Monday, January 23, 2012

The Cross Seems Silly When God is Shrunk and Man is Elevated

“All inadequate doctrines of the atonement are due to inadequate doctrines of God and man. If we bring God down to our level and raise ourselves to his, then of course we see no need for a radical salvation, let alone for a radical atonement to secure it. When, on the other hand, we have glimpsed the blinding glory of the holiness of God, and have been so convicted of our sin by the Holy Spirit that we tremble before God and acknowledge what we are, namely ‘hell–deserving sinners’, then and only then does the necessity of the cross appear so obvious that we are astonished we never saw it before.”
- John Stott, The Cross of Christ, 109

(HT:  OFI)

1 comment:

Jeremy Larson said...

More good quotes from Stott here (http://themundanemuse.blogspot.com/2011/12/john-stott-on-double-imputation.html) and here (http://themundanemuse.blogspot.com/2011/12/more-stott-quotes.html).