HeadTheology

In reading The Great Gain of Godliness by Thomas Watson, these are my favorite quotes from chapter 3 titled ‘Reasons To Fear God’.

“He who is under the eye of his earthly prince will be careful of doing anything that would offend him.” -17

“As not to praise God is to wrong him, so not to fear God is to slight him.” -17

“We are apt to fear men who have power in their hand to hurt us, but what is their power to God’s?  They threaten prison, God threatens hell.  They threaten our life, God threatens our soul, and shall we not tremble before him?” -18

“We must not fear God with such a fear as the wicked do.  They fear him as a Turkish slave does his master; they fear him in such a way as to hate him, and wish there were no God.  We must not serve God with this hellish fear, be we must serve him with an ingenuous fear sweetened with love.” -18

Here are my favorite quotes from chapter two of Thomas Watson’s, The Great Gain of Godliness.

“Fear makes men change their religion as the chameleon does her colours.” -12

“Fear is the leading grace, the first seed God sows in the heart.  When a Christian can say little of faith, and perhaps nothing of assurance, yet he dares not deny that he fears God (Neh. 1:11).  God is so great that the Christian is afraid of displeasing him, and so good that he is afraid of losing him.” -13

“Fear is as lead to the net, to keep a Christian from floating in presumption, and faith is as cork to the net, to keep him from sinking in despair.” -15

“He who fears God has the serpent’s eye in the dove’s head.” -15

In reading The Great Gain of Godliness by Thomas Watson, these are my favorite quotes from chapter 1.

“The more outrageous other are in sin, the more courageous we should be for truth.” -5

“Almost all will court the Gospel Queen when she is hung with jewels.  But to own the ways of God when they are decried and maligned, to love a persecuted truth, this evidences a vital principal.” -6

“Sin is never the better because it is in fashion, nor will this plea hold at the last day, that we did as the most.  God will say, Seeing you sinned with the multitude, you shall go to hell with the multitude.” -7

“Though others wonder we do not sin after the rate that they do, yet remember, it is better to go to heaven with a few than to hell in the crowd.” -9

“If anyone ask what Christ died of, it may be answered, He died of love.” -10

“Reproaches for Christ are ensigns of honour, badges of adoption (I Pet. 4:14), the high honours of accusations, Chrysostom.” -11

“Be not laughed out of your religion.  If a lame man laugh at you for walking upright, will you therefore limp?” -11

“I call ‘piety’ that reverence joined with love of God which the knowledge of his benefits induces. For until men recognize that they owe everything to God, that they are nourished by his fatherly care, that he is the Author of their every good, that they should seek nothing beyond him - they will never yield him willing service. Nay, unless they establish their complete happiness in him, they will never give themselves truly and sincerely to him.” John Calvin in The Institutes of the Christian Religion, ch. 2:1

That last sentence reminds me that no matter what side of the theological fence a believer is on, Arminian or Reformed, the Christian life is less about choosing God than it is about desiring God. For if God is the source of all good then we will desire him since our goodness and happiness will be found in him.

Last night at our small meeting there was a small discussion which some thought was not beneficial to the group. It was a matter not of great theological significance but was Scriptural nonetheless. What sticks out to me is not the topic which was lightly debated but the lack of tenderness that I felt in hearing one of participants speak. He was completely right in what he said but he was not as clear as he could have been and did not seem very patient with those that were not up to speed with his theological education. It reminded me of a book I had to read for my first seminary class, called A Little Exercise for Young Theologians, by Helmut Thielicke. He says, …

“There is a hiatus between the arena of the young theologian’s actual spiritual growth and what he already knows intellectually about this arena.”

and “in us men truth and love are seldom combined.”

and “It can be sacred theology or diabolical theology. That depends upon the hands and hearts which further it. But which of the two it is cannot necessarily be seen by the fact that in one case it is orthodox and in the other heretical.”

I do not feel I have always grown beyond this but I have been convicted of using the Sword of the Spirit against those I love, congratulating myself that I have forced them into an intellectual corner. Whereas instead of using my Scriptural knowledge against others I needed to use it against my sin and my flesh.

So from one middle-aged armchair theologian to all young theologians, do not use your knowledge to win an argument and show off your intellectual prowess, which you probably ripped off of someone else. But use it to display the glory of God and the joy that he offers. Only set Scripture before people and allow them to wrestle with it and what it plainly means giving them as much grace as God has given you.

In considering what is really important in the church Newton makes a wonderful point here.

“It is better people should be dissenters or Methodists than heathens.”

‘But Now I See’: The Life of John Newton, p. 337.

“But when zeal spends itself about the less essential matters of forms and names, about points in which the wisest and the best have always differed, I would, if I could, lull it fast asleep.  De he wait till we are all exactly of a mind?  Does He confine His regards, His grace, His presence, within the wall of a party?  Is He the God of the Presbyterians of the Independents only?… And shall zeal presume to come in with its ifs and its buts, and to build up walls of separation?  Yet many true believers are so much under the spirit of self and prejudice that they verily mean to do the Lord’s service by substituting their own commands in the room of His.  And they see no harm in saying, ‘You must think and act as I do, subscribe to my paper, and worship in my way, or else, though I hope the Lord has received you, I think it my duty to keep my distance from you.’”

From ‘But Now I See’: The Life of John Newton, by Josiah Bull

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“I feel much more union of spirit with some Arminians than I could with some Calvinists; and if I thought a person feared sin, loved the word of God, and was seeking after Jesus, I would not walk the length of my study to proselyte him to the Calvinist doctrines. Not because I think them mere opinions, or of little importance to a believer - I think the contrary; but because I believe these doctrines will do no one any good till he is taught them of God. I believe a too hasty assent to Calvinistic principles, before a person is duly acquainted with the plague of his own heart, is one principal cause of that lightness of profession which so lamentably abounds in this day, a chief reason why many professors are rash, heady, high-minded, contentious about words, and sadly remiss as to the means of Divine Appointment.”

-‘But Now I See’: The Life of John Newton, by Josiah Bull p. 212

I don’t know if you saw the CNN special God’s Warriors but they had a myriad of pastors discussing their view of mixing Christianity and politics. They had Jerry Falwell, John Hagee, Greg Boyd, and a few others. Certainly all the pastors I picked were not on my top ten theologians list but of all the messages that I heard Greg Boyd’s agreed with me the most. He states that “America is not the Kingdom of God” on the broadcast in seeming opposition to Falwell’s and Hagee’s message. I think in a lot of American churches there is this hubris which agrees that America is God’s nation and just maybe a little less than Israel in the OT and that is dangerous to say that.

Boyd also states that Christianity should have more to say in politics than just that homosexual marriage and abortion is wrong. Christians should speak out against greed corporations that have sweat shops in third world countries and have more to say about fighting poverty and other ‘life issues’.

I only wish they could have gotten someone who was not a heretic to espouse the political views that Boyd did.

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