Preston Sprinkle > Quotes

“Grace, on the other hand, means that God is pursuing you. That God forgives you. That God sanctifies you. When you are apathetic toward God, He is never apathetic toward you. When you don’t desire to pray and talk to God, He never grows tired of talking to you. When you forget to read your Bible and listen to God, He is always listening to you. Grace means that your spirituality is upheld by God’s stubborn enjoyment of you.

Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us (p. 76).”
― Preston Sprinkle

“But if we never hug a harlot, befriend a beggar, or forgive our enemy seventy times seven, then we confess grace with our lips but mock it with our lives.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“TULLIAN TCHIVIDJIAN   The best definition for grace I know comes from Paul Zahl: Grace is love that seeks you out when you have nothing to give in return. Grace is love coming at you that has nothing to do with you. Grace is being loved when you are unlovable…. The cliché definition of grace is “unconditional love.” It is a true cliché, for it is a good description of the thing.… Let’s go a little further, though. Grace is a love that has nothing to do with you, the beloved. It has everything and only to do with the lover. Grace is irrational in the sense that it has nothing to do with weights and measures. It has nothing to do with my intrinsic qualities or so-called “gifts” (whatever they may be). It reflects a decision on the part of the giver, the one who loves, in relation to the receiver, the one who is loved, that negates any qualifications the receiver may personally hold…. Grace is one-way love.1 Grace doesn’t make demands. It just gives. And from our vantage point, it always gives to the wrong person. We see this over and over again in the Gospels: Jesus is always giving to the wrong people—prostitutes, tax collectors, half-breeds. The most extravagant sinners of Jesus’s day receive His most compassionate welcome. Grace is a divine vulgarity that stands caution on its head.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“You can’t make God love you. God loves you because of who He is and because of what Christ has done. His love is not based on what you do, or what you don’t do.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“God hijacks and bends evil to work peace and healing. If God were only a God of justice, He could punish evil but do no more. Only a God of grace can use our evil to work His good. God’s grace is so much bigger than our sin . Sometimes He’ll let us pursue our idolatry until it kills us. Then He will resurrect us and turn our evil into testimonies of God’s grace.

Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us (p. 86).”
― Preston Sprinkle

“This is why your divorce, your addiction, your enslavement to porn, or years of sticking your finger down your throat to match up to some arbitrary standard of beauty can all be woven into the fabric of God’s plan of redemption. God doesn’t cause sin. He mourns it. He despises it. But through His gracious power, He’s able to use it. No one and no sin can outrun God’s grace.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“We are a generation of lovers who long to be loved. We spend exorbitant amounts of money to compel others to delight in us. We construct our ideal life on Facebook because we are unsatisfied with our real life, which is tainted with boredom, loneliness, insecurity, and a lack of friends and followers . We do not enjoy the person God created us to be or the life God has gifted us with. We think we are overweight, underweight, too pale, too dark, too plain, or just plain boring. Yet we crave to be delighted in by a significant other. So we pursue misguided avenues to make ourselves delightful, to satisfy our craving to be loved.

Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us (pp. 118-119).”
― Preston Sprinkle

“But our Edenic tent–God doesn’t just want to save us. He actually wants to be with us. He doesn’t just love us. God actually likes us. So God removes His royal robes and steps down from His throne to experience—for the first time—what it is like to be human. God is omniscient, which means that He is all-knowing. There’s nothing in the universe, no piece of information, no fact, no statistic that He doesn’t know. The hairs on your head, the zits on your face—He knows about every one. But until the incarnation, God hadn’t experienced human nature. Since zits aren’t a sin, perhaps Jesus had them too. God knows every hair on your head, but through the incarnation, God knows what it feels like to have hair ripped out. God knows about tiredness, but through the incarnation, He experiences exhaustion. God knows how many molecules it takes to shoot a hunger pain from your stomach to your brain. But through the incarnation, God knows what it feels like to starve to the point of death. Through the incarnation, God has enjoyed the same warm wave of sunlight that splashes across your face on the first day of spring. When you bathe in it, God smiles because He’s bathed in it too. He’s been refreshed by a night’s sleep after a long day of work. Warmed by a toasty bed on a cold winter night. Enjoyed a rich glass of wine while celebrating among friends. God authored creation. But through the incarnation, God experienced creation. And He encountered joy under the bridge. He also experienced pain. Relational, psychological, emotional, and physical agony. God has suffered the misery and brokenness of the same sin-saturated world that oppresses us every day. The pain of being rejected, beaten, abused, unloved, uncared for, mocked, shamed, spat upon, and disrespected as an image bearer of the Creator. Jesus knows all of this. He’s experienced all of this. And He willingly endured it to bring you back to Eden.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“FURIOUS FAVOR I wonder if David would be allowed in our churches today. In most cases, when a church member has an affair, he is shunned at best or mistreated at worst—even if he repents. But David doesn’t just have an affair. He lusts, covets, fornicates, lies, and gets another man hammered. Then he tries to keep his dirty little secrets by murdering the husband of the woman he “loves.” I doubt I’ve met anyone as sinful as David. Have you? He breaks half of the Ten Commandments in a single episode. And he doesn’t repent until he’s caught. But when Nathan shoves his prophetic finger into David’s chest and rebukes him, David falls to his knees and admits his guilt. And right then, at that moment, God rips open the heavens to reach down and touch David’s soul with stubborn delight. God eagerly forgives David for his sin, and all of it is buried at the bottom of the sea, never to be remembered again. There is no hiccup in God’s furious favor toward David. So why do repentant sinners still bear the stigma of “adulterer,” “divorced,” or “addict” in our churches today? It’s one thing if they don’t repent. But quite often we shun repentant sinners, like Jeffrey Dahmer, whose crimes we just can’t forget. “He’s the former addict.” “That’s the divorced mom.” “Here comes the guy who slept with the church secretary.” For some reason we love to define people by the sin in their lives—even past sin in their lives—rather than by the grace that forgave it. It’s no wonder that David pens the last sentence in Psalm 23: “Surely goodness and mercy shall [hunt me down] all the days of my life” (Ps. 23:6).”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“Grace is more than just leniency and unconditional acceptance. Divine grace is God’s relentless and loving pursuit of His enemies, who are unthankful, unworthy, and unlovable. Grace is not just God’s ability to save sinners, but God’s stubborn delight in His enemies—yes, even the creepy ones. Grace means that despite our filth, despite the sewage running through our veins , despite our odd addiction to food, drink, sex, porn, pride, self, money, comfort, and success, God desires to transform us into real ingredients of divine happiness.

Sprinkle, Preston (2014-07-01). Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us (p. 24). David C. Cook. Kindle Edition.”
― Preston Sprinkle

“And when Jesus declared, 'It is finished,' He meant it. God’s punishment for our sin was paid for, permanently settled, finished— 100 percent. If you have responded in faith to God’s free pardon through Jesus, then God will never punish you for your sin. It’s finished. No more. If you screw up today or tomorrow (which you will), it’s already been paid for through Jesus. 'There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,' Paul said (Rom. 8: 1). None. God will not and cannot condemn you after He has already condemned Jesus for you. It’s impossible. God will never be angry with you since His anger was poured out on Jesus. All of it. One hundred percent.

Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us (p. 169).”
― Preston Sprinkle

“the most visible form of Jesus’s not-of-this-world kingdom is the radical, head-turning love of one’s enemies, even (or especially) when we are suffering at their hands. Peter mentions this cruciform enemy-love no fewer than ten times in five chapters, making it the artery of the letter.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence

“is unconditional acceptance given to an undeserving person by an unobligated giver.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“Because Jesus came to set the captives free, life does not have to be a tireless effort to establish ourselves, justify ourselves, and validate ourselves.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“If the world out-loves the church, then we have implicitly nudged our children away from the loving arms of Christ.”
― Preston Sprinkle, People to Be Loved: Why Homosexuality Is Not Just an Issue

“If America, for instance, used the Bible to shape its warfare policy, that policy would look like this. Enlistment would be by volunteer only (which it is), and the military would not be funded by taxation. America would not stockpile superior weapons—no tanks, drones, F-22s, and of course no nuclear weapons—and it would make sure its victories were determined by God’s miraculous intervention, not by military might. Rather than outnumbering the enemy, America would deliberately fight outmanned and under-gunned. Perhaps soldiers would use muskets, or maybe just swords. There would be no training, no boot camp, no preparation other than fasting, praying, and singing worship songs. If America really is the “new Israel,” God’s holy nation as some believe, then it needs to take its cue from God and His inspired manual for military tactics. But as it stands, many Christians will be content to cut and paste selected verses that align with America’s worldview to give the military some religious backing. Some call this bad hermeneutics; others call it syncretism. The Israelite prophets called it idolatry.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence

“If God is God, then He must be transcendent. But what I have a hard time believing is that this same God cares about me. That He delights in me. That He thinks I am more valuable than the hundreds of snowcapped peaks in Colorado. That He can’t wait until I wake up so He can see my eyes and hear my voice. That He desires to be in relationship with me—not out of obligation, but out of sheer delight. I know that He is sovereign. But He wants to be my friend? He wants to have a relationship with me? And He wants this so badly that no matter what I do, He will keep on pursuing me, chasing me, and never give up?”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“Grace is God’s aggressive pursuit of, and stubborn delight in, freakishly foul people.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“Jesus came into our world as a man to embody grace. He left us, the church, to be the body of Christ, not a flock of parakeets that repeat Christian jargon but the ongoing in-the-flesh presence of His grace. We are the evidence that God’s grace is more than just words.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“Old Testament is all about grace, and it forms the rich soil from which Jesus’s gospel of charis blossoms. To understand Jesus, we must soak ourselves in Israel’s story of grace. That’s why we’ll end our adventure in this book by looking at the birth, life, and death of Jesus. Jesus is not just the beginning of the New Testament but also the fitting climax of the Old.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“The idea that there is an unconditional love that relieves the pressure, forgives our failures, and replaces our fear with faith seems too good to be true.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“when Jesus tells His followers not to resist evil people, He uses a word that suggests a violent resistance. In fact, New Testament scholar N. T. Wright translated the verse “Don’t use violence to resist evil” to remove all ambiguity.6 Put simply, when Jesus says, “Do not resist the one who is evil,” He specifically prohibits using violence to resist evil.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence

“As long as we pray, love, suffer, and herald the good news that Jesus is King, we will continue to see the kingdom of God thunder against the kingdom of Satan. We need to make sure we’re fighting in the right war with the right means.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence

“Genesis 1 shows off God’s raw power. Genesis 2 showcases God’s earthy affection. Here’s how. First, notice the different names for God in Genesis 1–2. Throughout Genesis 1, the English word “God” translates the Hebrew term Elohim. Thirty-five times, in fact, Moses writes the term Elohim to describe God, and he doesn’t use any other term, such as the Almighty, the Holy One, or the Lord of Hosts. But something changes in Genesis 2. Beginning in 2:4, Moses consistently writes “the LORD God,” or Yahweh Elohim in Hebrew. Moses never just says Elohim in Genesis 2. He always says Yahweh Elohim. Elohim is a generic term for God. Other ancient religions would have used the same term (or just El) to refer to their god. Elohim simply refers to a deity and emphasizes his (or her) power. And so it’s fitting for Moses to use Elohim to refer to God in Genesis 1 when he wants to emphasize God’s transcendence and power. But Yahweh is God’s personal name. My name is Preston, your name may be Joey, Sadie, or Mattie, and God’s name is Yahweh. Now, in the ancient world, revealing your name to somebody was a sign of intimacy. While the title Elohim simply means that God is powerful, revealing His personal name Yahweh means that this powerful God also desires a relationship.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“Grace is love that seeks you out when you have nothing to give in return.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“The most extravagant sinners of Jesus’s day receive His most compassionate welcome. Grace is a divine vulgarity that stands caution on its head. It refuses to play it safe and lay it up. Grace is recklessly generous, uncomfortably promiscuous.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“My culture gives me no categories to view suffering—especially suffering at the hands of an oppressor—as victory. My culture sees suffering only as defeat, as evil. It never sees suffering as a means of victory. This is why I need to read John’s vision about what’s really going on from God’s perspective to correct my American, self-serving, “I will defend my rights at all costs” mind-set. I need to follow the slaughtered Lamb wherever He goes, so that I can reign with Him in victory. THE”
― Preston Sprinkle, Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence

“But whenever the church fails to mediate God’s counterintuitive delight in broken people, the pain of sin will only be magnified until it suffocates our souls. Good deeds and spiritual lingo can’t heal a human heart suffocated by evil. Only grace can. Rich, embodied, earthy charis.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“The only times “work and keep” are used together in the Bible are in Eden (Gen. 2:15) and the tabernacle (for example, Num. 3:7–8).7 When you think of the tabernacle, you should think of Eden.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Charis: God's Scandalous Grace for Us

“Loving your enemy. Doing good things for evil people. Never taking vengeance. Responding to violence with nonviolent love—even if it brings suffering. These are not options, but the primary character traits of those who claim to follow a crucified God.”
― Preston Sprinkle, Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence