Any student of the Old Testament knows that God was concerned about Israel’s susceptibility to influence from the people of Canaan. He commanded Israel to drive the nations out, to show no mercy. God knew that if the people of Canaan lived alongside Israel, they would go astray. Like Old Testament Israel, you too, are subject to the powerful influence of your culture. Like Israel, you must reject things in the culture that are abhorrent to Jehovah your God.
– Tedd Tripp
It is sad to find so many professing Christians who appear to regard the wrath of God as something for which they need to make an apology; or at least they wish there were no such thing.
– A.W. Pink
1886 – 1952
We live in strange times. We live in times where people can tell you about the ten hills, and the ten kings, and ten horns, and ten heads in Revelation, and yet don’t know diddly about justification.
– Brian Borgman
“Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels” – Revelation 12:7
War will always rage between the two great sovereignties until one or other be crushed. Peace between good and evil is impossibility; the very pretence of it would, in fact, be the triumph of the powers of darkness. Michael will always fight; his holy soul is vexed with sin, and will not endure it. Jesus will always be the dragon’s foe and that not in a quiet sense, but actively, vigorously, with full determination to exterminate evil. All His servants, whether angels in heaven or messengers on earth, will and must fight; the are born to be warriors – at the cross they enter into covenant never to make truce with evil; they are a warlike company, firm in defense and fierce in attack. The duty of every soldier in the army of the Lord is daily, with all his heart, and soul, and strength, to fight against the dragon.
The dragon and his angels will not decline the affray; they are incessant in their onslaughts, sparing no weapon, fair or foul. We are foolish to expect to serve God without opposition: the more zealous we are, the more sure we are to be assailed by the myrmidons of hell. The church may become slothful, but not so her great antagonist; his restless spirit never suffers the war to pause; he hates the woman’s seed, and would fain devour the church if he could. The servants of Satan partake much of the old dragon’s energy, and are usually an active race. War rages all around, and to dream of peace is dangerous and futile.
Glory be to God, we know the end of the war. The great dragon shall be cast out and for ever destroyed, while Jesus and they who are with Him shall receive the crown. Let us sharpen our swords tonight, and pray to the Holy Spirit to nerve our arms for conflict. Every man to his post, ye warriors of the cross, and may the Lord tread Satan under your feet shortly!
– C.H. Spurgeon
I should as soon expect a farmer to prosper in business who contented himself with sowing his fields and never looking at them till harvest, as expect a believer to attain much holiness who was not diligent about his Bible reading, his prayers, and the use of his Sundays.
– J.C. Ryle
1816 – 1900
A little plain-speaking would do a world of good just now. These gentlemen desire to be let alone. They want no noise raised. Of course thieves hate watch-dogs, and love darkness. It is time that somebody should spring his rattle, and call attention to the way in which God is being robbed of his glory, and man of his hope. – C.H. Spurgeon
I’m sad to say there are some congregations today that seem to be wrestling with who they are and what their mission is—a spiritual identity crisis of sorts. Relentlessly assaulted by doctrinal fads, scandals, divisions, internal and external criticism, and worldly thinking, they’ve buckled under the pressure. The chain reaction that creates is heartbreaking. Doctrine is compromised, effectiveness is forfeited, biblical ministry is abandoned, and God’s blessing is withdrawn. That grieves me, and I know it grieves you as well.
However, we can thank the Lord for the many churches that have stayed the course in spite of pressure, and the many others that struggle but have not given up the fight. Large or small, the congregations that remain faithful to God’s Word are the ones that are alive, vital, flourishing, reaching their communities with great effectiveness, and advancing the kingdom of God. They’ve resisted the fads, remained true to God’s calling, and are now seeing His blessing. I’m grateful to Him for those churches, and for the encouragement they are to me and to the Body of Christ.
– John MacArthur
In few countries is the failure of Christian humanism more apparent than in Thailand. There, after 150 years of missionaries showing marvelous social compassion, Christians still make up only two percent of the entire population. Self-sacrificing missionaries probably have done more to modernize the country than any other single force. Thailand owes to missionaries its widespread literacy, first printing press, first university, first hospital, first doctor, and almost every other benefit of education and science. In every area, including trade and diplomacy, Christian missionaries put the needs of the host nation first and helped usher in the 20th century. Meanwhile, millions have slipped into eternity without the Lord. They died more educated, better governed, and healthier—but they died without Christ and are bound for Hell.
– K.P. Yohannan
In every age the church is threatened by heresy, and heresy is bound up in false doctrine . It is the desire of all heretics to minimize the importance of doctrine. When doctrine is minimized, heresy can exercise itself without restraint.
– RC Sproul
The majority of Christian teaching emphasizes individual doctrines of the Bible rather than presenting the Bible as one complete, interdependent revelation of God. Heresies, misrepresentation, and overemphasis of certain Scriptures, and denominationalism can, in most cases, be traced to this lack of chronological and panoramic Bible teaching.
– Trevor Mcllwain
Let’s play “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.” For $500,000: Which of these churches was a growing church in the book of Revelation; the church at Laodicea (Rev 3:14-22), which saw itself as rich and wealthy and in need of nothing or the church at Smyrna (Rev. 2:8-11), which was described as poor, in tribulation, and facing great persecution? Need a lifeline you say? Here you go: God said of the Laodicean church that he would spit them out of his mouth, but of the Smyrna church that they would receive the crown of life.
– Gary Gilley
How can a man be “in the right” before God? This is the dilemma that has tormented men down through history. It caused Martin Luther to crawl on his knees up the steps of the so-called Scala Sancta in Rome, and induced monks to wear hair shirts embedded with fishhooks in an attempt to pay for their sins. To this day, it causes natives of the South Sea Islands to sacrifice chickens and sprinkle their blood to the gods. In more “civilized” countries, many settle for “going to church” or some other form of “good deeds” to placate their guilty consciences. And everywhere men try to “justify” themselves by rationalizing or excusing their evil actions. How can a man be right with God? There is only one answer: A man can be right with God only through the life and death of the Lord Jesus Christ on his behalf.
– Charles Leiter
Because the preaching of the Gospel is so low, the church is basically—the majority of it—are carnal lost people. And because it is a democracy, they, by and large, govern the direction of the church. And because the pastor doesn’t want to lose the great number of people and because he has wrong ideas regarding evangelism and true conversion, he caters to the wicked in his church and his little group of true sheep that belong to Jesus Christ are sitting there in the midst of all the theater, in the midst of all the worldliness, in the midst of all the multi-media going, “We just want to worship Jesus and we just want someone to teach us the Bible,” and pastors are going to pay for that. . . . Trying to keep together a bunch of wicked people while a little flock in the midst of them are starving to death and are made to go in directions they don’t want to go with the carnal majority.
– Paul Washer
It is my contention that once biblical infallibility is surrendered it leads to the most undesirable consequences. It will end in apostasy at last. It is my opinion that it is next to impossible to stop the process of theological deterioration once inerrancy is abandoned.
– Harold Lindsell
The person who loves you most will tell you the most truth. One of the greatest distinguishing marks of a false prophet is that he will always tell you what you want to hear, he will never rain on your parade, he will get you clapping, he will get you jumping, he will make you dizzy, he will keep you entertained, and he will present a Christianity to you that will make your church look like a Six Flags over Jesus. And keep you so entertained you are never addressed with great issues such as these:
Is God working in my life?
Am I growing in holiness?
Have I truly been born again?
– Paul Washer
We often are taught that man becomes a sinner when he sins. The Bible teaches that man sins because he is a sinner.
– Tedd Tripp
Thou art my hope in the day of evil (Jeremiah 17:17)
The path of the Christian is not always bright with sunshine; he has his seasons of darkness and of storm. True, it is written in God’s Word, “Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace;” and it is a great truth, that religion is calculated to give a man happiness below as well as bliss above; but experience tells us that if the course of the just be “As the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day,” yet sometimes that light is eclipsed. At certain periods clouds cover the believer’s sun, and he walks in darkness and sees no light. There are many who have rejoiced in the presence of God for a season; they have basked in the sunshine in the earlier stages of their Christian career; they have walked along the “green pastures” by the side of the “still waters”, but suddenly they find the glorious sky is clouded; instead of the Land of Goshen they have to tread the sandy desert; in the place of sweet waters, they find troubled streams, bitter to their taste, and they say, “Surely, if I were a child of God, this would not happen.” Oh! Say not so, thou who are walking in darkness. The best of God’s saints must drink the wormwood; the dearest of His children must bear the cross. No Christian has enjoyed perpetual prosperity; no believer can always keep his harp from the willows. Perhaps the Lord allotted you at first a smooth and unclouded path, because you were weak and timid. He tempered the wind to the shorn lamb, but now that you are stronger in the spiritual life, you must enter upon the riper and rougher experience of God’s full-grown children. We need winds and tempests to exercise our faith, to tear off the rotton bough of self-dependence, and to root us more firmly in Christ. The day of evil reveals to us the value of our glorious hope.
– C.H. Spurgeon
Although the Bible primarily focuses on the human agents propagating false doctrine, it also deals with the source of false doctrine: Satan and his demons. Behind all false teachers are invisible demons. No false teacher teaches from his own wisdom; a demon or demons inspire him to teach. False teachers are mouthpieces for Satan.
– John MacArthur
In the construction of any building, the foundations are the first part of the structure to be prepared. The majority of Gospel preaching, however, is usually done with very little foundational preparation. This lack has contributed to a multitude of false professions and the uncertainty of many new Christians about the foundations of their faith.
– Trevor Mcllwain
Self-righteousness is the big lie of Satan. The truth is you are saved by Christ; the lie is you are saved by anything other than Christ. That lie can come in all kinds of packages: You can be saved by following these rules, doing these routines, belonging to this or that system, being good enough to outweigh your shortcomings…there’s a myriad of possible systems to counter the one truth, and they are all part of Satan’s big lie. If Satan can get somebody into a system that says they are righteous, it’s very hard to extract them from it. One reason is that self- righteousness is very proud. I am reminded of what Job said to those who judged him: “No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you” (12:2). Proverbs 12:15 says, “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes….” Luke 16:15 says, “…that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.” When men believe Satan’s lie and develop a system that is highly esteemed in their eyes, it is an abomination to God. Salvation can never be earned by good works and keeping religious rituals.
– John MacArthur
Christ Alone Wyoming 