Gene Edward Veith Jr. Quotes

No one can violently attack something without taking it seriously in some way. No one attacks belief in Zeus anymore. No one gets emotional over the Flat Earth Society. Yet Christianity calls forth the deepest emotions
even and especially in the ones who most reject it.

Our age in its honest moments admits its lostness.

The author relates that the word "OBSCENE" springs from the concept in Greek drama that certain actions would be performed outside the scene or off the stage. He clarifies that the Greeks did not shy away from shocking actions, but they knew that portraying them in the audience's view would drown out the emotional subtlety of the character development and ethical dilemmas.

So, in God's relationship to us, we might wonder, "Am I really saved?" "Am I of the elect?" "Is God angry with me?" "Why does God allow suffering in the world?" In each case, if we leave out the Cross, questions like these can drive us to despair or insanity.

Universal literacy, taken for granted today, was a direct result of the Reformation's reemphasis upon the centrality of Bible reading,

Human sin and God's grace are the two poles of Lutheran spirituality. To be sure, these are intrinsic to all of Christianity, but in Lutheranism they are both heightened. They are resolved in the principle by which, it is said, the church stands or falls: justification by grace through faith.

The popular culture gives us books that offer entertainment but no ideas. High culture gives us books that offer ideas but no entertainment. The best books manage to do both.

Reading can break us out of the tunnel vision of the narrow specialty and lead us into many intriguing and important avenues of thought.

Luther goes so far as to say that vocation is a mask of God. That is, God hides Himself in the workplace, the family, the Church, and the seemingly secular society. To speak of God being hidden is a way of describing His presence, as when a child hiding in the room is there, just not seen. To realize that the mundane activities that take up most of our lives - going to work, taking the kids to soccer practice, picking up a few things at the store, going to church - are hiding-places for God can be a revelation in itself. Most people seek God in mystical experiences, spectacular miracles, and extraordinary acts they have to do. To find Him in vocation brings Him, literally, down to earth, makes us see how close He really is to us, and transfigures everyday life.

More than that, the doctrine of vocation amounts to a comprehensive doctrine of the Christian life, having to do with faith and sanctification, grace and good works. It is a key to Christian ethics. It shows how Christians can influence their culture. It transfigures ordinary, everyday life with the presence of God.

As Emerson observes, "The etymologist finds the deadest word to have been once a brilliant picture. Language is fossil poetry."4

Rather, the doctrine of vocation encourages attention to each individual's uniqueness, talents, and personality. These are valued as gifts of God, who creates and equips each person in a different way for the calling He has in mind for that person's life. The doctrine of vocation undermines conformity, recognizes the unique value of every person, and celebrates human differences; but it sets these individuals into a community with other individuals, avoiding the privatizing, self-centered narcissism of secular individualism.

The habit of reading is absolutely critical today, particularly for Christians. As television turns our society into an increasingly image dominated culture, Christians must continue to be people of the Word. When we read, we cultivate a sustained attention span, an active imagination, a capacity for logical analysis and critical thinking, and a rich inner life. Each of these qualities, which have proven themselves the essential to a free people is under assault in a TV dominated culture.

Many modern artists, philosophers, and theologians reject the knowledge of the past. Thus they must continually start over again from ground zero, their vision restricted to their own narrow perspectives, making themselves artificially primitive.

Abject fear of pagan gods is little different from abject worship of them.

Original Sin has great marketing potential.

Realizing that one does not have to worry about what will happen, that the future is in God's hands, is liberating.

It.
Such is the perversity of human nature that what we have in abundance-our work, our possessions, and the beauty of our surroundings-we take for granted and learn to ignore, so that we are often paralyzed by boredom, indifference, and ingratitude.

Just as physical laws apply to Christians and non-Christians alike (Matthew 5:45), the laws of art apply universally. Aesthetic principles, no less than scientific principles, are grounded in the created order and are a manifestation of God's design.

To be free, one must have the critical-thinking skills that inoculate against the alluring rhetoric that pervades contemporary society, rhetoric that is constantly seeking to undermine freedom for the sake of varied narrow interests. It is an old story, and Daniel Scoggin, the CEO of Great Hearts, recognizes this reality when he reminds his constituency that "each generation must earn its freedom anew".

An easily manipulated population that cares mostly for its own amusement may be more ready for tyranny (which can keep the masses happy with "bread and circuses") than for the arduous responsibilities of self-government.

The Sermon on the Mount proves that sin is a condition of our inmost being; although our sinful nature is atoned for in the cross and our failures freely forgiven, we must never willingly cultivate habits that Scripture condemns.

Secular humanists of every type may ridicule the Bible, but they cannot escape it; and in their obsession with change, calls for reform, doomsday warnings, and utopian visions, they continue to steal from it.

The Reformation may have resulted in a "Protestant work ethic," but this was not due to the pressure to prove one's election by worldly success, as certain social scientists ludicrously maintain. Rather, the work ethic emerged out of an understanding of the meaning of work and the satisfaction and fulfillment that come from ordinary human labor when seen through the light of the doctrine of vocation.

One of the goals of classical education is to discern the appropriate manner by which the mistreated and oppressed can challenge their oppressors without destroying their civilization.

There is a great superficiality in today's evangelical world. Many Bible-believing Christians share the contemporary case for self-gratification, emotionalism, and anti-intellectualism. Many people who believe in the Bible have never read it.

Psychology either tends to glorify human beings or trivialize them, leaving out the complexity of the human soul and the demands of God.

According to the Reformers, each Christian has multiple vocations. We have callings in our work. We have callings in our families. We have callings as citizens in the larger society. And we have callings in the Church.

He is not actually far from each one of us, for 'in him we live and move and have our being'" (Acts 17:25, 27-28).

The priesthood of all believers did not make everyone into church workers; rather, it turned every kind of work into a sacred calling.

Misunderstanding literary form can result in misunderstanding Scripture.