Sermons

“Our ‘inconsolable secret,’ says C.S. Lewis, is that we are full of yearnings, sometimes shy and sometimes passionate, that point us beyond the things of earth to the ultimate reality of God.”

Cornelius Plantinga, Engaging God’s World

“The first step forward in knowing God better is the awareness that you do not yet know him fully.  It is ‘thirsting’ for God. It is discovering that he has water which can satisfy our deepest longings.  It is saying to him: ‘Lord, give me this water’ (John 4:15).”

Sinclair Ferguson, Grow in Grace

O, heart bereaved and lonely,
Whose brightest dreams have fled
Whose hopes like summer roses,
Are withered crushed and dead
Though link by link be broken,
And tears unseen may fall
Look up amid thy sorrow,
To Him who knows it all.

O, cling to thy Redeemer,
Thy Savior, Brother, Friend
Believe and trust His promise,
To keep you till the end
O watch and wait with patience,
And question all you will
His arms of love and mercy,
Are round about thee still.

Fanny Crosby

“Of the evils that infect God’s world (moral and spiritual perversity, waste of good, and the physical disorders and disruptions of a spoiled cosmos), it can summarily be said: God permits evil; he punishes evil with evil; he brings good out of evil; he uses evil to test and discipline those he loves; and one day he will redeem his people from the power and presence of evil altogether. . . The doctrine of providence teaches Christians that they are never in the grip of blind forces (fortune, change, luck, fate); all that happens to them is divinely planned, and each event comes as a new summons to trust, obey and rejoice, knowing that all is for one’s spiritual and eternal good.”

JI Packer

“The vulnerability that leads to flourishing requires risk, which is the possibility of loss – the chance that when we act, we will lose something we value. Risk, like life, is always about probabilities, never about certainties. To risk is to open ourselves up to the chance that something will go wrong, that something will be taken from us – without knowing for sure whether that loss will come to pass or not. To be vulnerable is to be exposed to the possibility of loss – and not just loss of things or possessions, but loss of our own self. Vulnerable at root means woundable – and any wound deeper than the most superficial scratch injures and limits not just our bodies but our very sense of self. Wounded, we are forced to become careful, tender, tentative in the way we move in the world.”

Andy Crouch

“I sing because I’m happy, I sing because I’m free,
For His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.”

Civilla Martin

“Hope has two beautiful daughters.  Their names are anger and courage: anger at the way things are and courage to see that they do not remain the way they are.”

Saint Augustine

“If God were not angry at injustice and deception and did not make a final end to violence, that God would not be worthy of worship. . . If I don’t believe that there is a God who will eventually put all things right, I will take up the sword and will be sucked into the endless vortex of retaliation.  Only if I am sure that there’s a God who will right all wrongs and settle all accounts perfectly do I have the power to refrain.”

Miroslav Volf

“Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps.  He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.”

1 Peter 2: 21-23

“Doubt is the ants-in-the-pants of faith; it keeps it alive and moving.”

Frederick Buechner

“A faith without some doubts is like a human body without any antibodies in it. People who blithely go through life too busy or indifferent to ask hard questions about why they believe as they do will find themselves defenseless against either the experience of tragedy or the probing questions of a smart skeptic. A person’s faith can collapse almost overnight if she has failed over the years to listen patiently to her own doubts, which should only be discarded after long reflection.”

Tim Keller, The Reason For God

“Without somehow destroying me in the process, how could God reveal himself in a way that would leave no room for doubt? If there were no room for doubt, there would be no room for me.”

Frederick Buechner

“Not that I am (I think) in much danger of ceasing to believe in God. The real danger is of coming to believe such dreadful things about Him. The conclusion I dread is not ‘So there’s no God after all,’ but ‘So this is what God’s really like. Deceive yourself no longer.’”

C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

“The grace of God means something like: Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn’t have been complete without you. Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don’t be afraid. I am with you. Nothing can ever separate us. It’s for you I created the universe. I love you.”

Frederick Buechner

“As we might guess, far from gradually becoming extinct in adulthood, our fears increase throughout our lives. What was once a small family of worries quietly conducts an aggressive breeding program to become a teeming community of palpable fears and private anxieties. The code by which fear and anxiety live is primal: multiply. As we possess more things, care about more people, accumulate more bad experiences, and watch the evening news, it is as if we absorb fear. If they are not obvious in your own life, perhaps it’s because you have been living in a war zone your entire life. At first you noticed every gunshot. After a while the mayhem blends in with the rustle of the trees, the TV, and the children playing in the other room. Fear gradually becomes the background noise of everyday life.”

Ed Welch, Running Scared

“Fear can sit in the car, but it sits in the back, and it can’t pick the music.”

Elizabeth Gilbert

“Prayer delights God’s ear; it melts His heart; it opens His hand. Plead with Him earnestly, either He will remove the affliction or remove the impatience.”

Thomas Watson

“Worship is meant to consist of much more than singing happy and thankful songs. And ultimately, I had missed something about God himself – the fact that He is not afraid of our struggle, pain, confusion, or even our anger. More than that, he wants us to bring those things to Him in song, and He so intended to underscore this desire for us that He gave us more examples of tearful and pain-filled ‘praising’ than he did jubilant and triumphant celebration . . . If Scripture regulates worship, as we believe, then it calls for something more daring, more poignant, and, yes, more costly than we would prefer to give. Again and again the message of the Psalms re-echoes: ‘To wrestle with God is worship. Bring your broken and turbulent heart with you.’”

Ewan Kennedy

“It is an act of faith and wisdom to be sad about sad things.”

Zack Eswine

“Is there nothing to sing about today? Then borrow a song from tomorrow; sing of what is yet to be.”

Charles Spurgeon