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In other days people chose a church on the basis of their doctrinal convictions. Now, lacking doctrinal convictions, they choose for social reasons.

Vance Havner

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Vance Havner
Age: 77 †
Born: 1886
Born: February 16
Died: 1963
Died: May 2
Clergyman
Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Plainfield
New Jersey
Days
Convictions
Church
Chose
Christian
Lacking
Social
Basis
Reason
Bases
People
Conviction
Reasons
Choose
Doctrinal

More quotes by Vance Havner

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There was a time when ministers spoke forthrightly and named things. We don't name anything anymore. Finney had a sermon on How to Preach so as to Convert Nobody. He said 'Preach on sin but never mention any of the sins of your congregation - that will do it.'
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Christians, like snowflakes, are frail, but when they stick together they can stop traffic.
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If you are a Christian, you are not a citizen of this world trying to get to heaven you are a citizen of heaven making your way through this world.
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It is only the life that is lost for Him that is found in Him.
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Most people would not want to live where there are no churches but many people live as though there were no churches.
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One cannot help the evil thoughts that come, but it is the thoughts we cultivate that make the difference between good or evil. We don't have to open the door to the devil and say, Make yourself at home.
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Taking it easy is often the prelude to backsliding. Comfort precedes collapse.
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What gives the Word of God authority is simply the fact that it is the word of God!
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Not everyone who has made peace with God has realized the peace of God.
Vance Havner
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If the church would only be the church- if Christians would only be Christians- nothing could halt our onward march.
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A wife who is 85 percent faithful to her husband is not faithful at all. There is no such thing as part-time loyalty to Jesus Christ.
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Self, service, substance is the Divine order and nothing counts until we give ourselves.
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I preach on specific sins because people are not convicted by sermons on sin in general. It was when our Lord said to the Samaritan woman, 'Go call thy husband...' (John 4:16), that she really faced up to her sinfulness.
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Blessed is that Christian who can accept at the start by simple faith that which others reach only through years of questioning and reach it only then because they give up trying to analyze it and decide to accept it.
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Any man who takes Jesus Christ seriously becomes the target of the devil. Most church members do not give Satan enough trouble to arouse his opposition
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Many people have the right aim in life, they just never get around to pulling the trigger. The vision must be followed by the venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps -- we must step up the stairs.
Vance Havner
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Our efficiency without God's sufficiency is only a deficiency.
Vance Havner
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Christ is most concerned with the direction in which you habitually are going and not with a spasmodic eruption either good or bad.
Vance Havner
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Beware of being a religious poseur, trying to live up to a dramatized version of yourself.
Vance Havner
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One hour in heaven, and we shall be ashamed that we ever grumbled.
Vance Havner