Quotes from Paisley's Exposition of Romans

 

This blog post is taken from a series that first appeared on my Twitter (X) account: @Riddle1689:

When I was in Belfast in June, we stopped by Martyrs Memorial Free Presbyterian Church (check the end of this post from some pictures) where the controversial founder of the Free Presbyterian Church and Ulster politician Iain R. K. Paisley served as pastor. Wanting to read some Paisly I ordered his Romans exposition, written during his three-month imprisonment in 1966. It was waiting when I got back from the Michigan trip. Less a commentary and more a collection of pithy and aphoristic thoughts from an orator.

I'll share a few quotes in this thread:

 

"It is good to be saved and to know it but it is best to be saved and show it" (16).

 

"Prayer is not the noisy sound Which clamorous lips repeat. Prayer is the silence of the soul Which clasps Jehovah's feet" (19).

 

"Only a spiritual church is an established church. A national name, human endowments and state recognition can establish a sect. Spiritual gifts alone establish a true church of Christ” (20).

 

"Gospel purposes and gospel preachers will always be resisted as long as the Devil is out of the lake of fire" (21).

 

"You could as soon stop the sun with a lollypop stick as stop the gospel preacher. No amount of opposition will stop him. He has a commission from heaven and must speak" (24).

 

"The works of the law form the very heart of man's religion.... Works! Works! You could as soon fly to heaven astride a straw as get there by your own good works" (44).

 

"Yet with the old Puritan we can say,

'God the Father thought it

God the Son bought it

God the Spirit wrought it

The Devil fought it

But, Glory to God, I got it'" (55).

 

"His life was in obedience to His life-giving. He was born in order to bleed. His obedience was in order to His offering" (59).

 

"It was Martin Luther the Reformer who said. 'There are but two men, Adam and Christ, and all other men hang at their girdles" (76).

 

"Birth is the family truth. We are born again and become members of His family. Baptism is the church truth. We are baptized and become members of His body" (90).

 

"God did not send the old man to hospital to be cured but to the Cross to be crucified" (94).

 

"Upon our body, our dying body, are the very marks of sin's dominion and here sin strives unceasingly for the mastery" (99).

 

"The desires of sin are not to be obeyed but rather resisted. They are not to be countenanced. By resisting we refuse to contemplate the sin to which we are tempted. Contemplation of sin leads to conception of sin and conception of sin to actual commission of sin" (99).

 

"Thomas Goodwin, the Puritan, said, that before entering the pulpit when his heart was not humble as it ought to be, he took a walk up and down his former sins. This always brought humiliation to his heart and stirred gratitude in his soul to God" (101).

 

"John Newton... once the slave driver and blasphemous seaman, had the text Deut. 15:15 printed in large capitals and hung over his study desk, 'And Thou Shalt Remember That Thou Wast a Bondsman in the Land of Egypt, And the Lord Thy God Redeemed Thee'" (101).

 

"The consummation of our degradation is freedom from righteousness. The consummation of our consecration is freedom from sin. What a contrast!" (106).

 

"Rather the law is the great X-ray revealing sin working death in me so that sin by the revelation of the law is seen to be exceedingly sinful" (114).

 

"Christ is not the great I was, Christ is the great I am" (120).

 

"The body of the believer at death is not buried but sown. It awaits the great harvest of the resurrection" (132).

 

On the Apostle Paul: "He dwarfs the modern preachers to pigmy size by his giant ministry" (142).

 

"Passionless preaching is the bane of both pulpit and pew. Without passion the preacher is only the vain sound of religious brass and the useless tinkling of ecclesiastical cymbals" (149).

 

"John Wesley's advice to the critic of the preacher was right: 'Pray that God will set your minister on fire and the people will come out to see him burn'" (149).

 

"Well might C. H. Spurgeon exclaim, 'If there's a fireman in the pulpit there'll be no snowmen in the pews!'" (150).

 

On the preacher's prayer life: "Before the preacher can talk to men about God, he must talk to God about men" (150).

 

"There is a great difference between a sent preacher and a called parson. Called parsons win silver, but sent preachers win souls" (157).

 

"Every believer is to be a nonconformist, a nonconformist to this present evil age" (168).

 

"How tragic when Christians ape the worldlings preferring the muck-rake to the golden crown" (168).

 

"We should always view our brethren in the love of Christ and measure our sacrifices for them by the yardstick of the Cross" (180).

 

JTR

Some pictures from Belfast: