Mark Dever Quotes About Church

Quotes about: Church

• When a person becomes a Christian, he doesn’t just join a local church because it’s a good habit for growing in spiritual maturity. He joins a local church because it’s the expression of what Christ has made him—a member of the body of Christ.

  Mark Dever

  Christian, Spiritual, Maturity

• As long as quick numerical growth remains the primary indicator of church health, the truth will be compromised. Instead, churches must once again begin measuring success not in terms of numbers but in terms of fidelity to the Scriptures.

  Mark Dever

  Numbers, Long, Growth

  Mark Dever (2012). “The Church: The Gospel Made Visible”, p.12, B&H Publishing Group

• A healthy church is not a church that's perfect and without sin. It has not figured everything out. Rather, it's a church that continually strives to take God's side in the battle against the ungodly desires and deceits of the world, our flesh, and the devil. It's a church that continually seeks to conform itself to God's Word.

  Mark Dever

  Perfect, Healthy, Church

• Friend, the church finds its life as it listens to the Word of God. It finds its purpose as it lives out and displays the Word of God. The church’s job is to listen and then to echo.

  Mark Dever

  Jobs, Echoes, Church

• The church arises only from the gospel. And a distorted church usually coincides with a distorted gospel.

  Mark Dever

  Church, Arise

  Mark Dever (2012). “The Church: The Gospel Made Visible”, p.10, B&H Publishing Group

• T]he church is not a place. It's not a building. It's not a preaching point. It's not a spiritual service provider. It's a people - the new covenant, blood-bought people of God. That's why Paul said, 'Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her' (Eph. 5:25). He didn't give himself up for a place, but for a people.

  Mark Dever

  Spiritual, Blood, People

• According to the New Testament, the church is primarily a body of people who profess and give evidence that they have been saved by God's grace alone, for His glory alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

  Mark Dever

  People, Giving, Grace

• Christian proclamation might make the gospel audible, but Christians living together in local congregations make the gospel visible (see John 13:34-35). The church is the gospel made visible.

  Mark Dever

  Christian, Together, Church

  Mark Dever (2012). “The Church: The Gospel Made Visible”, p.11, B&H Publishing Group

• Membership is the church's corporate endorsement of a person's salvation.

  Mark Dever

  Church, Membership, Salvation

• If you are not a member of the church you regularly attend, you may well be going to hell.

  Mark Dever

  Church, May, Hell

• I heard about a pastor in a church of 5,000 people who employed two seminary students whose main responsibility was to get four new people baptized each week. When asked, "What happens if they can't meet the quota?", his response was, "Then I'll find two students who can". This man wasn't even remotely interested in true gospel preaching. He was results-driven.

  Mark Dever

  Responsibility, Men, Two

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• A church is not a Fortune 500 company. It's not simply another nonprofit organization, nor is it a social club. In fact, a healthy church is unlike any organization that man has ever devised, because man didn't devise it.

  Mark Dever

  Men, Organization, Healthy

• We can't know at any given time how God will bless our faithful witness. So the apparent numerical growth of the church is never a good guide to how faithful we have been in evangelism.

  Mark Dever

  Faithful, Growth, Church

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• There are times when the gospel just seems to be powerfully at work in a nation, and thousands upon thousands are converted. If you think about what has happened in Latin America, Africa and East Asia all in the last hundred years, it is breathtaking. We have seen an expansion of the gospel as we have never seen before in the history of the church.

  Mark Dever

  Latin, Thinking, Years

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• Worldliness in the church is a lot more pervasive than a lack of passion for evangelism. Nevertheless, one of the results of worldliness is a waning enthusiasm for evangelism.

  Mark Dever

  Passion, Church, Enthusiasm

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• I don't have any way to control the Spirit or create revival. I pray that the Holy Spirit would move upon the church, but at the same time, I want to busy evangelizing. I am not one of those people who moan and pray for revival all the time, but do nothing.

  Mark Dever

  Moving, People, Church

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• Unfortunately, many of our churches calibrate their life to these nominal Christians. The predictable result is that you get fake, hypocritical churches that confuse the message of the gospel and make it hard for others who are trying to do genuine evangelism.

  Mark Dever

  Christian, Fake, Church

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• I think many people in the church are probably concerned that they can't answer all the questions that might come up. I am sure this affects people by playing on their doubts - especially if they have their own questions that they are wrestling with.

  Mark Dever

  Wrestling, Thinking, People

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• I know a girl who has become a really enthusiastic Christian. I remember meeting her several years ago. She lived in a house near us. She was standing out the front smoking, not apparently interested in religious things, but she did have a respect for spiritual matters when I spoke to her. So as we talked, she expressed an interest, and began to come to church occasionally. Over the years, I have watched her come to Christ, be converted, baptized and changed in wonderful ways. It's a real joy to me when I see things like this.

  Mark Dever

  Girl, Christian, Spiritual

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

• The church is the gospel made visible.

  Mark Dever

  Church, Made, Visible

• As a pastor, I have the opportunity every week to share the gospel publicly in a way that most of the members sitting in our church do not. However, that doesn't absolve them of the responsibility for reaching others with the gospel.

  Mark Dever

  Responsibility, Opportunity, Church

  Source: matthiasmedia.com

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