(J. C. Ryle, "Do You Believe?")
"God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son." John 3:16
Reader, if God has given you His only begotten Son, beware of doubting His kindness and love, in any painful providence of your daily life! Never allow yourself to think hard thoughts of God. Never suppose that He can give you anything which is not really for your good. Remember the words of Paul: "He who spared not His own Son—but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things" (Romans 8:32)
See in every sorrow and trouble of your earthly pilgrimage—the hand of Him who gave Christ to die for your sins! That hand can never smite you—except in love! He who gave His only begotten Son for you, will never withhold anything from you which is really for your good. Lean back on this thought and be content. Say to yourself in the darkest hour of trial, "This also is ordered by Him who gave Christ to die for my sins. It cannot be wrong. It is done in love. It must be well."
“The Christian gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to died for me, yet I am so loved and valued that Jesus was glad to die for me. This leads to deep humility and deep confidence at the same time. It undermines both swaggering (boasting) and sniveling (self pity). I cannot feel superior to anyone, and yet I have nothing to prove to anyone. I do not think more of myself nor less of myself. Instead, I think of myself less.”
- Timothy Keller, The Reason For God (New York, NY: Dutton, 2008), 181.
"I cannot escape the exceeding wonder that not only does God look upon a guilty person in the court room and exercise clemency and forgive him and say, "you're guilty, I forgive you, go and sin no more", but he, also, beyond all imagination looks upon this guilty sinner and does not just say, "you're guilty, I forgive you" he says "you're not guilty." I mean forgiveness is understandable - just a little bit understandable – we kind of had some way to get our hands around forgiveness: you let it go; you don't hold it against them. But this looks me right in the face, right in the face, sinner that I am, and says "righteous."
John Piper
“Faith believes God to be true, hope awaits the time when his truth shall be manifested; faith believes that he is our Father, hope anticipates that he will ever show himself to be a Father toward us; faith believes that eternal life has been given to us, hope anticipates that it will some time be revealed; faith is the foundation upon which hope rests, hope nourishes and sustains faith” (John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, III.2.42).
“Do any of us find decays in grace prevailing in us;—deadness, coldness, lukewarmness, a kind of spiritual stupidity and senselessness coming upon us? Do we find an unreadiness unto the exercise of grace in its proper season, and the vigorous acting of it in duties of communion with God? and would we have our souls recovered from these dangerous diseases?
Let us assure ourselves there is no better way for our healing and deliverance, yea, no other way but this alone,—namely, the obtaining of a fresh view of the glory of Christ by faith, and a steady abiding therein. Constant contemplation of Christ and his glory, putting forth its transformation power unto the revival of all grace, is the only relief in this case” (The Works of John Owen, I, 395).
"In times of affliction we commonly meet with the sweetest experiences of God's love."—Bunyan.
"As no temporal blessing is good enough to be a sign of eternal election; so no temporal affliction is bad enough to be an evidence of reprobation."—Arrowsmith.
"All the sufferings of the believer are not hell—but they are all the hell he shall suffer."—Mason.
"It is in these storms that he learns . . .
more of his own weakness, and of Christ's strength;
more of his own misery, and of Christ's mercy;
more of his own sinfulness, and of superabounding grace;
more of his own poverty, and of Christ's riches;
more of his own desert of hell, and of his own title to heaven.
It is in these storms that the same blessed Spirit who began the work carries it on; and goes on to engrave the image of Christ in deeper characters upon his heart; and to teach him more and more experimentally the truth as it is in Jesus."— Philpot
"Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy! I look to You for protection. I will hide beneath the shadow of Your wings until this violent storm is past." Psalm 57:1
"The work of Providence is so slow, and our desires so impatient, the work of progress so immense and our means of aiding it so feeble,the life of humanity is so long and that of the individual so brief, that we often only see the ebb of the advancing wave and are thus discouraged. It is History that teaches us to hope."
Robert E. Lee
“I believe in the sun, even when it is not shining. And I believe in love, even when there’s no one there. And I believe in God, even when God is silent.”
discovered written on a cellar wall shortly after World War II, in a Jewish hiding place
Quotes from Martin Luther:
Beautiful music is the art of the prophets that can calm the agitations of the soul; it is one of the most magnificent and delightful presents God has given us.
Everything that is done in the world is done by hope.
Du kannst nicht verhindern, daß ein Vogelschwarm über deinen Kopf hinwegfliegt. Aber du kannst verhindern, daß er in deinen Haaren nistet.
Glaube nicht alles, was Du hörst, sage nicht alles, was Du willst, tue nicht alles, was Du magst.
Mark Twain Quotes:
Never knew before what eternity was made for. It is to give some of us a chance to learn German.
Whenever the literary German dives into a sentence, that is the last you are going to see of him till he emerges on the other side of his Atlantic with his verb in his mouth.
CS Lewis Quotes:
Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement.
Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret? There are better things ahead than any we leave behind.
If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this.
Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become.
What saves a man is to take a step. Then another step.
You can't get a cup of tea big enough or a book long enough to suit me.
You don't have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.
“All thing I thought I knew; but now confess, the more I know I know, I know the less.”
John Owen