Marva Dawn Quotes

• If believers worship with gladness and passion, anyone not yet a part of the community certainly will be attracted to the One who is the object of their worship.

  Marva Dawn

  Religious, Passion, Community

  Marva J. Dawn (1999). “A Royal Waste of Time: The Splendor of Worshiping God and Being Church for the World”, p.124, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

  56 Copy quote

• Worship ought not to be construed in a utilitarian way. Its purpose is not to gain numbers nor for our church to be seen as successful. Rather, the entire reason for our worship is that God deserves it. (Worship) immerses us in the regal splendor of the King of the cosmos…provides opportunities for us to enjoy God’s presence in corporate ways that takes us out of time and into the eternal purposes of God’s kingdom. As a result, we shall be changed—but not because of anything we do. God, on whom we are centered and to whom we submit, will transform us by his Revelation of himself.

  Marva Dawn

  Kings, Successful, Opportunity

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• Sabbath ceasing means to cease not only from work itself, but also from the need to accomplish and be productive, from the worry and tension that accompany our modern criterion of efficiency, from our efforts to be in control of our lives as if we were God, from our possessiveness and our enculturation, and, finally, from the humdrum and meaninglessness that result when life is pursued without the Lord at the center of it all.

  Marva Dawn

  Mean, Worry, Effort

  17 Copy quote

• God's revelation... unmasks our illusions about ourselves. It exposes our pride, our individualism, our self-centeredness - in short, our sin. But worship also offers forgiveness, healing, transformation, motivation, and courage to work in the world for God's justice and peace - in short, salvation in its largest sense.

  Marva Dawn

  Motivation, Healing, Pride

  20 Copy quote

• This sense of being made in God's image calls us all constantly to look for it in others and to do what we can to help them acknowledge it and to realize it by joining in worship. We thereby carry to others the answer to their inmost longing, a yearning for union with the Trinity, a thirst to respond with adoration to the God who made them.

  Marva Dawn

  Joining In, Looks, Answers

  Marva J. Dawn (2009). “In the Beginning, GOD: Creation, Culture, and the Spiritual Life”, p.44, InterVarsity Press

  18 Copy quote

• Every other religion gives you directions on how to find God, but Jesus takes you to Him.

  Marva Dawn

  Jesus, Giving

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• The Christian life consists in what God does for us, not what we do for God.

  Marva Dawn

  Christian, Doe, Christian Life

  Marva J. Dawn (2006). “The Sense of the Call: A Sabbath Way of Life for Those Who Serve God, the Church, and the World”, p.91, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

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• Our present culture, however, specializes in inflaming endless lust for possessions with advertisements that constantly convince us that we need more (particularly to create the ease we have never found). The marketers don't tell us much about their products, but they spend a great deal of energy (and enormous amounts of money) appealing to our fears and dreams. Thus, the idolatry of possessions plays to the deeper idolatry of our selves-and in an endlessly consuming society, persons are always remaking themselves with new belongings.

  Marva Dawn

  Dream, Self, Convince Us

  18 Copy quote

• If the Christ we follow sent out his disciples with no extra possessions (Luke 9:1-6 and 10:1-12) and warned would-be devotees that he had nowhere to lay his head (see Luke 9:57-62), then we must recognize that it is extremely difficult to live in a Christian way in a consumer culture.

  Marva Dawn

  Christian, Would Be, Culture

  Marva J. Dawn (1999). “A Royal Waste of Time: The Splendor of Worshiping God and Being Church for the World”, p.88, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

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• In a time of infirmity, the illness IS one's work. Taking care of all the disciplines that our health problems require IS the other part of the small daily fidelity to which we are called, beside the faithfulness of being attentive to God. We can be well simply by our diligence in being who we are at the moment.

  Marva Dawn

  Discipline, Care, Who We Are

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• Instead of scrambling for security in national victory and domination, in preparation for war and military aggression, we must relearn the values of cooperation and sharing, of nonviolence and support.

  Marva Dawn

  Peace, Military, War

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• Let us make sure that the worship services we plan and conduct present that Truth in all its clarity and beauty and goodness.

  Marva Dawn

  Worship Service, Clarity, Goodness

  Marva J. Dawn (1997). “Is It a Lost Cause?: Having the Heart of God for the Church's Children”, p.87, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

  9 Copy quote

• Without the emotion and willingness of Spirit, our music becomes dry and dusty—without life. Without doctrinal bones as a skeleton, the Body is not enfleshed in a healthy way.

  Marva Dawn

  Skeletons, Healthy, Dry

  Marva J. Dawn (2015). “How Shall We Worship?: Biblical Guidelines for the Worship Wars”, p.8, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  9 Copy quote

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