What a wonder that two natures infinitely distant should be more intimately united than anything in the world... That the same person should have both a glory and a grief; an infinite joy in the Deity, and an inexpressible sorrow in the humanity; that a God upon a throne should be an infant in a cradle; the thundering Creator be a weeping babe and a suffering man;
A God of unmixed blessedness is linked personally with a man of...sorrows: life incapable to die, joined to a body in that economy incapable to live without dying first; infinite purity, and a reputed sinner; eternal blessedness with a cursed nature, Almightiness and weakness, omniscience and ignorance, immutability and changeableness, incomprehensibleness and comprehensibility; that which cannot be comprehended, and that which can be comprehended; that which is entirely independent, and that which is totally dependent; the Creator forming all things, and the creature made, met together to a personal union; "The word made flesh
I desire to cast my crown at the feet of Jesus, and to cry grace! grace! Dear Sir, what a charming word is that? I am sure I can freely own, that all my salvation is of grace, unmerited, distinguishing, electing grace!
Repentance was never yet produced in any man's heart apart from the grace of God. As soon may you expect the leopard to regret the blood with which its fangs are moistened, as soon might you expect the lion of the wood to abjure his cruel tyranny over the feeble beasts of the plain, as expect the sinner to make any confession, or offer any repentance that shall be accepted of God, unless grace shall first renew the heart.
You need grace! But someone says if you throw that much grace around it will be a liscence for sin. Only among the unconverted Church members. Oh they will take it as an excuse for sin. The genuinely converted will say this, if grace be such. If it be so large and so wide... depths I cannot sound. Then oh let me be holy! Unknown
The great objection of a penitent is, I have sinned, and I know not whether God will receive me: consider, God knows your sin better than you do, yet he kindly calls to you, and promises you as good a reception as if you had never sinned.
Those who suppose that the doctrine of God's grace tends to encourage moral laxity are simply showing that, in the most literal sense, they do not know what they are talking about. For love awakens love in return; Knowing God (The Grace of God, 152)
that principle of a greedy desire to be uncontrolled in their lusts -which induces men to a denial of providenceExistence and Attributes of God, Discourse 1
a fool is one who has lost his wisdom and right notion of God and divine things, which were communicated to man by creationExistence and Attributes of God, Discourse 1
The psalmist lays all the evil, tyranny, lust, and persecutions of men (as if the world were only for their sake) upon their neglect of God and the atheism cherished in the hearts.Existence and Attributes of God, Discourse 1
Love is a commanding affection, a uniting grace; it draws all the faculties of the soul to one center. The soul that loves God, when it hath to do with Him, is bound to the beloved object; it can mind nothing else during such impressions. When the affection is set to the worship of God, everything the soul hath will be bestowed upon it.
The law is tempered by the gospel but not nulled and cast out of doors by it. It enacts that none but those that are sanctified shall be glorified; that there must be grace here if we expect glory hereafter; that we must not presume to expect an admittance to the vision of God's face unless our souls be clothed with a robe of holiness (Heb. 12:14). It requires an obedience to the whole law in our intention and purpose and an endeavor to observe it in our actions; it promotes the honor of God and ordains a universal charity among men; it reveals the whole counsel of God and furnishes men with the holiest laws.
The commands of the gospel require the obedience of the creature. There is not one precept in the gospel which interferes with any rule in the law, but strengthens it and represents it in its true exactness; the heat to scorch us is allayed, but the light to direct us is not extinguished. Not the least allowance to any sin is granted; not the least affection to any sin is indulged.
Holiness can no more approve of sin than it can commit it. To be delighted with the evil in another's act contracts a guilt, as well as the commission of it; for approbation of a thing is a consent to it.
He could not be Lord of any man as a happy creature if He did not, by His power, make them happy; and He could not make them happy unless, by His grace, He made them holy.
God's children have various degrees of grace: some are little children who only feed upon the milk of the gospel; others are young men grown to maturity; others are fathers who are ready to take their degree in glory. Each has the vitality of godliness. The Scriptures speak both of the cedar and of the bruised reed: each is a plant of God's creation -each of His care; so the weakest plant in God's garden of the church is equally regarded by Him with the strongest. God can read the work of His Spirit on the soul which has received the dimmest impression.
The meditation of the excellency of grace would make us earnest in the pursuit after it. We dig for gold in the mine, we sweat for it in the furnace. Did we meditate on the worth of grace, we would dig in the mine of ordinances for it. What sweating and wrestling in prayer? We would put on a modest boldness and not take a denial.
Grace not only makes a man more a man, but it also makes him more than a man. The primitive Christians were the best of men. None were more lowly in their dispositions or more lovely in their conversation. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generation. He was not a sinner among saints, but he was a saint among sinners. Who would have looked for so fair a bird in so foul a nest? Though he once acted as the sons of men do, yet he was numbered with the sons of God. A field of wheat may be good and yet have a weed in it. A saint is not free from sin—that is his burden; a saint is not free to sin—that is his blessing.
Many men are changed in a moral sense, and one may say they are become new men, but they are in heart and nature the same men still. They are not changed in a spiritual and supernatural sense, and therefore it cannot be said of them they are become new creatures. Restraining grace may cause a moral change, but it is renewing grace that must cause a saving change. Now many are under restraining grace, and so changed morally, that are not under the power of renewing grace, and so changed savingly.