Quote 1140
I say there are two courts: one of justification, another of sanctification. In the court of justification merits are nothing worth, insufficient; but in the court of sanctification, as they are ensigns of a sanctified course, so they are jewels and ornaments.
Richard Sibbes
Complete Works (Edinburgh: James Nichol, 5:85)11.4K
Other Quotes from the Author & Topic
A regeneration that a man can have, and yet live carelessly in sin or worldliness, is a regeneration invented by uninspired theologians, but never mentioned in scripture. Holiness (Chapter 2)
Satan gives Adam an apple, and takes away paradise. Therefore in all temptations let us consider not what he offers, but what we shall lose.
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.
The Bruised Reed
True sanctification then does not consist in talk about religion. This is a point that ought never to be forgotten. The vast increase of education and preaching in these latter days makes it absolutely necessary to raise a warning voice. Holiness (Chapter 2)
None of us are normal, even after we are Christians if we mean by that being perfect. What is possible, however, is for us to live in the fullness of life in the circle of who we are, constantly pressing on the border lines to try to take further steps.
God is forced to mortify sins by afflictions, because we mortify them not by the Spirit.
usually he empties such of themselves, and makes them nothing, before he will use them in any great services.The Bruised Reed (3)
Every good deed we do in dependence on God does just the opposite of paying Him back; it puts us ever deeper in debt to His grace. And that is exactly where God wants us to be through all eternity. Brothers, We are Not Professionals (33)
It is not so easy a matter to pray as men think. In regard of the unspiritualness of our nature compared with the duty itself in which we draw near to a holy God, we cannot endure to be separated from our lusts; and there is great rebellion in our hearts against everything that is good; and Satan also is our special enemy…. When we go to God by prayer, the devil knows we go to fetch strength against him, and therefore he opposes us all he can. But though some may mumble over a few prayers, yet (indeed) no man can pray as he ought, or in faith, that is not within the covenant of grace, nor without the Holy Ghost.
Insomuch as we give way to our will in sinning, in such a measure of distance we set ourselves from comfort. Sin against conscience is a thief in the candle which wastes our joy and thereby weakens our strength. We must know, therefore, that willful breaches in sanctification will much hinder the sense of our justification.
As Satan slanders Christ to us, so he slanders us to ourselves. If thou be not so much as smoking flax, then why dost thou not renounce thy interest in Christ and disclaim the covenant of grace? This thou darest not do. Why dost thou not give up thyself wholly to other enjoyments? This thy spirit will not suffer thee.
A sanctified heart is better than a silver tongue. There is as much difference between gifts and grace as between a tulip painted on the wall and one growing in the garden.Divine Contentment
Sanctification is the work of God's free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God and are enabled more and more to die unto sin and live unto righteousness. Catechism
Sanctification and the mortification of our lusts are the hardest part of Christianity. It is, in a manner, as natural for us to leap when we see the new Jerusalem as to laugh when we are tickled. Joy is not under command nor at our nod when it kisseth. But O, how many of us would have Christ divided into two halves, that we might take the half of Him only and take His office—Jesus and salvation! But Lord is a cumbersome word, and to obey and work out our salvation and perfect holiness is the cumbersome and stormy north side of Christ and that which we eschew and shift.
Bad men have their good moods, as good men have their bad moods; a bad man may, under pangs of conscience, a smarting rod, the approaches of death, or the fears of hell, or when he is sermon sick, cry out to the Lord for grace, righteousness, and holiness; but he is the only blessed man that hungers and thirsts after righteousness at all times. Heaven is for that man and that man is for heaven that hungers and thirsts in a right manner after the righteousness of justification and after the righteousness of sanctification.
Pride is intolerable to pride.
Prayer is a venting of our desires to God from the sense of our wants, and he that is sensible of his wants is empty. A poor man, by the Spirit, earnestly pours out supplications in Christ's name and wrestles with God in prayer.
God can pick sense out of a confused prayer. These desires cry louder in His ears than thy sins. Sometimes a Christian has such confused thoughts that he can say nothing, but as a child cries, "O Father," not able to show what it needs, as Moses at the Red Sea. These stirrings of spirit touch the bowels of God and melt Him into compassion toward us when they come from the spirit of adoption and from a striving to be better.
It is an office of love here to take away the stones and to smooth the way to heaven. Therefore, we must take heed that under pretense of avoidance of disputes we do not suffer an adverse party to get ground upon the truth, for thus may we easily betray both the truth of God and souls of men.
It were good strife among Christians, one to labor to give no offense and the other to labor to take none.
Ingratitude is the grave of all God's blessings.
If we desire the Spirit, we must wait in the way of duty, as the apostles waited many days before the Comforter came. We must also empty our souls of self-love and the love of the world and willingly entertain those crosses that bring our souls out of love with it. The children of Israel in the wilderness had not the manna till they had spent their onions and garlic; so this world must be out of request with us before we can be truly spiritual. Through grace, labor to see the excellency of spiritual things. How despicable then must all the glory of the world appear! These things, duly considered, will raise our desires more and more toward spiritual and heavenly objects.
Knowledge and affection mutually help one another; it is good to keep up our affections of love and delight by all sweet inducements and divine encouragements, for what the heart likes best the mind studies most. Those that can bring their hearts to delight in Christ know most of His ways.
The heart of a Christian is Christ's garden, and His graces are as so many sweet spices and flowers, which His Spirit blowing upon makes them to send forth a sweet savor. Therefore, keep the soul open for entertainment of the Holy Ghost, for He will bring in continually fresh forces to subdue corruption, and this most of all on the Lord's Day.
Dead stones in an arch uphold one another, and shall not living? It is the work of an angel to comfort—nay, it is the office of the Holy Ghost to be a comforter not only immediately but by breathing comfort into our hearts together with the comfortable words of others. Thus, one friend becomes an angel—nay, a God to another, and there is a sweet sight of God in the face of a friend.
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