StephenBarkley.com » Weekend Wisdom

Starting from Scratch | Karl Barth

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 11:00:18 +0000

Theological work cannot be done on any level or in any respect other than by freely granting the free God room to dispose at will over everything that men may already have known, produced, and achieved, and over all the religious, moral, intellectual, spiritual, or divine equipage with which men have traveled.

—Karl Barth, Evangelical Theology, 166-7.

Freedom of the Gospel | Walter Brueggemann

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 11:00:33 +0000

The gospel message is precisely an invitation and authorization to be freed from all … distorting, coercive pressures: to be freely and completely Yahweh’s own people, freed to live a life of unfettered worship, assured not only of safety from threat but assured of Yahweh’s own person, who is the true joy of life.

—Walter Brueggemann, Isaiah 40-66, 140.

God’s Joy in our Blood | Frederick Buechner

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 11:00:49 +0000

God created us in joy and created us for joy, and in the long run not all the darkness there is in the world and in ourselves can separate us finally from that joy, because whatever else it means to say that God created us in his image, I think it means that even when we cannot believe in him, even when we feel most spiritually bankrupt and deserted by him, his mark is deep within us. We have God’s joy in our blood.

—Frederick Buechner, “The Great Dance” in Secrets in the Dark: A Life in Sermons, 240.

Engagement Ring | Martin Luther

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 11:00:19 +0000

Faith is the engagement ring which betroths us to Christ.

—Martin Luther, Luther’s Works: Sermons on the Gospel of St. John Chapters 1-4, 334.

Belief Before Action | Robert Barron

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 11:00:24 +0000

Right belief is the necessary condition for right action, not the other way round.

—Robert Barron, Catholicism: A Journey to the Heart of the Faith, 22.

Death Next to Life | Frederick Buechner

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 11:00:18 +0000

What’s lost is nothing to what’s found, and all the death that ever was, set next to life, would scarcely fill a cup.

—Frederick Buechner, Godric, 96.

Faith is Communion | Karl Barth

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 11:00:19 +0000

Christian faith occurs in the encounter of the believer with him in whom he believes. It consists in communion, not in identification, with him.

—Karl Barth, Evangelical Theology: An Introduction, 99.

Spirit Inspired Thoughts? | Martin Luther

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 11:00:00 +0000

Do not trust yourself to your own opinions, but take them to Christ and see whether they are in conformity with the faith (Rom. 12:7) and the Word of the holy Gospel. I, too, occasionally have beautiful and splendid thoughts, and I believe that the Holy Spirit inspired them. But when I judge them in the light of faith, I realize that they are sheer filth, sinful and impure.

—Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, Vol. 22: Sermons on the Gospel of St. John Chapters 1—4, 272.

Where Have Our Sins Gone? | Martin Luther

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 11:00:05 +0000

It is extremely important that we know where our sins have been disposed of. The Law deposits them on our conscience and shoves them into our bosom. But God takes them from us and places them on the shoulders of the Lamb.

—Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, Vol. 22: Sermons on the Gospel of St. John Chapters 1—4, 169.

Love is a Gift | Rudolf Bultmann

Stephen Barkley — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 11:00:37 +0000

Love is not a general human possibility, but a gift. More exactly, the possibility of love is given as a gift which must be repeatedly realized by the believer.

—Rudolph Bultmann, The Johannine Epistles, 1 John 3:24 (59).