John R.W. Stott Quotes & Sayings

We may believe in the deity and the salvation of Christ, and acknowledge ourselves to be sinners in need of his salvation; but this does not make us Christians. We have to make a personal response to Jesus Chris, committing ourselves unreservedly to him as our Savior and Lord. — John R.W. Stott

What dominated his mind was not the living but the giving of his life. — John R.W. Stott

God. Our highest destiny is to know God, to be in personal relationship with him. Our chief claim to nobility as human beings is that we were made in the image of God and are therefore capable of knowing him. — John R.W. Stott

It is impossible to read the New Testament without being impressed by the atmosphere of joyful confidence which pervades it, and which stands out in relief to the rather jejune religion that often passes for Christianity today. There was no defeatism about the early Christians; they spoke rather of victory. — John R.W. Stott

the word mission cannot properly be used to cover everything God is doing in the world. In providence and common grace he is indeed active in all men and all societies, whether they acknowledge him or not. But this is not his "mission" "Mission" concerns his redeemed people and what he sends them into the world to do. — John R.W. Stott

The overriding reason why we should take other people's cultures seriously is because God has taken ours seriously. — John R.W. Stott

The Christian message has a moral challenge. If the message is true, the moral challenge has to be accepted. So God is not a fit object for man's detached scrutiny. You cannot fix God at the end of a telescope or a microscope and say "How interesting!" God is not interesting. He is deeply upsetting. The same is true of Jesus Christ ... We know that to find God and to accept Jesus Christ would be a very inconvenient experience. It would involve the rethinking of our whole outlook on life and the readjustment of our whole manner of life. And it is a combination of intellectual and moral cowardice which makes us hesitate. We do not find because we do not seek. We do not seek because we do not want to find, and we know that the way to be certain of not finding is not to seek ... Christ's promise is plain: "Seek and you will find. — John R.W. Stott

If you Christians lived like Jesus Christ, India would be at your feet tomorrow. — John R.W. Stott

The Christian mind ... is not a mind which is thinking specifically about Christian or even religious topics, but a mind which is thinking about everything, however apparently 'secular', and doing so 'Christianly' or within a Christian frame of reference. It is not a mind stuffed full with pat answers to every question, all neatly filed as in the memory bank of a computer; it is rather a mind which has absorbed biblical truth and Christian presuppositions so thoroughly that it is able to view every issue from a Christian perspective and so reach a Christian judgment about it. — John R.W. Stott

Jesus Christ, we believe, is the fulfilment of every truly human aspiration. To find him is to find ourselves. — John R.W. Stott

There is evidence for the deity of Jesus
good, strong,
historical , cumulative evidence; evidence to which an honest
person can subscribe without committing intellectual suicide. — John R.W. Stott

Jesus evidently thought that human beings still retained a residue of their former glory. — John R.W. Stott

The Old Testament is the Gospel in the bud, the New Testament is the Gospel in full flower. The Old Testament is the Gospel in the blade; the New Testament is the Gospel in full ear. — John R.W. Stott

The spirit of our age is hostile toward people who state their opinions clearly and hold them strongly. — John R.W. Stott

All Christian preachers have to face this issue. Either we preach that human beings are rebels against God, under his just judgment and (if left to themselves) lost, and that Christ crucified who bore their sin and curse is the only available Saviour. Or we emphasize human potential and human ability, with Christ brought in only to boost them, and with no necessity for the cross except to exhibit God's love and so inspire us to greater endeavour. The former is the way to be faithful, the latter the way to be popular. It is not possible to be faithful and popular simultaneously. — John R.W. Stott

God intends us to penetrate the world. Christian salt has no business to remain snugly in elegant little ecclesiastical salt cellars; our place is to be rubbed into the secular community, as salt is rubbed into meat, to stop it going bad. And when society does go bad, we Christians tend to throw up our hands in pious horror and reproach the non-Christian world; but should we not rather reproach ourselves? One can hardly blame unsalted meat for going bad. It cannot do anything else. The real question to ask is: Where is the salt? — John R.W. Stott

We must trust in him as our Saviour and submit to him as our Lord; and then go on to take our place as loyal members of the church and responsible citizens in the community. — John R.W. Stott

Over against the challenges of pluralism, we are to be a community of truth, standing up for the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. Over against the challenge of materialism, we are to be a community of simplicity and pilgrimage. Over against the challenge of relativism, we are to be a community of obedience. Over the challenge of narcissism, we are to be a community of love. — John R.W. Stott

And self-sacrifice is what the Bible means by 'love.' While sin is possessive, love is expansive. Sin's characteristic is the desire to get; love's characteristic is the desire to give. — John R.W. Stott

The first thing that has to be said about the biblical gospel of reconciliation, however, is that it begins with reconciliation to God, and continues with a reconciled community in Christ. Reconciliation is not a term the Bible uses to describe 'coming to terms with oneself', although it does insist that it is only through losing ourselves in love for God and neighbour that we truly find ourselves. — John R.W. Stott

Good conduct arises out of good doctrine. — John R.W. Stott

To love the glory of God more than our own glory is also to seek approval from God rather than other people. — John R.W. Stott

We are not, therefore, to regard the cross as defeat and the resurrection as victory. Rather, the cross was the victory won, and the resurrection the victory endorsed, proclaimed and demonstrated. — John R.W. 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 R.W. Stott

But even if we remain in our own country, Christians and non-Christians are often widely separated from one another by social sub-cultures and lifestyles as well as by different values, beliefs and moral standards. Only an incarnation can span these divides, for an incarnation means entering other people's worlds, their thought-world, and the worlds of their alienation, loneliness and pain. Moreover, the incarnation led to the cross. Jesus first took our flesh, then bore our sin. This was a depth of penetration into our world in order to reach us, in comparison with which our little attempts to reach people seem amateur and shallow. The cross calls us to a much more radical and costly kind of evangelism than most churches have begun to consider, let alone experience. — John R.W. Stott

The very first step to becoming a follower of Jesus Christ is the humble admission that we need him. Nothing keeps us out of the kingdom of God more surely than our pride and self-sufficiency. — John R.W. Stott

Many people visualize a God who sits comfortably on a distant throne, remote, aloof, uninterested, and indifferent to the needs of mortals, until, it may be, they can badger him into taking action on their behalf. Such a view is wholly false. The Bible reveals a God who, long before it even occurs to man to turn to him, while man is still lost in darkness and sunk in sin, takes the initiative, rises from his throne, lays aside his glory, and stoops to seek until he finds him. — John R.W. Stott

You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you.' This situation is tragic beyond words. We are missing the destiny for which God made us. — John R.W. Stott

Nothing is more important for mature Christian discipleship than a fresh, clear, true vision of the authentic Jesus. — John R.W. Stott

God hides himself from intellectual dilettantes, but reveals himself in Christ to those who humbly seek him. — John R.W. Stott

Christianity is not just about what we believe; it's also about how we behave. — John R.W. Stott

We may succeed in preserving a modicum of rectitude in the performance of our public duty, but behind this facade lurk violent and sinful emotions, which are always threatening to erupt. — John R.W. Stott

Who delivered up Jesus to die? Not Judas, for money; not Pilate, for fear; not the Jews, for envy; - but the Father, for love!'181 — John R.W. Stott

Thirdly, Christ's salvation must be a free gift. He 'purchased' it for us at the high price of his own life-blood. So what is there left for us to pay? Nothing! Since he claimed that all was now 'finished', there is nothing for us to contribute. — John R.W. Stott

If we claim to be Christian, we must be like Christ. — John R.W. 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 R.W. Stott

Dialogue is a token of genuine Christian love, because it indicates our steadfast resolve to rid our minds of the prejudices and caricatures that we may entertain about other people, to struggle to listen through their ears and look through their eyes so as to grasp what prevents them from hearing the gospel and seeing Christ, to sympathize with them in all their doubts, fears and "hang-ups." For such sympathy will involve listening, and listening means dialogue. It is once more the challenge of the incarnation, to renounce evangelism by inflexible slogans, and instead to involve ourselves sensitively in the real dilemmas that people face. — John R.W. Stott

The cup from which he shrank was something different. It symbolized neither the physical pain of being flogged and crucified, nor the mental distress of being despised and rejected even by his own people, but rather the spiritual agony of bearing the sins of the world, in other words, of enduring the divine judgment which those sins deserved. — John R.W. Stott

Unless some people are commissioned for the task, there will be no gospel preachers; unless the gospel is preached, sinners will not hear Christ's message and voice; unless they hear him, they will not believe the truths of his death and resurrection; unless they believe these truths, they will not call on him; and unless they call on his name, they will not be saved. — John R.W. Stott

We cannot receive the mercy and forgiveness of God unless we repent, and we cannot claim to have repented of our sins if we are unmerciful towards the sins of others — John R.W. Stott

The salvation for which the Bible instructs us is available "through faith in Christ Jesus." Therefore, since Scripture concerns salvation and salvation is through Christ, Scripture is full of Christ. — John R.W. Stott

There is no value in the reading of Scripture for its own sake, but only if it effectively introduces us to Jesus Christ. — John R.W. Stott

Self-forgetfulness is unattainable as a goal, except as the byproduct of preoccupation with Another's presence, and with his message, his power, and his glory. — John R.W. Stott

Social responsibility becomes an aspect not of Christian mission only, but also of Christian conversion. It is impossible to be truly converted to God without being thereby converted to our neighbor. — John R.W. Stott

At the cross in holy love God through Christ paid the full penalty of our disobedience himself. — John R.W. Stott

To be disrespectful of tradition and of historical theology is to be disrespectful of the Holy Spirit who has been actively enlightening the church in every century. — John R.W. Stott

Some Christians sow to the flesh every day and wonder why they do not reap holiness. Holiness is a harvest; whether we reap it or not depends almost entirely on what and where we sow. — John R.W. Stott

A guilty conscience is a great blessing, but only if it drives us to come home. — John R.W. Stott

The gospel is not good advice to men, but good news about Christ; not an invitation to us to do anything, but a declaration of what God has done; not a demand, but an offer. — John R.W. Stott

The noun eleos (mercy) ... always deals with what we see of pain, misery and distress, these results of sin; and charis (grace) always deals with the sin and guilt itself. The one extends relief, the other pardon; the one cures, heals, helps, the other cleanses and reinstates. — John R.W. Stott

Self-denial is not denying to ourselves luxuries such as chocolates, cakes, cigarettes and cocktails (although it might include this); it is actually denying or disowning ourselves, renouncing our supposed right to go our own way. — John R.W. Stott

But when the teaching of the Bible is plain, then continuing to maintain an open mind is a sign not of maturity, but of immaturity. — John R.W. Stott

For if there is 'false guilt' (feeling bad about evil we have not done), there is also 'false innocence' (feeling good about the evil we have done). If false contrition is unhealthy (an ungrounded weeping over guilt), so is false assurance (an ungrounded rejoicing over forgiveness). — John R.W. Stott

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

Before we can begin to see the cross as something done for us, we have to see it as something done by us. — John R.W. Stott

So the fundamental question before the church is who is Lord? Is the church the lord of Jesus Christ, so that it has liberty to edit and manipulate, accepting what it likes and rejecting what it dislikes? Or is Jesus Christ our Teacher and our Lord, so that we believe and obey his teaching? He still says to us, 'Why do you call me, "Lord, Lord," and do not do what I say?' (Luke 6:46). To confess Jesus as Lord but not obey him is to build our lives on a foundation of sand. Again, 'Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me,' he said in the upper room (John 14:21). Here then are two cultures and two value systems, two standards and two lifestyles. On the one side there is the fashion of the world around us; on the other side is the revealed, good and pleasing will of God. Radical disciples have little difficulty in making their choice. — John R.W. Stott

We need to emphasize that what the Spirit speaks he speaks through what has already been spoken, and that what the Spirit does he does through what has already been done. — John R.W. Stott

Our responsibility before God is an inalienable aspect of our human dignity. Its final expression will be on the day of judgment. Nobody will be sentenced without trial. — John R.W. Stott

Every Christian should be both conservative and radical; conservative in preserving the faith and radical in applying it. — John R.W. Stott

The most effective preaching comes from those who embody the things they are saying. They are their message ... Christians ... need to look like what they are talking about. It is people who communicate primarily, not words or ideas ... Authenticity ... gets across from deep down inside people ... A momentary insincerity can cast doubt on all that has made for communication up to that point ... What communicates now is basically personal authenticity.3 — John R.W. Stott

The Bible isn't about people trying to discover God, but about God reaching out to find us. — John R.W. Stott

In fundamentals, faith is primary, and we may not appeal to love as an excuse to deny essential faith. In nonfundamentals, however, love is primary, and we may not appeal to zeal for the faith as an excuse for failures in love. — John R.W. Stott

Envy! Envy is the reverse side of a coin called vanity. Nobody is ever envious of others who is not first proud of himself. — John R.W. Stott

Seldom if ever should we have to choose between satisfying physical hunger and spiritual hunger, or between healing bodies and saving souls, since an authentic love for our neighbour will lead us to serve him or her as a whole person. Nevertheless, if we must choose, then we have to say that the supreme and ultimate need of all humankind is the saving grace of Jesus Christ, and that therefore a person's eternal, spiritual salvation is of greater importance than his or her temporal and material well-being ... The choice, we believe, is largely conceptual. In practice, as in the public ministry of Jesus, the two are inseparable ... — John R.W. Stott

In the real world of pain, how could one worship a God who was immune to it? — John R.W. Stott

The astonishing paradox of Christ's teaching and of Christian experience is this: if we lose ourselves in following Christ, we actually find ourselves. True self-denial is self-discovery. To live for ourselves is insanity and suicide; to live for God and for man is wisdom and life indeed. We do not begin to find ourselves until we have become willing to lose ourselves in the service of Christ and of our fellows. — John R.W. Stott

The radical biblical perspective is to see death not as the termination of life but as the gateway to life. — John R.W. Stott

So Jesus confronts us with himself, sets before us a radical choice between obedience and disobedience, and calls us to an unconditional commitment of mind, will and life to his teaching. — John R.W. Stott

A community of Jesus which seeks to hide itself has ceased to follow him. — John R.W. Stott

P. T. Forsyth's book Positive Preaching and the Modern Mind. These are its opening words: 'It is, perhaps, an overbold beginning, but I will venture to say that with its preaching Christianity stands or falls. — John R.W. Stott

Why is it that some Christians cross land and sea, continents and cultures, as missionaries? What on earth impels them? It is not in order to commend a civilization, an institution or an ideology, but rather a person, Jesus Christ, whom they believe to be unique. — John R.W. Stott

We must be global Christians with a global vision because our God is a global God. — John R.W. Stott

Every time we allow our mind to harbour a grudge, nurse a grievance, entertain an impure fantasy, or wallow in self-pity, we are sowing to the flesh. — John R.W. Stott

Thomas Cranmer in his 'Homily of Salvation' explained that three things had to go together in our justification: on God's part 'his great mercy and grace', on Christ's part 'the satisfaction of God's justice', and on our part 'true and lively faith'. He concluded the first part of the homily: 'It pleased our heavenly Father, of his infinite mercy, without any our desert or deserving, to prepare for us the most precious jewels of Christ's body and blood, whereby our ransom might be fully paid, the law fulfilled, and his justice fully satisfied.'15 — John R.W. Stott

110. When I enter the pulpit with the Bible in my hands and in my heart, my blood begins to flow and my eyes to sparkle for the sheer glory of having God's Word to expound. — John R.W. Stott

Probably the greatest tragedy of the church throughout its long and chequered history has been its constant tendency to conform to the prevailing culture instead of developing a Christian counter-culture. — John R.W. Stott

For our sake, he made him sin who knew no sin, so that in him we may become righteousness of God ...
As we look at the cross, we begin to understand the terrible implication of these words. At twelve noon, 'there was darkness over the whole land' which continued for three hours until Jesus died. With the darkness came silence, for no eye should see, and no lips could tell, the agony of the soul which the spotless Lamb of God now endured. The accumulated sins of all human history were laid upon him. Voluntarily he bore them in his own body. He made them his own. He shouldered full responsibility for them. — John R.W. Stott

we are to 'hunger and thirst for righteousness'. For what is the use of confessing and lamenting our sin, of acknowledging the truth about ourselves to both God and men, if we leave it there? Confession of sin must lead to hunger for righteousness. — John R.W. Stott

Our love grows soft if it is not strengthened by truth, and our truth grows hard if it is not softened by love. — John R.W. Stott

The power to save lies in the one who is gazed upon, not the one who does the looking. — John R.W. Stott

Such a man is altogether beyond our reach. He succeeded where we always fail. He had complete self-mastery. He never retaliated. He never grew resentful or irritable. He had such control of himself that, whatever others might think or say or do, he would deny himself and abandon himself to the will of God and the welfare of his fellow human beings. 'I seek not to please myself,' he said, and 'I am not seeking glory for myself.' As Paul wrote, 'For Christ did not please himself.' This utter disregard of self in the service of God and man is what the Bible calls love. There is no self-interest in love. The essence of love is self-sacrifice. Even the worst of us is adorned by an occasional flash of such nobility, but the life of Jesus radiated it with a never-fading incandescent glow. Jesus was sinless because he was selfless. Such selflessness is love. And God is love. — John R.W. Stott

If the Romans regarded crucifixion with horror, so did the Jews, though for a different reason. They made no distinction between a 'tree' and a 'cross', and so between a hanging and a crucifixion. They therefore automatically applied to crucified criminals the terrible statement of the law that 'anyone who is hung on a tree is under God's curse' (Deut. 21:23). They could not bring themselves to believe that God's Messiah would die under his curse, strung up on a tree. — John R.W. Stott

The forgiveness of God is a gift to be received, not a reward to be merited. — John R.W. Stott

We state and commend the faith only in so far as we go out and put ourselves inside the doubts of the doubters, the questions of the questioners and the loneliness of those who have lost their way. — John R.W. Stott

His authority on earth allows us to dare to go to all the nations. His authority in heaven gives us our only hope of success. And His presence with us leaves us with no other choice. — John R.W. Stott

Every time we linger in bad company whose insidious influence we know we cannot resist, every time we lie in bed when we ought to be up and praying, every time we read pornographic literature, every time we take a risk which strains our self-control, we are sowing, sowing, sowing to the flesh. — John R.W. Stott

[Christian rebellion] arises from the doctrine of mankind made in the image of God, and therefore protests against all forms of dehumanization. It sets itself against the social injustices which insult God the Creator, seeks to protect human beings from oppression and longs to liberate them ... it protests against every authoritarian regime, whether of the left or of the right, which discriminates against minorities, denies people their civil rights, forbids the free expression of opinions or imprisons people for their views alone. — John R.W. Stott

Perhaps the transformation of the disciples of Jesus is the greatest evidence of all for the resurrection. — John R.W. Stott

Human beings are comfortable with what is outward, visible, material and superficial. What matters to God is a deep, inward, secret work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. — John R.W. Stott

The most significant factor lies elsewhere, and it is on this that I intend to concentrate in this first chapter. Why I am a Christian is due ultimately neither to the influence of my parents and teachers, nor to my own personal decision for Christ, but to 'the Hound of Heaven'. That is, it is due to Jesus Christ himself, who pursued me relentlessly even when I was running away from him in order to go my own way. And if it were not for the gracious pursuit of the Hound of Heaven I would today be on the scrap-heap of wasted and discarded lives. — John R.W. Stott

Salvation is far more than merely the forgiveness of sins. It includes the whole sweep of God's purpose to redeem and restore humankind, and indeed all creation. What we claim for the Bible is that it unfolds God's total plan. — John R.W. Stott

Christianity is a religion of salvation, and the fact is that there is nothing in any of the non-Christian religions to compare with this message of a God who loved, and came after, and died for, a world of lost sinners. — John R.W. Stott

Yet Jesus Christ says he is standing knocking at the door of our lives, waiting. Notice that he is standing at the door, not pushing it; speaking to us, not shouting. This is all the more remarkable when we reflect that the house is his in any case. He is the architect; he designed it. He is the builder; he made it. He is the landlord; he bought it with his own blood. So it is his by right of plan, construction, and purchase. We are only tenants in a house that does not belong to us. He could put his shoulder to the door; he prefers to put his hand on the knocker. He could command us to open to him; instead, he merely invites us to do so. He will not force an entry to anybody's life. He says (verse 18) 'I counsel you.' He could issue orders; he is content to give advice. This is the nature of his humility and the extent of the freedom he has given us. — John R.W. Stott

A marriage that isn't built around the Cross will be devoid of grace, mercy, and humility that come when both husband and wife recognize their need for a savior. — John R.W. Stott

The point is that we can never take God by surprise. We can never anticipate him. He always makes the first move. He is always there 'in the beginning'. — John R.W. Stott

What God said to Abraham was not 'Obey this law and I will bless you', but 'I will bless you; believe my promise'. — John R.W. Stott

For whenever we turn away from Christ, we 'are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace' (Heb. 6:6). — John R.W. Stott

Insistence on security is incompatible with the way of the cross. What daring adventures the incarnation and the atonement were! What a breach of convention and decorum that Almighty God should renounce his privileges in order to take human flesh and bear human sin! Jesus had no security except in his Father. So to follow Jesus is always to accept at least a measure of uncertainty, danger and rejection for his sake. — John R.W. Stott

We have rejected the position of dependence which our createdness inevitably involves, and made a bid for independence. Worse still, we have dared to proclaim our self-dependence, our autonomy, which is to claim the position occupied by God alone. — John R.W. Stott

For the discipleship principle is clear: the poorer our vision of Christ, the poorer our discipleship will be, whereas the richer our vision of Christ, the richer our discipleship will be. — John R.W. Stott