These 20 quotes caught my attention as I read Russell Moore’s The Courage to Stand: Facing Your Fear without Losing Your Soul (B&H, 2020). You can also hear his recent Gospelbound interview with Collin Hansen.
We do not see in Elijah a picture of courage-through-triumph but of courage-through-crucifixion. Elijah is not, then, a “role-model” or example for us of courage. His life was a dramatic enactment, ahead of time, of the cross, just as your life is a dramatic enactment, after the fact, of that same cross. . . . The “fire from heaven” Elijah is explained by the “lost in the wilderness” Elijah, not the other way around, just as the glory we have in Jesus is explained by the crucified Christ, and not the other way around. (25, 27)
What it means to “stand” for Christ is not, it turns out, to evacuate our internal lives of all fear, or to humiliate our enemies with incontrovertible “winning,” but instead to live out in our very lives the drama of the cross. . . . The courage to stand is the courage to be crucified. (28)
The problem is that much of what is actually defined as courage in Scripture—the bridling of the passions, kindness, humility—is seen as timidity, while many who feel themselves “courageous” because they “tell it like it is” are really just seeking to be part of their protective tribes. (31)
Elijah walked that Way, and so must you. Your courage will not be found in your triumphant Mount Carmel moments, when you scatter your enemies, real and imagined, from in front of you, and when you can see clearly how protected and accepted you are. Your courage will be forged instead, like that of Elijah and everyone else who has followed this path, when you cannot stand on your own at all, when you are collapsed in the wild places, maybe even begging for death. Like Elijah, you will hear the words, “What are you doing here?” Elijah thought he was walking to Mount Sinai, but he was really walking toward Mount Calvary. And so are you. Only the crucifiable self can find the courage to stand. Do not be afraid. (33–34)
No matter what people assume, there is no call for Christians to participate in every argument going on around them. (49)
Usually, the sort of people who find themselves in constant quarrels would be in such quarrels no matter what religion, or no religion, they inhabit. . . . Quarrels are mostly about the very same thing: not about persuading opponents or making a difference in the world, but causing the quarreler to feel alive. (52, 55)
When it comes to the Devil’s first power over us—deception—[his] craftiness is a useful tool. But when it comes to his final power over us—accusation—his strength is not in his cunning but in his honesty. The Devil tells us lies about the consequences of sin, until we are guilty, and then he prosecutes us unrelentingly for that sin. (77)
When we are united to Christ, we are no longer to cringe before the thought of Judgment Day. That’s because we no longer have the pressure to make the case for our own innocence. Our case is thoroughly debunked. At the cross, God has already revealed our guilt. In our repentance from sin, we have already agreed with his verdict, and our ongoing confession of sin reaffirms that agreement. Judgment Day happened for us, in a very real sense, already, at the Place of the Skull outside the gates of Jerusalem two millennia ago. (84)
It simply is not true that we live in a time without judgment, no matter how we may want to view ourselves. Our age has replaced the Judgment Seat of Christ with nothing but with a countless number of little judgment seats. Not only this, but the ultimate penalty of those judgment seats is the dispensing of shame and exile. Whether in a middle school cafeteria or in a theological seminary faculty lounge or in a nursing home game room, the ultimate punishment is to be told, “You are not one of us; go away.” That is shame. And the fear of that kind of shame leads people to hide themselves in whatever crowd they need in order to belong. (91)
Much of what emotionally mobilizes the twenty-first-century North American church is not related to Christian life or doctrine or mission, but to “Christianity” as a set of values under siege by others. Whether one is trying to conform Christianity to the dominant culture or whether one is trying to rail against that dominant culture by conforming Christianity to the tribal values of a “Christian” subculture, the end result is same: exhaustion. It’s hard to keep up with all the compromises one is called upon to make. (134–35)
The so-called “prosperity gospel” is not a branch of historic Christianity, nor is it is a new religious movement. The prosperity gospel is a revival movement—reviving ancient Canaanite fertility worship. This is not the gospel of Jesus Christ, but witchcraft. (154)
In a time of the idolatry of winning and displaying, we can often tell what we really care about by what ignites our passions, what drives up our blood pressure. And, in our time, those are usually not about the mission of the gospel but about the identity politics of seeing “our side” as better than some other group. (170)
Our cultural and moral and policy debates are important. . . . But if our passions demonstrate that these things are most important to us, are central to our identity, then we have veered into a place we should not go. That’s why North American Christianity is sick and weak, and doesn’t even know it. We are bored by what the Bible reveals as mysterious and glorious, and red-in-the-face about what hardly matters in the broad sweep of eternity. And why? We clamor for the kind of power the world can recognize, while ignoring the very power of God that comes through Christ and him crucified. (171)
The path of the cruciform life does not, in fact, “work” if we judge it by the standards of success that have enveloped us since birth. . . . In the short-run, eye-for-an-eye Darwinism produces much better results than Sermon-on-the-Mount Christianity. (174–75)
Something about us is almost hardwired to seek safety in the herd. . . . We wish to hide from God, and often the vehicle of our hiding is behind each other, to be lost in the crowd. (189)
Whatever it is that God has called you to do, recognize that if there weren’t people who hate what you’re doing, that would only be because you were not doing anything needed. You endure naysayers for the sake of those God has called you to serve (sometimes the future selves of those same naysayers!). (197)
The difference between “moralism” and “morality” is the difference between whether the morality is motivated and defined by the gospel, or whether the morality is the gospel. (230)
God will usually see to it that most of what he does through you is invisible to you. Sometimes it will even look as though you are failing. . . . That’s not the way of the hero. But it is the way of the disciple. (242, 244)
The worst thing that can possibly happen to you is hell, being cut off from the presence of God, condemned under the curse of the Law. If you are in Christ, then you are crucified with him (Gal. 2:20). That means your worst-case scenario has already happened, and can never be repeated. (276)
I don’t know whether your obituary will end with an address for flowers to be sent, or a charity to which donations can be forwarded in your name. But I know that your real obituary—the real summation of your life—does not end with any of those things. Your real obituary ends with the words: “To be continued.” It’s not just that your life “turns out all right in the end,” but that at the end of what you think is your life is when your life is just getting started. (282)
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