They said it better than me – the value of Scripture

A few quotes that were left on the cutting room floor from Sunday’s sermon about Scripture:

“There is no substitute for submission to Scripture.  Your spiritual health depends on placing the utmost value on the Word of God and obeying it with an eager heart.…Don’t relinquish the sweet, satisfying riches of God’s Word for the bitter gall of this world’s folly.” [John MacArthur]

“if you let the Word of God alone, and never use, and you can’t expect the benefits of it…You must not only hear and read, etc., but you must have it sunk down into your heart. Believe. Be affected. Love the Word of God. Written in your heart. [You] must not only read and hear, but DO the things [of the Word]. Otherwise [it is] no good; but [you] will be the worse for it.” [Jonathan Edwards]

“The first way to put ourselves in touch with the invisible realm is to live with the Holy Scriptures, which are the Word and the testimony of God.…We must feed on God’s Word, my dear friends.  We must live with it constantly, day and night.  May it be for us what it was (to cite one example) for the author of Psalm 119 — that psalm with 176 verses of which not more than two or three fail to mention the Word of God with one of those countless names the psalmist gives it.” [Adolphe Monod]

“The Word of God is the only power that can subdue the rebellion of our heart.…To make the kingdom of God enter our hearts we need a battering-ram that can overthrow the strongest walls, and that ram is the Word of God.” [J. H. Merle D’Aubigne]

“The Bible is not a how-to book, a self-help book, or an inspirational reading.  Scripture does not work like a handbook full of abstracted principles, advice, steps, sayings and anecdotes.  Instead, the Word of God reveals God’s person, promises, ways, and will on the stage and in the story of real human lives.” [David Powlison]