J. I. Packer Quotes
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I need not torment myself with the fear that my faith may fail; as grace led me to faith in the first place, so grace will keep me believing to the end. Faith, both in its origin and continuance, is a gift of grace (Phil 1:29).
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Every time we mention God we become theologians, and the only question is whether we are going to be good ones or bad ones.
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We need to discover all over again that worship is natural to the Christian, as it was to the godly Israelites who wrote the psalms, and that the habit of celebrating the greatness and graciousness of God yields an endless flow of thankfulness, joy, and zeal.
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The truth is that, though we were justified by faith alone, the faith that justifies is never alone (it always produces fruit, 'good works,'...a transformed life).
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God has not abandoned us any more than he abandoned Job. He never abandons anyone on whom he has set his love; nor does Christ, the good shepherd, ever lose track of his sheep.
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Real spiritual growth is always growth downward, so to speak, into profounder humility, which in healthy souls will become more and more apparent as they age.
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Holy is the Bible word for all that makes God different from us, in particular his awesome power and purity.
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We must learn to measure ourselves, not by our knowledge about God, not by our gifts and responsibilities in the church, but by how we pray and what goes on in our hearts. Many of us, I suspect, have no idea how impoverished we are at this level. Let us ask the Lord to show us.
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The incarnation is in itself an unfathomable mystery, but it makes sense of everything else that the New Testament contains.
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Justification is the truly dramatic transition from the status of a condemned criminal awaiting a terrible sentence to that of an heir awaiting a fabulous inheritance.
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Christian minds have been conformed to the modern spirit: the spirit, that is, that spawns great thoughts of man and leaves room for only small thoughts of God.
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Men who know their God are before anything else men who pray, and the first point where their zeal and energy for God's glory come to expression is in their prayers. If there is little energy for such prayer, and little consequent practice of it, this is a sure sign that as yet we scarcely know our God.
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Our aim in studying the Godhead must be to know God himself better. Our concern must be to enlarge our acquaintance, not simply with the doctrine of God’s attributes, but with the living God whose attributes they are.
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In common honesty, we must not conceal the fact that free forgiveness in one sense will cost everything.
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Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder through life blindfolded.
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The simple statement, 'God is for us', is in truth one of the richest and weightiest utterances that the Bible contains.
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What were we made for? To know God. What aim should we have in life? To know God. What is the eternal life that Jesus gives? To know God. What is the best thing in life? To know God. What in humans gives God most pleasure? Knowledge of himself.
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Fanciful spiritualizing, so far from yielding God's meaning, actually obscured it. The literal sense is itself the spiritual sense, coming from God and leading to Him.
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Our business is to present the Christian faith clothed in modern terms, not to propagate modern thought clothed in Christian terms... Confusion here is fatal.
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Moreover, the whole purpose of God's mighty acts is to bring man to know Him by faith; and Scripture knows no foundation for faith but the spoken word of God, inviting our trust in Him on the basis of what He has done for us.
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A simple Bible reader and sermon hearer who is full of the Holy Spirit will develop a far deeper acquaintance with his God and Savior than a more learned scholar who is content with being theologically correct.
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Were I asked to focus the New Testament message in three words, my proposal would be ADOPTION THROUGH PROPITIATION, and I do not expect ever to meet a richer or more pregnant summary of the gospel than that.
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[N]obody can produce new evidence of your depravity that will make God change his mind. For God justified you with (so to speak) his eyes open. He knew the worst about you at the time when he accepted you for Jesus' sake; and the verdict which he passed then was, and is, final.
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Man is a responsible moral agent, though he is also divinely controlled; man is divinely controlled, though he is also a responsible moral agent.