“None are more exposed to slanders and insults than godly teachers. This comes not only from the difficulty of their duties, which are so great that sometimes they sink under them, or stagger or halt or take a false step, so that wicked men find many occasions of finding fault with them; but added to that, even when they do all their duties correctly and commit not even the smallest error, they never avoid a thousand criticisms. It is indeed a trick of Satan to estrange men from their ministers so as gradually to bring their teaching into contempt. In this way not only is wrong done to innocent people whose reputation is undeservedly injured, but the authority of God’s holy teaching is diminished. . . .

[T]he more sincerely any pastor strives to further Christ’s kingdom, the more he is loaded with spite, the more fierce do the attacks upon him become. And not only so, but as soon as any charge is made against ministers of the Word, it is believed as surely and firmly as if it had been already proved. This happens not only because a higher standard of integrity is required from them, but because Satan makes most people, in fact nearly everyone, over credulous so that without investigation, they eagerly condemn their pastors whose good name they ought to be defending.” – John Calvin, Second Corinthians, Timothy, Titus and Philemon (Grand Rapids, 1964), page 263, commenting on 1 Timothy 5:19.

“What is it to have a god? What is God? Answer: A god is that to which we look for all good and in which we find refuge in every time of need. To have a god is nothing else than to trust and believe him with our whole heart. As I have often said, the trust and faith of the heart alone make both God and an idol. If your faith and trust are right, then your God is the true God. On the other hand, if your trust is false and wrong, then you have not the true God. For these two belong together, faith and God. That to which your heart clings and entrusts itself is, I say, really your God.” – Martin Luther, The Large Catechism (Philadelphia, 1959), page 9.

“In times past we would have run to the ends of the world if we had known of a place where we could have heard God speak. But now that we hear this every day in sermons, indeed now that all books are full of it, we do not see this happening. You hear at home in your house father and mother and children sing and speak it; the preacher speaks it in the parish church – you ought to lift up your hands and rejoice that we have been given the honor of hearing God speak to us through the Word.

‘Oh,’ people say, ‘what is that? After all, there is preaching every day, often many times every day, so that we soon grow weary of it. What do we get out of it?’ All right, go ahead, dear brother, if you don’t want God to speak to you every day at home in your house and in your church, then be clever and look for something else: in Trier is our Lord God’s coat, in Aachen are Joseph’s britches and our blessed Lady’s chemise. Go there and squander your money, buy indulgence and the pope’s secondhand junk. These are valuable things! You have to go far for these things and spend a lot of money; leave house and home standing idle!

But aren’t we stupid and crazy, yes, blinded and possessed by the devil? There sits that decoy duck in Rome with his bag of tricks, luring to himself the whole world with its money and goods, and all the while anybody can go to baptism, the sacrament, and the pulpit! How highly honored and richly blessed are we to know that God speaks with us and feeds us with the Word, gives us baptism, the keys [absolution], and all the rest! But these barbarous, godless people say, ‘What, baptism? sacrament? God’s Word? Joseph’s britches, that’s what does it!’” – Martin Luther, preaching on 15 February 1546.

“In one of the streets of Bedford I came to where there were three or four poor women sitting at a door in the sun and talking about the things of God. Willing to listen, I drew near to hear what they said, for I was a brisk talker myself in matters of religion. But I have to say that I heard, but I didn’t understand, for they were far above, out of my reach. They spoke about a new birth, the work of God in their hearts . . . . They said how God had visited their souls with his love in the Lord Jesus, and with what words and promises they had been refreshed, comforted and supported against the temptations of the devil . . . . And it seemed to me they spoke as if joy did make them speak. They spoke with such pleasantness of biblical language, and with such obvious grace in all they said, that they were to me as if they had found a new world.” – John Bunyan, quoted in Monica Furlong, The Trial of John Bunyan & The Persecution of the Puritans (London, 1978), page 56. Style updated.

“You must be born again.” John 3:7

You. This is personal. If I resent it as threatening, that could be evidence I have not been born again. If my heart welcomes the approach of this truth and waves the white flag of surrender, that could be evidence I have been born again.

Must. This is authoritative. If I take evasive action, that could be evidence I have not been born again. If I breathe a sigh of relief that finally Someone is telling me the truth and taking me in hand, that could be evidence I have been born again.

Be born again. This is passive. I need more than self-correction; I need a miracle deep within. I need God to call into existence within me a new aliveness to God, new tastes, new desires, new openness and humility and fears and hopes, such as I have never experienced before and cannot conjure up out of my admirable upbringing and good intentions. I need newness of Genesis 1-magnitude. In fact, my eternal destiny hangs on something only God can do for me.

“It is a noteworthy and striking fact that no doctrine has excited such surprise in every age of the Church and has called forth so much opposition from the great and learned as this very doctrine of the new birth. The men of the present day who sneer at conversions and revivals as fanaticism are no better than Nicodemus. Like him, they expose their own entire ignorance of the work of the Holy Spirit.” – J. C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: John 1:1-10:9 (Grand Rapids, n.d.), page 139. Style updated.

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think, according to the power that works within us… Ephesians 3:20

“He is like an eternal, unfailing fountain. The more it pours forth and overflows, the more it continues to give. God desires nothing more seriously from us than that we ask Him for much and great things.” – Martin Luther, quoted in The Lutheran Study Bible, at Ephesians 3:20.

“Not above some things that we ask, but all. Not above some of our dimmer conceptions, our lower thoughts, but above all that we think. Now just put together all that you have ever asked for. Heap it up, and then pile upon the top thereof all that you have ever thought of concerning the riches of divine grace. What a mountain! . . . High as this pyramid of prayers and contemplations may be piled, God’s ability to bless is higher still.” – C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1950), III:419