Quotes by Preachers - Page 7

[Jesus] did not say, 'Simon, son of Jonas, fearest thou me.' He did not say, 'Dost thou admire me? Dost thou adore me?' Nor was it even a question concerning his faith. He did not say, 'Simon, son of Jonas, believest thou in me?' but he asked him another question, 'Lovest thou me?' I take it, that is because love is the very best evidence of godliness. Love is the brightest of all the graces; and hence it becomes the best evidence.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
I do not believe that any man can preach the gospel who does not preach the Law. Lower the Law and you dim the light by which man perceives his guilt; this is a very serious loss to the sinner rather than a gain; for it lessens the likelihood of his conviction and conversion. I say you have deprived the gospel of its ablest auxiliary [its most powerful weapon] when you have set aside the Law. You have taken away from it the schoolmaster that is to bring men to Christ. they will never accept grace till they tremble before a just and holy Law. Therefore, the Law serves a most necessary purpose, and it must not be removed from its place. The Law cuts into the core of evil, it reveals the seat of the malady and informs us that the leprosy lies deep within. They must be slain by the Law before they can be made alive by the gospel.
Charles Spurgeon
O my Mansoul, I have lived, I have died, I live, and I will die no more for thee. I live that thou mayest not die. Because I live thou shalt live also; I reconciled thee to my Father by the blood of My cross, and being reconciled thou shalt live through me. I will pray for thee, I will fight for thee, I will yet do thee good. Nothing can hurt thee but sin; nothing can grieve Me but sin; nothing can make thee base before thy foes but sin; take heed of sin, my Mansoul.
John Bunyan
Never go hungry while the daily bread of grace is on the table of mercy.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Jesus does not cherish an offense, loving us as well after the offense as before it.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
You shall find it greatly mitigates the sorrow of bereavements, if before bereavement you shall have learned to surrender every day all the things which are dearest to you into the keeping of your gracious God.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
God is too good to be unkind and He is too wise to be mistaken. And when we cannot trace His hand, we must trust His heart.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
If the Lord Jehovah makes us wait, let us do so with our whole hearts; for blessed are all they that wait for Him. He is worth waiting for. The waiting itself is beneficial to us: it tries faith, exercises patience, trains submission, and endears the blessing when it comes. The Lord’s people have always been a waiting people.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Christian contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God's wise and fatherly disposal in every condition.
Jeremiah Burroughs
[I]t is not hasty reading--but serious meditating upon holy and heavenly truths, that make them prove sweet and profitable to the soul. It is not the bee’s touching of the flower, which gathers honey--but her abiding for a time upon the flower, which draws out the sweet. It is not he who reads most--but he who meditates most, who will prove the choicest, sweetest, wisest and strongest Christian.
Thomas Brooks
Preach the gospel to yourself, because as you consider who you are in light of God's perfect goodness, holiness and peace, you must soften toward others.
Thomas Brooks
If boys would think, it would be well to give them less classwork and more opportunity for thought.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
If God be near a church, it must pray. And if he be not there, one of the first tokens of his absence will be a slothfulness in prayer.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
I hear another man cry, “Oh, sir my want of strength lies mainly in this, that I cannot repent sufficiently!” A curious idea men have of what repentance is! Many fancy that so many tears are to be shed, and so many groans are to be heaved, and so much despair is to be endured. Whence comes this unreasonable notion? Unbelief and despair are sins, and therefore I do not see how they can be constituent elements of acceptable repentance; yet there are many who regard them as necessary parts of true Christian experience. They are in great error. Still, I know what they mean, for in the days of my darkness I used to feel in the same way. I desired to repent, but I thought that I could not do it, and yet all the while I was repenting. Odd as it may sound, I felt that I could not feel. I used to get into a corner and weep, because I could not weep; and I fell into bitter sorrow because I could not sorrow for sin. What a jumble it all is when in our unbelieving state we begin to judge our own condition! It is like a blind man looking at his own eyes. My heart was melted within me for fear, because I thought that my heart was as hard as an adamant stone. My heart was broken to think that it would not break. Now I can see that I was exhibiting the very thing which I thought I did not possess; but then I knew not where I was. Remember that the man who truly repents is never satisfied with his own repentance. We can no more repent perfectly than we can live perfectly. However pure our tears, there will always be some dirt in them: there will be something to be repented of even in our best repentance. But listen! To repent is to change your mind about sin, and Christ, and all the great things of God. There is sorrow implied in this; but the main point is the turning of the heart from sin to Christ. If there be this turning, you have the essence of true repentance, even though no alarm and no despair should ever have cast their shadow upon your mind.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
I have now concentrated all my prayers into one, and that one prayer is this, that I may die to self, and live wholly to Him.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Another part or piece,' said Diabolus, 'of mine excellent armour, is a dumb and prayerless spirit, a spirit that scorns to cry for mercy, let the danger be ever so great; therefore be you, my Mansoul, sure that you make use of this.
John Bunyan
Groans that words cannot express are often prayers that God cannot refuse.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
He who makes his needs known to God gains for immediate answer "the peace of God which passeth understanding," and can wait God’s time for the rest.
Alexander MacLaren
As artists give themselves to their models, and poets to their classical pursuits, so must we addict ourselves to prayer.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
We should all know more, live nearer to God, and grow in grace, if we were more alone. Meditation chews the cud and extracts the real nutriment from the mental food gathered elsewhere.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
The commencement of all labor consisted in the preparation of his own soul.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Most of us think too much of speech, which is but the shell of thought.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Our silence might be better than our voices if our solitude was spent with God.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
We should pray when we are in a praying mood, for it would be sinful to neglect so fair an opportunity. We should pray when we are not in a proper mood, for it would be dangerous to remain in so unhealthy a condition.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Meditation puts the telescope to the eye, and enables us to see Jesus after a better sort than we could have seen Him if we had lived in the days of His flesh.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
If we cannot prevail with men for God, we will at least endeavor to prevail with God for men.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
The suppliant, whose fears prevent his words, will be well understood by the Most High.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
John Bunyan says that he never forgot the divinity he taught, because it was burnt into him when he was on his knees. That is the way to learn the gospel. If you learn it upon your knees you will never unlearn it. That which “men” teach you, men can unteach you – if I am merely convinced by reason, a better reasoner may deceive me. If I merely hold my doctrinal opinions because they seem “to me” to be correct, I may be led to think differently another day. But if “God” has taught them to me – he who is himself pure truth – I have not learned amiss, but I have so learned that I shall never unlearn, nor shall I forget.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
See, loving heart, how He delights in you. When you lean your head on His bosom, you not only receive, but you give Him joy; when you gaze with love upon His all-glorious face, you not only obtain comfort, but impart delight.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Worldlings pray to the Lord in times of need, when it serves their turn. They cry to Him in trouble, but forsake Him in prosperity.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
If it pleases Him to bid our patience exercise itself, shall He not do as He wills with His own!
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Will you not this day make it your prayer? "Lord, help me to glorify Thee; I am poor, help me to glorify Thee by contentment; I am sick, help me to give Thee honour by patience; I have talents, help me to extol Thee by spending them for Thee; I have time, Lord, help me to redeem it, that I may serve Thee; I have a heart to feel, Lord, let that heart feel no love but Thine, and glow with no flame but affection for Thee; I have a head to think, Lord, help me to think of Thee and for Thee; Thou hast put me in this world for something, Lord, show me what that is, and help me to work out my life-purpose.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
The Christian knows no change with regard to God. He may be rich to-day and poor to-morrow; he may be sickly to-day and well to-morrow; he may be in happiness to-day, to-morrow he may be distressed-but there is no change with regard to his relationship to God. If He loved me yesterday, He loves me to-day.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Faith is the angelic messenger between the soul and the Lord Jesus in glory.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
You will find it a stronghold in the day of trial to plead your adoption. You have no rights as a subject, you have forfeited them by your treason; but nothing can forfeit a child's right to a father's protection.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Remember how it is written of Job, “The Lord turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends.” While he prayed for himself, he remained a captive; but when he prayed for those unfriendly friends of his, then the Lord smiled upon him, and loosed his captivity
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
We get too comfortable with this orphanage universe, though. We sit in our pews, or behind our pulpits, knowing that our children watch "Christian" cartoons instead of slash films. We vote for the right candidates and know all the right "worldview" talking points. And we're content with the world we know, just adjusted a little for our identity as Christians. That's precisely why so many of us are so atrophied in our prayers, why our prayers rarely reach the level of "groanings too deep for words" (Rom 8:26). We are too numbed to be as frustrated as the Spirit is with the way things are.
Russell D. Moore
Prayer bends the omnipotence of heaven to your desire. Prayer moves the hand that moves the world.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Intercessory prayer is exceedingly prevalent. What wonders it has wrought! The Word of God teems with its marvelous deeds. Believer, thou hast a mighty engine in thy hand, use it well, use it constantly, use it with faith, and thou shalt surely be a benefactor to thy brethren.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Revival begins by Christians getting right first and then spills over into the world.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Groanings which cannot be uttered are often prayers which cannot be refused.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
We should seek not so much to pray but to become prayer.
Francis of Assisi
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;where there is hatred, let me sow love;when there is injury, pardon;where there is doubt, faith;where there is despair, hope;where there is darkness, light;and where there is sadness, joy.Grant that I may not so much seekto be consoled as to console;to be understood, as to understand,to be loved as to love;for it is in giving that we receive,it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,and it is in dying [to ourselves] that we are born to eternal life.
Francis of Assisi
The iron bolt which so mysteriously fastens the door of hope and holds our spirits in gloomy prison, needs a heavenly hand to push it back.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
The greatest and the best Christians when they are physically weak are more prone to an attack of spiritual depression than at any other time and there are great illustrations of this in the Scriptures.
Martyn Llyod-Jones
Cast the burden of the present along with the sin of the past and the fear of the future upon the Lord.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
If I can bring Him nothing but my tears, He will put them with His own tears in His own bottle for He once wept; if I can bring Christ nothing but my groans and sighs, He will accept these as an acceptable sacrifice, for He once was broken in heart, and sighed heavily in spirit.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Winter in the soul is by no means a comfortable season: but there is this comfort, namely, that the Lord makes it.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Jesus is in the tempest. His love wraps the night about itself as a mantle, but to the eye of faith the sable robe is scarce a disguise.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Even your little sorrows you may roll upon God, for He counteth the hairs of your head.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Then said he, ’I am going to my Father’s; and though with great difficulty I am got hither, yet now I do not repent me of all the trouble I have been at to arrive where I am. My sword I give to him that shall succeed me in my pilgrimage, and my courage and skill to him that can get it. My marks and scars I carry with me, to be a witness for me that I have fought His battles who now will be my rewarder.’.... So he passed over, and all the trumpets sounded for him on the other side.
John Bunyan
Although the author dealt some of John Bunyan's conclusions in spiritualizing the details of Solomon's Temple, he attributes to Bunyan a "consecrated ingenuity".
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Speak as educated nature suggests to you, and you will do well, but let it be educated and not raw, rude, uncultivated nature. Demosthenes took unbounded pains with his voice, and Cicero, who was naturally weak, made a long journey into Greece to correct his manner of speaking. With far nobler themes, let us not be less ambitious to excel.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Now, Mr. Great-heart was a strong man, so he was not afraid of a lion.
John Bunyan
Muhammad introduced the concept of such Glorious and Omnipotent God in Whose eyes all worldly systems are pieces of straw. Islamic equality of mankind is no fiction as it is in Christianity. No human mind has ever thought of such total freedom as established by Muhammad.
Mawde Royden
The root of impatience in discipline is really the same as that of overindulgence. In both instances, parents want to make up for lost time, to speed up a process that takes time.
Russell D. Moore
A godly man in the midst of the waves and storms that he meets with can see the glory of heaven before him and so contents himself. One drop of the sweetness of heaven is enough to take away all the sourness and bitterness of all the afflictions in the world. We know that one drop of sourness, or one drop of gall will make bitter a great deal of it; but if you put a spoonful of gall into a cup of sugar, it will embitter that. Now it is otherwise in heaven: one drop of sweetness will sweeten a great deal of sour affliction, but a great deal of sourness and gall will not embitter a soul who sees the glory of heaven that is to come.
Jeremiah Burroughs
Socrates used to say, "Philosophers can be happy without music;" and Christians can be happier than philosophers when all outward causes of rejoicing are withdrawn.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
...there is more good in contentment, than there is in the thing that you would fain have to cure your discontent...
Jeremiah Burroughs
Man is a fallen star till he is right with heaven: he is out of order with himself and all around him till he occupies his true place in relation to God. When he serves God, he has reached that point where he doth serve himself best, and enjoys himself most. It is man's honour, it is man's joy, it is man's heaven, to live unto God.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon