Christ forever sees us! Christ always knows us! Christ daily reads and observes our acts, words and thoughts! The recollection of this should alarm the wicked and drive them from their sins! Their wickedness is not hidden, and will one day be fearfully exposed, except they repent. It should frighten hypocrites out of their hypocrisy. They may deceive man, but they are not deceiving Christ. It should quicken and comfort all sincere believers. They should remember that a loving Master is looking at them, and should do all as in His sight. Above all, they should feel that, however mocked and slandered by the world, they are fairly and justly measured by their Savior's eye. They can say, "You, Lord, who know all things, know that I love You." (John 21:17)~ J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Luke volume 1, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1986], 145. {Luke 5: 17-26}

[Forgiveness] recognises the wrongdoer as a person. He has
done wrong, and about this there is no pretence. But that is
not the whole truth about him. He is still of infinite value as
a person, since every person is unique and irreplaceable by any
other. Since he has so greatly injured himself by doing wrong,
he is in special need of help, and help that can be rendered
only by the one to whom he has done the wrong.- Stephen Neill (1900-1984), A Genuinely Human Existence: Towards a Christian Psychology, Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday, 1959, p. 210

God says to the believer, as the king of Israel said to the king of Syria, "I am yours--and all that I have!" This is a hive of divine comfort! All that is in God--is ours! His wisdom is ours to teach us! His love is ours to pity us! His Spirit is ours to comfort us! His mercy is ours to save us! When God says to the soul, "I am yours," He can say no more! "For this God is our God for ever and ever!" Psalm 48:14- Thomas Watson, "The Christian's Charter"

"For this God is our God for ever and ever!" The degree of our faith is the degree of our prayer.

The strength of our hope is the strength of our prayer.

The warmth of our charity is the warmth of our prayer.-Carlo Carretto

In prosperity our friends know us; in adversity we know our friends.-- John Churton Collins

Prayer has everything to do with moulding the soul into the
image of God, and has everything to do with enhancing and
enlarging the measure of Divine grace. It has everything to do
with enriching, broadening and maturing the soul's experience
of God. That man cannot possibly be called a Christian, who
does not pray.- E. M. Bounds (1835-1913), The Necessity of Prayer [1907], Lulu, 2007, p. 26

Prayer pursues joy in fellowship with Jesus and in the power to share His life with others. And prayer pursues God’s glory by treating Him as the inexhaustible reservoir of hope and help. In prayer we admit our poverty and God’s prosperity, our bankruptcy and His bounty, our misery and His mercy. Therefore, prayer highly exalts and glorifies God precisely by pursuing everything we long for in Him and not in ourselves. - John Piper,Desiring God, 1996, p. 156,

O the depth of the evil of sin! If ever you will see how

great and horrid an evil sin is, measure it in your thoughts,

either by the infinite holiness and excellency of God, who is

wrong'd by it; or by the infinite sufferings of Christ, who

died to satisfy for it; and then you will have deeper

apprehensions of the evil of sin.- John Flavel (1628-1691), The Whole Works of the Reverend Mr. John Flavel, v. I, Paisley: A. Weir and A. McLean, 1770, p. 199

Let us remember this in our private devotions. It must not satisfy us to say good words, if our heart and our lips do not go together. What does it profit us to be fluent and lengthy, if our imaginations are roving far away while we are upon our knees? It profits us nothing at all. God sees what we are really doing, and rejects our offering. Heart-prayers are the prayers He loves to hear. Heart-prayers are the only prayers that He will answer. Our petitions may be weak, and stammering, and poor in our eyes. They may be presented with no fine words, or well-chosen language, and might seem almost unintelligible, if they were written down. But if they come from a right heart, God understands them. Such prayers are His delight.~ J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Mark, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1985], 137. {Mark 7:1-13}

Ill habits gather by unseen degrees,

As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas.- John Dryden, 1631 - 1700

The path of least resistance makes all rivers, and some men, crooked.- Napoleon Hill, 1883 - 1970

Courage can be a form of tenaciousness, a refusal to quit because you’re tired, hurt, humiliated or emotionally broken. Courage is the ability to face what life throws in your path on a daily basis.- Nina Lesowitz

Be sure no time is so well spent as that which a man spends on his knees.- J.C. Ryle,Thoughts for Young Men

If money be not thy servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that may be said to possess him - Francis Bacon, 1561 - 1626

To find something you can enjoy is far better than finding something you can possess. - Glenn Holm

Why grab possessions like thieves, or divide them like socialists, when you can ignore them like wise men? - Natalie Clifford Barney, 1876 - 1972

Man's best possession is a sympathetic wife. - Euripides, 480 - 406 BC

It should fill us with joy, that infinite wisdom guides the affairs of the world. Many of its events are shrouded in darkness and mystery, and inextricable confusion sometimes seems to reign. Often wickedness prevails, and God seems to have forgotten the creatures that He has made. Our own path through life is dark and devious, and beset with difficulties and dangers. How full of consolation is the doctrine, that infinite wisdom directs every event, brings order out of confusion, and light out of darkness, and, to those who love God, causes all things, whatever be their present aspect and apparent tendency, to work together for good.- J.L. Dagg, Manual of Theology, Gano Books, 1982 edition of original 1857 edition published by The Southern Baptist Publication Society, p. 86-87.

Scripture speaks about God working everything together “for the good” of those who love him (Rom. 8:28). But what is this “good?” It consists of believers being conformed (changed and remade) to the image of Christ (Rom. 8:29). Thus, all the experiences of life are intended, under the sovereign hand of God, to help us to grow towards the great goal of the Christian life – Christ-likeness.- Sinclair B. Ferguson, Healthy Christian Growth, by Permission of the Banner of Truth Trust, Carlisle, PA. 1991, p. 16.

Love has hands to help others. It has feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men. This is what love looks like. - Augustine

The workings of grace in the heart are utterly mysterious and unsearchable. We cannot explain why the word produces effects on one person in a congregation, and not upon another. We cannot explain why, in some cases--with every possible advantage, and in spite of every entreaty--people reject the word, and continue dead in trespasses and sins. We cannot explain why in other cases--with every possible difficulty, and with no encouragement--people are born again, and become decided Christians. We cannot define the manner in which the Spirit of God conveys life to a soul, and the exact process by which a believer receives a new nature. All these are hidden things to us. We see certain results, but we can go no further. "The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." [John 3:8]~ J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Mark, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1985], 74-75. {Mark 4:26-29}

Some leaders are born women.- Geraldine Ferraro, 1935 - 2011

Man, here below, lives so entirely among sensible things,
and meditates so little upon spiritual objects, that he comes
to look upon that which is spiritual as unreal, and upon
material things as the only realities. For most men, houses,
and lands, and gold are more real than God and the soul. The
former address the five senses, whereas "no man hath seen God
at any time," and the soul is not apprehensible by any sensuous
organ. Yet the invisible God is more real than any other being,
for he is the cause and ground of all other existence. It was
an invisible Mind that made the material chaos from nothing,
and brooded over it, and formed it into an orderly and
beautiful cosmos. The invisible is more firmly substantial than
the visible.- W. G. T. Shedd (1820-1894), Sermons to the Spiritual Man, New York: C. Scribner's Sons, 1884, p. 177-178

The first mark of a healthy church is expositional preaching. It is not only the first mark; it is far and away the most important of them all, because if you get this one right, all of the others should follow… If you get the priority of the Word established, then you have in place the single most important aspect of the church’s life, and growing health is virtually assured, because God has decided to act by His Spirit through His Word. The congregation’s commitment to the centrality of the Word coming from the front, from the preacher, the one specially gifted by God and called to that ministry, is the most important thing you can look for in a church.- Mark Dever, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Crossway, 2000, p. 25, 38.

No man ever enters heaven until he is first convinced that he deserves hell. -John Everett

Success is a great deodorant. It takes away all your past smells.- Elizabeth Taylor, 1932 - 2011

Victory is won not in miles but in inches. Win a little now, hold your ground, and later, win a little more.- Louis L'Amour, 1908 - 1988

With the Lord Jesus Christ nothing is impossible. No stormy passions are so strong; He can tame them. No temper is so rough and violent; He can change it. No conscience is so disturbed; He can speak peace to it and make it calm. No person ever need despair, if they will only bow down their pride, and come as a humbled sinner to Christ. Christ can do miracles upon their heart. No person ever need despair of reaching their journey's end, if they have once committed their soul to Christ's keeping. Christ will carry them through every danger. Christ will make them conqueror over every foe. What if our relatives oppose us? What if our neighbors laugh us to scorn? What if our place be hard? What if our temptations be great? It is all nothing, if Christ is on our side, and we are in the ship with Him. Greater is He that is for us, than all those who are against us.~ J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Mark, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1985], 85. {Mark 4:35-41} To do anything less than commit ourselves completely to our Lord in simple trust during the troubling times in our lives is to insult His wisdom. To resist Him, question Him, doubt Him, or criticize what He allows in our lives is to deny that He is the only wise God, and claim that we are wiser than He.- Richard L. Strauss, Treasures of Wisdom,www.bible.org, The best measure of spiritual life is not ecstasies but obedience. - Oswald Chambers The humblest citizen of all the land, when clad in the armor of a righteous cause, is stronger than all the hosts of error.- William Jennings Bryan, 1860 - 1925 A man who murders another shortens by a few brief years the life of a human being; but he who votes to increase the burden of debts upon the people of the United States assumes a graver responsibility.- William Jennings Bryan, 1860 - 1925