A Bunch Of Quotes: Quotable Quotes

The Church as Contrast-Society:

“The idea of church as contrast-society does not mean contradiction to the rest of society for the sake of contradiction. Still less does the church as contrast-society mean despising the rest of society due to elitist thought. The only thing meant is contrast on behalf of others and for the sake of others, the contrast function that is unsurpassably expressed in the images of ‘salt of the earth,’ ‘light of the world,’ and ‘city on a hill’ (Mt 5:13-14).

Precisely because the church does not exist for itself but completely and exclusively for the world, it is necessary that the church not become the world, that it retain its own countenance. If the church loses its own contours, if it lets its light be extinguished and its salt become tasteless, then it can no longer transform the rest of society. Neither missionary activity nor social engagement, no matter how strenuous, helps anymore. …

What makes the church the divine contrast-society is not self-acquired holiness, not cramped efforts and moral achievements, but the saving deed of God, who justifies the godless, accepts failures and reconciles himself with the guilty. Only in this gift of reconciliation, in the miracle of life newly won against all expectation, does what is here termed contrast-society flourish.”

—Gerhard Lohfink, Jesus and Community: The Social Dimension of Christian Faith (SPCK, 1985) as quoted in Eckhard J. Schnabel, Early Christian Mission: Paul and the Early Church (IVP, 2004), 1577-1578.

George W. Bush on Islam:

...days after the 9/11 attacks, Bush had much to say about the need for religious tolerance even after Islamic extremists carried out the worst foreign attack in history on U.S. soil.

"The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam," Bush said at the Islamic Center of Washington in a speech that set the tenor for when he later sent U.S. troops to fight on Muslim soil in Afghanistan and later Iraq. "That's not what Islam is all about. Islam is peace. These terrorists don't represent peace. They represent evil and war."

N. T. Wright on Idolatry and Community:

One of the primary laws of human life is that you become like what you worship; what’s more, you reflect what you worship not only back to the object itself but also outward to the world around. Those who worship money increasingly define themselves in terms of it and increasingly treat other people as creditors, debtors, partners, or customers rather than as human beings. Those who worship sex define themselves in terms of it (their preferences, their practices, their past histories) and increasingly treat other people as actual or potential sexual objects. Those who worship power define themselves in terms of it and treat other people as either collaborators, competitors, or pawns. These and many other forms of idolatry combine in a thousand ways, all of them damaging to the image-bearing quality of the people concerned and of those whose lives they touch. ---Surprised By Hope (HarperOne, 2008): (pg. 182).

Mark Driscoll on Idolatry and Commmunity:

If we idolize our gender, we must demonize the other gender. If we idolize our nation, we must demonize other nations. If we idolize our political party, we must demonize other political parties. If we idolize our socioeconomic class, we must demonize other classes. If we idolize our family, we must demonize other families. If we idolize our theological system, we must demonize other theological systems. If we idolize our church, we must demonize other churches. This explains the great polarities and acrimonies that plague every society. If something other than God’s loving grace is the source of our identity and value, we must invariably defend our idol by treating everyone and everything who may call our idol into question as an enemy to be demonized so that we can feel superior to other people and safe with our idol. ---Doctrine (Crossway, 2010): (pgs. 350-351).

Thomas Merton on Christian Non-Violence:

Christian non-violence is not built on a presupposed division, but on the basic unity of man. It is not out for the conversion of the wicked to the ideas of the good, but for the healing and reconciliation of man with himself, man the person and man the human family.

The non-violent resister is not fighting simply for "his" truth or for "his" pure conscience, or for the right that is on "his side." On the contrary, both his strength and his weakness come from the fact that he is fighting for the truth common to him and to the adversary, the right which is universal and objective. He is fighting for everybody. ---Faith And Violence: Christian Teaching and Christian Practice, pg. 15.

Some Thoughts On Mainline Protestantism

Henry Neufeld has this interesting quote from the Wesley Report:

Mainline Protestant Christianity has become known for leaving people in slavery, because somewhere along the way, our strategy changed from leading people out of Egypt to planting churches along the Nile. And that’s why mainline denominations continue to lose members. People don’t need churches to help them stay in slavery– they can do that by themselves!

Peter Wallace also has an interesting post on Mainliners:

Mainliners, Be a Little Brutal and Divisive | RD Blog: Daniel Schultz| ReligionDispatches: "What does all the quiet good work of Mainline Liberals really come to in a public square dominated by the right?"

Harry Emerson Fosdick On Christmas

“He (Jesus) is the light of the world, and he is the light of joy. This is your best gift at Christmas. He has come to save the world, and he has come to save you. This is why in the darkness of fear, the light of joy still smiles on us. It is a joy which casts out all fear.”

---Fosdick.

Karl Barth On Christmas

Karl Barth on the wonder of Christmas:

The wonder of Christmas is described in the article of the Apostles' Creed: "Qui conceptus est de spiritu sancto, natus ex Maria virgine"; "who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary." Or, according to the formula of the Nicene Creed which is recited every Sunday, and on many other days, in the Roman Catholic mass and at least on Christmas and on other high festivals in the German Evangelical Church: "Et incarnatus est de spiritu sancto ex Maria virgine et homo factus est"; "and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man." What does this mean?

It certainly means God's presence in our world, His presence as man among men and therefore God's revelation to men. It means man's reconciliation with God. That this happened and still happens, is the substance of the Christmas message. God is the "He" of whom the Creed speaks. In Him is present not only light but the Light, the eternal Light, not only help, but the perfect,
ultimate Helper Himself, not only power, but the Lord of all powers, not only love but the Lover in whom all love is founded, who excels all love and who is so infinitely lovable because He is wholly Love, even if no one responds.

This God is conceived where we all are conceived. He is born of Mary. She who conceived and bore Him, plays our part in the wonder of Christmas, for it concerns us. God has come to us. "Disguised in our flesh and blood, is the eternal good."

In the name of the Messianic King whom Israel expected, the Church has rediscovered the name of "the eternal good' in which she believes and which she confesses. The name is "Immanuel," God with us. ( Is. VII.14).

Even described in such general terms Christmas can only be understood as a wonder. That there is this Love of which Paul can say that it never ends, is not a known fact nor some general truth symbolically represented in the Christmas message but also recognisable elsewhere. Can it really be true: God in our world, God in our world? The facts cry out against it, for they speak of God's remoteness from the world and the world's remoteness from God. It needs a confession of faith to recognise reconciliation as truth, a confession whose strength and weakness lies in the fact that it appeals only to revelation and that it can be made and received only by faith. The Creed of the Christian Church is this confession. It appeals only to revelation, it is made only by faith, it demands and expects nothing but faith when it calls the Love which
never fails, an event, saying: "Et incarnatus est."

Wolfhart Pannenberg On Hope

"Hope and love belong together. Only those who hope with and for others can also love them ... Love's imagination, its creative impulse, lives on hope."


Pannenberg, W. Systematic theology, Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 3:182

[H/T] Chrisendom: Hope And Love

Graeme Randall On The Word Of God

Here is a quote from Graeme Randall:

John 1:1 says “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.” It goes on to say “and the word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). The writer of Hebrews writes “For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12). Now, we can debate whether it is “Big ‘W’ word” or “Little ‘w’ word” as much as we like. But it would seem plain that the Bible is saying that Christ is “The Word of God” - “Divine Logos.” Christ came to fulfill the Old Testament - so the Old Testament looked forward to Christ. It was but a dim reflection of what is in Heaven. The New Testament is about Christ more explicitly. I would suggest that the Word of God is Christ, and that the Bible is man’s commentary on the Word of God (Christ).

This gives us a very different way of understanding the Bible, and our own faith. Only then can we fully reconcile positions such as women in church leadership, gender inclusive language, issues of sexuality within the church - the list goes on - to science, psychology and our personal understanding of our faith.

The Bible is not The Word of God; it is commentary on The Word of God. It is fallible and open to interpretation. It gives us a historical understanding of how men and women have understood God and salvation. It must continue to change and evolve. If it doesn’t, then - as all things which do not change and grow - it is dead and has no power.

Oswald Chambers On Judgementalism

Oswald Chambers On Judgementalism:

We pronounce judgments, not by our character or our goodness, but by the intolerant ban of finality in our views, which awakens resentment and has none of the Spirit of Jesus in it. Jesus never judged like that. It was His presence, His inherent holiness that judged. Whenever we see Him we are judged instantly. We have to practice the presence of Jesus and work on the basis of his disposition. When we have experienced the unfathomable forgiveness of God for all our wrong, we must exhibit that same forgiveness to others.

---Oswald Chambers, The Quotable Oswald Chambers (Grand Rapids: RBC Ministries, 2008.

Exploring Our Matrix: Quote of the Day (Julia M. O'Brien)

Exploring Our Matrix: Quote of the Day (Julia M. O'Brien):

Quote of the Day (Julia M. O'Brien)

"A lot of verbage gets thrown around about the Bible (its perfection, its authority, its goodness) that makes sense only if you don't read it--or read it seriously. I'm a firm believer that you shouldn't say something about the Bible that isn't true about all of it. If you're going to talk about the Bible as the only rule of faith and practice, then you should be prepared to explain why you don't live your life by all of it.

I spend my energies trying to get people to spend less time spouting claims about the Bible and more time actually reading it, being honest about it, and valuing it for what it actually is."


-- Julia M. O'Brien, "Claims about the Bible Work Best if You Don't Actually Read It"

Bierlein on Christians and Mythology

Here's an interesting post from The Sci Fi Catholic: Bierlein on Christians and Mythology:

Sunday, June 1, 2008

Bierlein on Christians and Mythology

I recently finished J. F. Bierlein's Parallel Myths and found it a fine little introduction to comparative mythology. Of most interest to readers of The Sci Fi Catholic will probably be Bierlein's essay in the final chapter on the relationship between myth and the three major monotheistic religions. Bierlein relates the following:

Some years ago, I attended a Christian conference and had occasion to speak to two women with dramatically different reactions to their experience in the study of myth.

The first woman had nothing whatsoever good to say about myth or mythology. The subject matter, she pointed out, exalted false gods. For her, the study of myth was merely a "tool of the devil" in the hands of "secular humanists" in a wholesale effort to devalue Christianity and excise its influence from society. The study of myth caused her to doubt her own faith. She did not want her children to study mythology in the public schools. She had even gone so far as to throw out her books on the subject in order to make certain that her home, her children's minds, and her own mind would never be contaminated by them.

The second woman drew the opposite conclusion from her studies. Lest you think that she was a "liberal" Christian, a New Age adherent, or anything but orthodox in her beliefs, think again. She was from Alabama, the heart of the American Bible Belt, and described herself as "born again" and "spirit-filled" She could not even remotely be construed as a "secular humanist." She had just completed the third of three classes in comparative religion at her local university and was enthusiastic about the effects on her religious life. The parallels between the myths of distant cultures and the stories of the Bible intrigued her and led her to see her faith as the satisfaction of universal human needs. She was fascinated, not threatened, by parallel virgin births and resurrections. For her, these motifs persisted in myth--and were expressed in Christianity--because they are true. [pp. 308-309]

Posted by D. G. D. Davidson at 5:48 PM
Labels: books, J. F. Bierlein, Parallel Myths, quotes of note

Dietrich Bonhoeffer On The Church

So I was skimming through Letters and Papers from Prison as I haven't read it in awhile and I stumbled upon this paragraph on pgs. 382-383:

The church is the church only when it exists for others. To make a start, it should give away all its property to those in need. The clergy must live solely on the free-will offerings of their congregations, or possibly engage in some secular calling. The church must share in the secular problems of ordinary human life, not dominating, but helping and serving. It must tell men of every calling what it means to live in Christ, to exist for others.

A big contrast from the mega-church movement and the health and wealth gospel, wouldn't you say?

Rich Mullins On Being Born Again

Rich Mullins On Being Born Again :

"You guys are all into that born again thing, which is great. We do need to be born again, since Jesus said that to a guy named Nicodemus. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, I can tell you that you just have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy too…[And he paused in the awkward silence.] But I guess that’s why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest."

Interesting Quotes

Brian McLaren on Christian Nationalism:

When people tell me that we are or have been a Christian nation, I want to ask, "When?" Was it in the colonial era or during westward expansion, when we began stealing the lands of the Native Americans, making and breaking treaties, killing wantonly, and justifying our actions by the Bible? Was it in the era of slavery or segregation, when again, we used the Bible to justify the unjustifiable? Was it in more recent history, when we dropped the first nuclear bomb and killed hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians, when we overthrew democratically elected governments in the Cold War era, when we plundered the environment without concern for the birds of the air or flowers of the field, or when we sanctioned or turned a blind eye to torture earlier this decade? Was it earlier this week, when I turned on the TV or radio and heard people scapegoating immigrants and gay people and Muslims?

---thanks to Mainstream Baptist: Brian McLaren on Christian Nationalism.


Oscar Romero On Pluralism In The Church:

A healthy pluralism is needed. We don't want to force everything into the same mold. Uniformity is different from unity. Unity means pluralism, with everyone respecting how others think, and among all of us, creating a unity that is greater than just my way of thinking.---May 29, 1977.

You, with your charismatic movement; you, with your Cursillo movement of Christianity; you, with your community studying catechism; you, with your traditional thoughts; you, with your progressive thoughts, why do you do this? Do you defend what you do because it is comfortable? Then you are going the wrong way. This is not the right thing to do. Do you do it to serve God sincerely? Well do it this way and try to understand others who are doing what they are doing for God. This is true pluralism in the church.---September 17, 1978.

---pgs. 3 and 68 of Through The Year With Oscar Romero: Daily Meditations .

See also: “A bishop will die,…”.

Karl Barth On Grace

The Incomprehensibility of Grace
Posted on October 9, 2008 by Halden

“Grace is the incomprehensible fact that God is well pleased with a man, and that a man can rejoice in God. Only when grace is recognized to be incomprehensible is it grace. Grace exists, therefore, only where the Resurrection is reflected. Grace is the gift of Christ, who exposes the gulf which separates God and man, and, by exposing it, bridges it. . . . Where the grace of God is, the very existence of the world and the very existence of God become a question and a hope with which and for which men must wrestle. For we are not now concerned with the propaganda of a conviction or with its imposition on others; grace means bearing witness to the faithfulness of God which a man has encountered and recognized, and which requires a corresponding fidelity towards God. The fidelity of a man to the faithfulness of God–the faith, that is, which accepts grace–is itself the demand for obedience and itself demands obedience from others. Hence the demand is a call which enlightens and rouses to action; it carries with it mission, beside which no other mission is possible. For the name of Him in whom the two worlds meet and are separated must be honoured, and for this mission grace provides full authority, since men are shattered by it.”

– Karl Barth, Epistle to the Romans 6th Edition. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968), 31.

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How to Be Evangelical Without Being Conservative

Ironic Quotes of the Day (Roger Olson)

"The irony should not escape us. Many conservative Christians oppose biological evolution while implicitly and unconsciously promoting a form of social Darwinism" (Roger E. Olson, How to Be Evangelical without Being Conservative (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2008) p.137).

"Luther is a hero to most conservative evangelical theologians. But the ironic tragedy is that too often they now fill the role of those inquisitors who demanded that Luther recant his newly discovered truths...But how can the church be reformed and always reforming if it doesn't allow for new Luthers with their desire and ability to make the Word fresh by discovering the new light breaking forth from it?" (Roger E. Olson, How to Be Evangelical without Being Conservative (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2008) p.150).

---------Interesting quotes.