to Think

  "Simply telling people what to think in order to be orthodox, and then expecting them to be disciples, is like telling people what they should eat in order to be healthy and then expecting them to lose weight." Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Hearers & Doers, pg 54

  "Why are you preaching this sermon? That obvious question draws many inadequate answers. [...] No matter how brilliant or biblical a sermon is, without definite purpose it will not be worth preaching." Haddon Robinson, Biblical Preaching, pg 107

  "Neglecting the church is neglecting Jesus." Sam Allberry, Why bother with church? , pg 31

  "Pastors must remain vigilant, guarding not only the orthodoxy of statements of faith but also the imaginations of their congregants." Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Hearers & Doers, pg 12

  "Doctrine is not a distraction but the church's main business: living each day, all day, to the glory of God." Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Hearers & Doers, pg 134

  "There is no such thing as love or worship that is merely private." Anthony Esolen, Life Under Compulsion, pg 212

  So next time you hear someone say, "The church is a people, not a place," you might respond: "Sort of. The people become a people by regularly assembling in a place. You can't call the team a team if they never play together." Jonathan Leeman, One Assembly, pg 64

  "If a preacher will not--or cannot--think himself clear so that he says what he means, he has no business in the pulpit." Haddon Robinson, Biblical Preaching, pg 39

  "Change a church's structure and you change the moral shape of the church." Jonathan Leeman, One Assembly, pg 21

  "God wonderfully delivers his church from death by death." John Calvin, Commentary on the Catholic Epistles, pg 22

  "To make hearers into doers, we need to appeal not only to the intellect but also to the imagination." Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Hearers & Doers, pg 70

  "A preacher must learn to listen to God before he speaks for Him." Haddon Robinson, Biblical Preaching, pg 26

  "The society that promotes chastity promotes true wedded love. The land of marriage, despite all the troubles that sinful human beings bring upon themselves, is a paradise by comparison with the land of easy fornication and childlessness by choice." Anthony Esolen, Life Under Compulsion, pg 123

  "Modern people, though they cherish great thoughts of themselves, have as a rule small thoughts about God." J.I. Packer, Knowing God, pg 83

  "We do not rise up to God; he descends to us." Michael Horton, Pilgrim Theology, pg 31

  "The final purpose of God's communicative action is to form a people for his treasured possession: not simply a group of holy individuals but a 'holy nation' (1 Peter 2:9)." Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Hearers & Doers, pg 138

  "Baptism is not necessary for salvation, but it is necessary for obedience." Sam Allberry, Why bother with church? , pg 51

  The use of images in worship "begin to corrupt the devotion they trigger." J.I. Packer, Knowing God, pg 51

  "These days we have no true childhood, only a diseased precocity, introducing children to things that any decent man of Whittier's day, or of Armstrong's, would have considered unutterably vile. Therefore we have no true adulthood either, only a prolonged infantility, a curdled adolescence followed by old age and death." Anthony Esolen, Life Under Compulsion, pg 70  

  "Lacking a church is not equivalent to lacking a decent supermarket or movie theatre; it is like lacking a hospital or a source of water. It is an utter necessity." Sam Allberry, Why bother with church? , pg 19