As John says, a complete record of Jesus’s ministry would be impossible. To write them down one by one would be a mammoth task. John could’ve recounted another seven miracles—or another seventy. He could’ve included dozens of volumes of sermons, like we have for Charles Spurgeon and some of the other great preachers. If he wanted to, John could have told us what Jesus was like as a child: “He did many other things…” Yet John has told us about what is most important: the saving work of Jesus.

We want to know more about the bad stuff sometimes: the gossip, the bad news, someone’s dirty secrets. Other times we want to know about good things like the intricacies of creation or the complexities of God’s Word.

When it comes to Jesus, we might also be curious. What was it like for him to grow up in Nazareth? How did He get along with his siblings? You can Google “childhood stories of Jesus” and find a whole collection of apocryphal tales. About his ministry too, we’re curious: What was Jesus really like? We know that He cried—but did He laugh? Or what was He doing between the day that He arose from the dead and when He ascended?
If we can’t let go of such questions, we should read John 21:25. There John writes,

Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.

This verse comes at the very end of the Fourth Gospel as an editorial aside. John wants us to know something about the story that he’s told as a witness of Jesus’s ministry. He acknowledges that in telling the story, he has had to be selective. When it came time to put pen to papyrus, he had to pick and choose.
When we place John’s Gospel alongside Matthew, Mark and Luke, we see how accurate his comment is. For among these four Gospels, John’s is quite different. For instance, he records only seven specific miracles, while the others record many more. There are important things absent from John’s gospel, like Jesus’s birth in Bethlehem, and his parables, the first Lord’s Supper and the risen Jesus’s departure from earth. Compared to the other three Gospels, it’s obvious that John is only a partial account.
This is even more obvious when we set John’s 21 chapters alongside Jesus’s life. Just consider how long Jesus’s ministry was: roughly three years, more than a thousand days. Jesus used those years as full of opportunities to do his Father’s will: teaching, healing, helping, interacting with his disciples and crowds and Jewish leaders.

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It is hoped these 27 quotes will spur you on to read more of the man. “Most Christians are not joyful persons because they are not holy persons and they are not holy persons because they are not filled with the Holy Spirit, and they are not filled with the Holy Spirit because they are not separated persons. The Spirit cannot fill whom He cannot separate, and whom He cannot fill He cannot make holy, and whom He cannot make holy, He cannot make happy!”

In my irregular series of articles featuring key quotes from key Christians, I have done a number of them on the matter of holiness. No believer can deny that holiness is one of the most important and most often addressed themes in all of Scripture.
And I take it that most believers would know that one of the great Christians to speak and write on this biblical truth so often was the great American pastor A. W. Tozer. Those who want to know more about him can check out this article: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2009/10/02/notable-christians-a-w-tozer/
Most of Tozer’s sermons and writings in one way or another returned to this grand topic of holiness. Some of his books were totally given over to this topic. One of his most notable works is The Knowledge of the Holy. But any of his books and articles are also worth reading on this.
Here I provide, without references, just a few of many inspiring quotes, listed from shorter ones to longer ones. It is hoped these 27 quotes will spur you on to read more of the man.
“The true Christian ideal is not to be happy but to be holy.”
“Christians don’t tell lies they just go to church and sing them.”
“You knew one thing about a man who was carrying a cross out of the city… you knew he wasn’t coming back.”
“Every man is as holy as he really wants to be.”
“The holy man is not one who cannot sin. A holy man is one who will not sin.”
“It is because of the hasty and superficial conversation with God that the sense of sin is so weak and that no motives have power to help you to hate and flee from sin as you should.”
“No man should desire to be happy who is not at the same time holy. He should spend his efforts in seeking to know and do the will of God, leaving to Christ the matter of how happy he should be.”
“The vague and tenuous hope that God is too kind to punish the ungodly has become a deadly opiate for the consciences of millions.”
“I cannot think of even one lonely passage in the New Testament which speaks of Christ’s revelation, manifestation, appearing or coming that is not directly linked with moral conduct, faith and spiritual holiness.”
“Although God wants His people to be holy as He is holy, He does not deal with us according to the degree of our holiness but according to the abundance of His mercy. Honesty requires us to admit this.”
“You cannot study the Bible diligently and earnestly without being struck by an obvious fact – the whole matter of personal holiness is highly important to God!”
“The spiritual giants of old would not take their religion the easy way nor offer unto God that which cost them nothing. They sought not comfort but holiness, and the pages of history are still wet with their blood and their tears.”
“We know nothing like the divine holiness. It stands apart, unique, unapproachable, incomprehensible and unattainable.”
“To love is also to hate. The heart that is drawn to righteousness will be repulsed by iniquity in the same degree. The holiest man is the one who loves righteousness most and hates evil with the most perfect hatred.”
“God is holy; and because He is holy, He is actively hostile toward sin. He must be. God can only burn on and burn on and burn on against sin forever. Never let any spiritual experience or any interpretation of Scripture lessen your hatred for sin.”
“We Christians must stop apologizing for our moral position and start making our voices heard, exposing sin as the enemy of the human race and setting forth righteousness and true holiness as the only worthy pursuits for moral beings.”
“Holy is the way God is. To be holy he does not conform to a standard. He is that standard. He is absolutely holy with an infinite, incomprehensible fullness of purity that is incapable of being other than it is. Because he is holy, all his attributes are holy; that is, whatever we think of as belonging to God must be thought of as holy.”
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The only work that can be described as holy, is to come and meet with God, fellowship with His people, worship Him, rest in His provision, and dine at His table. This is the most joyful, critical, and holy work that any of us could ever do, which is why the commandment is so clear in what it commands.

8 “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God; in it, you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you. 11 “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and made it holy. – Exodus 20:8-11

A Call to Remember
The fourth commandment begins with the word remember because it is all too easy for us to forget it. Even more, it is all too easy to forget that the command concerns a holy day and that we are to keep it as sacred by the word of Almighty God.
The word “holy” means to be set apart; it means wholly different, distinct, and extraordinary. If we are going to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy, our approach to this day must be fundamentally different from any other day in the week.
He Gave You Six Days
According to the command, we have six days to accomplish our labors; we have six days to work in our vocations; we have six days to work in our homes—to catch up on the laundry, to make meals, and clean the home; we have six days to mow our yards; six days to pay our bills; six days to attend events.
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Even though we might be considered strange now, and even judged because we think and act differently, the world is not the final judge. There is another judgment coming. And that judgment, in a sense, is going to bring about what is real normalcy. Because the way we think? The way we act? These are strange things now, but they won’t be strange then. 

Madeline L’Engle, the author of A Wrinkle in Time among other things, once said this about her faith: “We try to be too reasonable about what we believe. What I believe is not reasonable at all. It’s hilariously impossible.” And she’s right.
Of course, there are reasonable parts of Christianity – it is reasonable, for example, when you look at the complexity of the world around us to conclude that we do not exist by chance but by intelligent design. That’s a reasonable conclusion. But in other ways, the whole Christian faith and the Christian life that results from it is entirely unreasonable. We believe that there was a man born of a virgin who never sinned. And this man was not only a man, but is also God in the flesh. And we believe that this man died on the cross in our place and then was raised from the dead. We believe in an afterlife despite there not being any way to go there or examine it. This is what faith is, and in that way, it is unreasonable. That’s why it is a matter of faith.
Further, the lives we lead as Christians are strange. Very strange, when you compare them to the normal way of operating in the world. We are a strange people, and Peter knew it. He said as much in 1 Peter 2:11.
He called us strangers. Exiles. Aliens. People not of this world.
Then later, in chapter 4, he recognized that strangeness again.
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Scripture refers to a dynamic wind that is ever-present and permanent for the believer. The word “spirit” in both Hebrew and Greek means “wind” or “breath.” Both breeze and breath are appropriate images of the Holy Spirit. That wind or breath of air, first revealed in the creation (Genesis 2:7), arrived again in history on the Day of Pentecost.

It’s interesting how memories are aroused and brought to the fore. I was working a crossword puzzle online, and 9-down called for the name of a cold, dry European wind. Immediately, I typed in “MISTRAL.” How did I know the answer? I lived in France for five years—two in Montpellier and three in Marseille. In Marseille, Le Mistral blew in and often swept through the city. The French also called it le balai (the broom) as it blew down from the North to sweep the streets clean with its forceful winds.
Another wind blew northward from Africa’s Sahara, sweeping across the Mediterranean into and across France. Its name is Le Sirocco. This wind is known for its dry, hot, violent wind. When it blows, it sucks up Saharan sand and deposits it across the north African coast and into southern Europe. I first became acquainted with it when living in Tunisia, and also experienced its powerful effects in France. The African desert sand would blow across the Mediterranean Sea and reach France covering cars, buildings, and streets. Two fierce winds with names known to millions.
We name our intense winds, too, don’t we? El Nino and Nor’easter winds qualify. However, I confess that it’s Le Mistral and Le Sirocco that arouse more memories for me, especially memories of riding my moped on both continents in my younger and more daring years of my life. Besides the sights and experiences that they recall, they remind me of winds that buffet our lives—sometimes for good as refreshing and sometimes for ill as trials to contend with.
We can all remember the winds in our lives that rocked our world, battered self-esteem, or pummeled us into the reality that we aren’t as self-sufficient as we thought. They might have been harsh winds representing want or need. Perhaps our self-reliance faltered, an important relationship was broken, the loss of a loved one occurred, faith in the existence God was challenged, the loss of status in life, or dire health conditions. We can all agree that we have experienced strong and harsh winds in our journey through this life.
Nonetheless, such winds that came from either direction may have also brought refreshment, a breath of fresh, cool, soothing air in a very tense, hot period of our lives. Perhaps a friend or soul mate blew into our lives at just the right time, or God provided incredible, necessary help in a time of need, or we rose out of a spiritually dry period to experience renewed joy and hope, or someone spoke a word of encouragement when we couldn’t see light through our depressed, hopeless, clouded vision.
Such dynamic winds blow in and out and across our lives with mixed effects. One deposits something unwanted, like sand causing various problems. Another wind acts like a broom sweeping our lives clean of worry and concern, bringing refreshing clean, cool air. If an artist were to attempt to paint an image of these winds, one representation might be of one exhaling a strong breath across the earth. Le Mistral and Le Sirocco come and go. I’m happy to have experienced them both.
Scripture refers to a dynamic wind that is ever-present and permanent for the believer. The word “spirit” in both Hebrew and Greek means “wind” or “breath.” Both breeze and breath are appropriate images of the Holy Spirit. That wind or breath of air, first revealed in the creation (Genesis 2:7), arrived again in history on the Day of Pentecost. “When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. . . All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit . . .” (Acts 2: 1-4). When Jesus spoke to Nicodemus on the need to be born again, he said, “Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.” He explained to Nicodemus that the “wind blows wherever it pleases . . . you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So, it is with everyone born of the Spirit” (John 3: 6).
But there is more. Christians are filled with a wind, a breath of air—the Holy Spirit—at their spiritual birth! This is a wind that will blow only good in our lives, that is, good as God intends for our welfare, His purposes, and His glory. It may be a broom (le balai) at times bringing cleansing from sin into our lives. It may be the force behind worshiping God in Spirit and in truth, or of deeds of compassion and mercy to others. At other times it will be that breath of fresh air that encourages us to be steadfast in faith as we complete our life’s journey. It surpasses Le Mistral and Le Sirocco in impact—both temporal and eternal, and I am thankful to God for making it known to me.
Thanks to a crossword puzzle for prompting these thoughts.
Helen Louise Herndon is a member of Central Presbyterian Church (EPC) in St. Louis, Missouri. She is freelance writer and served as a missionary to the Arab/Muslim world in France and North Africa.
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We are to forgive others as God in Christ has forgiven us. We forgive as an expression of the kingdom and in the power of the kingdom. Freely dispensing the healing properties of forgiveness is one of the ways we seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness. We look to overlook offenses and give grace in the model of God to us. Forgiveness is a discipline of the kingdom of God. 

And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another,even as God in Christ forgave you. (Ephesians 4:32, NKJV)
From his imprisonment, John the Baptist sent two of his disciples to ask of Jesus: “Are You the Coming One, or do we look for another?” (Luke 7:19). Jesus didn’t reply to John’s question with a simple “yes.” Rather, He answered John by having him take stock of what he has witnessed. “Go and tell John the things you have seen and heard: that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have the gospel preached to them” (Luke 7:22).
Jesus was assuring John that the kingdom of God had indeed come. He was the promised Messiah.
What did Jesus point to in order to convince John? He pointed to healing. The fall of the world under the dominion of sin had wreaked havoc on what God had created. The intrusion of sin had brought misery, alienation, disorder, decay, and death.
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We are to look to the saints that have come before, the great cloud of witnesses. We are to battle sin in our flesh today and look forward to the finish line. And who is that finish line? Jesus himself, who has come before us, stands with us today, and stands in front of us. He is our hope.

Are you progressive or conservative? It seems like a simple enough question, but let me complicate it for you. The terms are both tethered to time. The term progressive looks forward. Progressives believe that the best is yet to come. We are growing, evolving and our policies ought to reflect our progressive enlightenment. Conservatives, on the other hand, preserve that which is good from the past. It is our job to aspire to and embody the charter set forth by our founding fathers.
Our politics have forced us to two sides of ring: those looking back and those looking forward. These totalizing lenses have robbed us of a fully orbed biblical ethical vision that directs our eyes forward, and backward, and straight down. And, above all, a biblical ethic casts our vision on a person.
Drawing inspiration from the letter to the Hebrews, let’s consider how we are to look:
Backward
As Christians, we are to look backward. God reminds the Jews again and again to remember. They were to set up cairns (stone monuments) in remembrance, their holidays were moments to recreate their history, and they were to recite their history to their children. In Hebrews 11, the author looks back at the history of faith among God’s people for encouragement and inspiration. He reminds us that by faith, “the people of old received their commendation” (Heb 11:2), and that these remembered faithful ones are those “of whom the world was not worthy” (Heb 11:38).
CS Lewis famously called our predisposition to disregard the wisdom of those who have come before as “chronological snobbery.” We would do well to heed the encouragement of the author of Hebrews and Lewis and not disregard those who have come before.
Forward
As Christians, we are to look forward. We are told that Abraham “was looking forward,” (Heb 11:10), and urged to do likewise. “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us” (Heb 12:1).
The best is not behind us, it lies ahead. We celebrate that we are those who live after Jesus, the incarnate Son of God has come and shown us the fullness of God in flesh. We rejoice that the Spirit of God has now come and indwells those who have put their trust in Jesus Christ. And we look forward to the second coming of Jesus, who will judge “the living and the dead” (2 Tim 4:1).
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God revealed Himself using the Urim and Thummim and did other things that are hard for us to believe today. God spoke from a burning bush (Exodus 3). He parted the Red Sea (Exodus 14). He made the sun stand still (Joshua 10). He allowed a donkey to talk (Numbers 22). The Urim and Thummim fade into history. They’re mentioned one last time in Nehemiah 7:65, but it’s unclear if they were ever found or used then.

I don’t know if you’ve thought much about the Urim and Thummim.
The first mention of them can be found in the book of Exodus 28. In verse 15, God tells Moses to make “make a breastpiece of judgment.” The CSB calls it “an embroidered breastpiece for making decisions.” In verse 30, we read:
And in the breastpiece of judgment you shall put the Urim and the Thummim, and they shall be on Aaron’s heart, when he goes in before the LORD. Thus Aaron shall bear the judgment of the people of Israel on his heart before the LORD regularly.
They seem to be part of the breastplate worn by the high priest of Israel. We don’t know what they looked like. Some believe they were two stones — possibly gemstones — or other objects, possibly inscribed with symbols or words. We don’t know for sure.
We also don’t know how they were used. Some think they were a form of lots, like casting dice or drawing straws. Some think that they spelled out answers. Others think that they had numbers on them, or that they had two sides, one saying “yes” and the other “no.” Others think they used colors.
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Predestination and election are not a result of the Fall, of Adam’s sin. As Romans 9 makes clear the Father’s designs for Jacob and Esau had nothing to do with who they became. They became who they were, one elect the other rebrobate, before anything was done by them. The more we mine the beauty and power of these truths the easier it becomes to be built up in love regardless of what failures men and women pile up in our faces. We look above and beyond the personal slights to see the glory of the one who has called us out of darkness and into the wonders of His marvelous light.

Frustration seems to be a large part of life. We often find ourselves in that emotional position because people who we expect things from, usually fairly minor things, can’t seem to meet even that low of a bar. Trust is not an easy thing to earn, but it is an easy thing to lose. Yet like most situations we as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are not meant to allow the failing of expectations to keep us from the kind of peace we see in our Savior throughout His earthly ministry. Did Jesus get mad at the disciples sometimes for their lack of faith or understanding? Sure. But one of the things we learn from Him in those moments is that Christ understood something far more important about each of the men He had called to follow Him. They were made in God’s image and they belonged to Him. They were sinners in need of grace and mercy. However, even in this our Lord’s discouragement with His disciples motivated Him not to abandon them, but to love them more, and to build them up in faith through the witness of love. He strove with them even unto the end, and beyond.
In today’s prayer and worship help we are going to think some more about how to be Christlike in a world where there seems to be so much disappointment. Paul’s testimony to this effect can be found in his letter to the church at Colosse. While they weren’t as bad as the Galatians or the Corinthians who received a tongue lashing from the Lord’s apostle there were still matters that he felt like needed to be pointed out to these young Christians. In most of chapter two the subject is false teaching, both from the Judaizers and the Greek philosophers. As we come to the third chapter Paul moves the conversation along to remind the folks here that as newborn believers in Jesus Christ their whole visage has changed and they no longer are to see themselves as they once were. This being born again is a necessary part of the salvation we have received. If we act, think, do, etc… the same as before we claimed the named of Jesus then it becomes clear that we know not Him. There has to be fruit born of repentance or there is no new heart or no grafting into the life-giving vine of Christ. A Christian tree bears Christian fruit. An unbelieving heart produces unbelieving fruit and we can see this primarily in how we react to the negative effects of sin in the world around us.
Do we pray for those who persecute us? Do we seek the redemption of the lost? Do we hope in all hope for those who sin against us?
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God’s Word is true and cannot be bound. God’s Word gives us a sure and certain hope for our future. That hope means, though we might suffer for it now, we have good reason to press on because we’ll be vindicated in the end.

We might faithfully speak God’s truth but where people believe lies, being right doesn’t mean we’ll be well received. The prophet Jeremiah spoke God’s truth and was right about everything he said. That didn’t stop him being beaten and put in the stocks. It didn’t stop people hating him because they hated his message.
Truth is always true but the truth is people don’t always welcome the truth. God’s Word may be right, but people don’t always want to hear what is right. We may share God’s Word as it is but people may hate us for it.
Nevertheless, it doesn’t matter how much people hate God’s Word or what they do to God’s people. God’s Word can’t be stopped. Truth remains true whether people want to hear it or not. God’s Word remains true whether people welcome it or not. God’s Word will come to pass whether people respond well to it or actively stand against it.
We may face the sharp end of the world’s hatred of God’s Word. We may be harmed and persecuted because of God’s Word. But the world cannot stop God’s Word. He promises that we’ll be vindicated in the end.
Unfortunately, knowing you’re right doesn’t make harm and persecution feel good.
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