John Calvin on Honoring and Respecting the Word of God

"Their [objection] about our cleaving to the dead letter carries with it the punishment which they deserve for despising Scripture.  It is clear that Paul is there arguing against false apostles (2 Cor 3:6), who, by recommending the Law without Christ, deprived the people of the benefits of the new covenant, by which the Lord engages that he will write his law on the hearts believers, and engrave it on their inward parts.  The letter therefore is dead, and the law of the Lord kills its readers when it is dissevered from the grace of Christ, and only sounds in the ear without touching the heart.  But if it is effectually impressed on the heart by the Spirit; if it exhibits Christ, it is the word of life converting the soul, and making wise the simple.  No, in the very same passage, the apostle calls his own preaching the ministration of the Spirit (2 Cor 3:8), intimating that the Holy Spirit so cleaves to his own truth, as he has expressed it in Scripture, that he then only exerts and puts forth his strength when the word is received with due honor and respect" (John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion).

J.C. Ryle on Christianity's Unexplainable Facts (2 of 4)

"When skeptics and infidels have said all they can, we must not forget that there are three great broad facts which they have never explained away, and I am convinced they never can, and never will.  Let me tell you briefly what they are.  They are very simple facts, and any plain man can understand them."

Fact #1 - Jesus Christ

"The second fact is the Bible itself.  If Christianity is a mere invention of man, and the Bible is of no more authority than any other uninspired volume, how is it that the book is what it is?  How is it that a book written by a few Jews in a remote corner of the earth, written at distant periods without consort or collusion among the writers; written by members of a nation which, compared to Greeks and Romans, did nothing for literature - how is it that this book stands entirely alone, and there is nothing that even approaches it, for high views of God, for true views of man, for solemnity of thought, for grandeur of doctrine, and for purity of morality?  What account can the infidel give of this book, so deep, so simple, so wise, so free from defects?  He cannot explain its existence and nature on his principles.  We only can do that who hold that the book is supernatural and of God" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).