Quotes by John Stott

John Stott (1921–2011) — Theologe, Pastor und Autor · anglikanisch-evangelikal · Vereinigtes Königreich

John Stott (1921–2011) war ein britischer anglikanischer Theologe, Autor und langjähriger Pastor der All Souls Church in London. Als führende Stimme des weltweiten Evangelikalismus verband er fundierte Schriftauslegung mit sozialer Verantwortung in der Mission, stieß jedoch mit vorsichtigen Überlegungen zur bedingten Unsterblichkeit auf theologische Kritik. Für Bibelleser bieten seine Schriften bis heute Orientierung durch verständliche Auslegungen und die Verknüpfung von Glaubenslehre mit praktischem Alltagshandeln.

Era: Today

Recurring topics: Grace & Redemption, God, Jesus & the Holy Spirit, Love, Discipleship, The Bible & the Word of God, Growth & Character, Faith & Trust, Guilt & Forgiveness

Quotes by John Stott

God does not love us because Christ died for us; Christ died for us because God loved us.

John Stott

If we are looking for a definition of love, we should not look in a dictionary, but at Calvary.

John Stott

As we face the cross, then, we can say to ourselves both, 'I did it, my sins sent him there,' and 'He did it, his love took him there.

John Stott

Truth becomes hard when it is not softened by love; love becomes soft when it is not strengthened by truth.

John Stott

It is impossible to pray for someone without loving him, and impossible to go on praying for him without discovering that our love for him grows and matures.

John Stott

I could never myself believe in God, if it were not for the cross.

John Stott

Scripture, one might say, is the star that still leads wise men to Jesus.

John Stott

A Christian’s freedom from anxiety is not due to some guaranteed freedom from trouble, but to the folly of worry…and especially to the confidence that God is our Father, that even permitted suffering is within the orbit of His care.

John Stott

Every Christian should be both conservative and radical; conservative in preserving the faith and radical in applying it.

John Stott

Until you see the cross as that which is done by you, you will never appreciate that it is done for you.

John Stott

Grace is love that cares and stoops and rescues.

John Stott

How did Jesus expect His disciples to react under persecution? (In Matthew 5:12 He said), “Rejoice and be glad!” We are not to retaliate like an unbeliever, nor sulk like a child, nor lick our wound in self-pity like a dog, nor just grin a bear it like a Stoic, still less pretend we enjoy it like a masochist. What then? We are to rejoice as a Christian should and even “leap for joy” (Lk. 6:23).

John Stott

The truth is that there are such things as Christian tears, and too few of us ever weep them.

John Stott

Working and waiting belong together. In combination they will deliver us both from the presumption which thinks we can do everything and from the pessimism which thinks we can do nothing.

John Stott

Those who reject the Bible do so not because of its apparent contradictions, but because it contradicts them.

John Stott

Faith’s only function is to receive what grace offers.

John Stott

We should not ask, 'What has gone wrong with the world?' for the diagnosis has already been given. Rather, we should ask, 'What has gone wrong with the salt and the light?'

John Stott

The Bible is the prism which breaks up the light of Jesus Christ into its many beautiful colors.

John Stott

The Bible is the portrait of Jesus Christ.

John Stott

The doctrine of predestination promotes humility, not arrogance; assurance, not apprehension; responsibility, not apathy; holiness, not complacency; and mission, not privilege.

John Stott

Of course it costs something to be a Christian. But it costs far more not to be one.

John Stott

And seldom if ever do I leave the pulpit without a sense of partial failure, a mood of penitence, a cry to God for forgiveness, and a resolve to look to Him for grace to do better in the future.

John Stott

Nothing seals the lips and ties the tongue like the poverty of our own spiritual experience. We say nothing because we have nothing to say.

John Stott

We must never think of salvation as a kind of transaction between God and us in which He contributes grace and we contribute faith. For we were dead and had to be quickened before we could believe. No, Christ’s apostles clearly teach elsewhere that saving faith too is God’s gracious gift.

John Stott

Christian love is not a victim of our emotions, but the servant of our will.

John Stott

The battle is almost always won in the mind. It is through the renewal of our mind that our character and behavior are transformed.

John Stott

I am a Christian not because the Christian faith is attractive, but because it is true.

John Stott

We should be neither such emotional Christians that we never think, nor such intellectual Christians that we never feel.

John Stott

We have a fatal tendency to magnify the faults of others and minimize the seriousness of our own.

John Stott

Because [prayer for the church] is secret and therefore unrewarded by men, we shall only undertake it if we long for their spiritual welfare more than for their thanks.

John Stott

Doctrine leads to doxology as well as to duty.

John Stott

Faith is a reasoning trust, a trust which reckons thoughtfully and confidently upon the trustworthiness of God.

John Stott

The hallmark of an authentic evangelicalism is not the uncritical repetition of old traditions, but the willingness to submit every tradition, however ancient, to fresh Biblical scrutiny and, if necessary, reform

John Stott

Christian giving is to be marked by self-sacrifice and self-forgetfulness, not by self-congratulation.

John Stott

The essence of apostasy is changing sides from that of the crucified to that of the crucifier.

John Stott

The Scriptures say that God Himself is the chief evangelist. For the Spirit of God is the Spirit of truth, love, holiness and power, and evangelism is impossible without Him. It is He who anoints the messenger, confirms the word, prepares the hearer, convicts the sinful, enlightens the blind, gives life to the dead, enables us to repent and believe, unites us to the body of Christ, assures us that we are God’s children, leads us into Christ-like character and service, and sends us out in our turn to be Christ’s witnesses. In all this the Holy Spirit’s main preoccupation is to glorify Jesus Christ by showing Him to us and forming Him in us.

John Stott

We must allow the Word of God to confront us, to disturb our security, to undermine our complacency and to overthrow our patterns of thought and behavior.

John Stott

Persecution is simply the clash between two irreconcilable value-systems.

John Stott

In fundamentals…faith is primary, and we may not appeal to love as an excuse to deny essential faith. In non-fundamentals, however, love is primary, and we may not appeal to zeal for the faith as an excuse for failure in love. Faith instructs our own conscience; love respects the consciences of others. Faith gives liberty; love limits it exercise.

John Stott

Do not worry about who goes in and out of your churches; worry about what goes in and out of your pulpit.

John Stott

97 quotes in total — browse the collection.

Sources: langham.org, thegospelcoalition.org, theothercheek.com.au, teachingtheword.org

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