“That’s the illusion – the idea that you can be all right on the inside and not act it out – and it has affected us in many ways. That’s a part of the idea that professing is enough.”

The sinner is not the one who uses a lot of grace. The saint burns grace like a 747 burns fuel on take off.

Discipline, strictly speaking, is activity carried on to prepare us indirectly for some activity other than itself. We do not practice the piano to practice the piano well, but to play it well.

Keep eternity before the children.

Fasting confirms our utter dependence upon God by finding in Him a source of sustenance beyond food.

Spiritual transformation into Christ-likeness in not going to happen unless we act. What transforms us is the will to obey Jesus Christ.

The truly powerful ideas are precisely the ones that never have to justify themselves.

To allow lust (or strong desires) to govern our life is to exalt our will over God’s.

Bodily pleasure is not in itself a bad thing. But when it is exalted to a necessity and we become dependent upon it, then we are slaves of our body and its feelings. Only misery lies ahead.

The will is transformed by experience, not information.

The open secret of many Bible believing Churches is that a vanishingly small percentage of those talking about prayer and Bible reading are actually doing what they are talking about.

Grace is not opposed to effort, it is opposed to earning. Earning is an attitude. Effort is an action. Grace, you know, does not just have to do with forgiveness of sins alone.

This life is not something that is imposed upon us; we receive it and work with it.

Every church needs to be able to answer two questions. First, what is our plan for making disciples? And second, does our plan work?

Theology is a part of our lives. It’s unavoidable. A thoughtless theology guides our lives with just as much force as a thoughtful and informed one.

The effect of standing before God by welcoming him before us will be the transformation of our entire life.

Grace is not opposed to effort; it’s opposed to earning.

I never sleep comfortably except when I am at sermon or when I pray to God.

Slotted into broad diagnostic pigeonholes and provided generalized treatments that may not always meet their specific needs.

Homer must have felt this pressure to come up with an epic poem that would sound totally new to an audience that had loved his previous best-seller.

A graceful and honorable old age is the childhood of immortality.

The fool too late, his substance eaten up, reckons the cost.

Good things soon find a purchaser.

When you’re all burned up, then you become light.

Nixon is finding out there are no tails on an Eisenhower jacket.