Best 21 quotes of Edward T Welch on MyQuotes

As a counselor, I have spoken with many people who want to know their spiritual gifts. They come hoping for some sort of diagnostic test that will precisely locate them. My impression is that this perspective represents a breakdown in the church. It reflects a church where we are running around as self-actualizing individuals rather than uniting as a God-glorifying community.

Fear in the biblical sense... includes being afraid of someone, but it extends to holding someone in awe, being controlled or mastered by people, worshipping other people, putting your trust in people, or needing people.

If our failure to consistently worship the true God is the key feature of sin, we are sinners all.

If we think we are usually good, then God is usually irrelevant... Such thinking ignores the depths of sin in my own heart, and, in essence, it elevates me so that I am just a mildly flawed imitation of God rather than someone completely dependent on Him.

Sanctification is like a clumsy, slow walk rather than a light switch that we turn from off to on.

"Sinner" is a present-tense description of everyone, including those who have put their faith in Christ. Of course, those who have called Jesus "Lord" are justified, meaning that they are no longer guilty. Also, they have been given the Spirit, which makes them slaves to Christ rather than to sin. But we all are sinners. Perfection awaits eternity.

There is a mean streak to authentic self-control. Underneath what seems to be the placid demeanor of those who are not ruled by their desires is the heart of a warrior. Self control is not for the timid. When we want to grow in it, not only do we nurture an exuberance for Jesus Christ, we also demand of ourselves a hatred for sin.

The rule of thumb is that if someone is able to be verbally or physically abusive, he or she is able to understand that the behavior is wrong.

We spend too much time wondering what others may have thought about our outfit or the comment we made in the small group meeting. We see opportunities to testify about Christ, but we avoid them. We are more concerned about looking stupid (a fear of people) than we are about acting sinfully (fear of the Lord).

When you are in the grips of low self-esteem, it’s painful, and it certainly doesn’t feel like pride. But I believe that this is the dark, quieter side of pride — thwarted pride.

1. We fear people because they can expose and humiliate us. 2. We fear people because they can reject, ridicule, or despise us. 3. We fear people because they can attack, oppress, or threaten us. These three reasons have one thing in common: they see people as “bigger” (that is, more powerful and significant) than God, and, out of the fear that creates in us, we give other people the power and right to tell us what to feel, think, and do.

Are you worried? Jesus says there is nothing to worry about. It isn’t our kingdom, it’s God’s. We take our cue from the King, and the King is not fretting over anything. He is in complete control.

God's self-revelation is a higher authority than our feelings.

If your lifestyle makes you wonder if Jesus really is your King, that is actually a good thing. You are understanding the truth. But you should also be amazed that the King never stops inviting you to himself and his kingdom. That is either very weird, or it’s holy. If someone kept offering you a free invitation to a grand and expensive party, and you kept shoving it back in his face, at some point the host would stop making the offer. But God loves to invite you. He loves to invite those who can’t pay the cover charge, so that he can pay it for them. That way, you and everyone else know that God himself did it all. You added nothing to make the relationship possible. That is what people mean by grace. There is no room for boasting. If you know God as Holy Father, King, and Lord, you are moving in a direction from astonishment to devotion, devotion to reverence, and reverence to worship that delights in obeying him.

It is possible that our present-day discussion about needs might be framed more by secular psychological theories than by Scripture. If this is so, we should be careful about saying, "Jesus meets all our needs." At first, this has a plausible biblical ring to it. Christ _is_a friend; God _is_ a loving Father; Christians _do_ experience a sense of meaningfulness and confidence in knowing God's love. It makes Christ the answer to our problems. Yet if our use of the term "needs" is ambiguous, and its range of meaning extends all the way to selfish desires, then there will be some situations where we should say that Jesus does not intend to meet our needs, but that he intends to change our needs.

Our liberation comes through a person, not a system of ideas and principles. "Everything we need for life and godliness" ultimately comes "through our knowledge of Jesus Christ" (2 Peter 1:3).

Scripture assumes that we will be afraid and anxious sometimes. What is important is where we turn, or to whom we turn when we are afraid. The God who calls you to trust in Him when you are afraid will spend a great deal of time showing you that you can trust Him.

The idea of sin being able to deceive us, suppressing truth so that we believe a lie, should send shivers down our spines. It is one thing to deceive other people. That is scary enough. It is even more frightening when we realize that each lie we tell leaves us more self-deceived. All practiced sin teaches us to believe lies. WE don't often consider the boomerang effect of our deception. In the end it will get us.

When the only one who has a right to be angry chooses love and service, when He considers the interests of others more important than His own and chooses humility–He changes everything (p. 55).

When you erode the fear of death with the knowledge that you already died [in Christ], you will find yourself moving toward a simple, bold obedience.

Worry’s magnetic attraction can only be broken by a stronger attraction, and David is saying [in Psalm 27] we can only find that attraction in God Himself.