Morning and Evening with A.W. Tozer

The notion that we enter the Christian life by an act of acceptance is true, but that is not all the truth. There is much more to it than that. Christianity involves an acceptance and a repudiation, an affirmation and a denial. And this not only at the moment of conversion but continually thereafter day by day in all the battle of life till the great conflict is over and the Christian is home from the wars. To live a life wholly positive is, fortunately, impossible. Were any man able to do...

Surely we need a baptism of clear seeing if we are to escape the fate of Israel (and of every other religious body in history that forsook God). If not the greatest need, then surely one of the greatest is for the appearance of Christian leaders with prophetic vision. We desperately need seers who can see through the mist. Unless they come soon, it will be too late for this generation. And if they do come, we will no doubt crucify a few of them in the name of our worldly orthodoxy. But the...

Without doubt the greatest need of the human personality is to experience God Himself. This is because of who God is and who and what man is. God is the essence of intelligent, self-conscious life and man is created in His image. God is love, and man is made for God. God and man exist for each other and neither is satisfied without the other. Though God is self-sufficient He has sovereignly willed to have communion with the being He made in honor next to Himself, and He takes every means to...

I said that the causes of religious confusion were four, and I named misunderstanding of the nature of truth as one of them.

The others are lack of love, unbelief and nonobedience.

"Wisdom is a loving spirit," says the Wisdom of Solomon. "He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way" (Psalms 25:9), says David, the father of Solomon, and these set forth a truth which the whole Bible joins to celebrate; namely,...

It is a fact in human history that men and women have never in any great numbers sought after truth. The young people who stream from our halls of learning each year confess to having no more than a passing and academic interest in truth. The majority admit that they go to college only to improve their social standing and increase their earning power. So, the average American will confess that he most wants success in his chosen field; and he wants success both for prestige and for financial...

The impulse to share, to impart, normally accompanies any true encounter with God and spiritual things. The woman at the well, after her soul-inspiring meeting with Jesus, left her water pots, hurried into the city and tried to persuade her friends to come out and meet Him. Come, see a man, she said, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ" Her spiritual excitement could not be contained within her own heart. She had to tell someone. Is it not possible that our Lord...

The Bible is the most important book in the world, and for Christians it is just about the only book—certainly the only book that should claim the place of honor in the public worship of God. We are, we trust, duly grateful for every good spiritual book written since the close of the New Testament canon. We do not undervalue the devotional book or the carefully prepared theological work, but when saints meet in communion there should be but one book, the Bible. The place given to the...

To be happy, adjust to the social norm. That is the popular notion but it will not hold up under examination. This norm to which we must adjust-where did it come from" What Moses brought it down from what mount" Where are its credentials" From whence its authority"

Since the world insists that I adjust to its beliefs, its moral standards and its practical working philosophies, it should be able to demonstrate that it knows where it is going, what it wants and why, and it should...

Always the decisive conflict in religion will be where important concepts are joined in opposition, concepts so vital that they are capable of saving or wrecking the Christian faith in any given generation. At this critical juncture in church history, the real conflict is between those who hold to an objective Christianity capable of being grasped in its entirety by the human intellect and those who believe that there are far-in areas of religious experience so highly spiritual, so removed...

About 300 B.C. a Greek king named Pyrrhus fought a battle with the Romans at Heraclea. Pyrrhus won the battle but in doing so he suffered such appalling losses as to more than offset his gains.

Thus a victory that costs too much is often called a Pyrrhic victory.

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For years I have watched misled Christians in their unholy effort to make friends with the enemy and to render the cross socially acceptable. A few prophets have written and preached against...

I consider it a good sign that some people are still asking questions like these in our churches: "What should happen in a genuine conversion to Christ"" and "What should a man or woman feel in the transaction of the new birth"" If I am asked, my answer is this: "There ought to be a real and genuine cry of pain!" That is why I am not impressed with the kind of evangelism that tries to invite people into the fellowship of God by signing a card. There should be a birth within, a birth from...

I keep looking, but with little success, for a distinguishing radiance in life and testimony among our evangelical Christians. Instead of an inner witness, too many professing Christians are depending upon logical conclusions drawn from Bible texts. They have no witness of an encounter with God, no awareness of inner change! I believe that where there is a divine act within the soul, there will be a corresponding awareness. This act of God is its own evidence: it addresses itself directly to...

The more we study the words of our Lord Jesus Christ when He lived on earth among us, the more certain we are about who He is. Some critics have scoffed: "Jesus did not claim to be God. He only said He was the Son of Man." It is true that Jesus used the term, "Son of Man" frequently. But He testified boldly, even among those who were His sworn enemies, that He was God. He said with great forcefulness that He had come from the Father in heaven and that He was equal with the Father....

Gospel churches which mostly begin with the lowly are usually not content till they attain some degree of wealth and social acceptance. Then they gradually fall into classes, determined largely by the wealth and education of the members. The individuals that comprise the top layer of these various classes go on to become pillars of the religious society and are soon entrenched in places of leadership and influence. It is then that their great temptation comes upon them, the temptation to...