Wright on the Resurrection

"If Jesus, having been buried in the ordinary way, had remained physically dead, decomposing inside the tomb, so that there never was an empty tomb, let alone 'meetings' between him and his disciples we must suppose that someone from among his followers or family, or perhaps from the family of Joseph, would sooner or later have returned to perform this final act of respect.  And (unless we declare, a priori that every single scrap of our evidence about early Christianity is a late fiction) we must suppose that this would have happened at precisely the same time that the early church was busily proclaiming him as Messiah and lord ont he grounds that he had been raised from the dead--specifically, according to Acts, that his body had not decomposed.  And we must suppose that this happened around the same time that the zealous Saul of Tarsus, persecuting the church, was confronted by one whom he took to be Jesus, and forthwith declared that he had been raised from the dead.  IT is because of the impossibility of putting together ths story on this basis that scholars have been driven to the desperate expedient of denying everything about Joseph, discounting almost everything about Paul, and offering us instead a narrative of their own, without primary evidence."
NT Wright The Resurrection of the Son of God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003) 708.

Wright on the Resurrection

"The early Christians did not invent the empty tomb and the 'meetings' or 'sightings' of the risen Jesus in order to explain a faith they already had.  They developed that faith because of the occurrence, and convergence of these two phenomena.  Nobody was expecting this kind of thing; no kind of conversion-experience would have generated such ideas; nobody would have invented it, no matter how guilty (or how forgiven) they felt, no matter how many hours they pored over the scriptures.  To suggest otherwise is to stop doing history and to enter into a fantasy world of our own, a new cognitive dissonance in which the relentless modernist, desperately worried that the post-Enlightenment worldview seems in imminent danger of collapse, devises strategies for shoring it up nevertheless.  In terms of the kind of proof which historians normally accept, the case we have presented, that the tomb-plus-appearances combination is what generated early Christian belief, is as watertight as one is likely to find."
NT Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003) 707.

Peterson on Secularized Ministry

"The secularization of pastoral ministry takes place when the pastor gives up the uncertain and somewhat modest work of being a companion to persons in pilgrimage and takes on the job of public relations agent for the congregation; the job then is to whip up flagging enthusiasm, raise money for the budget, promote new programs, and 'get out the vote' on Sundays.  Even when people sense the manipulative nature of such visitation, they don't seem to mind--they are so conditioned to being treated in such ways by advertisers, politicians, and salespeople that they apparently assume that it is the mark of any successful person and admire the energy of the pastor who does it."
-Eugene Peterson, Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980) 93.

Torrance on the Mediation of Christ

"[Jesus] met the full opposition of our enmity to God, and the full opposition of God to our enmity and endured it with joy, refusing to let go of God for our sakes, and refusing to let go of us for God's sake.  In laying hold of us as sinners, he judged our sin in himself and reconciled us to God, and in laying hold of God he received his judgment of us upon himself and offered our humanity in himself to the Father."
-Thomas F. Torrance, Atonement: The Person and Work of Christ (IVP Academic, 2009) 151.  (Cited in Cruver, ed. Reclaiming Adoption (Cruciform Press,  2011) 46-47.

Newbigin on the Church, Politics, and Justice

"The church lives in the midst of history as a sign, instrument, and foretaste of the reign of God.  But this does not mean that in the life of the church there can be at any point in time a simple identification of the justice of God with the justice of a particular political cause.  The church has too often fallen into that trap.  To refuse the identification is not to fall into some kind of idealist or spiritualist illusion.  It is not to detach the interior life of the soul from the business of doing justice and mercy in the society.  It is simply to acknowledge that all human causes are ambiguous and all human actions are involved in the illusions that are the product of our egotism.  It is to confess that final judgment belongs to God, and that when people usurp that prerogative they fall into self-destructive blindness.
    The issue may be put in another way.  If we acknowledge the God of the Bible, we are committed to struggle for justice in society.  Justice means giving to each his or her due.  Our problem (as seen in the light of the gospel) is that each of us overestimates what is due to us as compared to our neighbors.  Consequently, justice cannot be done, for everyone will judge in his or her own favor.  Justice is done only when we all acknowledge a judge with authority over us, in relation to whose judgment we must relavitize our own...If I do not acknowledge a justice that judges the justice for which I fight, I am an agent not of justice, but of lawless tyranny."
Lesslie Newbigin, The Open Secret: An Introduction to Theology of Mission (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995) 110-111.

Ferguson on Tension

"Sometimes we are told that if we only were filled with the Spirit, all tensions would vanish.  However, the very fact that the Spirit lives in our lives as the Spirit of sonship is what causes the tension!  Without his presence we would not have the firstfruits of the Spirit; we would not be the children of God.  We would be so totally a part of this world that the family of God and the world to come would mean nothing whatsoever to us.  And we would be strangers to grace.  We would not experience the conflict between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of the world.  Again and again we need to remind ourselves that we experience many tensions in our spiritual pilgrimage, not in spite of the fact that we are sons and have the Spirit of the adoption, but precisely because we are sons!"
Sinclair Ferguson, Children of the Living God (Carlisle, Pa: Banner of Truth, 1989) 126.

Ferguson on Discipline

"Through their submission to discipline, the lame, rather than being disabled, are healed.  Setting a dislocated limb may seem to be a painful experience, but it is a healing act.  To an untrained, inexperienced observer, it might seem to be an act of uncaring brutality.  But to the person who is experiencing the pain, who realises the motives of his physician and trusts him, it is the first step back to health and strength."
Sinclair Ferguson, Children of the Living God (Carlisle, Pa: Banner of Truth, 1989) 118.

Ferguson on Discipline

"If we do not value holiness, we will not welcome discipline."
Sinclair Ferguson, Children of the Living God (Carlisle Pa, Banner of Truth, 1989) 115.

Valley of Vision on Blessing

"Lawful blessings are the secret idols, and do most hurt; the greatest injury is in the having, the greatest good in the taking away."
Arthur Bennet, ed. The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions (Carlisle: Pa, Banner of Truth, 1975) 37.

Ferguson on Discipline

"Being disciplined is a mark of legitimacy.  It is evidence that our father cares for us.  He thinks of ways in which he can mould us into the kind of mature children he wants us to be.  So, too, in the realm of the spirit.  It is essential for us to be disciplined by our heavenly Father."
Sinclair Ferguson, Children of the Living God (Carlisle: Pa, Banner of Truth, 1989) 105