Quote 4310
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A man may be theologically knowing and spiritually ignorant.
All the prayers in the Scripture you will find to be reasoning with God, not a multitude of words heaped together.
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
Power is God's hand or arm, omniscience His eye, mercy His bowels, eternity His duration, but holiness is His beauty
The best man is more unworthy to receive anything from God than the worst can be to receive from us.
The greatest punishment inflicted upon Christ, when he stood as a sacrifice for sin, was not the act of men, but the act of God
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.
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.
How comfortable is it to think that our distresses, as well as our deliverances, are the fruits of infinite wisdom! Nothing is done by Him too soon or too slow, but in the true point of time, with all its due circumstances, most conveniently for His glory and our good. How wise is God to bring the glory of our salvation out of the depths of a seeming ruin and make the evils of affliction subservient to the good of the afflicted!
God is said to harden men when He removes not from them the incentives to sin, curbs not those principles which are ready to comply with those incentives, withdraws the common assistances of His grace, concurs not with counsels and admonitions to make them effectual, flashes not in the convincing light which He darted upon them before. If hardness follows upon God's withholding His softening grace, it is not by any positive act of God but from the natural hardness of man.
Envy is a denial of providence.
The hell of devils belongs to [God's] authority. They have cast themselves out of the arms of His grace into the furnace of His justice. They have by their revolt forfeited the treasure of His goodness but cannot exempt themselves from the scepter of His dominion. When they would not own Him as a Lord Father, they are under Him as a Lord Judge. They are cast out of His affection but not freed from His yoke. He rules over the good angels as His subjects, over the evil ones as His rebels. Selections
Suppose a king's son should get out of a besieged city where he had left his wife and children, whom he loves as his own soul, and these all ready to die by sword or famine if supply came not the sooner. Could this prince, when he arrived at his father's house, please himself with the delights of the court and forget the distress of his family? Or rather would he not come post to his father, having their cries and groans always in his ears, and before he eat or drink do his errand to his father and entreat him, if ever he loved him, that he would send all the force of his kingdom to raise the siege rather than any of his dear relations should perish?
Prayers and supplications, earnest prayers out of affection, should be poured out even for them that cannot or do not pray for themselves. Wherefore are we taught to pray but that we may be the mouth of others? And since an intercessor is given to us above, how are we bound to be intercessors for others below.
Sometimes, the guilt of renewed infirmities or decays doth renew distrust and make us shrink, and we are like the child in the mother's arms that fears when he loses his hold, as if his safety were more in his hold of her than in her hold of him. Weak duties have weak expectations of success. In this case, what an excellent remedy has faith in looking to the perpetual intercession of Christ. Is He praying for us in the heavens, and shall we not be bold to pray and expect an answer? O remember that He is not weak when we are weak.
Evil works are a dust stirred up by an atheistical breath.
Think not God's time too long. He waits as much for a fit opportunity to share his mercy, as you can wait for the enjoyment of it: Isa. 30:18. Works i:118
A believer's courage for God is more sharpened oftentimes by the shame of his fall.
Though sin is not so evil as God is good, yet it is the greatest evil, and stands in opposition to God as the greatest good.
We see the main cause of unbelief and despair. It is ignorance of the Father's interest in redemption; the ignorance of the transaction between the Father and the Son is the cause of this, 'because they know not him who sent me.'
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8. John Piper (87)
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10. John Owen (73)
11. A.W. Pink (68)
12. William Gurnall (66)
13. Louis Berkhof (63)
14. Thomas Manton (61)
15. C.S. Lewis (59)
16. B.B. Warfield (59)
17. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (58)
18. R.C. Sproul (55)
19. Heinrich Bullinger (53)
20. Matthew Henry (51)
2. Charles Spurgeon (135)
3. J.C. Ryle (117)
4. John Calvin (107)
5. Thomas Brooks (98)
6. J.I. Packer (93)
7. John Flavel (88)
8. John Piper (87)
9. George Swinnock (83)
10. John Owen (73)
11. A.W. Pink (68)
12. William Gurnall (66)
13. Louis Berkhof (63)
14. Thomas Manton (61)
15. C.S. Lewis (59)
16. B.B. Warfield (59)
17. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (58)
18. R.C. Sproul (55)
19. Heinrich Bullinger (53)
20. Matthew Henry (51)
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