26 Sam Storms Quotes

Joy is not necessarily the absence of suffering, it is the presence of God.

We’ve been created to join the party

God limits the happiness and pleasure we have now precisely so we might not become attached to this world or dependent upon it or fearful of leaving it (dying), as well as to stir in our hearts a longing and yearning and holy anticipation for what is yet to come.

God created us so that the joy He has in Himself might be ours. God doesn’t simply think about Himself or talk to Himself. He enjoys Himself! He celebrates with infinite and eternal intensity the beauty of who He is as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And we’ve been created to join the party!

The only reason integrity should be a burden to you is if you enjoy being dishonest.

You weren't created for boredom or burnout or bondage to sexual lust or greed or ambition but for the incomparable pleasure and matchless joy that knowing Jesus alone can bring. Only then, in Him, will you encounter the life-changing, thirst-quenching, soul-satisfying delight that God, for His glory, created you to experience.

Our giving is but a reflex of God's giving.

God can do all He wills (and does) but need not do all He can (and does not). That is to say, God's infinite power is manifested in the works of creation, but isn't exhausted by them. God could have created more than He has, if He so pleased. What God has done, therefore, is no measure of what He could have done or can do.

Creation in its totality exists as a means to the fulfillment of some specific purpose that terminates on and for the sake of Jesus Christ.

The holiness of God only secondarily refers to His moral purity, His righteousness of character. It primarily points to His infinite otherness. To say that God is holy is to say that He is transcendentally separate. Holiness is not one attribute among many. It is not like grace or power or knowledge or wrath. Everything about God is holy. Each attribute partakes of divine holiness.

The focus of Satan's efforts is always the same: to deceive us into believing that the passing pleasures of sin are more satisfying than obedience.

This is the glory and miracle of grace, that God, through the Holy Spirit, is able to transform a stubborn, rebellious, and unbelieving will into a passionate, obedient, believing will without violating the integrity of the individual or diminishing the voluntary nature of one's decision to trust Christ for salvation.

I simply define glory as the beauty of God unveiled. Glory is the resplendent radiance of His power and His personality. Glory is all of God that makes God, and shows Him to be worthy of our praise and our boasting and our trust and our hope and our confidence and our joy.

God has a holy temper, but He has a very long fuse! Even those who deny and blaspheme His name are recipients of His patience and long-suffering. He permits His enemies to live, to spew forth their horrid blasphemies, all the while blessing them with food and air and earthly pleasures (see Romans 2:4-5).

The purpose of existence is the pursuit of enjoyment...in God! Our desires, affections, pursuits, all that we say and do, all that we love or hate, are to be measured by this single criterion and subordinated to this one end: happiness in God.

When it comes to satisfying our spiritual appetites, there is no such thing as excess. There are no restraints placed on us by God. There are no rules of temperance or laws requiring moderation or boundaries beyond which we cannot go in seeking to enjoy Him. We need never pause to inquire whether we've crossed a line or become overindulgent. You need never fear feeling too good about God.

The key to holiness? Eating and drinking and enjoying and delighting in all that God is for you in His Son. The key to holiness is falling in love with Jesus.

To obey God as though it were a matter of works is to obey out of your own strength with a view to your own merit. To obey God as though it were a matter of faith is to obey out of His own strength with a view to His glory (see 1 Peter 4:11; 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12).

God's pursuit of my praise of Him is not weak self-seeking but the epitome of self-giving love! If my satisfaction in Him is incomplete until expressed in praise of Him for satisfying me, then God's effort to solicit my worship is both the most loving thing He could possibly do for me and the most glorifying thing He could possibly do for Himself. For in my gladness in Him is His glory in me.

We encounter the beauty of the Lord when we spiritually ingest the statements of Scripture concerning the wonders of who God is and all He does. When we take the scintillating truths of God and hide them in our hearts, meditate on them, muse on them, soak our souls in them, so to speak, we become infatuated with the exquisite personality of God.

It strikes some as odd to say that Satan has a strategy. They mistakenly conclude that because our Enemy is atrociously sinful he must be equally stupid. Such reasoning has been the downfall of many in the body of Christ.

Integrity... does not mean sinless, but it does describe a person who by God's grace "sin less."

Worship is first and foremost a feasting on all that God is for us in Jesus... [One] in which God is the host, the cook, the waiter, and the meal itself.

The only authoritative interpreter of a book is its author!

One of the most serious threats to the human spirit is boredom. Boredom is the breeding ground for wickedness. Bored people are easy targets of the flesh and the Devil. It is like putting a bull's-eye on your chest with a sign: "Tempt me. I'm easy!" Why? Because boredom is contrary to the natural, God-given impulse for fascination, excitement, pleasure, and exhilaration.

The single most important principle I ever discovered is this: the goal or purpose of the Christian is precisely the pursuit of happiness - in God. The reason for this is that there is no greater way to glorify God than to find in Him the happiness that my soul so desperately craves.

The essence of loving living as a follower of Jesus isn't in trying harder but in enjoying more. I'm not saying you can change without trying. I'm saying that enjoyment empowers effort. Pleasure in God is the power for purity.

There are no term limits on His reign. He has always been King and He always will be King. There is no death that threatens the perpetuity of His sovereign authority. There is no usurping of power by a lesser rival to His throne. There are no coups, no revolutions (at least, none that succeed). There is no threat of impeachment. He is a King who rules eternally.

God is able to cause all things people do to us, even the bad things, to work together for our good (Rom. 8:28). That isn't to say that all things are good, but that God can orchestrate the evil into a symphony of glory.

Although God always thinks and acts in perfect harmony with His nature, His nature is infinitely complex. His personality is deep and rich and diverse and ultimately inexhaustible. Just when you've got Him figured out, He'll surprise you (but always in a good way).