David Platt

The way to conquer sin is not by working hard to change our deeds, but by trusting Jesus to change our desires. Follow Me, pg. 111.

What if followers of Christ stopped looking for work in places where the MOST number of Christians Christians lived and started looking for work places where the LEAST Christians lived?

The author holds up for inspection the fallacy of The Closed-Door Method wherein Christ's followers assume that if a decision is difficult to make it is not His will for us to make it because He would obviously not want us to do anything difficult.

The purpose of God's Word is to transform people in every country and every century into the image of God.

The price is certainly high for people who don__ know Christ and who live in a world where Christians shrink back from self-denying faith and settle into self-indulging faith. While Christians choose to spend their lives fulfilling the American dream instead of giving their lives to proclaiming the kingdom of God, literally billions in need of the Gospel remain in the dark

We are settling for a Christianity that revolves around catering to ourselves when the central message of Christianity is actually about abandoning ourselves.

I can almost picture the disciples faces. "No, not the drink-my-blood speech! We'll never get on the list of fastest-growing movements if you keep asking them to eat you!

My biggest fear, even now, is that I will hear Jesus' words and walk away, content to settle for less than radical obedience to Him._

So what is the difference between someone who willfully indulges in sexual pleasures while ignoring the Bible on moral purity and someone who willfully indulges in the selfish pursuit of more and more material possessions while ignoring the Bible on caring for the poor? The difference is that one involves a social taboo in the church and the other involves the social norm in the church.

If we were left to ourselves with the task of taking the gospel to the world, we would immediately begin planning innovative strategies and plotting elaborate schemes. We would organize conventions, develop programs, and create foundations_ But Jesus is so different from us. With the task of taking the gospel to the world, he wandered through the streets and byways_All He wanted was a few men who would think as He did, love as He did, see as He did, teach as He did and serve as He did. All He needed was to revolutionize the hearts of a few, and they would impact the world.

Radical obedience to Christ is not easy... It's not comfort, not health, not wealth, and not prosperity in this world. Radical obedience to Christ risks losing all these things. But in the end, such risk finds its reward in Christ. And he is more than enough for us.

The author describes the adoption process in which he and his wife participated as "a paperwork pregnancy".

God grows the Church through holiness in Christians.

God's glory is most majestically displayed not through you were through me, but through US. God raises up the Church, and says to all Creation in the heavens, on the Earth, and under the Earth, this is the bride and body of My Son, bought and purchased by His blood to be My people and receive My power, and enjoy My presence, and declare My praise forever and ever.

I could impart excitement, but not urgency. _ Francis Chen

As you call people to submit to the Person of Christ, you can trust the Spirit of Christ to lead them to salvation.

The purpose of prayer is not for the disciple to give information to God. The purpose of prayer is intimacy with God.

Making disciples of Jesus is the overflow of the delight in being disciples of Jesus.