Best 117 quotes in «sovereignty of god quotes» category

On observing 1963 America for the first time, the author says that organization and standardization to a certain degree compete with divine providence.

On what grounds would God be told that He can bring death to millions of people at the end of a normal life span, but that He may not do it in any other way?

Our culture says ‘live your dream,’ but God calls you to place your dream on His altar and to keep it there at all times. It is good to have hopes and dreams for the future, but we have no rights. There are no certainties. Any dream can become an idol and, if it does, God will bring it down.

Our God is sovereign. That means there's no such thing as luck. Anything that happens to you, good or bad, must pass through His fingers first. There are no accidents with God. I like the story of the cowboy who applied for health insurance. The agent routinely asked him, 'Have you ever had any accidents?' The cowboy replied, 'Well no, I've not had any accidents. I was bitten by a rattlesnake once, and a horse did kick me in the ribs. That laid me up for a while, but I haven't had any accidents.' The agent said, 'Wait a minute. I'm confused. A rattlesnake bit you, and a horse kicked you, Weren't those accidents?' 'No, they did that on purpose.

Pain is holy ground in a person's life.

Paul looked down at the hand that had known pain, and then up to the Reverend Mother. The sound of her voice contained a difference than from any other voicing his experience. The words were outlined in brilliance. There was an edge to them.

She did not find these riches (of fulfillment). They were a gift from God.

People, especially the young, wanted to hear about God and not man.

Resignation is the better part of wisdom.

Some may object that to speak of election or predestination is to limit the kingdom of God to a few. Does it make God a capricious tyrant? We must answer that such objections usually stem from a refusal to accept that we are faced here with a mystery that is not given to us to solve. There is also a radical misunderstanding which maintains that God's sovereignty in election removes man's responsibility. Such is not true. How divine sovereignty and human responsibility work together we cannot know. The Bible makes it clear that they do. // Let us remember that Jesus discriminated and limited the numbers of the saved: 'Small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it' (Matthew 7:13-14). This is in line with the Old Testament teaching that only a faithful remnant of Israel would be saved.

Spiritual disciplines can do nothing. They can only get us to the place where something can be done.

Supporting God's Scriptural ability to give or restrain man's desires, Jerry Bridges points to an amazing verse tucked away in Exodus 34:24. As Israel's people abandon their defense entirely to have a feast before Him three times per year, God says the surrounding peoples will be entirely devoid of even the logical desire to possess their land.

Sure, some of us humans might be angry at a sovereign God about Hell, but know that that is about as meaningful as a few germs being angry at humans about bleach.

That's the excitement in obedience, finding out later what God had in mind.

That vague and wandering opinion of Deity is declared by an apostle to be ignorance of God:

The author points out strikingly different reactions to calamity. While many passengers of a devastating shipwreck were thankful to be alive, future presidential assassin Charles Guiteau saw his being spared as proof of his exceptionalism rather than of the grace from which he benefited.

The battle belongs to the Lord, and we already know that He wins the war.

The Bible attitude is not that God sends sickness or that sickness is of the devil, but that sickness is a fact usable by both God and the devil.

The call of God is a call according to the nature of God; where we go in obedience to that call depends entirely on the providential circumstances which God engineers, and is not of any moment. The danger is to fit the call of God into the idea of our own discernment and say, “God called me there.” If we say so and stick to it, then it is good-bye to the development of the life of God in us.

The Christian story, centered as it is on the death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, is the only story for making sense of desire and loss.

Struggle is a prerequisite to surrender.

Sovereign LORD, your saving help is my shield.

The consequence model, the logical one, the amoral one, the one which refuses any divine intervention, is a problem really for just the (hypothetical) logician. You see, towards God I would rather be grateful for Heaven (which I do not deserve) than angry about Hell (which I do deserve). By this the logician within must choose either atheism or theism, but he cannot possibly through good reason choose anti-theism. For his friend in this case is not at all mathematical law: the law in that 'this equation, this path will consequently direct me to a specific point'; over the alternative and the one he denies, 'God will send me wherever and do it strictly for his own sovereign amusement.' The consequence model, the former, seeks the absence of God, which orders he cannot save one from one's inevitable consequences; hence the angry anti-theist within, 'the logical one', the one who wants to be master of his own fate, can only contradict himself - I do not think it wise to be angry at math.

The core problem seems to lie in the classical-philosophical equation of power with control, and thus omnipotence with omnicontrol, an equation that forces the problem of evil to be seen as a problem of God's sovereignty. If it is accepted that God is all-loving and all-powerful, and if maximum power is defined as maximum control, then by definition there seems to be no place for evil. If goodness controls all things, all things must me good.

The culture around us knows what it means when they see a church in perpetual bluster and outrage. They know that we are scared.

The early Christians believed, on the authority of Jesus himself, that the original vision for creation, and for Human within it, had been recaptured and restored through Jesus's inauguration of God's sovereign rule. What Jesus did and said was designed to give a decisive answer, in deeds as well as words, to the question, What would it look like if God was running things?

The Holy Ghost is no temporary gift, He abides with the saints. We have but to seek Him aright, and He will be found of us. He is jealous, but He is pitiful; if He leaves in anger, He returns in mercy. Condescending and tender, He does not weary of us, but awaits to be gracious still.

The greatness of the man's power is the measure of his surrender.

The sun was shining, but Christ had hidden Himself, and all the world was black to you; or it was night, and since the bright and morning star was gone, no other star could yield you so much as a ray of light. What a howling wilderness is this world without our Lord! If once He hideth Himself from us, withered are the flowers of our garden; our pleasant fruits decay; the birds suspend their songs, and a tempest overturns our hopes.

The Lord Jesus had goings forth for His people as their representative before the throne, long before they appeared upon the stage of time.

The more God-centered our worship practices, the more mercy-centered our life.

The more you know about Christ the less will you be satisfied with superficial views of Him.

There is a certain mysticism in the Christian's affirmation of the physical universe. There is a confidence that whatever is discovered conforms with Jesus Christ and is a manifestation of His will.

We are not bringing Christ to poor communities. He has been active in these communities since the creation of the world, sustaining them, Hebrews 1:3 says, by His powerful Word. Hence, a significant part of working in poor communities involves discovering and appreciating what God has been doing there for a LONG time.

We are not trying to manipulate God and tell Him what to do. Rather, we are asking Him to tell us what to do.

We cannot infer from prosperity that God is pleased with us, nor can we infer from adversity that he is displeased with us.

We do not pray to inform God of our needs, because He knows what we need before we ask. What is prayer like for you? Is it a religious ritual that you perform out of habit? Is it a spiritual discipline that you practice because you want to be the best Christian you possibly can be? Is it a mechanism by which you can bring your “shopping list” to God in order to have your needs met? Or are you running to meet your Lover, to commune with Him, hungering to find your joy in Him, and to be fulfilled in His presence?

This is God’s universe, and God does things his way. You may have a better way, but you don’t have a universe.

We must worship God before we can reverence parents or women, or root out flunkeyism and money-worship.

We must remember that all stations are as much about life as they are obviously about death. All is redeemed. All is grist for transformation and glory.

We think in terms of apostolic journeys. God dares to put His greatest ambassadors in chains.

When God does not answer His children according to the letter, He does so according to the spirit. If thou askest for coarse meal, wilt thou be angered because He gives thee the finest flour? If thou seekest bodily health, shouldst thou complain if instead thereof He makes thy sickness turn to the healing of spiritual maladies?

What defines us as Christians is not most profoundly that we have come to know him but that he took note of us and made us his own.

Winter in the soul is by no means a comfortable season: but there is this comfort, namely, that the Lord makes it.

Worship is the launching pad for life.

You are not the point. Your ministry is not the point and God has not pushed all his chips in on you, He has not put the kingdom in your hands as though all His hope relies in your ability to perform.

You can't bluff an old theologian. Linus

You have the chief spark of your health's fire, for you have true knowledge of the hand that guides the universe.

You have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.

You may break the clods, you may sow your seeds, but what can you do without the rain? As absolutely needful is the divine blessing.