Author Archives: Matt Jury

The Beautiful Sunset on Good Friday

Posted on by under John Piper

The climax of the glory of His [Jesus Christ’s] life on earth was the way it ended. It was as if all the darker colors in the spectrum of glory came together in the most beautiful sunset on Good Friday, with the crucified Christ as the blood-red sun in the crimson sky. And it was as if all the brighter colors in the spectrum of glory came together in the most beautiful sunrise on Easter morning, with the risen Christ as the golden sun shining in full strength. Both the glory of the sunset and the glory of the sunrise shone on the horizon of a lifetime of incomparable beautiful love.

John Piper, God Is the Gospel (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2005), 65.

Do You Think God Is an Angry Being?

Posted on by under J. C. Ryle

Beware of the common idea that God the Father is only an angry Being, whom sinful man can only regard with fear, and from whom he must flee to Christ for safety. Cast it aside as a baseless and unscriptural notion. Contend earnestly for all the attributes of God, — for His holiness and His justice, as well as for His love. But never allow for one moment that there is any want of love towards sinners in any Person in the Blessed Trinity. Oh! no! Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Ghost. The Father loves, and the Son loves, and the Holy Ghost loves. The cross is the effect of the Father’s love, and not the cause. Redemption is the result of the compassion of all three Persons in the Trinity. To place the Father and the Son in opposition one to another, is weak and crude theology. Christ died, not because God the Father hated, but because He loved the world.

J. C. Ryle, Do You Believe?

We Don’t Realize How Desperately We Need Christ

Posted on by under Jerry Bridges

We are not just dependent on Him [Christ]; we are desperately dependent on him. Because we so often equate Christlike character with ordinary morality, we fail to realize how impossible it is for us to attain any degree of conformity to Christ by ourselves. But if we take seriously the long list of Christlike character traits we are to put on, we see how impossible it is to grow in Christlikeness apart from the sanctifying influence and power of the Spirit in our lives.

Jerry Bridges, Transforming Grace (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1991), 115.