Though the Christian faith is grounded in the belief that Christ is the ultimate revelation of the Father, I contend that Christ’s life, ministry, and teachings are intelligible only within the framework of the history of Israel as recorded within the Old Testament. Christ himself drew on the sacred texts of Israel, and the earliest records we have of the incarnate life of the Son interprets him within this framework, sometimes by clear citation formulas — “Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet” (Matt. 1:22) — and sometimes through less direct allusions, as when Matthew depicts Jesus as the new Moses. This fact prompts me to hold two principles. First, what I have elsewhere called the inspiration principle requires that we see these biblical texts as exceeding merely human records. If these texts are necessary to understand God’s self-revelation in the Son, and if true human knowledge of God must participate in the archetypal knowledge that God has of himself, then Christians must take it as an article of faith that these texts participate in God’s knowledge by inspiration. Second, the fact that Jesus must be interpreted within the context of these older texts prompts a canonical principle. Again, if these books are necessary in understanding Jesus, then they must be included in theological analysis and thus rendered as canon, while other texts that are not equally important in interpreting Christ within his historical context are excluded from having equal authority. Only the canon is fully normative in theology.

A dogmatic account of the Trinity thus begins with the affirmation of the Bible as Scripture — a specific canon of texts viewed as uniquely communicating God’s knowledge of God in a manner appropriate to human knowledge.

D. Glenn Butner Jr., Trinitarian Dogmatics, 5-6.

What do the early papyri add to our understanding of the textual heritage of the Catholic Epistles other than their early dates? I submit that the answer is ‘But little’, and even to emphasize their early dates is deceptive . . . In conclusion, we need to ask why it is that the papyri are privileged by most textual critics and editors of an apparatus criticus. Who first promoted their supremely great authority? . . . Some papyri have obviously achieved their greatness just because of their age, and thereby allowing an insight into a tantalizing period in the life the text preceding the time of the great uncials and often problematizing the nature of their text. They are like elder statesmen basking in their own longevity, revered as custodians of an otherwise lost link to the distant past. But most papyri have had their greatness thrust upon them, whatever the dates allocated to them by palaeographers (and a significant number of papyri are indeed later than the fifth century), partly because they are all of recent discovery, thus making their arrival on a scholar’s radar relatively newsworthy, partly because most are published soon after they are unearthed so gaining for themselves a popularity due to their being quickly in the public domain, and partly because the gullible believe that there is an unwarranted magic associated with their having been written on papyrus.

The Early Text of the Catholic Epistles by J. K. Elliott in The Early Text of the New Testament, eds. Charles E. Hill & Michael J. Kruger, 223-224.

Don’t domesticate God’s grace. It is so much better than we realize.

David Platt, Jim Shaddix, and Matt Mason, Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary: Exalting Jesus in Psalms 51-100, 378.

As a Christian, when you think of things that light you up the most about the Christian faith, what comes to mind — the things you’re currently doing or the things Jesus has done? Friend, the Christian gospel isn’t fundamentally an exhortation. It is a report of what God has done to rescue sinners.

David Platt, Jim Shaddix, and Matt Mason, Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary: Exalting Jesus in Psalms 51-100, 377.

The Christian life is fueled by remembrance.

David Platt, Jim Shaddix, and Matt Mason, Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary: Exalting Jesus in Psalms 51-100, 375.

God’s Word always addresses people. It’s always personal, and it always speaks to real need. And there’s always help.

David Platt, Jim Shaddix, and Matt Mason, Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary: Exalting Jesus in Psalms 51-100, 375.

Q. What doth the preface to the Lord’s prayer teach us in general? — A. To begin our prayers with exalted and adoring views of God, Nehemiah 9:5-6 [Then the Levites, Jeshua, Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabneiah, Sherebiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah, said, “Stand up and bless the LORD your God from everlasting to everlasting. Blessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise. You are the LORD, you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them; and you preserve all of them; and the host of heaven worships you.]

John Brown of Haddington, Questions and Answers on the Shorter Catechism, 343.

“The first act of the love of God the Father wherein there is anything ad extra, or without the divine essence, is the person of Christ considered as invested with our nature.”

John Owen [Works, 9:614] quoted in Kelly M. Kapic, Christian Life, 73.

Owen’s claim [quoted above] . . . does not chiefly concern chronology but priority and purity, telos, and goodness.

Kelly M. Kapic, Christian Life, 78.

Sin disorders everything, from our heads to our hearts, from the land to political systems, from our souls to the social structures we inhabit. A realist analysis of Christian life will include, in its proper place, an examination of this disorder. Everything is not terrible, but there is no part of God’s good creation that hasn’t been affected by sin.

Kelly M. Kapic, Christian Life, 72.

Life is God’s great gift, to be preserved for His uses, not thrown away.

John G. Paton, The Autobiography of the Pioneer Missionary to the New Hebrides (Vanuatu), 108.