there is something far more dreadful than physical calamity and suffering, namely, moral delinquency and spiritual apostasy. Alas, that this is so rarely perceived today!The Life of Elijah. Chapel Library.
And it is a mercy to have so near a friend to be a helper to your soul; to join with you in prayer and other holy exercises; to watch over you and tell you of your sins and dangers, and to stir up in you the grace of God, and remember to you of the life to come, and cheerfully accompany you in the ways of holiness.Richard Baxter,A Christian Directoiy: or, Sum ofPractical7heology, and Cases of Conscience, 11.1 (7he Practical Works of the Rev. Richard Baxter [London: James Duncan, 1830], IV, 30).
I take occasion to make the general remark that the great thing I always desired to find was a woman who was a real Christian, who was a real lady, and who was not a fool.AutoBiography (73)
Here then is the design of prayer: not that God's will may be altered, but that it may be accomplished in His own good time and way. It is because God has promised certain things that we can ask for them with the full assurance of faith.https://www.monergism.com/sovereignty-god-unabridged
How many a young man, never called of God, has been pressed into the ministry by well-meaning friends who had more zeal than knowledge. None may rightly count upon the divine blessing in the service of Christ unless he has been expressly set apart thereto by the Holy Spirit (Ac 13:2)Gleanings from Elisha (18)
the very manner of their publication plainly showed that God Himself assigned to the Decalogue peculiar importance. The Ten Commandments were uttered by God in an audible voice, with the fearful adjuncts of clouds and darkness, thunders and lightnings and the sound of a trumpet, and they were the only parts of Divine Revelation so spoken—none of the ceremonial or civil precepts were thus distinguished. Those Ten Words, and they alone, were written by the finger of God upon tables of stone, and they alone were deposited in the holy ark for safekeeping. Thus, in the unique honor conferred upon the Decalogue, we may perceive its paramount importance in the divine government.https://www.monergism.com/ten-commandments-ebook-1
False theology makes God's foreknowledge of our believing the cause of His election to salvation; whereas, God's election is the cause, and our believing in Christ is the effect
In 1950 the average age at marriage was twenty for women and twenty-two for men; by 2019 those numbers rose to twenty-eight for women and thirty for men.Remarriage in Early Christianity, Eerdmans, 7
Marriage is called a yoke, too heavy for one alone to bear; therefore, each had a mutual help, a wife. In the participation of good, compassion of evil, in health the best delight, in sickness the best comfort; the sole companion to whom we may communicate our joys and into whose bosom we unload our sorrows. Thus are our griefs lessened, our joys enlarged, our hearts solaced.
Headship is the divine calling of a husband to take
primary responsibility for Christlike servant-leadership, protection, and provision in the home.
Submission is the divine calling of a wife to honor
and affirm her husband's leadership, and help carry it
through according to her gifts.
we would say to any young man who is seriously contemplating entering the ministry, Abandon such a prospect at once if you are not prepared to be treated with contempt and made 'as the filth of the world, the off-scouring of all things'The Life of Elijah (chap 30)
A wife takes sanctuary not only in her husband's house but in his heart. The tree of love should grow up in the family as the tree of life grew up in the garden. They that choose their love should love their choice. They that marry where they affect not will affect where they marry not. Two joined together without love are but two tied together to make one another miserable.
Marry neither only or chiefly for beauty, by the eye; nor for honor, by the ear; nor for money or wealth, by the hand; but find out a meet helper, a suitable yoke fellow, one whom you are sure you shall love because you do love her, and that too for her virtues and qualifications, so decently lodged, that you cannot but be pleased to dwell with them. To conclude this particular about the choice of a wife and conversation with a wife, let me mind you what wisdom itself advises—namely, to marry in the Lord.
As for the qualifications of a husband or wife, I would advise all to look at true religion in the first place, that those that marry may be said to marry in the Lord. Next to religion, I should commend a suitable disposition and a conformity in manners, that man and wife may delight in the society and converse one of another. And as I would not have a man or woman marry merely or chiefly by their eyes or fancies, so neither would I advise a marriage betwixt those that have an averseness or antipathy at first sight each to other.
He that is free from a wife may frame his choice to his mind, but he that hath chosen must frame his mind to his choice. Before, he might conform his actions to his affections; now he must endeavor to frame his affection according to his action.
True, the Christian is not under the Law as a Covenant of Works nor as a ministration of condemnation, but he is under it as a rule of life and a means of sanctification.https://www.monergism.com/ten-commandments-ebook-1