Believing and trusting God; assurance and doubt; the nature and exercise of saving faith; wavering and resting on Christ.
- Debaters Ready George Hutcheson
None are more bold and ready to fall on debates than those who are weakest in religion.
- Love is Vulnerable C. S. Lewis
There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of …
- Leisure to Look Up to Heaven Thomas Brooks
King Henry the Fourth (of France) asked the Duke of Alva if he had observed the great eclipse of the sun, which had lately happened. No, said the duke, I have so much to …
- Is He Not Gracious and Faithful? John Newton
Let us suppose the thing we are most afraid of actually to happen. Can it come a moment sooner, or in any other way, than by His appointment?
Is He not gracious, and …
- Too Little Concerned for the Glory of God John Newton
But indeed, we hearken too much to the flesh — and too little to faith; we are too much attached to our own petty concerns — and too little concerned for the glory of …
- Exercise of Trials John Newton
And how are you to know experimentally, either your own weakness—or the power, wisdom and grace of God, seasonably and sufficiently afforded—but by frequent and various …
- Knowledge of God vs Fear of Man Ed Welch
A growing knowledge of God displaces the fear of people, and it casts out our tendency to be casual with our secret sins.
- Full and Complete and Sufficient Ransom Christopher Love
What is the great reason that so many poor souls are so much cast down for sin, too much dejected under the sight and sense of it?
It is this: because they are afraid to …
- Beware Doubting His Kindness J.C. Ryle
If God has given His Son to die for us, let us beware of doubting His kindness and love in any painful providence of our daily life. Let us never allow ourselves to think …
- Helpless, Unworthy Sinner John Newton
If you can come as a helpless, unworthy sinner, without strength, without righteousness, without any hope but what arises from the worth, work, and word of Christ, this …
- Habitual Resignation John Newton
Let us strive and pray for a habitual resignation to his will—for he does all things well.
It is never ill with us—but when our evil hearts doubt or forget this plainest …
- Christ's Commitment to Our Salvation Gavin Ortlund
Christ has a greater commitment to our salvation and we do—a greater concern for our welfare, a greater pity for us in distress, a greater zeal for our advancement, a …
- The Top of our Comfort Stephen Charnock
It is the top of our comfort that he is in heaven a pleader, as it was the foundation of our comfort that he was once on earth a sufferer.
- Growth of a Believer John Newton
Remember, the growth of a believer is not like a mushroom, but like an oak, which increases slowly indeed but surely.
Many suns, showers, and frosts, pass upon it before …
- Restraint on a Christian J. Gresham Machen
The Christian is restrained from doing certain things. True!
But he is restrained from doing those things not in order that he may do nothing at all, but in order that he …
- Walk Humbly John Newton
May the Lord enable us to walk humbly—and then we shall walk safely; to such he will give more grace.
- Vos on American Christianity Geerhardus Vos
We must confess with shame that the deepest cause of that lack of esteem for dogma and theology that we lament in American Christianity, is a lack of self-confidence, of …
- Religion that Stands J. Gresham Machen
The type of religion which rejoices in the pious sound of traditional phrases regardless of their meanings or shrinks from controversial matters will never stand amid the …
- Heart-Eating Anxieties John Newton
We have liberty to express our desires to the Lord; but the more simply we can commit the how, the when, and the where, to his wisdom and will, the more we shall be freed …
- What Thou Wilt, When Thou Wilt, How Thou Wilt John Newton
Help me with your prayers, that I may trust him too, and be at length enabled to say without reserve,
What thou wilt, when thou wilt, how thou wilt.
I had rather speak …
- No Great Matter Where We Are John Newton
It is no great matter where we are, provided we know that the Lord has placed us there, and that he is with us!
- Living in Dependence on Him J. Ligon Duncan
God will continually put His people into situations where they must live in dependence on Him expressed through prayer.
- The Benefit of Trials John Newton
I have indeed had my trials, and some of them have been sharp; but their sharpness, as I have hinted, has been chiefly owing to my lack of faith and submission.
I have …
- Comfort from Sovereignty John Newton
When heavy trials in life are appointed to us, and we are called to give up, or perhaps to pluck out, a right eye—it is an easy matter for a bystander to say ‘Be …
- Trifles Once Discouraging John Newton
The hour is coming when we shall be astonished to think what mere trifles were once capable of discouraging us for though many things we now meet with have a kind of …
- Laying Up Treasures in Heaven William Greenhill
Men can endure any difficulty and danger to get estates, but they will hardly endure anything to get heaven, grace, or an interest in Christ.
- Wait His Leisure Georg Neumark
Only be still, and wait his leisure In cheerful hope, with heart content To take whate’er thy Father’s pleasure And all deserving love hath sent; Nor doubt our inmost …
- Jesus is Mine! John Newton
Jesus is mine! I’m now prepared To meet with what I thought most hard; Yes, let the winds of trouble blow, And comforts melt away like snow:
No blasted trees, or failing …
- Stay the Course Herman Bavinck
Preservation of the saints is also both gift and task. The New Testament repeatedly admonishes believers to remain faithful, to stay true to their Savior and Lord. At the …
- End of Fear Matthew Henry
The clearer sight we have of the sovereignty and power of heaven the less we shall fear the calamities of this earth.
- Knowledge and Knowledge John Bunyan
There is, therefore, knowledge and knowledge. Knowledge that resteth in the bare speculation of things; and knowledge that is accompanied with the grace of faith and …
- Faith Can Do This Jeremiah Burroughs
So what do you get by being a believer, a Christian? What can you do by your faith? I can do this: I can in all states cast my cares upon God, cast my burden upon God, I …
- God’s Tools in Providence Jeremiah Burroughs
‘I think I could be content with God’s hand,’ says one, ‘so far as I see the hand of God in a thing I can be content. But when men deal so unreasonably and unjustly with …
- The Authentic Face of Christ David VanDrunen
Making pictures of Jesus fails to recognize or submit to God’s inscrutable wisdom in requiring his people to live for a time by faith and not by sight as they wait …
- Too Hasty Assent to Calvinistic Principles John Newton
I believe a too hasty assent to Calvinistic principles, before a person is duly acquainted with the plague of his own heart, is one principal cause of that lightness of …
- Christ Outside of Us John Calvin
We must understand that as long as Christ remains outside of us, and we are separated from Him, all that He has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race …
- When Our Faith is Weak Herman Bavinck
When our faith is weak, when we lapse into sin, believers always have the right and the freedom to go with confidence to the throne of grace and plead on the basis of the …
- Value of Hymns Fernando Ortega
When you take a pop song and weigh it down with the gospel it sort of cheapens both. The theology is too heavy for the song, and the song usually ends up being too light …
- C. S. Lewis on Devotional Books C. S. Lewis
I believe that many who find that ’nothing happens’ when they sit down, or kneel down, to a book of devotion, would find that the heart sings unbidden while they are …
- The Promise of God’s Word Chad Van Dixhoorn
This is the promise of God’s Word. In spite of our daily failings, in spite of the accusations of our enemies, [Jesus] is there to quieten our consciences, to encourage …
- Believers are Exiles Tom Schreiner
Believers are exiles, not because they are displaced from their homeland. Believers are exiles because they suffer for their faith in a world that finds their faith …
- Does Your Faith Waiver? Chad Van Dixhoorn
Does your faith ever waver? Remember the Holy Spirit, for he too is promised in this covenant that is all of grace. The Spirit will make us ‘willing’ to believe in a …
- Tender and Awesome Thomas Schreiner
What is remarkable here [1 Peter 1:17] is that God’s tenderness and love as father is mingled with his judgment and the fear that should mark Christians in this world. …
- Jesus! Edmund Clowney
Jesus rose!
Our hope remains in the present: Jesus lives!
Our hope is completed in the future: Jesus is coming!
- Unpractical Theology? Edmund Clowney
Some may scorn the comfort and triumph of [1 Peter] as unpractical theology. His answers are answers of faith. But Peter knows that his witness is true, that Jesus Christ …
- Ye May Ebb and Flow Samuel Rutherford
Ye may yourself ebb and flow, rise and fall, wax and wane; but your Lord is this day as he was yesterday; and it is your comfort that your salvation is not rolled upon …
- Faith and Works John Calvin
Yet [Paul] is not so careful about good works as to despise the root – that is, faith – while he is gathering the fruits. He takes account of both parts, and, as is …
- Baptism into Death John Fesko
Would sentimentalism and saccharine emotions dominate congregations if they realized that a person is baptized into the death of Christ? Would characterizations of …
- All Tears Will be Wiped Away John Newton
Yes, madam, though every stream must fail, the fountain is still full and flowing. All the comfort you ever received in your dear friend was from the Lord, who is …
- Newton’s Childhood John Newton
When I was four years old, I could… repeat the answers to the questions in the Assembly’s Shorter Catechism, with the Scripture proofs; and all Isaac Watts’ smaller …