To know that nothing
hurts the godly, is a matter of comfort; but to be assured that all things
which fall out shall co-operate for their good, that their crosses shall
be turned into blessings, that showers of affliction water the withering
root of their grace and make it flourish more; this may fill their hearts
with joy till they run over.
God takes away the world,
that the heart may cleave more to Him in sincerity.
God sweetens outward pain
with inward peace.
Not to be afflicted is a
sign of weakness; for, therefore God imposeth no more on me, because he
sees I can bear no more.
When we grow careless of
keeping our souls, then God recovers our taste of good things again by
sharp crosses.
The winter prepares the
earth for the spring, so do afflictions sanctified prepare the soul for
glory.
Do not even such things
as are most bitter to the flesh, tend to awaken Christians to faith and
prayer, to a sight of the emptiness of this world, and the fadingness of
the best it yield? Doth not God by these things (ofttimes) call our sins
to remembrance, and provoke us to amendment of life? How then can we be
offended at things by which we reap so much good?.... Therefore if mine
enemy hunger, let me feed him; if he thirst, let me give him drink. Now
in order to do this, (1) We must see good in that, in which other men can
see none. (2) We must pass by those injuries that other men would revenge.
(2) We must show we have grace, and that we are made to bear what other
men are not acquainted with. (4) Many of our graces are kept alive, by
those very things that are the death of other men's souls.... The devil,
(they say) is good when he is pleased; but Christ and His saints, when
displeased.
As the wicked are hurt by
the best things, so the godly are bettered by the worst.
Poverty and affliction take
away the fuel that feeds pride.
I am mended by my sickness,
enriched by my poverty, and strengthened by my weakness.... Thus was it
with.... Manasseh, when he was in affliction, "He besought the Lord his
God": even that king's iron was more precious to him than his gold, his
jail a more happy lodging than his palace, Babylon a better school than
Jerusalem. What fools are we, then, to frown upon our afflictions! These,
how crabbed soever, are our best friends. They are not indeed for our pleasure,
they are for our profit.
Labour to grow better under
all your afflictions, lest your afflictions grow worse, lest God mingle
them with more darkness, bitterness and terror.
The secret formula of the
saints: When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord's choicest
wines.
The way to be eased is not
struggling with it, but meekly to bear it.
There is a fable, but it
has its moral for this purpose. A certain ass, laded with salt, fell into
a river, and after he had risen, found his burden lighter, for the moisture
had made it melt away; whereupon he would ever after lie down in the water
as he traveled with his burden, and so ease himself. His owner perceiving
this craft , after laded him with Wool. The ass purposing to ease himself,
as before, laid himself down in the water, and thinking to have ease, rising
again to feel his weight, found it
heavier.
Look how fears have presented
themselves, so have supports and encouragements; yea, when I have started,
even as it were at nothing else but my shadow, yet God, as being very tender
of me, hath not suffered me to be molested, but would with one Scripture
or another, strengthen me against all; insomuch that I have often said,
Were it lawful, I could pray for greater trouble, for the greater comfort's
sake.
He that rides to be crowned,
will not think much of a rainy day.
God takes a safe course
with His children, that they may not be condemned with the world, He permits
the world to condemn them, that they may not love the world, the world
hates them....
Afflictions are light when
compared with what we really deserve. They are light when compared with
the sufferings of the Lord Jesus. But perhaps their real lightness is best
seen by comparing them with the weight of glory which is awaiting us.
No wise man can expect that...God
should diet us with a continual feast. It would neither suit with our health,
nor the condition of this pilgrimage. Live, therefore, on your peace of
conscience as your ordinary diet; when this is wanting, know that God appointeth
you a fast for your health; and when you have a feast of high joys, feed
on it and be thankful! But when they are taken from you, gape not after
them as the disciples did after Christ at His ascension; but return thankfully
to your ordinary diet of peace.
The highest honor that God
can confer upon his children is the blood-red crown of martyrdom. The jewels
of a Christian are his afflictions. The regalia of the kings that God has
made, are their troubles, their sorrows, and their griefs. Griefs exalt
us, and troubles lift us.
It is the great support
and solace of the saints in all the distresses that befall them here, that
there is a wise Spirit sitting in all the wheels of motion, and governing
the most eccentric creatures and their most pernicious designs to blessed
and happy issues.
Assurance
Whom God legally saves,
He experimentally saves; whom He justifies, them He also sanctifies. Where
the righteousness of Christ is imputed to an individual, a principle of
holiness is imparted to him; the former can only be ascertained by the
latter. It is impossible to obtain a Scriptural knowledge that the merits
of Christ’s finished work are reckoned to my account, except by proving
that the efficacy of the Holy Spirit’s work is evident in my soul.
It is only in proportion
as the Christian manifests the fruit of a genuine conversion that he is
entitled to regard himself and be regarded by others as one of the called
and elect of God. It is just in proportion as we add to our faith the other
Christian graces that we have solid ground on which to rest in the assurance
we belong to the family of Christ. It is not those who are governed by
self-will, but “as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons
of God” (Rom. 8:14).
Sit not down without assurance.
Get alone, and bring thy heart to the bar of trial: force it to answer
the interrogatories put to it to set the qualifications of the saints on
one side, and the qualifications of thyself on the other side, and then
judge what resemblance there is between them.... Yet be sure thou judge
by a true touchstone, and mistake not the Scripture description of a saint,
that thou neither acquit nor condemn thyself by mistake.
Beware, I pray thee, of
presuming that thou art saved. If thy heart be renewed, if thou shalt hate
the things that thou didst once love, and love the things that thou didst
once hate; if thou hast really repented; if there be a thorough change
of mind in thee; if thou be born again, then hast thou reason to rejoice:
but if there be no vital change, no inward godliness; if there be no love
to God, no prayer, no work of the Holy Spirit, then thy saying “I am saved”
is but thine own assertion, and it may delude, but it will not deliver
thee.
The Scripture abounds in
commands and cautions for our utmost diligence in our search and inquiry
as to whether we are made partakers of Christ or not, or whether His Spirit
dwells in us or not—which argue both the difficulty of attaining an assured
confidence herein, as also the danger of our being mistaken, and yet the
certainty of a good issue upon the diligent and regular use of means to
that purpose.
We all profess that we are
bound for heaven, immortality, and glory: but is it any evidence that we
really design it if all our thoughts are consumed about the trifles of
this world, which we must leave behind us, and have only occasional thoughts
of things above?
Though true grace has various
degrees, and there are some that are but babes in Christ, in whom the exercise
of the inclination and will, towards divine and heavenly things, is comparatively
weak; yet everyone that has the power of godliness in his heart, has his
inclinations and heart exercised towards God
and divine things, with
such strength and vigor that these holy exercises do prevail in him above
all carnal or natural affections, and are effectual to overcome them: for
every true disciple of Christ "loves him above father or mother, wife and
children, brethren and sisters, houses and lands: yea, than his own life."
Blessings
Did you never run for shelter
in a storm, and find fruit which you expected not? Did you never go to
God for safeguard, driven by outward storms, and there find unexpected
fruit?
To bless God for mercies
is the way to increase them; to bless Him for miseries is the way to remove
them.
Those blessings are sweetest
that are won with prayers and won with thanks.
The riches of His free grace
cause me daily to triumph over all the temptations of the wicked one, who
is very vigilant, and seeks all occasions to disturb me.
God will not be behind-hand
in love to us: for our drop, we shall receive an ocean.
Chastisement
Chastisement is designed
for our good, to promote our highest interests. Look beyond the rod to
the All-wise hand that wields it!
For a Christian to defy
adversities is to "despise" chastisement. Instead of hardening himself
to endure stoically, there should be a melting of the heart.
Whatsoever we have over-loved,
idolized, and leaned upon, God has from time to time broken it, and made
us to see the vanity of it; so that we find the readiest course to be rid
of our comforts is to set our hearts inordinately upon them.
God's wounds cure, sin's
kisses kill.
Better be pruned to grow
than cut up to burn.
Thou art beaten that thou
mayest be better.
Especially look to those
sins to which your crosses have some reference and respect. Are you crossed
in your goods? Think if you did not over-love them and get them unjustly,
or if in your children, see if you did not over-love them and cocker them,
and so in all things of like kind. In what God smites vou, see if you have
not in that sinned against Him, and so frame to lament your sins and to
seek help against them.
God would not rub so hard
if it were not to fetch out the dirt that is ingrained in our natures.
God loves purity so well He had rather see a hole than a spot in His child's
garments.
No marvel if the worldling
escape earthly afflictions. God corrects him not. He is base born and begot.
God will not do him the favour to whip him. The world afflicts him not,
because it loves him: for each man is indulgent to his own. God uses not
the rod where He means to use the Word. The pillory or scourge is for those
malefactors that shall escape execution.
The
Christian Life
The whole life of a Christian
should be nothing but praises and thanks to God; we should neither eat
nor sleep, but eat to God and sleep to God and work to God and talk to
God, do all to His glory and praise.
The tenets of [the Christian
life] seem paradoxes to carnal men; as first, that a Christian is the only
freeman, and other men are slaves; that he is the only rich man, though
never so poor in the world; that he is the only beautiful man, though outwardly
never so deformed; that he is the only happy man in the midst of all his
miseries.
We are only safe when we
wisely make use of all good advantages that we have access to. By going
out of God's ways we go out of His government, and so lose our good frame
of mind, and find ourselves overspread quickly with a contrary disposition.
When we draw near to Christ (James 4:8), in His ordinances, He draws near
to us.
In our manner of speech,
our plans of living, our dealings with others, our conduct and walk in
the church and out of it—all should be done as becomes the gospel (Phil.
1:27).
Christians should be grave
and serious, though cheerful and pleasant. They should feel that they have
great interests at stake, and that the world has too. They are redeemed—not
to make sport; purchased with precious blood—for other purposes than to
make men laugh. They are soon to be in heaven—and a man who has any impressive
sense of that will habitually feel he has much else to do than to make
men laugh. The true course of life is midway between moroseness and levity;
sourness and lightness; harshness and jesting. Be benevolent, kind,
cheerful, bland, courteous—but serious. Be solemn, thoughtful, deeply impressed
with the presence of God and with eternal things—but pleasant affable and
benignant. Think not a smile sinful; but think not levity and jesting harmless.
Sorrows, because they are
lingering guests, I will entertain but moderately, knowing that the more
they are made of the longer they will continue: and for pleasures, because
they stay not, and do but call to drink at my door, I will use them as
passengers with slight respect. He is his own best friend that makes the
least of both of them.
The Christian and the carnal
man are most wonderful to each other. The one wonders to see the other
walk so strictly, and deny himself to those carnal liberties that the most
take.... And the Christian thinks it strange that men should be so bewitched,
and still remain children in the vanity of their turmoil, wearying and
humouring themselves from morning to night, running after stories and fancies,
and ever busy doing nothing; wonders that
the delights of earth and sin can so long entertain and please men, and
persuade them to give Jesus Christ so many refusals—to turn from their
life and happiness, and choose to be miserable, yea, and take much pains
to make themselves miserable.
My brethren, let me say,
be like Christ at all times. Imitate him in "public." Most of us live in
some sort of public capacity—many of us are called to work before our fellow-men
every day. We are watched; our words are caught; our lives are examined—taken
to pieces. The eagle-eyed, argus-eyed world observes everything we do,
and sharp critics are upon us. Let us live the life of Christ in public.
Let us take care that we exhibit our Master, and not ourselves—so that
we can say, "It is no longer I that live, but Christ that lives in me."
Contentment
Instead of complaining at
his lot, a contented man is thankful that his condition and circumstances
are no worse than they are. Instead of greedily desiring something more
than the supply of his present need, he rejoices that God still cares for
him. Such an one is "content" with such as he has (Heb. 13:5).
—Arthur W. Pink
Christian contentment is
that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits
to and delights in God's wise and fatherly disposal in every condition.
Death
God, to prevent all escape,
hath sown the seeds of death in our very constitution and nature, so that
we can as soon run from ourselves, as run from death. We need no feller
to come with a hand of violence and hew us down; there is in the tree a
worm, which grows out of its own substance, that will destroy it; so in
us, those infirmities of nature that will bring us down to the dust.
Death is only a grim porter
to let us into a stately palace.
We spend our years with
sighing; it is a valleyof tears; but death is the funeral of all our sorrows.
Mighty and gracious lords,
I will tell you to what your honour shall come; first, ye shall wax old
like others, then ye shall fall sick like others, then ye shall die like
others, then ye shall be buried like others, then ye shall be consumed
like others, then ye shall be judged like others, even like the beggars
which cry at your gates: one sickens, the other sickens; one dies, the
other dies; one rots, the other rots: look in the grave, and show me which
was Dives and which was Lazarus. This is some comfort to the poor, that
once he shall be like the rich; one day he shall be as wealthy, and as
glorious as a king; one hour of death will make all alike.
I account this body nothing
but a close prison to my soul; and the earth a larger prison to my body.
I may not break prison till I be loosed by death; but I will leave it,
not unwillingly,when I am loosed.
If a man that is desperately
sick today, did believe he should arise sound the next morning; or a man
today, in despicable poverty, had assurance that he should tomorrow arise
a prince: would they be afraid to go to bed....?
Let thy hope of heaven master
thy fear of death. Why shouldst thou be afraid to die, who hopest to live
by dying!
Death is half disarmed when
the pleasures and interests of the flesh are first denied.
He may look on death with
joy, who can look on forgiveness with faith.
Familiarize the thoughts
of the evil day to thy soul; handle this serpent often, walk daily in the
serious meditations of it, do not run from them because they are unpleasing
to flesh, that is the way to increase
the terror of it. Do with your souls, when shy of, and scared with the
thoughts of affliction or death, as you use to do with your beast that
is given to boggle and start as you ride on
him; when he flies back and starts at a thing, you do not yield to his
fear and go back, that will make him worse another time, but you ride him
up close to that which he is afraid of, and in time
you break him of that quality. The evil day is not such a fearful thing
to thee that art a Christian, as thou shouldst start for it. Bring up thy
heart close to it, show thy soul what Christ hath done to take the sting
out of it....
Pray that thy last days,
and last works may be the best; and that when thou comest to die, thou
mayest have nothing else to do but die.
It is well known that when
a jailer knocks off a prisoner's fetters, that the constant wearing them
hath put him to a great deal less pain than the knocking of them off doth
at the present; yet, though every blow
go to the very heart of him, he never murmurs at it.. . . because he knows
that the pain will be compensated by the ease that he shall afterwards
enjoy.
Death is never sudden to
a saint; no guest comes unawares to him who keeps a constant table.
Lord, be pleased to shake
my clay cottage before Thou throwest it down. Make it totter awhile before
it doth tumble. Let me be summoned before I am surprised.
There is an essential difference
between the decease of the godly and the death of the ungodly. Death comes
to the ungodly man as a penal infliction, but to the righteous as a summons
to his Father's palace. To the sinner it is an execution, to the saint
an undressing from his sins and infirmities. Death to the wicked is the
King of terrors. Death to the saint is the end of terrors, the commencement
of glory.
Eternal
Security
A man sometimes goes from
home, and sometimes he does not quite leave his house. There is much difference
between those two. If a man leaves his house and comes no more, then he
carries away all his goods.... But though a man
ride a great journey, yet he may come again; and ye say, "Surely he will
come again." Why? Because still his goods, wife and children are in his
house. So if Christ rejects a man and go away finally, He carries away
all His goods, spiritual gifts, graces and principles. But though He be
long absent, yet if His household stuff abide in the heart— if there be
the same desires after Him, and delight in Him, and admiring of Him—ye
may say, "Surely, He will come again." Why? Because His household stuff
is here still. When did Christ ever forsake a man in whose heart He left
this spiritual furniture?
God's decree is the very
pillar and basis on which the saint's perseverance depends. That decree
ties the knot of adoption so fast, that neither sin, death, nor hell, can
break it asunder.
When God calls a man, He
does not repent of it. God does not, as many friends do, love one day,
and hate another; or as princes, who make their subjects favourites, and
afterwards throw theminto prison. This is the blessedness of a saint; his
condition admits of no alteration. God's call is founded upon His decree,
and His decree is immutable. Acts of grace cannot be reversed.God blots
out His people's sins, but not their names.
Though Christians be not
kept altogether from falling, yet they are kept from falling altogether.
In our first paradise in
Eden there was a way to go out but no way to go in again. But as for the
heavenly paradise, there is a way to go in, but not way to go out.
Eternity
A man's greatest care should
be for that place where he lives longest; therefore eternity should be
his scope.
0 my brother! your opinion
about "for ever" can have no manner of effect upon the reality of that
"for ever!" A party of boatmen on the Niagara river may have a very strong
opinion when they are caught by the rapids that it is very pleasant rowing;
but neither their shouts nor their merriment will alter the fact that the
world's cataract is close at hand.
Eternity to the godly is
a day that has no sunset; eternity to the wicked is a night that has no
sunrise.
When the race is ended,
and the play is either won or lost, and ye are in the utmost circle and
border of time, and shall put your foot within the march of eternity, all
the good things of your short nightdream shall seem to you like ashes of
a blaze of thorns or straw.
Faith
If a man would lead a happy
life, let him but seek a sure object for his trust [or faith], and he shall
be safe: "He shall not be afraid of evil tidings: his heart is fixed, trusting
in the Lord." He hath laid up his confidence in God, therefore his heart
is kept in an equal poise.
This is a life of faith,
for God will try the truth of our faith, so that the world may see that
God has such servants as will depend upon His bare word.
Faith, whereby especially
Christ rules, sets the soul so high that it looks down on all other things
as far below, as having represented to it, by the Spirit of Christ, riches,
honor, beauty and pleasures of a higher nature.
As the strongest faith may
be shaken, so the weakest, where truth is, is so far rooted that it will
prevail. Weakness with watchfulness will stand, when strength with too
much confidence fails. Weakness, with acknowledgement of it, is the fittest
seat and subject for God to perfect His strength in; for consciousness
of our infirmities drives us out of ourselves to Him in whom our strength
lies.
A true faith in Jesus Christ
will not suffer us to be idle. No, it is an active, lively, restless principle;
it fills the heart, so that it cannot be easy till it is doing something
for Jesus Christ.
Oh let us continually keep
faith in exercise, till it be entirely swallowed up in the boundless ocean
of beatific vision.
No doubt [women of faith
in the past] were reproached for His name's sake, and accounted mad women;
but they had a faith which enabled them at that time to overcome the world,
and by which they climbed up to heaven.
Where reason cannot wade
there faith may swim.
It is the nature of faith
to believe God upon His bare word.... It will not be, saith sense; it cannot
be, saith reason; it both can and will be, saith faith, for I have a promise.
How weak soever the believer
finds himself, and how powerful soever he perceives his enemy to be, it
is all one to him, he hath no more to do but to put faith on work, and
to wait till God works.
How many, alas, of the precious
saints of God must we shut out from being believers, if there is no faith
but what amounts to assurance.... shall we say their faith went away in
the departure of their assurance? How oft then in a year may a believer
be no believer? even as often as God withdraws and leaves the creature
in the dark. Assurance is like the sun-flower, which opens with the day
and shuts with the night. It follows the motion of God's face; if that
looks smilingly on the soul, it lives; if that frowns or hides itself,
it dies. But faith is a plant that can grow in the shade, a grace that
can find the way to heaven in a dark night. It can "walk in darkness, and
yet trust in the name of the Lord."
Faith endures as seeing
Him who is invisible (Heb. 11:27); endures the disappointments, the hardships,
and the heart-aches of life, by recognizing that all comes from the hand
of Him who is too wise to err and too loving to be unkind. But so long
as we are occupied with any other object than God Himself, there will be
neither rest for the heart nor peace for the mind. But when we receive
all that enters our lives as from His hand, then, no matter what may be
our circumstances or surroundings—whether in a hovel or prison-dungeon,
or at a martyr's stake—we shall be enabled to say, " The lines are fallen
unto me in pleasant places" (Ps. 16:6). But that is the language of faith,
not of sight nor of sense.
Fear
Christian, let God's distinguishing
love to you be a motive to you to fear Him greatly. He has put His fear
in your heart, and may not have given that blessing to your neighbor, perhaps
not to your husband, your wife, your child, or your parent. Oh, what an
obligation should this thought lay upon your heart to greatly fear the
Lord! Remember also that this fear of the Lord is His treasure, a choice
jewel, given only to favorites, and to those who are greatly beloved.
In order to the attaining
of all useful knowledge this is most necessary, that we fear God; we are
not qualified to profit by the instructions that are given us unless our
minds be possessed with a holy reverence of God, and every thought within
us be brought into obedience to Him.... As all our knowledge must take
rise from the fear of God, so it must tend to it as its perfection and
centre. Those know enough who know how to fear God, who are careful in
every thing to please Him and fearful of offending Him in any thing; this
is the Alpha and Omega of knowledge.
We fear men so much, because
we fear God so little. One fear cures another. When man's terror scares
you, turn your thoughts to the wrath of God.
The wicked is a very coward,
and is afraid of everything; of God, because He is his enemy; of Satan,
because he is his tormentor; of God's creatures, because they, joining
with their Maker, fight against him;
of himself, because he bears about with him his own accuser and executioner.
The godly man contrarily is afraid of nothing; not of God, because he knows
Him his best friend, and will not hurt him; not of Satan, because he cannot
hurt him; not of afflictions, because he knows they come from a loving
God, and end in his good; not of the creatures, since "the very stones
in the field are in league with Him;" not of himself, since his conscience
is at peace.
How can you affright him?
Bring him word his estate is ruined; "Yet my inheritance is safe," says
he. Your wife, or child, or dear friend is dead; "Yet my Father lives."
You yourself must die; "Well, then, I go home to my Father, and to my inheritance.
Grace
"Grace" is more than mercy
and love, it superadds to them. it denotes, not simply love, but the love
of a sovereign, transcendly superior, one that may do what he will, that
may wholly choose whether he will love or no. There may be love between
equals, and an inferior may love a superior; but love in a superior, and
so superior as he may do what he will, in such a one love is called grace:
and therefore grace is attributed to princes; they are said to be gracious
to their subjects, whereas subjects cannot be gracious to princes. Now
God, who is an infinite Sovereign, who might have chosen whether ever He
would love us or no, for Him to love us, this is grace.
The Kingdom of grace is
nothing but.... the beginning of the Kingdom of glory; the Kingdom of grace
is glory in the seed, and the Kingdom of glory is grace in the flower;
the Kingdom ofgrace is glory in the daybreak, and the Kingdom of glory
is grace in the full meridian; the Kingdom of grace is glory militant,
and the Kingdom of glory is grace triumphant.... the Kingdom ofgrace leads
to the Kingdom of glory.
Grace and glory differ very
little; the one is the seed, the other is the flower; grace is glory militant,
glory is grace triumphant.
As rivers, the nearer they
come to the ocean whither they tend, the more they increase their waters,
and speed their streams; so will grace flow more fully and freely in its
near approaches to the ocean of glory.
Growth
in Grace
God's children improve all
advantages to advance their grand end; they labour to grow better by blessings
and crosses, and to make sanctified use of all things.
If believers decay in their
first love, or in some other grace, yet another grace may grow and increase,
such as humility, their brokenheartedness; they sometimes seem not to grow
in the branches when they may grow at the root; upon a check grace breaks
out more; as we say, after a hard winter there usually follows a glorious
spring.
Let weak Christians know
that a spark from heaven, though kindled under green wood that sobs and
smokes, yet it will consume all at last.
The right manner of growth
is to grow less in one's own eyes.
Heaven
Where the unveiled glories
of the Deity shall beat full upon us, and we for ever sun ourseves
in the smiles of God.
How sweet is rest after
fatigue! How sweet will heaven be when our journey is ended.
He that will be knighted
must kneel for it, and he that will enter in at the strait gate must crowd
for it—a gate made so on purpose, narrow and hard in the entrance, yet,
after we have entered, wide and glorious, that after our pain our joy may
be the sweeter.
He that loves the world,
how active is he! He will break his peace and sleep for it. He that loves
honour, what hazards will he run! He will swim to the throne in blood....
Love heaven, and you cannot miss it; love breaks through all opposition—it
takes heaven by storm.
Some have asked whether
we shall know one another in heaven? Surely, our knowledge will not be
diminished, but increased. The judgement of Luther and Anselm, and many
other divines is, that we shall know one another; yea, the saints of all
ages, whose faces we never saw; and, when we shall see the saints in glory
without their infirmities of pride end passion, it will be a glorious sight.
Even the tired horse, when
he comes near home, mends pace: be good always, without weariness, but
best at last; that the nearer thou comest to the end of thy days, the nearer
thou mayest be to the end of thy hopes, the salvation of thy soul.
Hell
Are there not millions of
us who would rather go sleeping to hell; than sweating to heaven?
Wrath to come implies both
the futurity and perpetuity of this wrath.... Yea, it is not only certainly
future, but when it comes it will be abiding wrath, or wrath still coming.
When millions of years and ages are past and gone, this will still be wrath
to come. Ever coming as a river ever flowing.
Thus it is in hell; they
would die, but they cannot. The wicked shall be always dying but never
dead; the smoke of the furnacedascends for ever and ever. Oh! who can endure
thus to be ever upon the rack? This word "ever" breaks the heart. Wicked
men do now think the Sabbaths long, and think a prayer long; but oh! how
long will it be to lie in hell for ever and ever?
The torments of hell abide
for ever.... If all the earth and sea were sand, and every thousandth year
a bird should come, and take away one grain of this sand, it would be a
long time ere that vast heap of sand were emptied; yet, if after all that
time the damned may come out of hell, there were some hope; but this word
EVER breaks the heart.
Holiness
There is nothing destroyed
by sanctification but that which would destroy us.
It is no small advantage
to the holy life to "begin the day with God." The saints are wont to leave
their hearts with Him over night, that they may find them with Him in the
morning. Before earthly things break in upon us, and we receive impressions
from abroad, it is good to season the heart with thoughts of God, and to
consecrate the early and virgin operations of the mind before they are
prostituted to baser objects. When the world gets the start of religion
in the morning, it can hardly overtake it all the day.
Christ will be master of
the heart, and sin must be mortified. If your life is unholy, then your
heart is unchanged, and you are an unsaved person. The Savior will sanctify
His people, renew them, give them a hatred of sin, and a love of holiness.
The grace that does not make a man better than others is a worthless counterfeit.
Christ saves His people, not IN their sins, but FROM their sins. Without
holiness, no man shall see the Lord.
Hope
Truly, hope is the saint's
covering, wherein he wraps himself, when he lays his body down to sleep
in the grave: "My flesh," saith David, "shall rest in hope."
Hope fills the afflicted
soul with such inward joy and consolation, that it can laugh while tears
are in the eye, sigh and sing all in a breath; it is called "the rejoicing
of hope" (Hebrews 3:6).
Humility
Oh that I was lowly in heart!
Honor and dishonor, good report and evil report would then be alike, and
prove a furtherance to me in my Christian cause.
A truly humble man is sensible
of his natural distance from God; of his dependence on Him; of the insufficiency
of his own power and wisdom; and that it is by God's power that he is upheld
and provided for, and that he needs God's wisdom to lead and guide him,
and His might to enable him to do what he ought to do for Him.
Joy
Take a saint, and put him
into any condition, and he knows how to rejoice in the Lord.
[Believers] have joy and
comfort—that joy that angels cannot give, and devils cannot take.
Foolish talking and jesting are not the ways in
which Christian cheerfulness should express itself, but rather "giving
of thanks" (Eph. 5:4). Religion is the source of joy and gladness,
but its joy is expressed in a religious way, in thanksgiving and praise.
The more we enjoy of God,
the more we are ravished with delight.
Judgment
Both in thy private sessions,
and the universal assizes, thou shalt be sure of the same Judge, the same
jury, the same witnesses, the same verdict. How certain thou art to die,
thou knowest; how soon to die, thou knowest not. Measure not thy life with
the longest; that were to piece it out with flattery. Thou canst name no
living man, not the sickest, which thou art sure shall die before thee.
That which a man spits against
heaven, shall fall back on his own face.
Alas! that the farthest
and of all our thoughts should be the thought of our ends.
Love
Let a man have what he will,
and do what he will, it signifies nothing without charity; which surely
implies that charity is the great thing, and that everything which has
not charity in some way contained or implied in it is nothing, and that
this charity is the life and soul of all religion, without which all things
that wear the name of virtues are empty and vain.
All the fruits of the Spirit
which we are to lay weight upon as evidential of grace, are summed up in
charity, or Christian love; because this is the sum of all grace. And the
only way, therefore, in which any can know their good estate, is by discerning
the exercises of this divine charity in their hearts; for without charity,
let men have what gifts you please, they are nothing.
I wish, brothers and sisters,
that we could all imitate "the pearl oyster"—A hurtful particle intrudes
itself into its shell, and this vexes and grieves it. It cannot reject
the evil, but what does it do but "cover" it with a precious substance
extracted out of its own life, by which it turns the intruder into a pearl!
Oh, that we could do so with the provocations we receive from our fellow
Christians, so that pearls of patience, gentleness, and forgiveness might
be bred within us by that which otherwise would have harmed us.
Meditation
Continued meditation brings
great profit to the soul. Passant and transient thoughts are more pleasant,
but not so profitable. Deliberate meditation is of most use because it
secures the return of the thoughts.
Meditation will keep your
hearts and souls from sinful thoughts. When the vessel is full you can
put in no more.... If the heart be full of sinful thoughts, there is no
room for holy and heavenly thoughts: if the heart be full of holy and heavenly
thoughts by meditation, there is no room for evil and sinful thoughts.
If I have observed anything
by experience, it is this: a man may take the measure of his growth and
decay in grace according to his thoughts and meditations upon the person
of Christ, and the glory of Christ's Kingdom, and of His love.
Singing God's praise is
a work of the most meditation of any we perform in public. It keeps the
heart longest upon the thing spoken. Prayer and hearing pass quick from
one sentence toanother; this sticks long upon it.
What is the reason there
is so much preaching and so little practice? For want of meditation....
Constant thoughts are operative, and musing makes the fire burn. Green
wood is not kindled by a flash or spark, but by constant blowing.
It is not the bee's touching
of the flower that gathers honey, but her abiding for a time upon the fower
that draws out the sweet. It is not he that reads most, but he that
meditates most, that will prove the choicest, sweetest, wisest and strongest
Christian.
When we find our souls at
all declining, it is best to raise them up presently by some awakening
meditations, such as of the presence of God, of the strict reckoning we
are to make, of the infinite love of God in Christ and the fruits of it,
of the excellency of a Christian's calling, of the short and uncertain
time of this life, of how little good all those things that steal away
our hearts will do us before long, and of how it shall be for ever with
us hereafter, as we spend this short time well or ill. The more we make
way for such considerations to sink into our hearts, the more we shall
rise nearer to that state of soul which we shall enjoy in heaven.
Patience
The patient man is merry
indeed.... The jailers that watch him are but his pages of honour, and
his very dungeon but the lower side of the vault of heaven. He kisseth
the wheel that must kill him; and thinks the stairs of the scaffold of
his martyrdom but so many degrees of his ascent to glory. The tormentors
are weary of him. the beholders have pitty on him, all men wonder at him;
and while he seems below all men, below himself, he is above nature. He
hath so overcome hlmself that nothing can conquer him.
Peace
And therefore you who think
so basely of the Gospel and the professors of it, because at present their
peace and comfort are not come, should know that it is on the way to them,
and comesto stay everlastingly with them; whreas your peace is going is
going from you every moment, and is sure to leave you without any hope
of returning to you again. Look not how the Christian begins, but ends.
Perseverance
Christ ceaseth not to work
by His intercession with God for us, and by His Spirit in us for God, whereby
He upholds His saints, their graces, their comforts in life, without which
they would run to ruin.
Your life is short, your
duties many, your assistance great, and your reward sure; therefore faint
not, hold on and hold up, in ways of well-doing, and heaven shall make
amends for all
If Christ has once possessed
the affections, there is no dispossessing of him again. A fire in the heart
overcomes all fires without.
When we are foiled, let
us believe we shall overcome; when we have fallen, let us believe we shall
rise again. Jacob, after he received a blow which made him lame, yet would
not give over wrestling (Gen. 32:25) till he had obtained the blessing.
So let us never give up, but, in our thoughts knit the beginning, progress
and end together, and then we shall see ourselves in heaven out of the
reach of all enemies.
Piety
Piety hath a wondrous virtue
to change all things into matter of consolation and joy. No condition in
effect can be evil or sad to a pious man: his very sorrows are pleasant,
his infirmities are wholesome, his
wants enrich him, his disgraces adorn him, his burdens ease him; his duties
are privileges, his falls are the grounds of advancement, his very sins
(as breeding contrition, humility, circumspection, and vigilance), do better
profit him: whereas impiety doth spoil every condition, doth corruptand
embase all good things, doth embitter all the conveniences and comforts
of life.
Pleasures
of the World
I cannot but look upon all
the glory and dignity of this world, lands and lordships, crowns and kingdoms,
even as on some brain-sick, beggarly fellow, that borrows fine clothes,
and plays, the part of a king or lord for an hour on a stage, and then
comes down, and the sport is ended, and they are beggars again.
Pleasures come like oxen
slow and heavily, and go away like post-horses, upon the spur.
Temporal good things are
not the Christian's freight, but his ballast, and therefore are to be desired
to poise, not load the vessel.
Seek not great things for
yourselves in this world, for if your garments be too long, they will make
you stumble; and one staff helps a man in his journey, when many in his
hands at once hinders him.
Prayer
Prayer is not overcoming
God's reluctance, but laying hold of His willingness.
I had rather stand against
the cannons of the wicked than against the prayers of the righteous.
Israel prevailed with God
in wrestling with Him, and therefore it is that he prevails with men also.
If so be that we will wrestle with God for a blessing, and prevail with
Him, then we need not to fear but we shall wrestle the enemies out of it
also.
Furnish thyself with arguments
from the promises to enforce thy pravers, and make them prevalent with
God. The promises are the ground of faith, and faith, when strengthened,
will make thee fervent, and such fervency ever speeds and returns with
victory out of the field of prayer.... The mightier any is in the Word,
the more mighty he will be in prayer.
Prayer is not appointed
for the furnishing of God with the knowledge of what we need, but it is
designed as a confession to Him of our sense of the need. In this,
as in everything, God's thoughts are not as ours. God requires that
His gifts should be sought for. He designs to be honoured by our
asking, just as He is to be thanked by us after He has bestowed His blessing.
Prayer is not intended to
change God's purpose, nor is it to move Him to form fresh purposes.
God has decreed that certain events shall come to pass through the means
He has appointed for their accomplishment.
Prayer is the way and means
God has appointed for the communication of the blessings of His goodness
to His people.
The prevailing idea seems
to be, that I come to God and ask Him for something that I want, and that
I expect Him to give me that which I have asked. But this is a most
dishonouring and degading conception. The popular belief reduces
God to a servant, our servant: doing our bidding, performing our pleasure,
granting our desires. No, prayer is a coming to God, telling Him
my need, committing my way unto the Lord, and leaving Him to deal with
it as seemeth Him best.
Real prayer is communion
with God, so that there will be common thoughts between His mind and ours.
What is needed is for Him to fill our hearts with His thoughts, and then
His desires will become our desires flowing back to Him.
Prayer is not so much an
act as it is an attitude—an attitude of dependency, dependency upon God.
I have benefited by my praying
for others; for by making an errand to God for them, I have gotten something
for myself.
Priorities
If our principal treasure
be as we profess, in things spiritual and heavenly, and woe unto us if
it be not so! on them will our affections, and consequently our desires
and thoughts, be principally fixed.
A godly man preferreth grace
before goods, and wisdom before the world.
Build your nest upon no
tree here; for you see God has sold the forest to death.
Let us use worldly things
as wise pilgrims do their staves and other necessaries convenient for their
journey. So long as they help us forward in our way, let us make use of
them, and accordingly esteem them. But if they become troublesome hindrances
and cumbersome burdens, let us leave them behind us, or cast them away.
Promises
of God
Promises, though they be
for a time seemingly delayed, cannot be finally frustrated.... the heart
of God is not turned though His face be hid; and prayers are not flung
back, though they be not instantly answered.
Prosperity
As men cherish young
plants at first, and fence them about to keep them from hurt, but when
they are grown, they remove them, and then leave them to the wind and weather,
so God besets His children first with props of inward comforts, but afterwards
exposes them to storms and winds, because they are better able to bear
it. Therefore let no man think himself the better because he is free from
troubles. It is because God sees him not fit to bear greater.
Where one thousand are destroyed
by the world's frowns, ten thousand are destroyed by the world's smiles.
The world, siren-like, sings us and sinks us.
And as men's diversions
increase from the world, so do their entanglements from Satan. When they
have more to do in the world than they can well manage, they shall have
more to do from Satan than they can well withstand.
Afflictions, like bills
and pikes, make a terrible show when they cannot reach us; but the temptations
of prosperity, like unseen bullets, wound and kill us before they are discerned.
Providence
How often has providence
convinced its observers, upon a sober recollection of the events of their
lives, that if the Lord had left them to their own counsels they had as
often been their own tormentors, if not executioners!
If God has given you but
a small portion of the world, yet if you are godly He has promised never
to forsake you (Heb. 13:5). Providence has ordered that condition for you
which is really best for your eternal good. If you had more of the world
than you have, your heads and hearts might not be able to manage it to
your advantage.
All the dark, intricate,
puzzling providences at which we were sometimes so offended...we shall
[one day] see to be to us, as the difficult passage through the wilderness
was to Israel, "the right way to the city of habitation".
Providence so orders the
case, that faith and prayer come between our wants and supplies, and the
goodness of God may be the more magnified in our eyes thereby.
Ah, did we but rightly understand
what the demerit of sin is, we would rather admire the bounty of God than
complain of the straithandedness of Providence. And if we did but consider
that there lies upon God no obligation of justice or gratitude to reward
any of our duties, it would cure our murmurs (Gen. 32:10).
Look around in the world,
and you may see some in every place who are objects of pity, bereaved by
sad accidents of all the comforts of life, while in the meantime Providence
has tenderly preserved you.
When the world smiles upon
us, and we have got a warm nest, how do we prophesy of rest and peace in
those acquisitions, thinking with good Baruch, great things for ourselves,
but Providence by a particular or general calamity overturns our plans
(Jer. 45:4,5), and all this to turn our hearts from the creature to God.
Let us consider and marvel
that ever this great and blessed God should be so much concerned, as you
have heard He is in all His providences, about such vile, despicable worms
as we are! He does not need us, but is perfectly blessed and happy in Himself
without us. We can add nothing to Him.
You may look upon some providences
once and again, and see little or nothing in them, but look "seven times,"
that is, meditate often upon them, and you will see their increasing glory,
like that increasing cloud (1 Kings 18:44).
When our needs are permitted
to grow to an extremity, and all visible hopes fail, then to have relief
given wonderfully enhances the price of such a mercy (Isa. 41:17-18).
Sometimes God makes use
of instruments for good to His people, who designed nothing but evil and
mischief to them. Thus Joseph's brethren were instrumental to his
advancement in that very thing in which they designed his ruin (Gen. 50:20).
[Providences] often puzzle
and entangle our thoughts, but bring them to the Word, and your duty will
be quickly manifested. "Until I went into the sanctuary of God, then understood
I their end" (Ps. 73:17). And not only their end, but his own duty,
to be quiet in an afflicted condition and not envy their prosperity.
Whatsoever we have over-loved,
idolized, and leaned upon, God has from time to time broken it, and made
us to see the vanity of it; so that we find the readiest course to be rid
our comforts is to set our hearts inordinately or immoderately upon them.
The boundless stores of
Providence are engaged for the support of the believer. Christ is our Joseph,
who has granaries full of wheat; but He does not treat us as Joseph did
the Egyptians, for He opens the door of His storehouse and bids us call
all the good therein our own. He has entailed upon His estate of Providence
a perpetual charge of a daily portion for us, and He has promised that
one day we shall clearly perceive that the estate itself has been well-farmed
on our behalf and has always been ours. The axle of the wheels of the chariot
of Providence is Infinite Love, and Gracious Wisdom is the perpetual charioteer.
Those circumstances, which
to the dim eye of Jacob's faith wore a hue so somber, were at that very
moment developing and perfecting the events which were to shed around the
evening of his life the halo of a glorious and cloudless sunset.
All things were working together for his good! And so, troubled soul, the
"much tribulation" will soon be over, and as you enter the "kingdom of
God" you shall then see, no longer "through a glass darkly" but in the
unshadowed sunlight of the Divine presence, that "all things" did "work
together" for your personal and eternal good.
Riches
Riches are long in getting
with much pains, hard in keeping with much care, quick in losing with more
sorrow.
Separation
We should take heed with
whom we join in league and amity. Before we plant our affections,
consider the persons what they are; if we see any signs of grace, then
it is good; but if not there will be a rent. Throughout our whole
life this ought to be our rule; we should labour in all company either
to do good or receive good; and where we can neither do nor receive good
we should avoid such acquaintance. Let men therefore consider and
take heed how they stand in combination with any wicked persons.
If any occupation or association
is found to hinder our communion with God or our enjoyment of spiritual
things, then it must be abandoned. Beware of 'leprosy' in the garment.
(Lev. 13:47) Anything in my habits or ways which mars happy fellowshp
with the brethren or robs me of power in service, is to be unsparingly
judged and made an end of— 'burned.' (Lev.13:52) Whatever I
cannot do for God's glory must be avoided.
Guilt or grief is all that
gracious souls get by communion with vain souls (Ps. 119:136, 158).
It is our wisest and our
safest course to stand at the farthest distance from sin; not to go near
the house of the harlot, but to fly from all appearance of evil (Prov.
5:8, I Thess. 5:22). The best course to prevent falling into the
pit is to keep at the greatest distance; he that will be so bold as to
attempt to dance upon the brink of the pit, may find by woeful experience
that it is a righteous thing with God that he should fall into the pit.
Sin is a plague, yea, the
greatest and most infectious plague in the world; and yet, ah! how few
are there that tremble at it, that keep at a distance from it!
The
Sovereignty of God
Divine sovereignty is not
the sovereignty of a tyrannical Despot, but the exercised pleasure of One
who is infinitely wise and good! Because God is infinitely wise He
cannot err, and because He is infinitely righteous He will not do wrong.
Here then is the preciousness of this truth. The mere fact itself
that God's will is irresistible and irreversible fills me with fear, but
once I realize that God wills only that which is good, my heart is made
to rejoice.
A consciousness of our powerlessness
should cast us upon Him who has all power. Here then is where a vision
and view of God's sovereignty helps, for it reveals His sufficiency and
shows us our insufficiency.
What is God's remedy for
dejection at apparent failure in our labours? This—the assurance
that God's purpose cannot fail, that God's plans cannot miscarry, that
God's will must be done. Our labours are not intended to bring about
that which God has not decreed.
Spiritual
Warfare
There is no such way to
be even with the devil and his instruments, for all their spite against
us, as by doing what good we can wherever we be come.
Temptation
Satan would seem to be mannerly
and reasonable; making as if he would be content with one-half of the heart,
whereas God challengeth all or none: as, indeed, He hath most reason to
claim all that made all. But this is nothing but a crafty fetch of Satan;
for he knows that if he have any part, God will have none: so the whole
falleth to his share alone.
If you yield to Satan in
the least, he will carry you further and further, till he has left you
under a stupefied or terrified conscience: stupefied, till thou hast lost
all thy tenderness. A stone at the top of a hill, when it begins to roll
down, ceases not till it comes to the bottom. Thou thinkest it is but yielding
a little, and so by degrees are carried on, till thou hast sinned away
all thy profession, and all principles of conscience, by the secret witchery
of his temptations.
Satan's time of tempting
is usually after an ordinance; and the reason is, because then he thinks
he shall find us most secure. When we have been at solemn duties, we are
apt to think all is done, and we grow remiss, and leave off that zeal and
strictness as before; just as a soldier, who after a battle leaves off
his armour, not once dreaming, of an enemy. Satan watches his time, and
when we least suspect, then he throws in a temptation.
Our great Pattern hath showed
us what our deportment ought to be in all suggestions and temptations.
When the devil showed Him "all the kingdoms of the world and the glory
of them," to tempt Him withal, He did not stand and look upon them, viewing
their glory, and pondering their empire.... but instantly, without stay,
He cries, "Get thee hence, Satan." Meet thy temptation in its entrance
with thoughts of faith concerning Christ on the cross; this will make it
sink before thee. Entertain no parley, no dispute with it, if thou wouldst
not enter into it.
If thou least fallen into
sin through violent temptations, seek speedily for repentance for it, recovery
out of it, and reformation from it.
Temptations, when we meet
them at first, are as the lion that reared upon Samson; but if we overcome
them, the next time we see them we shall find a nest of honey within them.
The cause why our oppressors
prevail oft against us is, because we trust too much in our own wits, and
lean too much upon our own inventions opposing subtility to subtility,
one evil device to another, matching and maintaining policy by policv,
and not committing our cause to God.
God sometimes permits Satan
to assail His dear children, the more to strengthen them in His spiritual
graces, and to confirm them more fully in the assurance of His love and
their salvation.
For as a city which has
been once besieged and not sacked will ever after be more strong to hold
out if it be assaulted by the like danger.... so those who are besieged
and assaulted by their spiritual enemies will ever after more carefully
arm themselves against them with the graces of God's Spirit, that they
may not be overcome nor foiled by them.
Watch constantly against
those things which are thought to be no temptations. The most poisonous
serpents are found where the sweetest flowers grow. Cleopatra was poisoned
by an asp that was brought to her in a basket of fair flowers. Sharp-edged
tools, long handled, wound at last.
Verbal
Communication
All our words ought to be
filled with true sweetness and grace; and this will be so if we mingle
the useful with the sweet.
As idle talk is often concealed
under the garb of jesting, and wit, the Apostle Paul expressly condemns
pleasantry, which is so agreeable as to seem a praiseworthy virtue, as
a part of foolish talking (Eph. 5:4).
Foolish talking and jesting are not the ways in
which Christian cheerfulness should express itself, but rather "giving
of thanks" (Eph. 5:4). Religion is the source of joy and gladness,
but its joy is expressed in a religious way, in thanksgiving and praise.
Whatever be the topic of
conversation, the spirit of piety should be diffused through it—as the
salt in our food should properly season it all, whatever the article of
food may be (Col. 4:6).
In our manner of speech,
our plans of living, our dealings with others, our conduct and walk in
the church and out of it—all should be done as becomes the gospel (Phil.
1:27).
Christians should be grave
and serious, though cheerful and pleasant. They should feel that they have
great interests at stake, and that the world has too. They are redeemed—not
to make sport; purchased with precious blood—for other purposes than to
make men laugh. They are soon to be in heaven—and a man who has any impressive
sense of that will habitually feel he has much else to do than to make
men laugh. The true course of life is midway between moroseness and levity;
sourness and lightness; harshness and jesting. Be benevolent, kind,
cheerful, bland, courteous—but serious. Be solemn, thoughtful, deeply impressed
with the presence of God and with eternal things—but pleasant affable and
benignant. Think not a smile sinful; but think not levity and jesting harmless.
I think it is not very difficult
to discern by the duties and converses of Christians, what frames their
spirits are under. Take a Christian in a good frame, and how serious, heavenly,
and profitable, will his converses and duties be! what a lovely companion
is he during the continuance of it!
Watchfulness
The Christian soldier must
avoid two evils—he must not faint or yield in the time of fight, and after
a victory he must not wax insolent and secure. When he has overcome, he
is so to behave himself as though he were presently again to be assaulted.
For Satan's temptations, like the waves of the sea, do follow one in the
neck of the other.
When the soul puts her danger
furthest off, and lies most secure, then 'tis nearest; therefore labour
to be constant in thy holy care—the want of this spoils all. Some you shall
have, that after a great fall into a sin that hath bruised them sorely,
will seem very careful for a time where they set their foot, how they walk,
and what company they come in, but as soon as the soreness of their consciences
wears off, their watch breaks up, and they are as careless as ever; like
one that is very careful to shut up his shop strongly, and maybe sit up
late to watch it also, for two or three nights after it hath been robbed,
but then minds it no more.
More
Quotes
Many of the quotes on this
page are taken from
The Golden Treasury of Puritan Quotations, edited
by I. D. E. Thomas.
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from Charles Spurgeon or one of the Puritans via e-mail, simply send request
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