black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

As long as young people are asking, ‘Can I get away with this?’ or ‘Can I get away with that?’ I wonder if they’re regenerate. If they’re asking, instead, ‘How can I grow in holiness?’ then I suspect they’ve begun to understand.

D. A. Carson

God’s love in John 3:16 is not amazing because the world is so big, but because the world is so bad.
D. A. CARSON

Bigs God Love World
Make a mistake in the interpretation of one of Shakespeare’s plays, falsely scan a piece of Spenserian verse, and there is unlikely to be an entailment of eternal consequence; but we cannot lightly accept a similar laxity in the interpretation of Scripture.
D. A. CARSON

Mistake Pain Play
A weak understanding of what the Bible says about sin is tied to a weak understanding of what the Bible says is achieved by the cross.
D. A. CARSON

Sin Understanding Weak
God is absolutely sovereign, but his sovereignty never mitigates human responsibility.
D. A. CARSON

Responsibility Sovereign Sovereignty
A text without a context is a pretext for a proof text.
D. A. CARSON

Context Pretext Proof
We are dealing with God’s thoughts: we are obligated to take the greatest pains to understand them truly and to explain them clearly.
D. A. CARSON

Effective Greatest Pain Teaching
It was not nails that held Jesus to that wretched cross; it was his unqualified resolution, out of love for his Father, to do his Father’s will-and it was his love for sinners like me.
D. A. CARSON

Father Jesus Unqualified
A billion years or so into eternity, how many toys we accumulated during this life will not seem too terribly important.
D. A. CARSON

Important Toy Years
We are lost when human opinion means more to us than God’s.
D. A. CARSON

Lost Mean Opinion
Good praying is more easily caught than taught.
D. A. CARSON

Caught Praying Taught
God in his infinite wisdom chose to give us his Word in the 66 canonical books, with all of their variations in theme, emphasis, vocabulary, literary form, and distinctive contributions across time.
D. A. CARSON

Contribution Distinctive God Vocabulary
The kingdom of heaven is worth infinitely more than the cost of discipleship, and those who know where the treasure lies joyfully abandon everything else to secure it.
D. A. CARSON

Cost Heaven Lying
Sex is about timing. The world says: any time, any place. God says: my time, my place.
D. A. CARSON

Sex Timing World
The Bible does not tell us that life in this world will be fair. Evil and sin are not Victorian gentlemen; they do not play fair.
D. A. CARSON

Evil Gentleman Play
He is sold for thirty pieces of silver but gives His life a ransom for many; He will not turn stones to bread for Himself but gives His own body as bread for people.
D. A. CARSON

Bread People Sold Stones
Draw nigh to God, so that you may dread the grave as little as your bed. Draw nigh to God, that you may live a happy and useful life.
D. A. CARSON

Blessing Drawing Prayer

As long as young people are asking, ‘Can I get away with this?’ or ‘Can I get away with that?’ I wonder if they’re regenerate. If they’re asking, instead, ‘How can I grow in holiness?’ then I suspect they’ve begun to understand.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

As long as young people are asking, ‘Can I get away with this?’ or ‘Can I get away with that?’ I wonder if they’re regenerate. If they’re asking, instead, ‘How can I grow in holiness?’ then I suspect they’ve begun to understand.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More D. A. Carson Quotes