To make converts, we are tempted to play down the difficulties and play up the peace of mind and worldly success enjoyed by those who accept Christ. We will never be completely honest with our hearers until we tell them the blunt truth that, as members of a race of moral rebels, they are in a serious jam, and one they will not get out of easily. If they refuse to repent and believe on Christ, they will most surely perish. If they do turn to Him, the same enemies that crucified Him will try to crucify them. - A.W. Tozer

A single grateful thought raised to heaven is the most perfect prayer. - Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

It is a part of my daily habit to look back to my slavery in Africa, and to retrace the path by which the Lord has led me, for about forty-seven years, since He called me from infidelity and madness!My astonishing unsought deliverance from the hopeless wickedness and misery into which I had plunged myself, taken in connection with what He has done for me since--make me say, with peculiar emphasis, "Oh to grace how great a debtor, daily I'm constrained to be!" - Letters of John Newton

The hand of Christ is strong enough to uphold the heavens and gentle enough to wipe away our tears.- William Barclay (1907-1978), The Revelation of John, v.I, Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1961, reprint, Saint Andrew Press, 1965, p. 63

A woman, especially if she has the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can.- Jane Austen, 1775 - 1817

Truth's like a fire, and will burn through and be seen.- Maxwell Anderson, 1888 - 1959

A philosopher is a man who can look at an empty glass with a smile.- Thomas Robert Dewar, 1864 - 1930

A teetotaller is one who suffers from thirst instead of enjoying it.- Thomas Robert Dewar, 1864 - 1930

If you get to the top on your own, who'll take the picture?- Thomas Robert Dewar, 1864 - 1930

The road to success is filled with women pushing their husbands along.- Thomas Robert Dewar, 1864 - 1930

We have a great regard for old age when it is bottled.- Thomas Robert Dewar, 1864 - 1930

Are you a distressed believer? Is your heart pressed down with sickness, tried with disappointments, overburdened with cares? To you I say this day, "Behold the cross of Christ." Think whose hand it is that chastens you; think whose hand is measuring to you the cup of bitterness which you are now drinking. It is the hand of Him who was crucified! It is the same hand which, in love to your soul, was nailed to the accursed tree. Surely that thought should comfort and hearten you. Surely you should say to yourself, "A crucified Savior will never lay upon me anything that is not for my good. There is a needs be. It must be well."~ J.C. Ryle,Old Paths, “The Cross of Christ”, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1999], 261

Love is a medicine for the sickness of the world; a prescription often given, too rarely taken.- Karl Augustus Menninger, 1893 - 1990

There is need of a great revival of spiritual life, of truly fervent devotion to our Lord Jesus, of entire consecration to His service. It is only in a church in which this spirit of revival has at least begun, that there is any hope of radical change.-Andrew Murray

An error is the more dangerous in proportion to the degree of truth which it contains.-Frédéric Amiel, 1821 - 1881

Truth is not only violated by falsehood; it may be equally outraged by silence.-Frédéric Amiel, 1821 - 1881

Perfect happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.-Frédéric Amiel, 1821 - 1881

God is a covenant-making and covenant-keeping God. If you have never thought of Him in these terms, then you have not yet begun to think about Him in the way he wants you to. God’s Word describes those covenants, proclaiming Him to be a covenanting God. In a sense, the Bible is the book of His covenant. We even call it that – the Old and the New Covenants (Testaments)! --Sinclair Ferguson

A gentleman, who lived at Ealing, taught—

“There is no limit to the power of thought.”

I still, however, can’t help sometimes feeling

... That thought alone does not account for Ealing.

~GKC

Time bears away all things, even the mind. -Virgil (70-19 BC) _Eclogues_ Book IX, Line 51

The tests of life are to make, not break us. Trouble may

demolish a man's business but build up his character. The blow

at the outward man may be the greatest blessing to the inner

man. If God, then, puts or permits anything hard in our lives,

be sure that the real peril, the real trouble, is that we shall

lose if we flinch or rebel.- Maltbie D. Babcock (1858-1901), Thoughts for Eve

Let it be a settled principle with us, never to be satisfied with mere outward church-membership. We may be inside the net, and yet not be in Christ. The waters of baptism are poured on myriads who are never washed in the water of life. The bread and wine are eaten and drunk by thousands at the Lord's table, who never feed on Christ by faith. Are we converted? Are we among the "good fish?" This is the grand question. It is one which must be answered at last. The net will soon be "drawn to shore." The true character of every man's religion will at length be exposed. There will be an eternal separation between the good fish and the bad. There will be a "furnace of fire" for the wicked. ~ J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Matthew, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1986], 153, 154.

I have no doubt that where there is much love, there

will be much to love, and where love is scant,

faults will be plentiful. -Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892) _John Ploughman's Talk_ [1880]

There's always been a market for self-loathing in free societies:

after all, the most effectively anti-western idea of all was itself an

invention of the West, cooked up by Karl Marx while sitting in the

Reading Room of the British Library. The obvious defect in Communism

is that it's decrepit and joyless and therefore of limited appeal.

Fascism, likewise, had many takers in those parts of the cultural West

that were politically deficient - i.e., continental Europe - but it

had minimal support in the heart of the political West - i.e., the

English-speaking world. So the counter-tribalists came up with

something subtler and suppler than Communism and Fascism - the

slipperiest -ism of all. The great strength of "multiculturalism" is

not that it's an argument against the West but that it short-circuits

the possibility of argument. If there's no difference between English

Common Law and native healing circles and Tamil Tiger fundraisers and

gay marriage and sharia, then what's to discuss? Even to want to

debate the merits is to find oneself on the wrong side - for, if the

core belief of multiculturalism is that there's nothing to discuss and

everything's equally nice and fluffy, then to favour honest argument

puts you, by definition, on the extremist side.

-- Mark Steyn, The Slipperiest Ism, http://www.steynonline.com/4527/the-apathy-of-defeat

Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear

bright until you hear them speak.

You're never too old to learn something stupid.

When tempted to fight fire with fire, remember that the Fire

Department usually uses water.

One cold night they were sitting before the fire, where pine logs were hissing and spitting as they were burnt away. Churchill watched the blaze in silence. Then he growled: "I know why logs spit. I know what it is to be consumed."- John Gray, Churchill, chance and the 'black dog', http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15033046

God having forgiven sin, he will no longer call it to remembrance (Jer. 31:34)The Lord will make an act of indemnity. He will not upbraid us with former unkindness, nor sue us with a cancelled bond. 'He will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea' (Mic. 7:19). Sin shall not be cast in like cork which rises up again, but like lead which sinks to the bottom. How we should all labour for this covenant blessing!~Thomas Watson, The Godly Man's Picture (Edinburgh, Scotland; The Banner of Truth Trust; 1992) p. 9.

We must not conceal from ourselves that true Christianity
brings with it a daily cross in this life, while it offers us a
crown of glory in the life to come. The flesh must be daily
crucified. The devil must be daily resisted. The world must be
daily overcome. There is a warfare to be waged, and a battle to
be fought. All this is the inseparable accompaniment of true
religion. Heaven is not to be won without it. Never was there a
truer word than the old saying, "No cross, no crown!" If we
never found this out by experience, our souls are in a poor
condition. - J. C. Ryle (1816-1900), Expository thoughts on the Gospels, with the text complete, St. Matthew,Ipswitch: William Hunt, 1856, p. 202

Security is the mother of danger and the grandmother of destruction. - Thomas Fuller, 1608 - 1661

There are people in every time and every land who want to stop history in its tracks. They fear the future, mistrust the present, and invoke the security of the comfortable past which , in fact, never existed.- Robert F. Kennedy, 1925 - 1968

For social liberals, it sometimes seems that they think a family is just any group of people who share a refrigerator. Unk via Bruce Thompson

If we have a faith worth living for we have a faith worth dying for. Don't you compromise the faith that we are living and dying for - Archbishop Ben Kwashi

If you do not resist (Islam) now your grandchildren are going to have to fight a battle you do not have courage to fight.- Archbishop Ben Kwashi

Let us learn the high authority of the Bible, and the immense value of a knowledge of its contents. Let us read it, search into it, pray over it, diligently, perseveringly, unweariedly. Let us strive to be so thoroughly acquainted with its pages, that its text may abide in our memories, and stand ready at our right hand in the day of need. Let us be able to appeal from every perversion and false interpretation of its meaning, to those thousand plain passages, which are written as it were with a sunbeam. The Bible is indeed a sword, but we must take heed that we know it well, if we would use it with effect.~ J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Luke volume 1, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1986], 111, 112.

Salvation is complete; it involves justification, sanctification, and glorification. By grace, through faith, God justifies believers in an instantaneous act. That is to say, Christ died for His people in order that the penalty for their sins might be paid and His righteousness might be counted to them. They are declared just before God when they believe. Once justified, Christ saves them from the power of their sins through the lifelong process of sanctification. In sanctification, Christians are made more and more like Jesus Christ. But a lifelong process never ends, and the final goal is never reached until death. At death, Christians are glorified; they are then made completely perfect for the first time. - Jay E. Adams, Christian Living in the Home, P&R Publishing, 1972, p. 10-11

You will get through today one step, one moment at a time. Your main responsibility is to remain attentive to Me, letting Me guide you through the many choices along your pathway. This sounds like an easy assignment, but it is not. your desire to live in My Presence goes against the grain of "the world, the flesh, and the devil." Much of your weariness results from your constant battle against these opponents. However, you are on the path of My choosing, so do not give up! Hope in Me, for you will again praise Me for the help of My Presence. - Joe Lehr

‎Men must be governed by God, or they will be ruled by tyrants.- William Penn

If you feel that you are empty, if you feel you are nothing, if you feel you are poor and wretched and blind, if you hate your inclination to sin and have any suspicion of a feeling of self-loathing and hatred, you can take it from me that you have eternal life, for no one ever experiences such things until the life of God comes into his or her soul.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Life in God)

For all our conceits about being the center of the universe, we live in a routine planet of a humdrum star stuck away in an obscure corner ... of an unexceptional galaxy which is one of about 100 billion galaxies.... That is the fundamental fact of the universe we inhabit, and it is very good for us to understand that.- Carl Sagan, 1934 - 1996

I've often thought there ought to be a manual to hand to little kids, telling them what kind of planet they're on, why they don't fall off it, how much time they've probably got here, how to avoid poison ivy, and so on.- Kurt Vonnegut, 1922 - 2007

It is called The Bible - GJW

The riders in the race do not stop short when they reach the goal.

There is a little finishing canter before coming to a standstill.

There is time to hear the kind voice of friends and to say to one's

self: "The work is done." But just as one says that, the answer comes:

"The race is over, but the work never is done while the power to work

remains." The canter that brings you to a standstill need not be only

coming to rest. It cannot be, while you still live. For to live is to function. That is all there is in living. -Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., Radio address on his ninetieth birthday, March 8, 1931

Holiness depends on God's faithfulness, and not on our feelings or awareness of it. We must put our faith in God's faithfulness.. It is our duty to grow and thrive in holiness. Now what God requires of us, we are to believe He will help us to achieve. We must not rely on our feelings or whether we are aware of being more holy or not. - John Owen

As we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know.

We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are

some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns — the

ones we don't know we don't know. -Donald Rumsfeld (b. 1932)

Defense Department news briefing [12 February 2002].

If you do not march onward with Jesus, you are dying backward.

Not only are we all in the same boat, but we are all seasick. - G.K. Chesterton in What’s Wrong with the World

What is it going to be like in eternity with God?

Frankly, the capacity of our brains cannot handle

the wonder and greatness of heaven. It would be

like trying to describe the Internet to an ant.

It's futile. Words have not been invented that

could possibly convey the experience of eternity.

The Bible says, "No mere man has ever seen, heard

or even imagined what wonderful things God has

ready for those who love the Lord." 1 Corinthians 2:9 TLB -Rick Warren (1954- ) _The Purpose Driven Life_ [2002], Chapter 4

You’ll become a martyr if you stand for God, and if they can’t kill you, they will kill your reputation - Ian Paisley

I am not prepared to enter a Battle of Wits with someone with no defences." - Sir Edward Carson KC

There is also in the minds of the unregenerate men a moral inability by which the mind will never receive spiritual things, because it is governed and ruled by various lusts, corruptions, and prejudices. They are so fixed in the unregenerate mind as to make it think spiritual things are foolishness (John 6:44; 5:40; 3:19)." - John Owen

But if the mind is ignorant of the gospel, or is blinded by prejudice, then the heart will not be roused to desire Christ, nor will the will be urged to embrace Him. If the mind is deceived, both will and heart will be deceived also. Where the mind is depraved, so will the heart be. We see, therefore, how important are the words of Jesus, “You must be born again.– John Owen

No good deed goes unpunished by the envious. The French find it easier to forgive the Germans for conquering them, than the Americans for saving them, twice. When David Marash resigned as editor in chief of Al-Jazeera English because it was so anti-American, he commented that it was the British, not the Arabs, who were the worst – and by that he meant the products of a media elite that clusters around a BBC-Guardian nexus.- Richard Landes, Daily Telegraph, By reacting to 9/11 with self-recrimination, the Western elites have strengthened the hand of brutal Islamismhttp://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/richardlandes/100104166/by-reacting-to-911-with-self-recrimination-the-western-elites-have-strengthened-the-hand-of-brutal-islamism/

Among the many memes widely circulating in Western circles, one of the most absurdly noxious is “Who are we to judge?” All the great progressive victories of demotic polities – equality before the law, freedom of religion and dissent, respect for those disadvantaged by “might makes right,” women, workers, weak – arises from harsh value judgments on the authoritarianism that exploits them: patriarchy, exploitation, cruelty. Not judging too quickly – admirable; not judging at all – folly. We end up ferociously judging ourselves, and giving others, whose values and motives are far more base, a free pass. In doing so we illustrate Pascal’s warning, “the more we want to be angels, the more we become beasts.”
So when, in order to seem peaceful, we abandon non-westerners to brutal political cultures in the name of some quasi-religious commitment to cultural relativism, we betray everything we claim we support. Such attitudes seem particularly inadvisable when facing an apocalyptic foe dedicated to the destruction of all our progressive values.- Richard Landes, Daily Telegraph, By reacting to 9/11 with self-recrimination, the Western elites have strengthened the hand of brutal Islamismhttp://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/richardlandes/100104166/by-reacting-to-911-with-self-recrimination-the-western-elites-have-strengthened-the-hand-of-brutal-islamism/

If the only people who fight Islamic triumphalism are really on the Right, their solutions will obviously favour harsh responses. Liberals and progressives would, presumably, struggle harder to come up with more creative and less violent forms of effective resistance. So it constitutes a catastrophic loss of creative energy to have a “Left” that believes that somehow, if only we were nicer to Muslims, they’d be nicer to us, one that views as an alarming embarrassment anyone who points out the Islamic contribution to the problem, as a saboteur of this effort at placation, an “enemy of peace.” It also represents a colossal betrayal of genuine Muslims moderates who really do want to live in a vibrant civil society that respects everyone; where Muslims respect infidels, and infidels respect Islam.- Richard Landes,Daily Telegraph, By reacting to 9/11 with self-recrimination, the Western elites have strengthened the hand of brutal Islamism http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/richardlandes/100104166/by-reacting-to-911-with-self-recrimination-the-western-elites-have-strengthened-the-hand-of-brutal-islamism/

I have a great need for Christ; I have a great Christ for my need. ~ Spurgeon

A true Christian is one who has not only peace of conscience, but war within.- J. C. Ryle

Will a man ever love his enemies? He may come to do

good to them that hate him; but when will he pray

for them that despitefully use him and persecute

him? When? When he is the child of his Father in heaven. Then

shall he love his neighbor as himself, even if that

neighbor be his enemy. -George MacDonald (1824-1905) _Unspoken Sermons_, Series One [1867]

Death is the divine cure of many ills. -George MacDonald (1824-1905) _The Miracles Of Our Lord_ [1870]

We are so full of ourselves, and feel so grand, that

we should never come to know what poor creatures we

are, never begin to do better, but for the knockdown

blows that the loving God gives us. We do not like

them, but he does not spare us for that. George MacDonald (1824-1905) _A Rough Shaking_ [1890]

The idea that science can enable us to live without myths is one of these silly modern stories. There's nothing in science that says the world can be finally understood by the human mind.If Darwin's theory of evolution is even roughly right, humans aren't built to understand how the universe works. The human brain evolved under the pressures of the struggle for life

Through science humans can lift themselves beyond the view of things that's forced on them by day-to-day existence. They can't overcome the fact that they remain animals, with minds that aren't equipped to see into the nature of things.Darwin's theory is unlikely to be the final truth. It may be just a rough account of how life has developed in our part of the cosmos. Even so, the clear implication of the theory of evolution is that human knowledge is by its nature limited.It's been said that the universe is a queerer place than we can possibly imagine, and I'm sure that's right. However rapidly our knowledge increases, we'll always be surrounded by the unknowable.-- John Gray ,A Point of View: Can religion tell us more than science? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14944470

Science hasn't enabled us to dispense with myths. Instead it has become a vehicle for myths - chief among them, the myth of salvation through science. Many of the people who scoff at religion are sublimely confident that, by using science, humanity can march onwards to a better world. But "humanity" isn't marching anywhere. Humanity doesn't exist, there are only human beings, each of them ruled by passions and illusions that conflict with one another and within themselves.Science has given us many vital benefits, so many that they would be hard to sum up. But it can't save the human species from itself.Because it's a human invention, science - just like religion - will always be used for all kinds of purposes, good and bad. Unbelievers in religion who think science can save the world are possessed by a fantasy that's far more childish than any myth. The idea that humans will rise from the dead may be incredible, but no more so than the notion that "humanity" can use science to remake the world.- - John Gray ,A Point of View: Can religion tell us more than science? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14944470

Human beings don't live by argumentation, and it's only religious fundamentalists and ignorant rationalists who think the myths we live by are literal truths.Evangelical atheists who want to convert the world to unbelief are copying religion at its dogmatic worst. They think human life would be vastly improved if only everyone believed as they do, when a little history shows that trying to get everyone to believe the same thing is a recipe for unending conflict. We'd all be better off if we stopped believing in belief.- John Gray ,A Point of View: Can religion tell us more than science? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14944470

Always preach in such a way that if the people listening do not come to hate their sin, they will instead hate you ~ Martin Luther

Godwin's law is the observation made by Mike Godwin in 1990 that, ‘As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1 (100%).

CRANMER’S LAW: “No matter how decent, intelligent or thoughtful the reasoning of a conservative may be, as an argument with a liberal is advanced, the probability of being accused of ‘bigotry’, ‘hatred’ or ‘intolerance’ approaches 100%.”- http://archbishop-cranmer.blogspot.com/2011/09/cranmers-law.html

No party is Eurosceptic while in office - Hannan's First Law

You can't determine truth by democracy.-Benedict XVI,

The natural man cannot, will not and does not receive the things of the Spirit of God. He can know the literal sense of the doctrines presented to him. He can know that Jesus was crucified. But there is a wide difference between receiving doctrines as mere statements presented to him and knowing the reality which those statements present. - John Owen

There is no use crying about it. Cousin America has run off with a Presbyterian parson, and that is the end of it. - Horace Walpole, referring to John Witherspoon, president of Princeton University (the "seminary of sedition"), and the only minister to sign the Declaration of Independence. Witherspoon was not only one of the founding fathers, he was the instructor of the founding fathers. Nine of the 55 delegates at the Constitutional Convention had been students of Witherspoon.

The Revolution of 1776, so far as it was affected by religion, was a Presbyterian measure. It was the natural outgrowth of the principles which the Presbyterianism of the Old World planted in her sons, the English Puritans, the Scotch Covenanters, the French Huguenots, the Dutch Calvinists, and the Presbyterians of Ulster. ~ George Bancroft

As man cannot keep all the commandments, it must be done for him by surety. Christ not only obeyed all the commandments on behalf of man, but he also bore the penalty of death. But though we are freed from the penalty of death, we are still bound to obey the law. Yet that obedience is not to gain acceptance with God, but rather it is an expression of gratitude to God for our deliverance from death. Are we, then, freed from obedience? Yes. We are free from obeying the law in our own strength, and we are freed from obeying it in order to obtain everlasting life.- John Owen, Communion with God

Does God love His people while they are sinning? Yes! He loves his people but does not love their sinning. Doesn't God's love change towards them? Not the purpose of His will to love them, but the working out of His gracious acts and disciplines towards them is changed. He rebukes them, disciplines them, hides His face from them, smites them, fills them with a sense with His indignation, but woe to us if He should change His love, or take away His kindness from us.- John Owen

Man was never made to live independently from God. Eyes are beautiful and useful, but if they try to see without light, their beauty and power will be of no use and the eyes might even be damaged. And if the unconverted mind tries to see spiritual things without the help of the Holy Spirit of God, it will only end up destroying itself. - John Owen

The Great Commission is not about getting decisions but about making disciples. -Ligon Duncan

A law is established in the gospel that whoever receives it shall be accepted and saved. But Christ knows none, of themselves, will receive the gospel. Therefore He sends them His Holy Spirit to quicken them (John 6:63). By His Holy Spirit, He causes those who are ‘dead to hear His voice.’ Christ lived and died in order to work out a perfect righteousness for His people. He then tells them what He has done and finally He actually gives this righteousness to them and regards them as if they had worked out that righteousness themselves, so that by this righteousness they will be perfectly accepted by the Father.- John Owen-Communion with God

By the grace of sanctification, our best duties are cleansed from defilement. Even our very best duties are defiled (Isa. 64:6). Self, unbelief, and formality insinuate themselves into all that we do. God has promised that the saints’ good works shall follow them. In fact, if our good works were tested and weighed in the balance of the sanctuary, it would be just as well if they were buried forever. But the Lord Christ, as our High Priest, bears the iniquity and the guilt of our best works and washes away all their filth and defilement. He is like a refiner’s fire to purge both the sons of Levi and their offerings, adding sweet incense to them so that they may be accepted (Ma. 3:3). Whatever is of the Spirit Himself, or of grace, will remain. Whatever is of self, flesh and unbelief, that is wood hay and stubble. These He burns up. The good works of the saints shall meet them one day with a changed face, so that even they will not recognize them. That which seemed to the saints to be black, deformed and defiled shall appear beautiful and glorious. Saints shall not be afraid of their works, but rejoice in them.- John Owen,Communion with God

Believers hear the voice of Christ calling them to come to Him with their burdens (Matt. 11:28). So they come to Him and lay their guilt upon Him. They lay down their sins at the Cross of Christ and He bears them on his shoulders. This is faith’s great and bold confidence in the grace, faithfulness and the truth of God. They stand by the cross and say, ‘He was bruised for my sins, and wounded for my transgressions, and the chastisement of my peace was upon Him. He was made sin for me. So He is able to bear my sins. He calls me to lay the burden of them on Him.’ This is the believer’s daily work. This is what it means to know Christ crucified. - John Owen-Communion with God [p.144]

There is nothing that Jesus Christ is more delighted with than with His saints should always hold communion with Him by giving Him their sins and receiving His righteousness. This greatly honors Him and gives Him that glory that is His due. What great dishonor we do to Christ to try and get rid of our sins in any other way. ’Lord, this is your work. This is what you came in the world to do. You call for my burden which is too heavy for me to carry. Take it, blessed Redeemer, and give me Your righteousness.’ Then Christ is honored. The glory of His meditation is given to Him when we walk with Him in this way. This greatly endeavors the souls of the saints to the Lord Jesus and constrains them to value Him highly.- - John Owen,Communion with God

Christ is honored by His saints all over the world. The great solemn worship of the Christian church lies in honoring and glorifying the Lord Jesus (Phil. 3:8; Song 5:9-16). Believers heartily approve of this righteousness, this way of being accepted by God, because it brings glory to God. When they were under the guilt of sin, they were puzzled as to how they could be saved and God’s justice, faithfulness and truth glorified. Believers see that, by this righteousness, all the properties of God are greatly glorified in the pardon, justification and acceptance of sinners. This is, then, the first way by which the saints hold daily fellowship with the Lord Jesus. Believers continually keep alive in the hearts a sense of guilt and evil of sin, even when they are fully assured of their acceptance with God. A sense of pardon takes away the horror and fear, but not a due sense of the guilt of sin. David said, ‘My sin is ever before me’. Believers set sin before them, not to terrify themselves but so that they are always aware of the evil of it. Christ has certainly and really answered the justice of God for our sins. This is the believer’s full assurance of faith.-John Owen-Communion with God [p. 143]

Dear Lord, so far today I am doing alright; I have not lost my temper, been greedy, grumpy, nasty or selfish. I have not whined, gossiped or eaten any chocolate....However, I'm going to get out of bed soon and will need a lot more help! Amen

It belongs to the church of God to receive blows rather than to inflict them, but she is an anvil that has worn out many hammers. ~Theodore Beza

How many Zen masters -- does it take to screw in a light bulb?

None. Zen masters carry their own light....

I was going to change my shirt, but I changed my mind instead.- Winnie the Pooh

Q: What do Winnie the Pooh and John the Baptist have in common?

A: The same middle name.

... and a taste for honey.

A bear, however hard he tries, grows tubby without exercise.

-- Pooh's Little Instruction Book, inspired by A. A. Milne...

`Pathetic,'' he said. ``That's what it is.

Pathetic.'' - Milne, A. A. (1882-1956) * _Winnie-the Pooh_ (1926) ch. 6...

The reformer is always right about what is wrong. He is generally wrong about what is right. -- GKC

A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

Change is inevitable except from vending machines.

If you think nobody cares, try missing a couple of payments.

If at first you don't succeed, then skydiving isn't for you.

Criticism never built a house, wrote a play, composed a song, painted a picture, or improved a marriage. – Unknown

Maturity is not a destination. It is a daily process!

The sooner you fall behind the more time you'll have to catch

‎'the greatest drag on Christianity , the most serious menace to the Church's mission, is not the secularism without, it is the reduced Christianity within: the religious generalities and innocuous platitudes of a pallid anaemic Christianity...' (James S. Stewart, 'A Faith to Proclaim', 1953)

The letter and spirit of scripture, and of all Christianity, forbid us to suppose that life in the New Creation will be a sexual life; and this reduces our imagination to the withering alternatives either of bodies which are hardly recognisable as human bodies at all or else of a perpetual fast. As regards the fast, I think our present outlook might be like that of a small boy who, on being told that the sexual act was the highest bodily pleasure, should immediately ask whether you ate chocolates at the same time. On receiving the answer “No,” he might regard absence of chocolates as the chief characteristic of sexuality. In vain would you tell him that the reason why lovers in their carnal raptures don’t bother about chocolates is that they have something better to think of. The boy knows chocolate: he does not know the positive thing which excludes it. We are in the same position. We know the sexual life; we do not know, except in glimpses, the other thing which, in Heaven, will leave no room for it. Hence where fulness awaits us we anticipate fasting. In denying that sexual life, as we now understand it, makes any part of the final beatitude, it is not of course necessary to suppose that the distinction of sexes will disappear. What is no longer needed for biological purposes may be expected to survive for splendor. Sexuality is the instrument both of virginity and of conjugal virtue; neither men nor women will be asked to throw away the weapon they have used victoriously. It is the beaten and the fugitives who throw away their swords. The conquerors sheathe theirs and retain them. - C S Lewis

In my youth I regarded the universe as an open

book, printed in the language of physical equations,

whereas now it appears to me as a text written

in invisible ink, of which in our rare moments of

grace we are able to decipher a small fragment. -Arthur Koestler (1905-1983) _Bricks to Babel: Selected Writings With Author's Comments_ [1980], "Epilogue"

As to the question, how shall we be persuaded that [scripture] came from God.... it is just the same as if we were asked How shall we learn to learn to distinguish light from darkness, white from black, sweet from bitter. Scripture bears on the face of it as clear evidence of its truth as do white and black of their color. sweet and bitter of their taste. - J Calvin, I.7.2

They who strive to build up a firm faith in scripture through disputation are doing things backwards...- J Calvin,I.7.2,4

Scripture, carrying its own evidence along with it, deigns not to submit itself to proofs and arguments, but owes the full conviction with which we ought to receive it to the testimony of the Spirit of God. - J Calvin,Inst. I.7. 5

The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard.

When I am full of myself I'm empty of God. ~ Rick Warren

Adam sinned willfully, eyes wide-open, without hesitatiion. His sin was freighted with sunful interest. He had watched Eve take the fruit, and nothing happened to her. He sinned willfully, assuming there would be no consequences. Everything was upside down. Eve followed the snake, Adam followed Eve, and NO ONE FOLLOWED GOD. (Dr. Steven Lawson's "Foundations of Grace" page 54)

The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the ability to reach it.

To succeed in politics, it is often necessary to rise above your principles.

You never really learn to swear until you learn to drive.

Two wrongs are only the beginning.

Criticism, like rain, should be gentle enough to nourish a man's growth without destroying his roots.- F.H.Clark

Dominionism is, we are told, a school of evangelical thought that aims to impose Biblical law over secular government. It is to nutty Evangelicals what Shariah Law is to Islamists - FREDDY GRAYFRIDAY, Spectator, Gripped by 'Dominion',2ND SEPTEMBER 2011

Bills travel through the mail at twice the speed of checks

Never do card tricks for the group you play poker with.

No one is listening until you make a mistake.

Success always occurs in private and failure in full view.

The hardness of butter is directly proportional to the softness of the bread.

There does come a time when force, even physical force, is appropriate. The Christian is not to take the law into his own hands and become a law unto himself. But when all avenues to flight and protest have closed, force in the defensive posture is appropriate. This was the situation of the American Revolution. The colonists used force in defending themselves. Great Britain, because of its policy toward the colonies, was seen as a foreign power invading America. The colonists defended their homeland. As such, the American Revolution was a conservative counter-revolution. The colonists saw the British as the revolutionaries trying to overthrow the legitimate colonial governments.

A true Christian in Hitler’s Germany and in the occupied countries should have defied the false and counterfeit state and hidden his Jewish neighbors from German SS troops. The government had abrogated its authority, and it had no right to make any demands.- F A Schaeffer, “A Christian Manifesto”

Please read most thoughtfully what I am going to say in the next sentence: If there is no final place for civil disobedience, then the government has been made autonomous, and as such, it has been put in the place of the Living God. If there is no final place for civil disobedience, then the government has been put in the place of the Living God, because then you are to obey it even when it tells you in its own way at that time to worship Caesar. And that point is exactly where the early Christians performed their acts of civil disobedience even when it cost them their lives.- F A Schaeffer, “A Christian Manifesto” 1981

… as we stand for religious freedom today, we need to realize that this must include a general religious freedom from the control of the state for all religion. It will not mean just freedom for those who are Christians. It is then up to Christians to show that Christianity is the Truth of total reality in the open marketplace of freedom.- F A Schaeffer, “A Christian Manifesto” 1981

… we must make definite that we are in no way talking about any kind of a theocracy. Let me say that with great emphasis. Witherspoon, Jefferson, the American Founders had no idea of a theocracy. That is made plain by the First Amendment, and we must continually emphasize the fact that we are not talking about some kind, or any kind, of a theocracy. In the Old Testament there was a theocracy commanded by God. In the New Testament, with the church being made up of Jews and Gentiles, and spreading over all the known world from India to Spain in one generation, the church was its own entity. There is no New Testament basis for a linking of church and state until Christ, the King returns. The whole “Constantine mentality” from the fourth century up to our day was a mistake. Constantine, as the Roman Emperor, in 313 ended the persecution of Christians. Unfortunately, the support he gave to the church led by 381 to the enforcing of Christianity, by Theodosius I, as the official state religion. Making Christianity the official state religion opened the way for confusion up till our own day. There have been times of very good government when this interrelationship of church and state has been present. But through the centuries it has caused great confusion between loyalty to the state and loyalty to Christ, between patriotism and being a Christian. We must not confuse the Kingdom of God with our country. To say it another way: “We should not wrap Christianity in our national flag.” None of this, however, changes the fact that the United States was founded upon a Christian consensus, nor that we today should bring Judeo-Christian principles into play in regard to government. But that is very different from a theocracy in name or in fact.- F A Schaeffer, “A Christian Manifesto” 1981

What we think, or what we know, or what we believe is, in the end, of little consequence. The only consequence is what we do.—John Ruskin

A word to the wise isn't necessary...it's the stupid ones that need the advice. ~Bill Cosby

Repentance is not a merely intellectual change of mind or mere grief, still less doing penance, but a radical transformation of the entire person, a fundamental turnaround involving mind and action and including overtones of grief, which result in (spiritual) fruit. - D.A. Carson

Our Lord’s teaching was always anti-self-realization. His purpose is not the development of a person— His purpose is to make a person exactly like Himself, and the Son of God is characterized by self-expenditure. - Chambers

If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant,

if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of those who are intolerant,then, the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance,the right not to tolerate the intolerant- Karl Popper

If cigarette packs are required to have pictures of diseased lungs, college brochures should be required to have pictures of graduates working at Starbucks." - (attributed to Daniel Lin, posted to Facebook by Jim Davidson): quoted at "Higher Education Fraud"

http://www.two--four.net/weblog.php?id=P5170

... Christopher Columbus went from hero (founder of

the New World) to villain (insensitive colonialist) in one

generation. Thomas Jefferson went from "celebrated

idealist" to racist slaveholder." Yet, ironically, a new

kind of rigidity emerged to replace the old. In the

interest of focusing on the history of those long ignored,

textbook publishers became subject to the enormous

pressures of special interest groups and political

oversight aimed at keeping the American story even-

handed and politically correct.

" 'By the 1990s there had to be a certain percentage

of each race or minority group in the books, either

in the text or illustrations,' says Tim Paulsen, a

Manhattan textbook editor. 'By the same token, religion

and God all but disappeared - despite the fact that

religious beliefs were a key to colonialist exploits

as well as the founding fathers' rebellion.' [...]

"... [N]ew kinds of errors began to stalk the industry.

Columbia University historian Jack Garraty discoved the

problem when he noticed that Henry Hudson was missing

from a revised edition of one of his popular history texts

(first published in 1982). 'They had a Spanish explorer

named Esteban Gomez as the first European to sail on the

river that was named after Hudson,' recalls Garraty, who

at the time had never heard of Gomez. 'But there is no

evidence that Gomez had ever sailed on the Hudson,'

Garraty laughs. 'And he wasn't even Spanish. He was

Portugese.'

" ... 'They wanted to sell the book in Texas and

California,' explains Garraty of the decision to

alter his work, 'so they needed Hispanic people

in the book. They put a lot of stuff in there that

I never heard of.' ...

" 'We have to realize that children see themselves in

history,' explains Stephanie Hirsh ... general editor

of "Texas, the United States and the World." ... 'The

more they see themselves in the story, the more they

connect. Sometimes you have to sacrifice the real

story to be inclusive.' - _In Search of America_ by Peter Jennings &

Todd Brewster [2002], ch. 1 "God's Country"

[Of grade school textbooks (time frame 1980-1995):]

A day without sunshine is like, night.

99 percent of lawyers give the rest a bad name.

For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism.

Typical of the badinage between Churchill and his private secretary is the exchange when Churchill asks Colville, immediately before Colville's departure for RAF service in 1941, his age. On being told, Churchill pointed out that, at 26, Napoleon was commanding the armies of Italy. Colville replied that the Younger Pitt was Prime Minister at the age of 24.- Wikipedia on Jock Colville

William Wilberforce: (Ioan Gruffudd)

Billy, no one of our age has ever taken power.

William Pitt: (Benedict Cumberbatch)

Which is why we're too young to realize that certain things are impossible. So we will do them anyway. -Dialogue from the film _Amazing Grace_ [2006], written by Steven Knight

In my sterile search for success, I have sometimes chosen to be effective rather than committed. I have chosen to be successful rather than merely being faithful. Sometimes my calendar is full, but my heart is empty. The Lord tries to fill my cup, but I poke a hole in it. Perforated trust. Am I afraid to trust Him completely? Am I afraid to love others without knowing whether or not I’ll be loved in return? I still don’t understand His kind of love—a love which expects nothing. I tend to calculate and define. Evaluate and measure. Make sure that everything is equal. I am an accountant rather than a disciple. It’s hard to give with a closed fist, or receive with a calculator in your hand. My feelings go up and down more than the Dow Jones charts. As Ian Thomas says, "God doesn’t ask us to be sensational—He simple asks us to be a miracle." A miracle is something that cannot be explained apart from Jesus Christ. He wants to borrow our humanity to communicate His truths to the world. He doesn’t give us His strength, He is our strength. - Tim Hansel

From the outside looking in, many people make the mistake of assuming Christianity is only a religion—a neo-pagan set of mystical traditions and rituals. This assumption is false from the founding members of the Christian faith to the theological leaders of today. Christianity has always been a complete worldview. Paul argued with Greek and Roman philosophers. Aquinas showed us how the Christian system of philosophy compares to that of Aristotle. When John Calvin wrote his Institutes of the Christian Religion in the sixteenth century AD, he wasn't knitting mythological yarns of fairies and nymphs; he was laying out a system of thought and practice—a worldview based on God's revelation from start to finish. Even many Christians view their faith as a collection of little truths—little nuggets to live by. This is not the Christianity of history nor the Bible. Christianity has always been presented as an all-encompassing system of life having cognitive, mystical, and behavioral aspects.- Matthew Griffin, MAY 14TH, 2008, Web Design Worldview

Men often do despise afflictions. They think the troubles that come on them are nothing. They refuse to see God's hand in them. They are well able to look after themselves in their troubles. So they do not seek the comfort and strengthening of the Holy Spirit. - John Owen, Communion with God

“Sometimes the soul wonders whether it is a child of God or not, because so much of the old nature remains. So the soul brings out all the evidences to prove its claims to be a true child of God. Satan, in the meantime, opposes with all his might. Sin and law add their opposition also. Many flaws are found in his evidences. The truth of them is all questioned and the soul is left in doubt as to whether he is a child of God or not. Then the Comforter comes and by a word of promise, or in some other way, overwhelms the heart with a sure persuasion, putting down all objections, showing that his plea is good and that he is indeed a child of God. And therefore the Holy Spirit is to ‘witness with our spirits that we are children of God.- John Owen Communion with God [pg. 183]

The Holy Spirit does His work sovereignly. The Holy Spirit distributes to everyone as He wills. So the believer may at one time be full of joy and, at another, full of distress. Every promise at one time brings great joy when trouble are great and heavy; yet at another time, when only suffering a little, he finds no joy in the promises, however much he seeks for it. The reason is simple. The Holy Spirit distributes as He wills. So there are no rules or course of procedure given to us to follow in order to get peace and joy in promises. In this way, faith learns to wait on the sovereign will and pleasure of the Holy Spirit.- John Owen- Communion with God

The Comforter actually never leaves the believing soul with no comfort at all. A man may be in the dark, under a cloud, refusing comfort and actually finding none and feeling none. But the Spirit is the source of all comfort and in due time his comfort will be felt. God promises that He will heal sinners and restore comfort to them (Isa. 57:18).-John Owe)-Communion with God

I expect to pass through this life but once. If, therefore, there be any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not deter or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again. ~~William Penn

Learn in confession to be honest with God. Do not

give fair names to foul sins; call them what you

will, they will smell no sweeter. -Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892)

_Morning And Evening_ ; "April 7, Evening"

Mark then, Christian, Jesus does not suffer so as to exclude your suffering. He bears a cross, not that you may escape it, but that you may endure it. Christ exempts you from sin, but not from sorrow. Remember that, and expect to suffer. -Spurgeon

The man who discovers that he can find no way out

may go into the pigsty and let every passion have

its way; but when a man has been gripped by purity

and has seen God if only for one minute, he may try

and live in a pigsty but he will find he cannot.

There is something that produces misery and longing

even while he lets loose his passion. -Oswald Chambers (1874-1917)

_Shade Of His Hand_ [1924]

Now there is no way of managing our souls in troubles and afflictions so that God is glorified and we ourselves spiritually strengthened but by the comforts of the Holy Spirit. All that Christ promised His disciples when He told them of the great troubles and persecutions they would have in the world is the Comforter. So Paul says, 'We glory in tribulations' (Rom. 5:3). But how can we do this? By the Holy Spirit pouring out the love of God in our hearts. So the believers are said receive the Word with affliction, with the joy of the Holy Spirit (1 Thess. 1:6). They are to 'take joyfully the spoiling of their goods.' All these we are enabled to do the glory of God by the Comforter, the Holy Spirit.- John Owen, Communion with God

1. We see Thee, Lord of glory,

Descending from above,

And learn the wondrous story

Of God come down in love.

2. Thus cradled in a manger,

We see Thee, Jesus, there,

A houseless, homeless Stranger,

Our sorrows all to share.

3. O strange yet fit beginning

Of all that life of woe,

In which Thy grace was winning

Poor man his God to know!

4. O love, all thought surpassing!

That Thou shouldst with us be,

Nor yet in triumph passing,

But human infancy!

5. We gaze upon Thy weakness -

The manger and the cross;

We love Thee for Thy meekness

Through suff'ring, pain and loss.

6. We see the Godhead glory

Shine through that human veil,

And, willing, hear the story

Of love that's come to heal.

J. N. Darby

The awareness of sin used to be our shadow. Christians hated sin,

feared it, fled from it, grieved over it. [...] But now the shadow has

faded. Nowadays, the accusation you have sinned is often said with a

grin and a tone that signals an inside joke. At one time, this

accusation still had the power to jolt people. Catholics lined up to

confess their sins; Protestant preachers rose up to confess our sins.

And they did it regularly. Their view was that confessing our sin is

like taking out the garbage: once is not enough. As a child growing up

in the fifties among Western Michigan Calvinists, I think I heard as

many sermons about sin as I did about grace. The assumption in those

days seemed to be that you could not understand either without

understanding both. [...]

In today's group confessionals it is harder to tell. The newer

language of Zion fudges: "Let us confess our problem with human

relational adjustment dynamics, and especially our feebleness in

networking." Or, "I'd just like to share that we just need to target

holiness as a growth area." Where sin is concerned, people mumble now.

[...]

The word sin[...]now finds its home mostly on dessert menus. "Peanut

Butter Binge" and "Chocolate Decadence" are sinful; lying is not. The

measure for sin is caloric. - Cornelius Plantinga, Jr., Not The Way It's Supposed To Be: A Breviary Of Sin, 1995

He that falls into sin is a man; that grieves at it may be a saint;

that boasteth of it is a devil. - Thomas Fuller