Quotes about Grace

Christ is indeed presented to all, but God opens the eyes of the elect alone, and enables them by faith to seek after him.

There is nothing absurd in the doctrine, that though man is justified by faith, he is himself not only not righteous, but the righteousness attributed to his works is beyond their own deserts.

If the testimony by which the Jews were assured of the salvation of their posterity is taken away from us, the coming of Christ would have the effect of making God's grace more obscure and less well attested to us than it was to the Jews before us.

When the law is separated from Christ, nothing is left but empty forms.

And when Paul discusses the restoration of the image, it is clear that we should infer from his words that man is made to conform to God, not by an inflowing of substance, but by the grace and power of the Spirit. For he says that by "beholding Christ's glory, we are being transformed into his very image… as through the Spirit of the Lord" [II Cor. 3:18], who surely works in us without rendering us consubstantial with God.

And it was our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the true and only eternal Son of God, who had to be sent and given to mankind by the Father, to restore a world otherwise wasted, destroyed, and desolate.

in Augustine with this expression, - "God crowns not our merits but his own gifts; and the name of reward is given not to what is due to our merits, but to the recompense of grace previously bestowed?"

Supposing a man not only deserves nothing good from you, but he has also provoked you with injustices and injuries—even this is not just cause for you to stop embracing him with affection and fulfilling your duties of love to him.

God has not rendered you due punishment, but bestows upon you unmerited grace. If you wish to be an alien from grace, boast your merits," (in Psa 70) Again, "You are nothing in yourself, sin is yours, merit God's. Punishment is your due; and when the reward shall come, God shall crown his own gifts, not your merits.

If you shall be paid what you deserve, you must be punished. What then happens? God has not rendered you the punishment you deserve, but bestows undeserved grace. If you would be estranged from grace, boast of your own merits." Again: "Of yourself you are nothing. Sins are your own, but merits are God's. You deserve punishment, and when the reward comes he will crown his own gifts, not your merits.

Whence follows the plain conclusion, that if all men were elected, no man would perish.

God sometimes bestows his bounty more   profusely, and, at other times, more sparingly, upon his children,   according as he sees it to be most for their good;