A. W. Tozer is so quotable that his words might well be called “Tozerisms.” Who knows, maybe someone has called them that? If not, I’ve coined the term and would like 50 cents every time it is used. J Here are some Tozerisms from my reading in The Root of the Righteous this morning.
“The Gospel not only furnishes transforming power to remold the human heart; it provides also a model after which the new life is to be fashioned, and that model is Christ himself. Christ is God acting like God in the lowly raiments of human flesh. Yet He is also man; so He becomes the perfect model after which redeemed human nature is to be fashioned.”
“The cross effects its end by destroying one established pattern, the victim’s, and creating another pattern, its own. Thus it always has its way. It wins by defeating the opponent and imposing its will upon him. It always dominates. It never compromises, never dickers or confers, never surrenders a point for the sake of peace. It cares not for peace; it cares only to end its opposition as fast as possible. With perfect knowledge of all this Christ said, ‘If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.’ So the cross not only brings Christ’s life to an end, it ends also the first life, the old life, of every one of His true followers. It destroys the old pattern, the Adam pattern, in the believer’s life, and brings it to an end. Then the God who raised Christ from the dead raises the believer and a new life begins.”
“There are before us two kinds of dying, a dying to be sought and a dying to be avoided at any cost . . . If we will not die then must die, and that death will mean the forfeiture of many of those everlasting treasures which the saints have cherished.”
“If men do not have joy in their hearts they will seek it somewhere else. If Christians are forbidden to enjoy the wine of the Spirit they will turn to the wine of the flesh for enjoyment . . . Our teachers took away our right to be happy in God and the human heart wreaked its terrible vengeance by going on a fleshly binge from which the evangelical Church will not soon recover, if indeed it ever does. For multitudes of professed Christians today the Holy Spirit is not a necessity. They have learned to cheer their hearts and warm their hands at other fires . . . The human heart with its divine capacity for holy pleasure must no longer be allowed to remain the victim of fear and bad teaching. Christ died for our hearts and the Holy Spirit wants to come and satisfy them.”
“The only true object of saving faith is none other than Christ Himself; not the ‘saviourhood’ of Christ nor the ‘lordship’ of Christ, but Christ Himself. God does not offer salvation to the one who will believe on one of the offices of Christ, nor is an office of Christ ever presented as an object of faith. Neither are we exhorted to believe on the atonement, nor on the cross, nor on the priesthood of the Saviour. All of these are embodied in the person of Christ, but they are never separated nor is one ever isolated from the rest. Much less are we permitted to accept one of Christ’s offices and reject another. The notion that we are so permitted is a modern day heresy . . . It is altogether doubtful whether any man can be saved who comes to Christ for His help but with no intention to obey Him. Christ’s saviorhood is forever united to His lordship.”
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