Jerry Bridges

"The same grace that brings salvation teaches us to renounce ungodly living.  We cannot receive half of God's grace.  If we have experienced it at all, we will experience not only forgiveness of our sins but also freedom from sin's dominion."

Unknown Author

"even our tears of repentance must be washed in the blood of Jesus Christ."

Stephen Charnock

"It is less injury to Him to deny His being than to deny the purity of it; the one makes Him no God, the other a deformed, unlovely, and detestable God...he that saith God is not holy speaks much worse than he that saith there is no God at all."

Tim Keller

"the reason we have idols, is because down deep we don't trust God.  The serpent suggested that we couldn't trust God, and that is what we have believed ever since.  The real reason we don't worship him fully is because we are afraid that, if we give ourselves to him utterly and make him the supreme desire of our hearts, he will let us down."

George Mueller

"I seek at the beginning to get my heart into such a state that it has no will of its own in regard to a given matter.  Nine-tenths of the trouble with people is just here.  Nine-tenths of the difficulties are overcome when our hearts are ready to do the Lord's will, whatever it may be.  When one is truly in this state, it is usually but a little way to the knowledge of what His will is."

Tim Keller

"This is always the main way we get renewal in our lives.  God will not help you out of your obvious, visible problems (money problems, relationship problems, etc.) until you see the idols that we are worshiping right beside the Lord.  They have to be removed first....We are not to add anything to Jesus Christ as a requirement for being happy.  We are not to use God to get what we really want, but we are to see and make God that which we really want."

Unknown Author

The Will of God will never take you
Where the Grace of God cannot keep you
Where the Arms of God cannot support you
Where the Riches of God cannot support your needs
Where the Power of God cannot endow you.


The Will of God will never take you
Where the Spirit of God cannot work through you
Where the Wisdom of God cannot teach you
Where the Army of God cannot protect you
Where the Hands of God cannot mold you.

The Will of God will never take you
Where the Love of God cannot enfold you
Where the Mercies of God cannot sustain you
Where the Peace of God cannot calm your fears
Where the Authority of God cannot overrule you.

The Will of God will never take you
Where the Comfort of God cannot dry your tears
Where the Word of God cannot feed you
Where the Miracles of God cannot be done for you
Where the omnipresence of God cannot find you.

Augustine

"GREAT art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is Thy power, and of Thy wisdom there is no end. And man, being a part of Thy creation, desires to praise Thee, man, who bears about with him his mortality, the witness of his sin, even the witness that Thou 'resistest the proud,' -- yet man, this part of Thy creation, desires to praise Thee. Thou movest us to delight in praising Thee; for Thou hast formed us for Thyself, and our hearts are restless till they find rest in Thee? Lord, teach me to know and understand which of these should be first, to call on Thee, or to praise Thee; and likewise to know Thee, or to call upon Thee. But who is there that calls upon Thee without knowing Thee? For he that knows Thee not may call upon Thee as other than Thou art. Or perhaps we call on Thee that we may know Thee. 'But how shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed ? or how shall they believe without a preacher?' And those who seek the Lord shall praise Him. For those who seek shall find Him, and those who find Him shall praise Him. Let me seek Thee, Lord, in calling on Thee, and call on Thee in believing in Thee; for Thou hast been preached unto us. O Lord, my faith calls on Thee,--that faith which Thou hast imparted to me, which Thou hast breathed into me through the incarnation of Thy Son, through the ministry of Thy preacher."

Jerry Bridges

"our attitude toward sin is more self-centered than God-centered.  We are more concerned about our own 'victory' over sin than we are about the fact that our sins grieve the heart of God.  We cannot tolerate failure in our struggle with sin chiefly because we are success-oriented, not because we know it is offensive to God...God wants us to walk in obedience - not victory.  Obedience is oriented toward God; victory is oriented toward self. This may seem to be merely splitting hairs over semantics, but there is a subtle, self-centered attitude at the root of many of our difficulties with sin.  Until we face this attitude and deal with it, we will not consistently walk in holiness."

Thomas Brooks

"It is not the hearing of truth, nor the knowing of truth, nor the commending of truth, nor the talking of truth, but the indwelling of truth in your souls, that will keep your judgments chaste and sound, in the midst of all those glittering errors that betray many souls into his hands, that can easily 'transform himself into an angel of light' (2 Cor 11:14), that he may draw others to lie in chains of darkness with him for ever."

Thomas Brooks

"There are no men on earth so fenced against error as those are that receive the truth in the love of it.  Such souls are not 'easily tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the sleight of men and cunning craftiness, wherein they lie in wait to deceive' (Eph. 4:14).  It is not he that receives most of the truth unto his head, but he that receives most of the truth affectionately into his heart, that shall enjoy the happiness of having his judgement sound and clear, when others shall be deluded and deceived by them, who make it their business to infect the judgments and to undo the souls of men."

Edmund Burke

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men to do nothing"

Edward Welch

"The psalmist invite you into perilous situations with them.  They have real questions about whether or not they will be alive tomorrow.  Their situations are probably more extreme than our own, but the psalmists rarely mention the specifics because they don't want the details of their personal stories to bar us from entering in with our own.  Instead, they invite us to participate whenever possible.  They are choirmasters who want us to join them in their chorus to the Lord."

W.S. Plumer

"We never see sin aright until we see it as against God....All sin is against God in the sense: that it is His law that is broken, His authority that is despised, His government that is set at naught....Pharaoh and Balaam, Saul and Judas each said, 'I have sinned'; but the returning prodigal said, ' I have sinned against heaven and before thee'; and David said, 'Against Thee, Thee only have I sinned.'"

Paul Miller

“Power in prayer comes from being in touch with your weakness.  To teach us how to pray, Jesus told stories of weak people who knew they couldn’t do life on their own. The persistent widow and the friend at midnight get access, not because they are strong, but because they are desperate.  Learned desperation is at the heart of a praying life.”

Thomas Brooks

"There is not a wicked man in the world that is set up with Lucifer, as high as heaven, but shall with Lucifer be brought down low as hell.  Canst thou think seriously of this, O soul, and not say, O Lord, I humbly crave that thou wilt let me be little in this world, that I may be great in another world; and low here, that I may be high for ever hereafter.  Let me be low, and feed low, and live low, so I may live with thee for ever; let me now be clothed with rags, so thou wilt clothe me at last with thy robes; let me now be set upon a dunghill, so I may at last be advanced to sit with thee upon thy throne.  Lord make me rather gracious than great, inwardly holy than outwardly happy, and rather turn me into my first nothing, yea, make me worse than nothing, rather than set me up for a time, that thou mayest bring me low for ever."

Thomas Brooks

"It is not what men enjoy, but the principle from whence it comes, that makes men happy."

Augustine

"Many are miserable by loving hurtful things, but they are more miserable by having them."

Thomas Brooks

"there is more evil in the least sin than in the greatest affliction; and this appears as clear as the sun, by the severe dealing of God the Father with his beloved Son, who let all the vials of his fiercest wrath upon him, and that for the least sin as well as for the greatest."

Theodore Roosevelt

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”

Henry Scougal

"the worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love."

Blaise Pascal

“All men seek happiness, This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.”

Abraham Lincoln

"I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day."

C.S. Lewis

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket- safe, dark, motionless, airless--it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.”

John Piper

“The astonishing thing is that people can become religious without being converted. That is, they join churches and start reading the Bible and doing religious things with no change in the foundation of their happiness: It is still themselves. They are the ground of their joy.”

Will Rogers

“So live that you wouldn’t be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip”

Thomas Watson

"It is a vain thing for me, says the sinner, to set upon repentance; my sins are of that magnitude that there is no hope for me"..."Our sins are mountains, and how shall these ever be cast into the sea? Where unbelief represents sin in its bloody colours and God in his judge's robes, the soul would sooner fly from him than to him. This is dangerous. Other sins need mercy, but despair rejects mercy"..."Why should we entertain such hard thoughts of God? He has bowels of love to repenting sinners (Joel 2:13)"..."God's anger is not so hot but mercy can cool it, nor so sharp but mercy can sweeten it. God counts his mercy his glory (Exod. 33:18-19)

Thomas Watson

"Hypocrites grieve only for the bitter consequence of sin"..."Godly sorrow, however, is chiefly for the trespass against God, so that even if there were no conscience to smite, no devil to accuse, no hell to punish, yet the soul would still be grieved because of the prejudice done to God. 'My sin is ever before me' (Psalm 51: 3); David does not say, The sword threatened is ever before me, but 'my sin'. O that I should offend so good a God, that I should grieve my Comforter! This breaks my heart!"

Thomas Watson

"Sorrow for sin must surpass worldly sorrow. We must grieve more for offending God than for the loss of dear relations"..."We are to find as much bitterness in weeping for sin as ever we found sweetness in committing it"..."The Christian has arrived at a sufficient measure of sorrow when the love of sin is purged out."

Thomas Brooks

"it is not hasty reading, but serious meditating upon holy and heavenly truths, that make them prove sweet and profitable to the soul. It is not the bee's touching of the flower that gathers honey, but her abiding for a time upon the flower 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."

Thomas Brooks

"Know that it is not knowing, nor the talking, nor the reading man, but the doing man, that at last will be found the happiest man. 'if you know these things, blessed and happy are you if you do them.' (John 13:17)"

Thomas Brooks

"That sorrow for sin that keeps the soul from looking towards the mercy-seat, and that keeps Christ and the soul asunder, or that shall render the soul unfit for the communion of saints, is a sinful sorrow."

John Piper

"Humility agrees and is glad that everything we have is a free gift of God, and that this severs the root of boasting in our distinctives. Whatever talents, whatever intelligence, whatever skills, whatever gifts, whatever looks, whatever pedigree, whatever possessions, whatever wit, whatever influence you have, put away all pride because it is a gift, and put away all despair because it is a gift from God."