Inspirational Quotes on Ministry

“[O]ur English divines are sounder in it than any in the world, generally: I think because they are more practical, and have had more wounded, tender consciences under cure, and less empty speculation and dispute (336-7).”

“That physician is no better than a murderer, that negligently delayeth till his patient be dead or past cure (389).”

“There are men in evangelicalism today who are just ordinary men with no longing after God. They grind out their sermons week after week, take little trips here and there, fish and play golf and fool around and then come back and preach. They go on and spend their lives that way. But you cannot speak with them for long because there is nothing of substance to talk about after you have done a little chitchat business. Not all preachers are that way. There are some whom you can speak with for hours on end and talk about God and Christ.”

“It is not great counts God blesses so much as likeness to Jesus.”

“Shoddy work is not just shoddy work. It's a failure of love.”

“You can leave the Word of God to wound and kill it need not be yourselves cutting in phrase in manner.”

“A divided heart can never bring complete satisfaction. The man of mingled interests will seldom make a success of anything. If he would succeed in business he must give the major portion of his time and the best of his thought to his business.... The very same is true of the man who would be used of God, only to a far greater degree. The work alone must claim his whole attention. He has no room for other things.”

“The commencement of all labor consisted in the preparation of his own soul.”

“A fruitful ministry will not abandon the gospel by overcontextualizing to its place and culture, nor will it privatize the gospel by undercontextualizing to his place and culture.”

“The gospel isn't just the message we take to small places; it's our motivation for going to them in the first place and our means of fruitful ministry once we get there.”

“One of the students was a doctor, a German woman, and I used to watch her scouring garbage pails as though she were preparing a room for surgery.”