January 26, 2017

Atheist Quotables - Thomas Nagel

 “I speak from experience, being strongly subject to this fear myself: I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn’t just that I don’t believe in God and, naturally, hope that I’m right in my belief. It’s that I hope there is no God! I don’t want there to be a God; I don’t want the universe to be like that. My guess is that this cosmic authority problem is not a rare condition and that it is responsible for much of the scientism and reductionism of our time. One of the tendencies it supports is the ludicrous overuse of evolutionary biology to explain everything about human life, including everything about the human mind …. This is a somewhat ridiculous situation …. [I]t is just as irrational to be influenced in one’s beliefs by the hope that God does not exist as by the hope that God does exist.”

Nagel, Thomas, "The Last Word", pp. 130–131, Oxford University Press, 1997. Dr Nagel, Professor of Philosophy and Law Emeritus at New York University

Quoatables - Charles Spurgeon

"Every Christian is either a missionary or an imposter."
 
— Charles Spurgeon

1st Clement - Chapter 56

"Let us then also pray for those who have fallen into any sin, that meekness and humility may be given to them, so that they may submit, not unto us, but to the will of God. For in this way they shall secure a fruitful and perfect remembrance from us, with sympathy for them, both in our prayers to God, and our mention of them to the saints. Let us receive correction, beloved, on account of which no one should feel displeased. Those exhortations by which we admonish one another are both good [in themselves] and highly profitable, for they tend to unite us to the will of God. For thus saith the holy Word: “The Lord hath severely chastened me, yet hath not given me over to death.” “For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth.” “The righteous,” saith it, “shall chasten me in mercy, and reprove me; but let not the oil of sinners make fat my head.” And again he saith, “Blessed is the man whom the Lord reproveth, and reject not thou the warning of the Almighty. For He causes sorrow, and again restores [to gladness]; He woundeth, and His hands make whole. He shall deliver thee in six troubles, yea, in the seventh no evil shall touch thee. In famine He shall rescue thee from death, and in war He shall free thee from the power of the sword. From the scourge of the tongue will He hide thee, and thou shalt not fear when evil cometh. Thou shalt laugh at the unrighteous and the wicked, and shalt not be afraid of the beasts of the field. For the wild beasts shall be at peace with thee: then shalt thou know that thy house shall be in peace, and the habitation of thy tabernacle shall not fail. Thou shall know also that thy seed shall be great, and thy children like the grass of the field. And thou shall come to the grave like ripened corn which is reaped in its season, or like a heap of the threshing-floor which is gathered together at the proper time.” Ye see, beloved, that protection is afforded to those that are chastened of the Lord; for since God is good, He corrects us, that we may be admonished by His holy chastisement."

January 25, 2017

January 22, 2017

Quotables - R.C. Sproul

Because there are no expendable or disposable people, every life is worth honoring, protecting, and saving.

- R.C. Sproul

January 19, 2017

Quotables - Albert Mohler

"What we laugh at, we will come to terms with."

- Albert Mohler, President: Southern Baptist Seminary

January 14, 2017

Two Ways to say the Same Thing

Finalizing the divorce yesterday has evoked in me tremendous feelings of failure as a man.

There may be no greater way of evoking a feeling of failure in manhood than signing an unwanted divorce.

January 11, 2017

Thomas Sowell - Quotables

"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance."

"The problem isn't that Johnny can't read. The problem isn't even that Johnny can't think. The problem is that Johnny doesn't know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling."

"The next time some academics tell you how important diversity is, ask how many Republicans there are in their sociology department."

"Those who cry out that the government should 'do something' never even ask for data on what has actually happened when the government did something, compared to what actually happened when the government did nothing."

"The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive."

"People who enjoy meetings should not be in charge of anything."

"The welfare state is not really about the welfare of the masses. It is about the egos of the elites."

"The least productive people are usually the ones who are most in favor of holding meetings."

"Liberals seem to assume that, if you don't believe in their particular political solutions, then you don't really care about the people that they claim to want to help."

"The old adage about giving a man a fish versus teaching him how to fish has been updated by a reader: Give a man a fish and he will ask for tartar sauce and French fries! Moreover, some politician who wants his vote will declare all these things to be among his 'basic rights.'"

"One of the common failings among honorable people is a failure to appreciate how thoroughly dishonorable some other people can be, and how dangerous it is to trust them."

"Without a moral framework, there is nothing left but immediate self-indulgence by some and the path of least resistance by others. Neither can sustain a free society."

"The more people who are dependent on government handouts, the more votes the left can depend on for an ever-expanding welfare state."

"Too much of what is called 'education' is little more than an expensive isolation from reality."

"Mystical references to society and its programs to help may warm the hearts of the gullible but what it really means is putting more power in the hands of bureaucrats."

"Mistakes can be corrected by those who pay attention to facts but dogmatism will not be corrected by those who are wedded to a vision."

"There is no question that liberals do an impressive job of expressing concern for blacks. But do the intentions expressed in their words match the actual consequences of their deeds?"

"What is ominous is the ease with which some people go from saying that they don't like something to saying that the government should forbid it. When you go down that road, don't expect freedom to survive very long."

"Much of the social history of the Western world, over the past three decades, has been a history of replacing what worked with what sounded good."

"It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong."

"The big divide in this country is not between Democrats and Republicans, or women and men, but between talkers and doers."

"It is amazing that people who think we cannot afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, and medication somehow think that we can afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, medication and a government bureaucracy to administer it."

Quotables - John Murray

It is one thing for sin to live in us; it is another for us to live in sin.

—John Murray

January 06, 2017

Atheist Quotables - Michael Ruse, FRSC

"Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion—a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality. I am an ardent evolutionist and an ex-Christian, but I must admit that in this one complaint—and Mr [sic] Gish is but one of many to make it—the literalists are absolutely right. Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today."

"… Evolution therefore came into being as a kind of secular ideology, an explicit substitute for Christianity."

- Michael Ruse, FRSC - Lucyle T. Werkmeister Professor and Director of HPS Program at Florida State University

January 05, 2017

"Judge Not" - Quotables - D. Martin Lloyd-Jones

"What is the danger against which our Lord is warning us? We can say first of all that is it it is a kind of spirit, a spirit which manifests itself in certain ways. What is this spirit that condemns? It is a self-righteous spirit. Self is always at the back of it, and it is always a manifestation of self righteousness, a feeling of superiority, and a feeling that we are all right while others are not. That then leads to a censoriousness, and a spirit that is always ready to express itself in a derogatory manner. And then, accompanying that, there is the tendency to despise others, to regard them with contempt. I am not only describing the Pharisees, I am describing all who have the spirit of the Pharisee.
 
It seems to me, further, that a very vital part of this spirit is the tendency to be hypercritical... Criticism in a true sense is never merely destructive; it is constructive, it is appreciation. There is all the difference in the world between exercising criticism and being hypercritical. The man who is guilty of judging, in the sense in which our Lord uses the term here, is the man who is hypercritical, which means that he delights in criticism for its own sake and enjoys it. I am afraid I must go further and say that he is a man who approaches anything which he is asked to criticize expecting to find faults, indeed, almost hoping to find them.
 
The simplest way, perhaps, of putting all this is to ask you to read I Corinthians xiii. Look at the negative of everything positive which Paul says about love. Love 'hopeth all things', but this Spirit hopes for the worst; it gets a malicious, malign satisfaction in finding faults and blemishes. It is a spirit that is always expecting them, and is almost disappointed if it does not find them; it is always on the look-out for them, and rather delights in them. There is no question about that, the hypercritical spirit is never really happy unless it finds these faults. And, of course, the result of all this is that it tends to fix attention upon matters that are indifferent and to make of them matters of vital importance. The best commentary in this connection is found in Romans xiv where Paul tells the Romans at great length to avoid judging one another in matters like food and drink, and regarding one day above another. They have been exalting these matters to a supreme position, and judging and condemning in terms of these things. But Paul tells them that that is all wrong. 'The kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost', he says (Romans xiv. 17). One may observe one day, and another, another. 'Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.' But the thing to remember, he says, is that you are all being judged by God. The Lord is the Judge. Furthermore, you do not decide whether a man is a Christian or not by regarding his views on matters such as these, which are unimportant, and matters of indifference. There are essential matters in connection with the faith, matters about which they must be no doubt, while others are matters of indifference. We must never elevate the latter into matters of vital importance.
 
That is more or less the spirit of the man who is guilty of judgement. I am not applying all this as we go along. I trust that the Holy Spirit is enabling us to do so. If we ever know the feeling of being rather pleased when we hear something unpleasant about another, that is the wrong spirit. If we are jealous, or envious, and then suddenly hear that the one of whom we are jealous or envious has made a mistake and find that there is an immediate sense of pleasure with us, that is it. That is the condition which leads to this spirit of judgment."
 
- D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, from 'Studies in the Sermon on the Mount', Vol 2., Chapter 15 "Judge Not", page 166-168.