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)
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
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.
But we are freed by Christ from the law? I answer, there is a double obligation of the law: the obligation of penalty and the obligation of duty. We are freed from the obligation of penalty but not from the obligation of duty. "Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity" (2 Tim. 2:19). He has taken from the law all power to condemn us but not all power to rule us. We must still serve God according to His law or He will not save us according to His gospel. Our faith in the Lord Jesus and our obedience to the law must be joined together, as Moses and Christ met upon the mountain. "The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ" (John 1:17).
Hope is a virgin of a fair and clear countenance; her proper seat is upon earth, her proper object is in heaven; of a quick and piercing eye that can see the glory of God, the mercy of Christ, the society of saints and angels, the joys of paradise through all the clouds and orbs, as Stephen saw heaven opened and Jesus standing in the holy place. Her eye is so fixed on the blessedness above that nothing in the world can remove it. Faith is her attorney general, prayer her solicitor, patience her physician, charity her almoner, thankfulness her treasurer, confidence her vice admiral, the promise of God her anchor, peace her chair of state, and eternal glory her crown.
Divine knowledge makes us understand the gospel, but it is divine grace which makes us live according to the gospel. Therefore, what you want in great learning supply with good living. I love preaching, and I love practicing; and I had rather hear one sermon in a day and do three good works than hear three sermons in a day and do never a good work else.
God is an essence spiritual, simple, infinite, most holy. (1) An essence subsisting in Himself and by Himself, not receiving it from any other; all other things subsist in Him and by Him: "in him we live, move, and have our being." (2) Spiritual: He hath not a body nor any parts of a body, but is a spirit invisible, indivisible. (3) Simple: we are all compounded; God is without composition of matter, form, or parts. (4) Infinite: and that in respect [1] of time, without beginning or ending; [2] of place, excluded nowhere, included nowhere; within all places, without all places. (5) Most holy; His wisdom, goodness, mercy, love are infinite.
Faith is generally an acknowledgment and assent to the truth (James 2:19). It is either common to all: such is an historical faith which is in the devils themselves, and temporary faith that will always keep the warm side of the hedge, never windward. Christ is little beholden to that faith, and that faith shall be little beholden to Christ.Meditations upon the Creed
While the wine is in thy hand, thou art a man; when it is in thy head, thou art become a beast. The drunkard cries to his fellow, "Do me reason," but the drink answers, "I will leave thee no reason; scarce so much as a beast, for they will drink no more than they need." Diogenes being urged to drink immoderately cast the drink on the ground. Being reproved for that loss, he answered, "If I had drunk it, I had lost both the drink and myself."
We walk in this world as a man in a field of snow; all the way appears smooth, yet cannot we be sure of any step. All are like actors on a stage; some have one part, and some another. Death is still busy among us. Here drops one of the players. We bury him with sorrow, and to our scene again. Then falls another—yea all, one after another—till death be left alone upon the stage. Death is that damp which puts out all the dim lights of vanity. Yet man is easier to believe that all the world shall die than to suspect himself.
The Puritan ethic of marriage was first to look not for a partner whom you do love passionately at this moment but rather for one whom you can love steadily as your best friend for life, then to proceed with God's help to do just that.
cross words aren't an indication of a bad marriage. They're an indication that the marriage is between two sinners. Also that there are times when we have to work things through in such a way that we get messy.Daddy Tried, 187
Marriage is more than your love for each other. . . . In your love you see only the heaven of your own happiness, but in marriage you are placed at a post of responsibility towards the world and mankind. Your love is your own private possession, but marriage is more than something personal - it is a status, and office. Just as it is the crown, and not merely the will to rule, that makes the king, so it is marriage, and not merely your love for each other, that joins you together in the sight of God and man.Letters and papers from Prison
The only way for you to be truly free is to link your feeling to an obligation. Only if you commit yourself to loving in action, day in and day out, even when feelings and circumstances are in flux, can you truly be a free individual and not a pawn of outside forces. Also, only if you maintain your love for someone when it is not thrilling can you be said to be actually loving a person.Meaning of Marriage (97)
When over the years someone has seen you at your worst, and knows you with all your strengths and flaws, yet commits him-or herself to you wholly, it is a consummate experience. To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us.Meaning of Marriage (95)
In so many cases, when one person says to another, 'I love you, but lets not ruin it by getting married,' that person really means, 'I don't love you enough to close off all my options. I don't love you enough to give myself to you that thoroughly.' To say, 'I dont need a piece of paper to love you' is basically to say, 'My love for you has not reached the marriage level.'Meaning of Marriage (78)
So what do you need to make marriage work? You need to know the secret, the gospel, and how it gives you both the power and pattern for your marriage. On the one hand, the experience of marriage will unveil the beauty and depths of the gospel to you. It will drive you further into reliance on it. On the other hand, a greater understanding of the gospel will help you experience deeper and deeper union with each other as the years go on.Meaning ofMarriage 47-48
If our views of marriage are too romantic and idealistic, we underestimate the influence of sin on human life. if they are too preparing and cynical, we misunderstand marriages divine origin. If we somehow manage, as our modern culture has, to do both at once, we are doubly burdened by a distorted vision. Yet the trouble is not within the institution of marriage but within ourselves. meaning of marriage 44