Grace quotes - Empowerment
- In efficacious grace we are not merely passive, nor yet does God do some and we do the rest. But God does all, and we do all. God produces all, we act all. For that is what produces, viz. our own acts. God is the only proper author and fountain; we only are the proper actors. We are in different respects, wholly passive and wholly active. Jonathan Edwards
- Yet the duties God requires of us are not in proportion to the strength we possess in ourselves. Rather, they are proportional to the resources available to us in Christ. We do not have the ability in ourselves to accomplish the least of God’s tasks. This is a law of grace. When we recognize it is impossible to perform a duty in our own strength, we will discover the secret of its accomplishment. But alas, this is a secret we often fail to discover. John Owen
- Nothing whatever pertaining to godliness and real holiness can be accomplished without grace. Augustine
- Grace does not grant permission to live in the flesh; it supplies power to live in the Spirit. John MacArthur
- Before we can learn the sufficiency of God’s grace, we must learn the insufficiency of ourselves. The more we see our sinfulness, the more we appreciate grace in its basic meaning of God’s undeserved favor. In a similar manner, the more we see our frailty, weakness, and dependence, the more we appreciate God’s grace in its dimension of His divine assistance. Just as grace shines more brilliantly against the dark background of our sin, so it also shines more brilliantly against the background of our human weakness. Jerry Bridges
- One great paradox of the Christian life is that we are fully responsible for our Christian growth and at the same time fully dependent upon the Holy Spirit to give us both the desire to grow and the ability to do it. God’s grace does not negate the need for responsible action on our part, but rather makes it possible. Jerry Bridges
- God’s delight in obedience is good news because it shows that God’s grace is a glorious power and not just a flimsy tolerance of sin. John Piper
- Grace is not simply leniency when we have sinned. Grace is the enabling gift of God not to sin. Grace is power, not just pardon. Therefore the effort we make to obey God is not an effort done in our own strength, but in the strength which God supplies. John Piper
- Just as our justification is from God, so our sanctification is from God, but unlike our justification, which is monergistic work, in sanctification God calls us to work together with Him to mature as Christians. As Christians we can never say to God: “The reason I still sin, or the reason I am not maturing as quickly as I would like, is because you have not given me enough grace.”Burk Parsons
- We should therefore learn that the only good we have is what the Lord has given us gratuitously; that the only good we do is what He does in us; that it is not that we do nothing ourselves, but that we act only when we have been acted upon, in other words under the direction and influence of the Holy Spirit. John Calvin
- Resting on God's grace does not relieve us of our holy obligations; rather it should enable us to fulfill them. Bryan Chapell
- Where the will of God leads you, the grace of God will keep you. Author Unknown
- If grace does not make us differ from other men, it is not the grace which God gives His elect. C.H. Spurgeon