“There is a great deal of deceitfulness in sin; it appears fair, but is filthy; it appears pleasant, but is pernicious; it promises much, but performs nothing. The deceitfulness of sin is of a hardening nature to the soul; one sin allowed prepares for another; every act of sin confirms the habit; sinning against conscience is the way to sear the conscience; and therefore it should be the great concern of every one to exhort himself and others to beware of sin.” Matthew Henry
Category Archives: Quotes
God’s Love
Quote, “Love many times in the Bible is used interchangeably with forbearance and mercy. God forbears with His enemies and is merciful towards them in lieu of them repenting. But this is not to be mistaken as God being genuinely disposed towards his enemy in a manner as He is disposed towards His Son Jesus and His children.
When we are commanded to love our enemy it must be taken within the context of the Old Testament Law as found in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. In the law, God says, “If you see your enemy’s ox going astray, return it to him, or if you see your enemy’s ox struggling under his burden you shall help him”. The Bible does not contradict itself. David manifest how this ought to be fulfilled by only cutting off a piece of Saul’s cloak and not killing him.
Loving our enemy simply means being lawful towards them, nothing else. And being lawful at times means taking them to court if they act unlawfully towards you. What it does prohibit is taking up the sword to implement justice upon them. God specifically gave the civil magistrate the monopoly of the sword.” ~ Keon Garraway posted on the Puritan Board
quotes from John Wesley
Lightning Against the Pope
“There are many that think I am too fierce against Popedom; on the contrary, I complain that I am, alas! too mild; I wish I could breathe out lightning against pope and Popedom, and that every word were a thunderbolt.”
A philosophical look at tobacco use.
First Things
Tobacco and the Soul
Michael P. Foley
The current brouhaha over smoking has made everyone painfully aware of tobacco’s effects on the body, but it has also obscured a more profound reason for smoking’s popularity: its relation to the soul. As the heyday of smoking passes into the ashheap of history, it is meet that we reflect on this connection.The soul, of course, is a complex thing. Long ago Plato suggested that we consider it as divided into three parts-the appetitive, spirited, and rational-that correspond to the three basic kinds of human desires: the desire to satisfy physical appetites, the desire for recognition, and the desire for truth. Once this tripartite division is recalled, tobacco’s relation to the soul becomes clear: the three prevalent types of smoking tobacco-cigarettes, cigars, and pipes-correspond to the three parts of the soul.
http://www.leaderu.com/ftissues/ft9704/opinion/foley.html
Free Grace Quotes
Some great quotes found on Wiki, enjoy!
Christopher Ness
“Evangelical repentance is the gift of free grace; faith is the gift of God. What is God’s, as a gift to bestow, cannot be man’s duty to perform as a condition of salvation. Those who are invited to look to Christ, to come to Him for salvation, are very minutely described: they are the weary and heavy laden with sin, the penitent, the hungry and thirsty soul, etc., etc.; these are the characters invited to come to and believe in Christ, and not all men (Mt 11:28; Isa 55:1; Mr 2:17).”
J.H. Gosden
“We believe that all men are under obligation to believe and obey God. Though the Adam Fall utterly depraved and alienated human nature from God and goodness, rendering him as entirely incapable as unwilling to submit to God’s law, yet the divine Lawgiver has not lost His power to command and to judge. Man’s inability does not exonerate him… But what is every man duty-bound to believe? Surely not that each individual is himself interested in the redemption work of Christ, Man is not called upon to believe a lie.”
William Styles
“If Faith be a duty, it is a work; but according to the reasoning of the Apostle, the works of the Law are contradistinguished from Faith. Yet if Faith be a natural duty—though we are saved by grace—it is through the works of the law. The Covenant of Works is blended with the Covenant of Grace, and “grace is no more grace.”
Benjamin Taylor
“A man is called upon to believe in God so far as his knowledge goes of God, both in His works of grace and His works of providence. No man is called upon to believe what he never heard… To believe in Christ as my own Saviour is purely a spiritual act; and before I can do this, it is certain I must have a revelation of Christ to my soul.”
John Foreman
“…faith cannot be separated from any part of its connection and interest… If faith unto salvation be the natural man’s duty, then it must be the natural man’s duty to be all that the actual believer, through grace unto salvation, really and properly is… it must be the natural man’s duty to have all what the actual believer through grace unto salvation truly and properly has, according to the word of God… it must be the natural man’s duty for God himself to be to him all what by promise and gift he is to those who through grace do believe unto salvation… it must be the natural man’s duty for God to do for him, and give to him, all what by promise he does and gives to those who through grace do really believe unto salvation… If duty faith were a truth, it must have some meaning with God in regard to salvation; and such a meaning too, as that if it were the universal duty of all men, wherever the gospel comes, to believe unto salvation, then salvation would be as universal as the spread of the gospel, if all men did but do their duty.”
William Huntington
“…such doctrine had no good effect, either upon the saint, or upon the sinner: not to the saint, for he was sent to Moses for help; nor to the sinner, for he was sent to the physician before he was sick. Nor will God ever attend with his blessing and his seal such a doctrine as this to the conversion of any soul living… There is a great difference between law and gospel, works and grace, the letter and the Spirit; and between a legal commandment and a life-giving commandment.”
John Gill
“…the law is not of faith, so faith is not of the law. There is a faith indeed which the law requires and obliges to, namely, faith and trust in God, as the God of nature and providence; for as both the law of nature, and the law of Moses, show there is a God, and who is to be worshipped; they both require a belief of him, and trust and confidence in him… moreover the law obliges men to give credit to any revelation of the mind and will of God he has made, or should think fit to make unto them at any time; but as for special faith in Christ as a Saviour, or believing in him to the saving of the soul; this the law knows nothing of, nor does it make it known.”
John Gill
“The gospel is indeed ordered to be preached to every creature to whom it is sent and comes… And that there are universal offers of grace and salvation made to all men I utterly deny; nay, I deny they are made to any; no, not to God’s elect; grace and salvation are provided for them in the everlasting covenant, procured for them by Christ, published and revealed in the gospel, and applied by the Spirit.” 
Robert Hawker
“And the advocates of a yea and nay gospel, all act in perfect conformity to those principles… Offers of Christ, yea pressing Christ upon the congregation, are the chief topics adopted. And sometimes, from the great earnestness with which they have worked up their natural feeling to persuade, they enforce the present opportunity as if, should it be neglected, never another perhaps may be afforded them.”
John Brine
“With respect to offers and tenders of mercy and salvation to sinners I observe: That Christ and his salvation are to be proposed for acceptance, to all who see their need of him, that this includes an offer in it, but is more than an offer, and that he is graciously given to them, and ‘tis their duty to embrace and receive him.”
William Tant
“If then the gospel is good tidings because it proclaims blessings that are given to, secured for, and wrought in the souls of all interested in them, independent of creature merit, creature wisdom, creature seeking, creature asking, or creature diligence; then that gospel which gives an opposite view of these things is not good tidings. An offered gospel does do so; therefore an offered gospel is a contradiction to itself, and cannot be the gospel of the ever blessed God, for he is not the author of confusion, 1 Cor. 14:23, Therefore an offered gospel is contrary to God’s Word and Will.”
Two Kingdoms in Scotland
Posted on the Puritan Board;
Sirrah, ye are God’s silly vassal; there are two kings and two kingdoms in Scotland: there is king James, the head of the commonwealth; and there is Christ Jesus, the king of the Church, whose subject James the Sixth is, and of whose kingdom he is not a king, not a lord, not a head, but a member. – Andrew Melville
Gilead’s Balm
“Ye must be born again.”-John .iii. 7.
WILLIAM FELTON , The new birth is entirely the sovereign work of the ever-blessed Spirit. It is the coming into a new state; ” If any man be in Christ he is a new creature;” “Ye are God’s workmanship.” ‘Tis the formation of the soul in the image of Christ; “Ye are quickened together with Christ.” ‘Tis the erection of an empire in the heart, never to be destroyed; for the Spirit of Him that raised up Christ from the dead dwells in all the regenerate family.
Regeneration differs from conversion; with propriety, we may say, they have often been confounded. The former is life imparted; the latter is life in its act and exercise. With respect to the matter of the Spirit’s work in regeneration, it is perfect in its kind, but progressive in its apprehension. The new-born babe in the mystic family has all the properties of regeneration; but not an understanding of their use: hence we are said to ” grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ;” but who that have been brought into the school of Christ do not find a progression in self-knowledge to loathe and abhor themselves, whilst they are certainly conscious of desiring, with the apostle, to know Christ more, and the power of his glorious resurrection?
The new birth is distinguished by peculiar acts in the soul: hence helplessness is felt, yet help experienced. In the perfection of this work the sinner’s imperfection clearly appears. Thus the life that comes from God heaves the soul to the throne in groans and sighs. The chains that are around the conscience are felt to be galling. Sincere desire for mercy would put up her head; but a cloud is seen, Jehovah is just, cries the anxious prisoner; and, therefore, will he have compassion upon my guilty soul?
I well remember, (sometimes with humbled feelings,) those many years of intense anguish, passed in heavy bondage of soul, whilst waiting for the moving of living waters, the hymns of that blessed man of God, Mr. Hart, and the Bible, being my only companions, except a conscience drenched in agony. I ran from chapel to chapel with a desire to get ease; but they appeared only to minister fresh torment to my distracted soul; and sure I am, as of my own existence, that no relief to such a state can be found, but in the peaceful blood of the cross. Many convictions have been healed by men; but the wounds made by the arrows of the Almighty can receive no cure but from Gilead’s balm. (found in the Pillar and Truth for May – June 2011, NO15)
GOSPEL STANDARD, OR, FEEBLE CHRISTIAN’S SUPPORT.
No. 47. NOVEMBER, 1839 – REGENERATION – VOL. V.
Wow, The End of the Wicked
The End of the Wicked Contemplated by the Righteous
by Jonathan Edwards
When the saints in glory shall see the wrath of God executed on ungodly men, it will be no occasion of grief to them, but of rejoicing.
It is not only the sight of God’s wrath executed on those wicked men who are of the antichristian church, which will be occasion of rejoicing to the saints in glory; but also the sight of the destruction of all God’s enemies: whether they have been the followers of antichrist or not, that alters not the case, if they have been the enemies of God, and of Jesus Christ. All wicked men will at last be destroyed together, as being united in the same cause and interest, as being all of Satan’s army. They will all stand together at the day of judgment, as being all of the same company.
And if we understand the text to have respect only to a temporal execution of God’s wrath on his enemies, that will not alter the case. The thing they are called upon to rejoice at, is the execution of God’s wrath upon his and their enemies. And if it be matter of rejoicing to them to see justice executed in part upon them, or to see the beginning of the execution of it in this world; for the same reason will they rejoice with greater joy, in beholding it fully executed. For the thing here mentioned as the foundation of their joy, is the execution of just vengeance: Rejoice, for God hath avenged you on her. [source]
God Hates
Martin Luther (1483-1546): “the love and hate of God towards men is immutable and eternal, existing, not merely before there was any merit or work of ‘free-will,’ but before the world was made; [so] all things take place in us of necessity, according as He has from eternity loved or not loved … faith and unbelief come to us by no work of our own, but through the love and hatred of God” (The Bondage of the Will, pp. 226, 228-229).
William Perkins (1558-1602): “This hatred of God is whereby he detesteth and abhorreth the reprobate when he is fallen into sin for the same sin. And this hatred which God has to man comes by the fall of Adam and is neither an antecedent nor a cause of God’s decree, but only a consequent and followeth the decree” (A Golden Chain, chapter 53).
A. W. Pink (1886-1952): “‘Thou hatest all workers of iniquity’—not merely the works of iniquity. Here, then, is a flat repudiation of present teaching that, God hates sin but loves the sinner; Scripture says, ‘Thou hatest all workers of iniquity’ (Ps. 5:5)! ‘God is angry with the wicked every day.’ ‘He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God’—not ‘shall abide,’ but even now—‘abideth on him’ (Ps. 5:5; 8:11; John 3:36). Can God ‘love’ the one on whom His ‘wrath’ abides? Again; is it not evident that the words ‘The love of God which is in Christ Jesus’ (Rom. 8:39) mark a limitation, both in the sphere and objects of His love? Again; is it not plain from the words ‘Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated’ (Rom. 9:13) that God does not love everybody? … Is it conceivable that God will love the damned in the Lake of Fire? Yet, if He loves them now He will do so then, seeing that His love knows no change—He is ‘without variableness or shadow of turning!’” (The Sovereignty of God, p. 248).
Homer C. Hoeksema (1923-1989): “All history, in which vessels unto honor or unto dishonor are formed, is the revelation and realization of the counsel of God according to which He loved Jacob and all His elect people, but hated Esau and all the reprobate” (cf. “A Scriptural Presentation of God’s Hatred“).
Cornelius Hanko (1907-2005): “God loves His people in Christ, but He hates all the workers of iniquity (Ps. 5:5). Since God loves holiness, that very love turns in hatred against unholiness and sin. Since He is righteous, He burns with righteous indignation against all wickedness. Since He loves Himself as the sole Good, He banishes from His presence all that is in conflict with His Holy Name. God is a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Him. No one has ever dared to deny that God hates the devil. And yet also the devil is one of God’s creatures, who was created as a holy angel. If God hates the devil and his host, does He not hate those who are branded in Scripture as the very seed of the serpent, a generation of vipers? Nor can we distinguish between the deed and the person, as if God hates the sin but loves the sinner. For the deed can never be separated from the depravity of the one who commits the sin, nor can the guilt be reckoned to anyone but the guilty party. Therefore God does not banish sin to hell, but the sinner. The Word of God never hesitates, therefore, to declare that God’s very soul hates the wicked and him that loveth violence (Ps. 11:5). “Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated” (Rom. 9:13). See also verses 17 and 18″ (“Particular Love, Particular Atonement, and Missions,” Standard Bearer, vol. 42, issue 4).
John MacArthur, Jr.: “In a very real sense, God hated Esau himself. It was not a petty, spiteful, childish kind of hatred, but something far more dreadful. It was divine antipathy—a holy loathing directed at Esau personally. God abominated him as well as what he stood for” (The Love of God, pp. 86-87).
Donald S. Fortner: “The Christ of modern, freewill, works religion loves everyone in the universe and wants to save them. We are told that Christ loves all men alike, desires the salvation of all men alike, and is gracious to all men alike. That makes the love, will, and grace of Christ helpless and useless. But that language cannot be applied to the Christ of the Bible. The true Christ, the Christ of the Bible, the saving Christ loves his people, wills and prays for the salvation of his people, and is gracious to his people, the people unconditionally chosen unto salvation from eternity, whom he came to save (Ps. 5:5; 7:11; 11:5; Matt. 1:21; 11:27; John 10:16; 17:9-10; Acts 13:48; Rom. 9:21-24; Eph. 1:3-6).”
[The source for the following quotes can be found here.]
