John R. Rice Quotes of the Week

A dear old man seventy-one years old held his hand for prayer and I talked to him following a funeral service. I asked him why he was not saved and he answered, "I don't know how!"
"Why, that is easy," I said. "Simply 'believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.'"
He began to weep and said, "I have heard that before, but I don't understand what you mean. I don't know how to believe."
After a moment of prayer God seemed to put on the tip of my tongue these words, "That simply means that God furnished the Saviour and you furnish the sinner."
He looked up to me startled and then his eyes lightened and he began to chuckle while the tears still ran down his grey, beard-stubbled face. "Well, I can certainly furnish the sinner, if He is willing to furnish the Saviour," he said. He claimed Christ as his Saviour and later came out publicly before men as a child of God. - John R. Rice

All of our failures are prayer failures. - John R. Rice

It is impossible for a Christian to be really revived, to get a fresh vision of the will of God in his life and a new and more abounding zeal to do the will of God without honestly setting out to obey Christ in this soul-winning matter. - John R. Rice

Bible evangelism, mass evangelism, that is, old-time revivals, are offensive to modernists who hope and believe they are out of date. The emphasis on sin is offensive to modernists who are not willing to repent. The emphasis on God's grace, on the blood of Christ as the only hope for sinners, is offensive to the modern infidel who worships man and believes in salvation by merit instead of saving faith. Evangelism is based on the authority of the Bible as God's infallible revelation. Such faith in the Bible is essential to Bible evangelism, essential to great revivals, but is utterly abominable to modernists. The voice of modernism, unbelief in the churches which says there can be no more great revivals in the historic and old-fashioned sense, speaks as the enemy of the Bible and as the enemy of New Testament Christianity itself. - John R. Rice

A young evangelist preaching in his third revival and seeing drunkards and other hardened sinners wonderfully saved, told me with great joy, "I have found out that if I can get people lost enough, I can get them saved!" Of course he meant that if he could get sinners to know how far they are from God, how terribly wicked their hearts, how fearful their ultimate fate if they do not repent, he can get many of them to flee to Christ for refuge and trust Him for mercy. - John R. Rice

Whatever the outward distress, God's people can seek His face and have His power. Whatever the human limitations, we can have revival. We can have revival when it means persecution and death for Christians. We can have revival when the government is wicked and anti-Christian. We can have revival when modernism is everywhere in the saddle. We can have revival, provided God's faithful few pay God's price and have His mighty power! - John R. Rice

The Bible is not simply to be the object of dispassionate, technical interest and investigation. It is not a museum curiosity! It is the sword of the Spirit which ought to be used to cut sinners to the heart. It contains the gospel, the dynamite of God which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. - John R. Rice