I wanted to post the quote I read from Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hands, written by Paul Tripp.  I also have added two more that are excellent!  May God continue to build us by His Spirit into the church He wants us to be!

“The church is full of people dealing with the effects of sin, people who are not fully formed into the image of Jesus Christ. The church is full of people who have lost their way and don’t even know it, who haven’t made a connection between their daily problems and the transforming grace of Christ. Everywhere you look, you will find couples who are struggling to love, parents who are struggling to be patient, children who are attracted to temptations, and friends who battle the disappointments of imperfect relationships. This is 100 percent of the church’s membership!  The church is not a theological classroom. It is a conversion, confession, repentance, reconciliation, forgiveness, and sanctification center, where flawed people place their trust in Christ, gather to know and love him better, and learn to love others as he has designed. The church is messy and inefficient, but it s God’s wonderful mess – the place where he radically transforms hearts and lives.”

“I am deeply persuaded that the foundation for people-transforming ministry is not sound theology; it is love. Without love, our theology is a boat without oars. Love is what drove God to send and sacrifice his Son. Love led Christ to subject himself to a sinful world and the horrors of the cross. Love is what causes him to seek and save the lost, and to persevere until each of his children is transformed into his image. His love will not rest until all of his children are at his side in glory. The hope of every sinner does not rest in theological answers but in the love of Christ for his own. Without it, we have no hope personally, relationally, or eternally.  This love is not a band-aid attempting to cope with a cancerous world. It is effective and persevering. It is jealous, intent on owning us without competition. It faces the facts of who we are and how we need to change and simply goes to work. Any hope for the problems we face – with our own hearts and with a dark and corrupt world – is found in the love of the Lord Jesus Christ for us.”

“When we forget the call to incarnate the love of Christ, we take our relationships as our own. Soon they are governed by our pleasure, comfort, and ease. We get irritated at people who interfere with these things, and much of our anger is due to the fact that we are relationship thieves. People do not belong to us; they belong to God! Relationships between sinners are messy, difficult, labor-intensive, and demanding, but in that, they are designed to result in God’s glory and our good as he is worshiped and our hearts are changed. Effective personal ministry begins when we confess that we have taken relationships that belong to God and used them for our own selfish purposes.  When we have confessed and repented, we are ready to ask what role our relationships can play in the work Christ wants to do. If the relationships God gives us are not mere luxuries for our own happiness, what is God’s plan for them?  God’s relationship to us is loving and redemptive, and he wants our relationships to mirror those qualities.”