史普罗(R.C. Sproul，1939–2017）金句四十则40Quotes from R. C. Sproul (1939–2017)
摘录者: Matt Smethurst 译者: Duncan Liang
只有两种死法，我们可以存着信心死，或者我们可以在罪中死。
“There
are only two ways of dying. We can die in faith or we can die in our sins.”
我们是安全的，不是因为我们紧紧抓住耶稣，而是耶稣紧紧抓住我们。
“We
are secure, not because we hold tightly to Jesus, but because he holds tightly
to us.”
认识到上帝认识我的一切，却仍然爱我，这确实是我终极的安慰。
“To
know that God knows everything about me and yet loves me is indeed my ultimate
consolation.”
最了不起的光景，莫过于跪下祷告之后起来，知道上帝已经赦免了你曾犯过的每一件罪。
”There
is no greater state than to get up from your knees knowing that God has
forgiven every sin you’ve ever committed.”
如果上帝不是主权的上帝，那么上帝就不是上帝了。
“If
God is not sovereign, then God is not God.”
上帝说话，这就了结了争论。
“When
God says something, the argument is over.”
一位全然是爱，全然是恩典，全然是怜悯，没有主权，没有公义，没有圣洁，没有忿怒的上帝，只不过是偶像而已。
“A
god who is all love, all grace, all mercy, no sovereignty, no justice, no
holiness, and no wrath is an idol.”
只要我们一认为上帝欠了我们怜悯，我们想的就不再是怜悯了。
“As
soon as we think God owes us mercy, we’re not thinking about mercy any more.”
当上帝的话语中有一些事情是我不喜欢的，问题不在上帝的话语，而在于我。
“When there’s
something in the Word of God that I don’t like, the problem is not with the
Word of God. It’s with me.”
上帝要求你相信、传讲和教导圣经所说是真实的事情，而不是你要圣经说是真实的事情。
By
James Thompson from Louisville, KY, USA (R.C. Sproul) CC BY 2.0
“You
are required to believe, to preach, and to teach what the Bible says is true,
not what you want the Bible to say is true.”
上帝并不总是在公义中行事，有时祂在怜悯中行事。怜悯并非公义，但也并非不公义。不公义干犯义。怜悯彰显慈爱和恩典，并不干犯义。我们可能看到上帝不凭公义行事，这是怜悯，但我们绝不会看到上帝不公义。
“God
does not always act with justice. Sometimes he acts with mercy. Mercy is not
justice, but it also is not injustice. Injustice violates righteousness. Mercy
manifests kindness and grace and does no violence to righteousness. We may see
nonjustice in God, which is mercy, but we never see injustice in God.”
对上帝心怀敬畏的人，绝不会抱怨教会沉闷。
“People
in awe never complain that church is boring.”
当他们把我冰冷、没有了生命的指头从我圣经上用力掰开，那就是我退休的时候。
“I’ll
retire when they pry my cold, dead fingers off of my Bible.”
若有人有抱怨不公义的余地，那就是耶稣。他是唯一一位受上帝惩罚的无辜之人。如果我们对上帝的忿怒感到愤怒，就让我们对十字架感到愤怒吧。十字架是我们的震惊应聚焦的所在。如果我们有理由感受道德愤怒，就让我们把这愤怒指向各各他。
“If
ever a person had room to complain of injustice, it was Jesus. He was the only
innocent man ever to be punished by God. If we stagger at the wrath of God, let
us stagger at the cross. Here is where our astonishment should be focused. If
we have cause for moral outrage, let it be directed at Golgotha.”
不管我在别人手中遭受多大的不公义对待，我却从未在上帝手中遭遇过丝毫不公义对待。
“No matter how much
injustice I have suffered from the hands of other people, I have never suffered
the slightest injustice from the hand of God.”
上帝回答约伯的问题，不是用说话，而是用祂自己。
“God
answered Job’s questions not with words but with himself.”
基督徒的人生是不从的人生。
“The
Christian life is a life of non-conformity.”
基督不仅取了我们的罪、我们的亏欠和我们的过失，祂还把祂的顺服、祂的产业和祂的功德赐给了我们。
“Not
only does Christ take our sins, our debts, and our demerits, but he also gives
us his obedience, his assets, and his merits.”
如果人没有成圣，这就意味着他从未有过任何称义。
“If
there is no sanctification, it means that there never was any justification.”
如果我们藐视上帝的公义，我们就不是基督徒了。
“If we despise the
justice of God, we are not Christians.”
我们可以按我们罪性去爱的唯一一种上帝，是一位不圣洁的上帝，一个我们亲手制造的偶像。
“The
only kind of God we can love by our sinful nature is an unholy god, an idol
made by our own hands.”
对于上帝救赎了我们，我们其实并不真正感到惊奇。在我们深处某个地方，在我们内心隐秘处，我们窝藏着这种观念，就是上帝欠了我们祂的怜悯。如果我们被排除在天堂之外，天堂就不再一样。我们知道自己是罪人，但肯定不是我们能有的那样糟糕。我们的人性有足够多值得救赎的特点，如果上帝真是公义，祂就会把我们包括在拯救当中。让我们感到惊奇的是公义，而非恩典。
“We are not really surprised that God
has redeemed us. Somewhere deep inside, in the secret chambers of our hearts we
harbor the notion that God owes us his mercy. Heaven would not be quite the
same if we were excluded from it. We know that we are sinners, but we are
surely not as bad as we could be. There are enough redeeming features to our
personalities that if God is really just he will include us in salvation. What
amazes us is justice, not grace.”
人与上帝相争，没有平局，没有裁判不完全划一的判决。当我们与全能的上帝摔跤，我们就输了。祂是在这宇宙未曾遭遇挫败的冠军。
“There are no draws with God, no split
decisions. When we wrestle with the Almighty, we lose. He is the undefeated
champion of the universe.”
上帝的公义总是、永远是祂圣洁品格的表现……上帝所行的，总与上帝的所是一致。
“The
justice of God is always and ever an expression of his holy character. . . .
What God does is always consistent with who God is.”
我们犯罪时，不仅犯了背叛上帝的罪，而且也彼此侵害。罪是侵害人的。罪没有任何抽象之处。我通过犯罪伤害人。我伤害了他们的人格，我掠夺了他们财物，我毁坏了他们的名声，我抢夺了他们的一种宝贵生命特质，我击破了他们对幸福的梦想和渴望。当我不尊荣上帝的时候，我就是在不尊荣一切背负祂形象样式的人。难怪上帝如此严肃看待罪。
“When we sin, we not only commit treason
against God, but we also do violence to each other. Sin violates people. There is
nothing abstract about it. By my sin I hurt human beings. I injure their
person; I despoil their goods; I impair their reputation; I rob from them a
precious quality of life; I crush their dreams and aspirations for happiness.
When I dishonor God, I dishonor all people who bear his image. Is it any
wonder, then, that God takes sin so seriously?”
我们面对的问题，就是圣洁一词对所有语言来说都是陌生。没有一本字典能充分解释这词。
“The
problem we face is that the word holy is foreign to all languages. No
dictionary is adequate to the task.”
死亡提醒我们，我们是受造物。死亡虽可怕，但与和一位圣洁的上帝相遇相比却根本算不得什么。与祂相遇时，我们恍然大悟，自己全然是受造之人，将我们对自己看法的神话击得粉碎，这神话就是我们对自己的看法，我们是半神，次等的神祗，尝试永远活着的神话。
“Death
reminds us that we are creatures. Yet as fearsome as death is, it is nothing
compared with meeting a holy God. When we encounter him, the totality of our
creatureliness breaks upon us and shatters the myth that we have believed about
ourselves, the myth that we are demigods, junior-grade deities who will try to
live forever.”
圣经只有一次把上帝的一种属性提升到第三层次，只有一次连续三次提到上帝的一种特征。圣经说上帝是圣哉、圣哉、圣哉。
“Only
once in sacred Scripture is an attribute of God elevated to the third degree.
Only once is a characteristic of God mentioned three times in succession. The
Bible says that God is holy, holy, holy.”
上帝把祂话语的事工，而非它的结果托付给了我们。
“God
has entrusted to us the ministry of the Word, not its results.”
十字架是上帝恩典荣耀的彰显，藉此父差遣子完全满足祂的公义，使罪人可以得救，却不牺牲这公义。
”The
cross was a glorious outworking of the grace of God, by which the Father
commissioned the Son to make full satisfaction so that sinners might be saved
with no sacrifice of God’s justice.”
一位替代在时空中显现，祂由上帝亲自设立，承受我们过犯的重担，为我们的罪责赎罪，代表我们挽回上帝的忿怒，这就是福音。
“A
Substitute has appeared in space and time, appointed by God himself, to bear
the weight and the burden of our transgressions, to make expiation for our
guilt, and to propitiate the wrath of God on our behalf. This is the gospel.”
如果我要永生之道，我只能在一个地方把它找到，就是来到将自己生命赐下，好使我们能活过来的那一位面前。
“If I want the words of eternal life, there’s
only one place I can go to get them—to the One who gave his life that we might
live.”
没有一人曾因口头承认相信得救，你必须要得着信心。
“Nobody was ever
saved by a profession of faith. You have to possess faith.”
上帝不要我把玩信仰，祂不要我在教会中蜻蜓点水。祂要得着我，我的身体和灵魂。
“God doesn’t want me to play with religion. He
doesn’t want me to dabble in church. He
wants me—body and soul.”
我们是罪人，并非因为我们犯罪；我们犯罪，因为我们是罪人。
“We are not sinners because we sin. We sin
because we are sinners.”
你称义的根据，是耶稣基督完全的行为。我们靠行为得救，但这行为不是我们自己的行为。
“The grounds of your justification are the
perfect works of Jesus Christ. We’re
saved by works, but they’re not our own.”
没有唯独因信称义的教义，福音就不仅遭妥协，还是完全失去了。
“Without the doctrine of justification by faith
alone, the gospel is not merely compromised; it’s lost altogether.”
我们在查考上帝话语的本分上失败，最大的原因并非它难以理解，也不是因它沉闷，而是因为这是要付出努力的工作。我们的问题不是缺乏聪明或热情，我们的问题是我们懒惰。
“We fail in our duty to study God’s Word not so
much because it is difficult to understand, not so much because it is dull and
boring, but because it is work. Our problem is not a lack of intelligence or a
lack of passion. Our problem is that we
are lazy.”
你在这宇宙中睁开眼睛，不可能看不到这是一座剧院，彰显着上帝的启示。
“You can’t open your eyes in this universe
without seeing a theater of divine revelation.”
你不可能爱耶稣，却不爱祂的话。
“You can’t love Jesus and not love his Word.”