Just thought you might enjoy some more Christ-centered, gospel-saturated Ryle quotes at my site:

http://jcrylequotes.com/

Be encouraged and strengthened in your faith as Ryle continually points you to our Savior Jesus Christ.

Keep up the insightful posts.

Soli Deo Gloria!

~ Erik

“Say what you will, do what you will, the ministry is a “learned profession”; and the man without learning, no matter with what other gifts he may be endowed, is unfit for its duties. “Apt to teach”—yes, the minister must be “apt to teach.” Not apt merely to exhort, to beseech, to appeal, to entreat; not even merely, to testify, to bear witness;but to teach. And teaching implies knowledge: he who teaches must know. But aptness to teach alone does not make a minister; nor is it his primary qualification. It is only one of a long list of requirements which Paul lays down as necessary to meet in him who aspires to this high office. And all the rest concern, not his intellectual, but his spiritual fitness. A minister must be learned,on pain of being utterly incompetent for his work. But before and above being learned, a minister must be godly.Nothing could be more fatal, however, than to set these two things over against one another. Recruiting officers do not dispute whether it is better for soldiers to have a right leg or a left leg: soldiers should have both legs. Sometimes we hear it said that ten minutes on you knees will give you a truer, deeper, more operative knowledge of God than ten hours over your books. “What!” is the appropriate response, “than then hours over your books, on your knees?” Why should you turn from God when you turn to your books, or feel that you must turn from your books in order to turn to God? That I am asked to speak to you on the religious life of the student of theology proceeds on the recognition of the absurdity of such antithesis. You are students of theology, it is understood that you are religious men. In your case there can be no“either—or” here—either a student or a man of God. You must be both. Religion does not take a man away from his work; it sends him to his work with an added quality of devotion.”

While there is a danger of pride in boasting about one’s academic degree(s), it is equally prideful to think of one’s self to be self-sufficient because he is self-educated. Seminary degree(s) may seem nothing to some people, however, it does mean that an individual has sacrificed/invested a portion of his life to sit under his teachers (whom he may sometimes disagree with) for rigorous training academically and spiritually (though like Calvin, I don’t see the two as contradictions). In a nutshell, seminary training offers tools for people to enhance their call to preach and pastor. To me, that’s priceless.

On a different note, your point about the Regulative Principle of Worship is something I’ve been reading/studying/thinking for the past few years, and it is something l would love for us (contributors) to discuss/write in near future to sharpen each other.