It is impossible, indeed, to separate works from faith, just as it is impossible to separate heat and light from fire.- Martin Luther

The truth is that unless people realize they have a sin problem, they will not come to Christ for a solution. People don’t come for healing unless they know they have a disease; they don’t come for life unless they are conscious that they are under the penalty of death; they don’t come for salvation unless they are weary of the bondage of sin.-John MacArthur
The Gospel According to Jesus, © John MacArthur, 1988, p. 61.

There is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more
than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no
repentance. But what is Repentance? Not the last and noblest
and most refined achievement of the righteousness of men in the
service of God, but the first elemental act of the
righteousness of God in the service of men; the work that God
has written in their hearts and which, because it is from God
and not from men, occasions joy in heaven; that looking forward
to God, and to Him only, which is recognized only by God and by
God Himselm. -Karl Barth (1886-1968), The Epistle to the Romans translated from the 6th edition by Edwyn C. Hoskyns, London: Oxford University Press, H. Milford, 1933,6th ed., Oxford University Press US, 1968, p. 68

How do we distinguish between satanic accusation and divine conviction? Among other things, the former comes in the shape of condemnation that breeds feelings of hopelessness. We are told that our sin has put us beyond the hope of grace and the power of forgiveness. Satan’s accusations are devoid of any reference to the sufficiency of the cross. Divine conviction for sin, on the other hand, comes with a reminder of the sufficiency and finality of Christ’s shed blood, together with a promise of hope and the joy of forgiveness.-Sam Storms, Tactics of Temptation, November 8, 2006, www.enjoyinggodministries.com.

Freedom has ceased to be a birthright; it has come to mean whatever we are still permitted to do. - Joseph Sobran

I'm against sin. I'll kick it as long as I've got a foot. I'll fight it as long as I've got a fist. I'll butt it as long as I've got a head. I'll bite it as long as I've got a tooth. And when I'm old, fistless, footless, and toothless, I'll gum it till I go home to glory and it goes home to perdition! -Billy Sunday (1862-1935)

Derrida was, in short, the mad axeman of Western philosophy. He tried to hack apart the very basis of our thought - language, reason and the attempt to tell big stories about how we became as we are. Johann Hari

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.-John Muir, 1838 - 1914

It is always interesting to see people in dead earnest, from whatever cause, and earthquakes make everybody earnest.-John Muir, 1838 - 1914

A genuine Christian dreads sin. He will not say,
"Is it not a little one?" for he knows that a little
sin is like a small dose of a very potent poison.
It is sufficient to destroy our peace and comfort. Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892) _Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit_, Volume 12 [1866]

Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all. - Oliver Wendell Holmes

Being a Christian is more than just an instantaneous conversion- it is a daily process whereby you grow to be more and more like Christ.- Billy Graham

Sacrifice? I never made a sacrifice. It is no sacrifice to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. Rather, it is the highest privilege any man or woman could ever ask for. -- David Livingstone

No man can break any of the Ten Commandments. He can only break himself against them.- G. K. Chesterton

It always seems inexplicable to me that those who claim free will so
very boldly for man should not also allow some free will to God. Why
should not Jesus Christ have the right to choose His own bride?" - Charles H. Spurgeon

Sin is a disposition of self-love that obeys every
temptation to its own lordship. Sin is literally
self-centered rule, a disposition that rules the
life apart from God. -Oswald Chambers (1874-1917)

The trouble with trouble is it starts out as fun. ~Naomi Judd 1946-

What sinners remember best is that they were happy while sinning. - C. S. Lewis

An enemy is a danger, but the danger is not what he can do to you. It is what he makes you do. If he fills you with envy, malice, hatred and all uncharitableness, he has done you real harm. But you can prevent that. Pray for him. If you say you cannot trust him, then watch and pray. But you cannot hate a man you pray for. - E. S. Waterhouse

The attempt by man to impose his word on God's Universe, and to replace God's order with a man-made system, is sin, insanity and death- R. J. Ryushdoony

History has never been dominated by majorities, but only by dedicated minorities who stand unconditionally on their faith -Rousas John Rushdoony

When we disobey God we defy His authority and despise His holiness. BUT WHE WE FAIL TO TRUST GOD WE DOUBT HIS SOVEREIGNTY AND QUESTION HIS GOODNESS.-Jerry Bridges

To know God is to know him as Lord and therefore to pursue knowledge of him in a godly way. As we come to know God, we recognize that he initiates our knowledge, that his Word is the ultimate authority for our knowledge, and that in knowing God we come into a personal relationship with him. Theology is the application of Scripture to all areas of human life. Exegetical, biblical, and systematic theology look at the whole Bible from various perspectives -John Frame, Salvation Belongs to the Lord, pg. 72

Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others.- Marcus Tullius Cicero

I know well there is no comfort for this pain of parting: the wound always remains, but one learns to bear the pain, and learns to thank God for what He gave, for the beautiful memories of the past, and the yet more beautiful hope for the future.-Max Muller

I am born for God only. Christ is nearer to me than father,
or mother, or sister,--a near relation, a more affectionate
friend; and I rejoice to follow Him, and to love Him. Blessed
Jesus! thou art all I want--a forerunner to me in all I ever
shall go through, as a Christian, a minister, or a missionary.-Henry Martyn (1781-1812), Life and letters of the Rev.Henry Martyn, B.D., with John Sargent, London:Seeley, Jackson & Halliday, 1862, p. 140

Fear not the knife that God wields, for his hand is sure.-Francois Fenelon

How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them.- Benjamin Franklin, 1706 - 1790

For some years now I have read through the Bible twice
every year. If you picture the Bible to be a mighty tree and
every word a little branch, I have shaken every one of these
branches because I wanted to know what it was and what it
means. -Martin Luther (1483-1546), Preface to the Prophets [1532], in What Luther Says: an anthology, v. I, Ewald Martin Plass, ed., Concordia Pub. House, 1959, p. 83

Tradition wears a snowy beard, romance is always young..-John Greenleaf Whittier, 1807 - 1892

We cannot attain to the understanding of Scripture either
by study or by the intellect. Your first duty is to begin by
prayer. Entreat the Lord to grant you, of His great mercy, the
true understanding of His Word. There is no other interpreter
of the Word of God than the Author of this Word, as He Himself
has said, "They shall be all taught of God." (John 6:45) Hope
for nothing from your own labors, from your own understanding:
trust solely in God, and in the influence of His Spirit.
Believe this on the word of a man who has experience.-Martin Luther (1483-1546), in a letter (see What Luther Says: An Anthology, #233), quoted in History of the Great Reformation of the Sixteenth Century in Germany, Jean Henri Merle d'Aubigne, London: Walther, 1838, p. 320

Contentment comes when we remember that what God chooses is far better than what we choose.-Unknown

There must be a constant and increasing appreciation that
though sin still remains it does not have the mastery. There is
a total difference between surviving sin and reigning sin, the
regenerate in conflict with sin and the unregenerate complacent
to sin. It is one thing for sin to live in us: it is another
for us to live in sin... It is of paramount concern for the
Christian and for the interests of his sanctification that he
should know that sin does not have the dominion over him, that
the forces of redeeming, regenerative, and sanctifying grace
have been brought to bear upon him in that which is central in
his moral and spiritual being, that he is the habitation of God
through the Spirit, and that Christ has been formed in him the
hope of glory.-John Murray (1898-1975), Redemption, Accomplished and Applied, Grand Rapids: W. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1955, p. 145-146

In Conspiracy A Biblical View, Gary North wrote that only three world views are serious contenders, the three which have an an eschatology of victory; biblical Christianity, Islam and Marxism. He wrote before the collapse of the 'evil empire'. Marxism is now only in places like N Korea and Western universities. The contenders are true Christianity and Islam. Unfortunately many Christians have not an eschatology of victory, only seeing things decline until Christ comes.- GJW

Not 'Cogito ergo sum' but 'Amor ergo sum'. I'm loved, therefore I am. - N.T. WRIGHT

Keep, we beseech thee, O Lord, thy Church with thy perpetual mercy: and, because the frailty of man without thee cannot but fall, keep us ever by thy help from all things hurtful, and lead us to all things profitable to our salvation; through Jesus Christ our Lord.- Collect for 12 September, Book Common Prayer

What i don't understand is why you are trying so hard to fit in when you were made to stand out?! - What a Girl Wants

Libertarian free will is a myth. We have only a free will to act according to our nature. Men are sinners. Men thus are free to sin.~ Bret L. McAtee

The dark night of the soul always gives way to the brightness of the noonday light of the presence of God. - R.C. Sproul

Men are idolaters, and want something to look at and kiss and hug, or throw themselves down before; they always did, they always will; and if you don't make it of wood, you must make it of words. --Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809-1894) _The Poet at the Breakfast Table_ [1872]

A sound mind in a sound body, is a short but full description of a happy state in this world. --John Locke (1632-1704) _Some Thoughts Concerning Education_ [1693], Section 1

Measure your growth in grace by your sensitiveness to sin. --Oswald Chambers (1874-1917) _Disciples Indeed_ [1955]

We have but a very few sins which we can observe and detect, compared
with those which are hidden to ourselves and unseen by our fellow
creatures. I doubt not it is true of all of us who are here, that in
every hour of our existence in which we are active, we commit tens of
thousands of unholinesses for which conscience has never reproved us,
because we have never seen them to be wrong, seeing we have not studied
God's laws as we ought to have done. .... Let all of us who know our
sins, offer this prayer after all our confessions: "Lord, I have
confessed as many as I know, but I must add an etcetera after them, and
say, 'Cleanse thou me from secret faults.'~ Rev. C. H. Spurgeon 1834-92, Sermon (No. 116) Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 8, 1857, at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.

To be sensible of our corruption and abhor our own transgressions is the first symptom of spiritual health.-J. C. Ryle

Keep your lamp burning, and let God place it where He will.-Unknown


Although men are accused of not knowing their own weakness, yet perhaps as few know their own strength. It is in men as in soils, where sometimes there is a vein of gold, which the owner knows not of.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


When a true genius appears in this world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


Positiveness is a good quality for preachers and orators, because he that would obtrude his thoughts and reasons upon a multitude, will convince others the more, as he appears convinced himself.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


The latter part of a wise man's life is taken up in curing the follies, prejudices, and false opinions he had contracted in the former.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


The power of fortune is confessed only by the miserable; for the happy impute all their success to prudence or merit.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745

My sins are many, but, oh, it is nothing to Jesus to take them all away. - Spurgeon

Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.- François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778
(nb not true but illustrative of enlightenment folly - GJW)

The wicked can have only accomplices, the voluptuous have companions in debauchery, self-seekers have associates, the politic assemble the factions, the typical idler has connections, princes have courtiers. Only the virtuous have friends.-François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778

A minister of state is excusable for the harm he does when the helm of government has forced his hand in a storm; but in the calm he is guilty of all the good he does not do.François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778-

All men would then be necessarily equal, if they were without needs. It is the poverty connected with our species which subordinates one man to another. It is not inequality which is the real misfortune, it is dependence.- François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778

10 Jul 10

Man is never sufficiently touched and affected by the awareness of his lowly state until he has compared himself with God's majesty. - John Calvin

The nearer to God--the more we discover our depravity, the more we loathe
ourselves, and the more precious does the person and work of Jesus
become! - James Smith

Fix my thoughts, my hopes, and my desires, upon heaven and
heavenly things; teach me to despise the world, to repent me
deeply for my sins; give me holy purposes of amendment, and
[spiritual] strength and assistances to perform faithfully
whatsoever I shall intend piously. Enrich my understanding with
an eternal treasure of Divine Truths, that I may know thy will:
and thou, who workest in us to will and to do of Thy good
pleasure, teach me to obey all Thy commandments, to believe all
Thy revelations, and make me partaker of all Thy gracious
promises.-Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667), Holy Living [1650], in The
Whole Works of the Right Rev. Jeremy Taylor, D.D., v. III, London: Longman, Brown, Green & Longmans, 1847, p. 34

5 Jul 10

The nearer a man lives to God the more intensely has he to mourn over his own evil heart.—C.H. Spurgeon

Christ saves His people, not in their sins but from them.—C.H. Spurgeon

The Doctor gave a man six months to live. The man couldn't pay his bill so the doctor gave him another six months.

The Doctor called Mrs. Cohen saying, "Mrs. Cohen, your check came back. "
Mrs. Cohen answered, "So did my arthritis!"

Doctor: "You'll live to be 60!"
Patient: "I am 60!"
Doctor: "See! What did I tell you?"