Quotes by Sam Storms
Sam Storms (b. 1951) — Theologe, Pastor und Autor · calvinistisch-charismatisch · USA
Der US-amerikanische Theologe und Pastor Sam Storms (* 1951) lehrte unter anderem am Wheaton College und wirkte über Jahrzehnte im pastoralen Dienst in Oklahoma und Missouri. Er gilt als prominenter Vertreter eines reformierten Charismatismus und geriet sowohl wegen seiner Auffassung zur Fortdauer übernatürlicher Gaben als auch wegen seiner langjährigen Nähe zur charismatischen Bewegung um Kansas City in die Kritik. Bibellesern bietet er eine Auslegungsperspektive, die eine calvinistische Gnadenlehre mit dem praktischen Ausüben neutestamentlicher Geistesgaben exegetisch verbinden möchte.
Era: Today
Recurring topics: God, Jesus & the Holy Spirit, Joy & Gratitude, Temptation & Struggle, Growth & Character, Grace & Redemption, Faith & Trust, Guilt & Forgiveness, Meaning & Identity
Quotes by Sam Storms
Joy is not necessarily the absence of suffering, it is the presence of God.
Sam Storms
The essence of loving living as a follower of Jesus isn’t in trying harder but in enjoying more. I’m not saying you can change without trying. I’m saying that enjoyment empowers effort. Pleasure in God is the power for purity.
Sam Storms
The truth is that the God of the Bible is the kind of God whose greatest delight comes not from making demands but from meeting needs.
Sam Storms
God is able to cause all things people do to us, even the bad things, to work together for our good (Rom. 8:28). That isn’t to say that all things are good, but that God can orchestrate the evil into a symphony of glory.
Sam Storms
True forgiveness pursues relationship and restoration. True forgiveness is not satisfied with simply canceling the debt. It longs to love again.
Sam Storms
Don’t come to God in times of worship arrogantly presuming to give. Come humbly yearning to get, for God always feeds the hungry heart.
Sam Storms
Satan’s “fiery darts” do not easily penetrate a mind captivated by the beauty of Christ. When our hearts beat with perpetual fascination and our thoughts are filled with the beauty and splendor and adequacy of God, little room is left for the devil to gain a foothold (see Phil. 4:8).
Sam Storms
Self-image, the concept we have of ourselves, must begin not by looking in the mirror but by looking into the face of God.
Sam Storms
Temptation is often strong because it comes in the form of an enticement to satisfy legitimate needs through illegitimate means.
Sam Storms
The reason we resist God’s laws and pursue our own sinful strategies is because we believe that we can do better at securing our happiness than God can.
Sam Storms
Worship is first and foremost a feasting on all that God is for us in Jesus… [One] in which God is the host, the cook, the waiter, and the meal itself.
Sam Storms
Every syllable of every statute, every clause of every commandment that ever proceeded from the mouth of God was divinely designed to bring those who would obey into the greatest imaginable happiness of heart. Don’t swallow God’s law like castor oil. For when you understand His intent, it will be like honey on your lips and sweetness to your soul.
Sam Storms
[Forgiveness] is [often] deciding to live with the painful consequences of another person’s sin. You are going to have to live with it anyway, so you might as well do it without the bitterness and rancor and hatred that threaten to destroy your soul.
Sam Storms
Temptation, in and of itself, is not sin… Jesus was repeatedly tempted (Hebrews 2:17-18; 4:14; Matthew 4), but He was sinless… Temptation only becomes a sin when you acquiesce to it, “fondle” it, and “enjoy” it.
Sam Storms
Everything without God is pathetically inferior to God without everything.
Sam Storms
The strength of all sin, whether simple or scandalous, is the lie that God can’t do what it can.
Sam Storms
[God] does not give His grace by calculated measure.
Sam Storms
If offense is to be taken at the gospel, let it be because of the gospel, not the one who proclaims it.
Sam Storms
The key to holiness? Eating and drinking and enjoying and delighting in all that God is for you in His Son. The key to holiness is falling in love with Jesus.
Sam Storms
Whom else do you know that is high, yet humble; strong, yet sensitive; righteous, yet gracious; powerful, yet merciful; authoritative, yet tender; holy, yet forgiving; just, yet compassionate; angry, yet gentle; (and) firm, yet friendly?
Sam Storms
God does not bear witness to the world by taking his people out of suffering, but by demonstrating his grace in the midst of pain through them.
Sam Storms
God does not reveal information by communication: He reveals Himself by communion. Revelation is a personal meeting of God with man. It is a meeting of mind with mind or person with person
Sam Storms
If the Father was pleased to make a gift of certain sinners to His most blessed Son, you may rest assured that the Son will neither despise nor deny His Father’s gracious generosity. [There is] the certainty of ultimate and absolute salvation for those who come to the Son… Their life in Christ is eternal and irrevocable because that is the will of the Father; a will or a purpose that the whole of Christ’s person and work was designed to secure, a will or purpose that shall ultimately be (Psm. 115:3; 135:6; Dan. 4:34-35; Eph. 1:11; Ac. 4:28). What did Jesus come to do? He came to do the Father’s will (Jn. 6:38). What is the Father’s will? The Father’s will is that all those He has given to the Son be fully and finally saved (Jn. 6:39). Oh, what a glorious thought it is!
Sam Storms
I’m a hedonist because I believe it is impossible to desire pleasure too much. But I’m a Christian hedonist because I believe the pleasure we cannot desire too much is pleasure in God and all that He is for us in Jesus.
Sam Storms
Sin turns ugly and is subject to defeat only when seen in the light of Christ’s beauty.
Sam Storms
The focus of Satan’s efforts is always the same: to deceive us into believing that the passing pleasures of sin are more satisfying than obedience.
Sam Storms
The purpose of existence is the pursuit of enjoyment…in God! Our desires, affections, pursuits, all that we say and do, all that we love or hate, are to be measured by this single criterion and subordinated to this one end: happiness in God.
Sam Storms
The strength of temptation also comes from a tendency to push virtues to such an extreme that they become vices. For example, it is all too easy for the joy of eating to become gluttony, or for the blessing of rest to become sloth, or for the peace of quietness to become noncommunication, or for industriousness to become greed, or for liberty to be turned into an excuse for licentiousness. We all know what it’s like for pleasure to become sensuality, or for self-care to become selfishness, or for self-respect to become conceit, or for wise caution to become cynicism and unbelief, or for righteous anger to become unrighteous rage, or for the joy of sex to become immorality, or for conscientiousness to become perfectionism. The list could go on endlessly, but I think you get the point.
Sam Storms
The ultimate goal of theology is not knowledge, but worship. If our learning and knowledge of God do not lead to the joyful praise of God, we have failed. We learn only that we might laud. Another way of putting it is to say that theology without doxology is idolatry. The only theology worth studying is a theology that can be sung.
Sam Storms
The Word became flesh! God became human! The invisible became visible! The untouchable became touchable! Eternal life experienced temporal death! The transcendent one descended and drew near! The unlimited became limited! The infinite became finite! The immutable became mutable! The unbreakable became fragile! Spirit became matter! Eternity entered time! The independent became dependent! The almighty became weak! The loved became hated! The exalted was humbled! Glory was subjected to shame! Fame turned into obscurity! From inexpressible joy to tears of unimaginable grief! From a throne to a cross! From ruler to being ruled! From power to weakness!
Sam Storms
You can’t escape your passion for pleasure. It will haunt you in the night. It will whisper to you in the day. You will feel its impulse in all you do and think and say. The problem is not that we desire. The problem is that we desire sin rather than God. The problem is that we have been duped by the Devil. We have believed what is perhaps the most pernicious lie ever told, namely, that the pleasures and delights of the world, the flesh, and the Devil are more enjoyable and satisfying than who God is for us in Jesus.
Sam Storms
It grieves me to say this, but the primary reason people are in bondage to sin is because people are bored with God. One of Satan’s most effective tactics is to convince us that God is a drag.
Sam Storms
Enjoyment empowers effort. Doing is the fruit of delighting. Performance is energized by pleasure.
Sam Storms
Each of us is under a divine mandate to become an amateur astronomer, to peer into the incalculable depths of sky and space to behold the handiwork of our omnipotent Creator.
Sam Storms
Our giving is but a reflex of God’s giving.
Sam Storms
We do not have any honor and glory in our possession that He supposedly lacks, thinking that somehow we are able to give Him what He does not already have inherently and eternally. Our role, our joy, is to ascribe and declare and proclaim to and of Him what He is and always will be.
Sam Storms
Jesus will come bathed in radiant splendor, enveloped within an atmosphere of indescribable brilliance, surrounded by the ear-piercing praise of angels and saints. Scintillating light shining from His eyes. Irresistible power pouring from His hands. None will deny His beauty or escape its transforming energy.
Sam Storms
Legalism is the tendency to regard as divine law things which God has neither required nor forbidden in Scripture and the corresponding inclination to look with suspicion on others for their failure or refusal to conform.
Sam Storms
Sin comes to us, taps us on the shoulder or tugs at our shirttail and whispers in our ear: “You deserve better than what God has provided. He’s holding out on you. You deserve to feel good about yourself. I’ll affirm you in a way no one else can. Why live in misery any longer? Come to me. I’ll give you a sense of power you’ve never known before. I’ll expand your influence. I’ll fill your heart with a sense of accomplishment. I’ll nourish your soul. You’ve never had a physical rush like the one I’ve got in store for you. Obeying God is boring. It’s a pain. He’s always telling you to do stuff that’s difficult and burdensome and inconvenient or ordering you to forsake the few things that really bring you happiness. Come on. You’ve only got one life. Obedience is ugly. My way is fun. My way feels good.”
Sam Storms
So here’s how to avoid hypocrisy in fasting. If at any point, while fasting, you find yourself thinking, “God will love me more…God will surely be impressed with me now!” get in your car and go eat a McDonald’s Quarterpounder! If you are the least way tempted to believe, “God will bless me more…He will have no choice but to regard my righteousness!” go eat the biggest greasiest pizza you can find! If it crosses your mind, “I’m better than others who don’t fast, and I sure hope they recognize it as clearly as I do!” go to an all-you-can-eat smorgasbord!
Sam Storms
269 quotes in total — browse the collection.
Sources: scribd.com, samstorms.org, wikipedia.org
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