J. I. Packer
J. I. Packer was an Anglican theologian, priest, and university teacher who was a citizen of Canada.
Born on July 22, 1926, in Twyning, Packer was educated at Corpus Christi College. He went on to work as a university teacher while also serving as an ordained Anglican priest, combining roles in both academic and church life throughout his career.
Packer was closely associated with Evangelicalism, and that connection shaped much of his theological work. He was also associated with the English Standard Version, a project that placed him at the intersection of biblical scholarship and the evangelical community he had long been part of.
Packer died on July 17, 2020, in Vancouver. His association with Evangelicalism and his involvement with the English Standard Version stand as two of the clearest markers of his theological commitments and his engagement with the broader Christian world.
Quotes by J. I. Packer
J. I. Packer's insights on:
Every time we mention God we become theologians, and the only question is whether we are going to be good ones or bad ones.
God in his wisdom, to make and keep us humble and to teach us to walk by faith, has hidden from us almost everything that we should like to know about the providential purposes which he is working out in the churches and in our own lives.
What makes life worthwhile is having a big enough objective, something which catches our imagination and lays hold of our allegiance, and this the Christian has in a way that no other person has. For what higher, more exalted, and more compelling goal can there be than to know God?
Certainly true worship invigorates, but to plan invigoration is not necessarily to order worship.
Pelagianism is the natural heresy of zealous Christians who are not interested in theology.
He that has learned to feel his sins, and to trust Christ as a Saviour, has learned the two hardest and greatest lessons in Christianity.
Grace means God sending his only Son to the cross to descend into hell so that we guilty ones might be reconciled to God and received into heaven.