Tag: Selected Quotes

“The issue of emphasis is problematic when discussing issues like this. I believe all kinds of things that I emphasize in varying degrees. Why is that a problem? Belief is where you measure doctrinal orthodoxy. Legitimate differences in emphasis can be affected by numerous factors like the period of history you are in, the state of the church you are preaching to, the nature of your own personal gifts, and so on. If I am preaching at Thyatira, my emphasis is one thing; if at Ephesus, it is another. The truth remains unified.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 527

“I am going to heaven because of Jesus, and not because of my mastery of the dikai-word group.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 527

“It is not the voice of moderation to limit oneself to believe only ten percent of the false accusations. To hear 100 lies and limit oneself to entertaining only ten of them is not being judicious.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 523

“He should know about decretal election—he just read about it a few chapters before in Romans. He believes in it, and so do I. But whatever we do with the doctrine of decretal election, we must not manipulate it such that we become what Paul is warning against here—high-minded. Saving faith trembles ‘at the threatenings’ (WCF 14.2).”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 520

“When tares are being addressed as tares, and in that condition their relationship to Christ is described as having a certain reality to it that they are in the process of losing, that cannot be explained as a judgment of charity.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 519

“True Kuyperian practice is not to go out into the world and do pretty much what everybody else is doing, only with a Jesus label attached. This is not the lordship of Christ—rather it is Christians getting into the manufacture of knock-offs. If something gets popular in the world, the Christians are right there with a competing model made with cheap labor in a Third World factory and using a lot more plastic.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 515

“Churches that have had their lampstand removed are apostate. Churches that are being seriously warned about that possibility are corrupt. Branches that have been cut out of the olive tree are apostate. Branches that are still on the tree but have started to think that they support the root are corrupt. The short answer is that apostasy does not occur with no warning at all—the run up to that apostasy is the period of corruption. God dealt with the Israelites even though they worshipped him in the high places. They were corrupt, but not yet rejected. The prophets were ticked about it, as they should have been, but God nevertheless still owned them as His people. That was corruption, not apostasy. The severance of Israel from the olive tree after 70 AD was apostasy, the culmination of corruption.

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 510.

“Some won’t accept the explanations we offer because they flat don’t believe us. In other words, when it sounds orthodox, it must be a trick. Heretics often manage to sound orthodox. Yeah, but orthodox people often sound orthodox too.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 501

“When you believe God, the whole world comes alive, and this is especially true with instruments that God has appointed, like the Word . . . and like baptism. But without evangelical faith, man, your situation is worse than it was before. You gotta have Jesus, and no Christian should have a problem with that.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 500

“New life in Christ is weightier than Calvinism. We can tell this because our gracious God has given that new life to all His true children, and He has not given Calvinism to all His true children. That will have to wait until heaven.”

The Auburn Avenue Chronicles Vol. 2, p. 499