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When A Certain Shameless Fellow Mockingly Asked A Pious Old Man What God Had Done Before The Creation Of The World The Latter Aptly Countered That He Had Been Building Hell For The Curious.

-John Calvin

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When A Certain Shameless

John Calvin

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When A Certain Shameless Fellow Mockingly Asked A Pious Old Man What God Had Done Before The Creation Of The World The Latter Aptly Countered That He Had Been Building Hell For The Curious.

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Angels Are The Dispensers And Administrators Of The Divine Beneficence Toward Us.

If We Believe Heaven To Be Our Country, It Is Better For Us To Transmit Our Wealth Thither, Than To Retain It Here, Where We May Lose It By A Sudden Removal.

Whenever The Lord Holds Us In Suspense, And Delays His Aid, He Is Not Therefore Asleep, But, On The Contrary, Regulates All His Works In Such A Manner That He Does Nothing But At The Proper Time.

On The Contrary, Therefore, Christ Declares That The Doctrine Of The Gospel, Though It Is Preached To All Without Exception, Cannot Be Embraced By All, But That A New Understanding And A New Perception Are Requisite; And, Therefore, That Faith Does Not Depend On The Will Of Men, But That It Is God Who Gives It.

There Are Babies A Span Long In Hell.

However Many Blessings We Expect From God, His Infinite Liberality Will Always Exceed All Our Wishes And Our Thoughts.

Nothing Is More Dangerous Than To Be Blinded By Prosperity.

By Predestination We Mean The Eternal Decree Of God, By Which He Determined With Himself Whatever He Wished To Happen With Regard To Every Man

Without The Fear Of God, Men Do Not Even Observe Justice And Charity Among Themselves.

For, To My Mind, This Is A Certain Principle, That Nothing Is Here Treated Of But The Visible Form Of The World. He Who Would Learn Astronomy, And Other Recondite Arts, Let Him Go Elsewhere. (on Commenting The Text Of Genesis 1:6)

Our Physical Illnesses Serve Us For Medicines To Purge Us From Worldly Affections And Retrench What Is Superfluous In Us, And Since They Are To Us The Messengers Of Death, We Ought To Learn To Have One Foot Raised To Take Our Departure When It Shall Please God.

Whoever The Lord Has Adopted Ought To Prepare Themselves For Hard, Toilsome And Unquiet Living.

Mingled Vanity And Pride Appear In This, That When Miserable Men Do Seek After God, Instead Of Ascending Higher Than Themselves As They Ought To Do, They Measure Him By Their Own Carnal Stupidity, And Neglecting Solid Inquiry, Fly Off To Indulge Their Curiosity In Vain Speculation.

All The Blessings We Enjoy Are Divine Deposits, Committed To Our Trust On This Condition, That They Should Be Dispensed For The Benefit Of Our Neighbors.

God Promised By The Mouth Of Isaiah That Queens Should Be The Nursing Mothers Of The Church.

The Sum Is, That The Worship Of God Must Be Spiritual, In Order That It May Correspond With His Nature. For Although Moses Only Speaks Of Idolatry, Yet There Is No Doubt But That By Synecdoche, As In All The Rest Of The Law, He Condemns All Fictitious Services Which Men In Their Ingenuity Have Invented.

It Is Permissible To Use Wine Not Only For Necessity, But Also To Make Us Merry...... [it Must Be Moderate] Lest Men Forget Themselves, Drown Their Senses,.....in Making Merry [those Who Enjoy Wine] Feel A Livelier Gratitude To God.

There Can Be No Courage In Men Unless God Supports Them By His Word.

The Name Of Christ Excludes All Merit Of Our Own.

Humility Is The Beginning Of True Intelligence.

It Is Evident That Man Never Attains To A True Self-knowledge Until He Has Previously Contemplated The Face Of God, And Come Down After Such Contemplation To Look Into Himself.

The World Was No Doubt Made, That It Might Be A Theatre Of The Divine Glory.

Whoever Is Not Satisfied With Christ Alone, Strives After Something Beyond Absolute Perfection.

But We Have Nothing Of The Spirit Except Through Regeneration. Everything, Therefore, Which We Have From Nature Is Flesh.

The Fanaticism Which Discards The Scripture, Under The Pretense Of Resorting To Immediate Revelations Is Subversive Of Every Principle Of Christianity. For When They Boast Extravagantly Of The Spirit, The Tendency Is Always To Bury The Word Of God So They May Make Room For Their Own Falsehoods.

There Are Sons Of God Who Do Not Yet Appear So To Us, But Now Do So To God; And There Are Those Who, On Account Of Some Arrogated Or Temporal Grace, Are Called So By Us, But Are Not So To God.

Hypocrisy Can Plunge The Mind Of A Man Into A Dark Abyss, When He Believes His Own Self-flattery Instead Of God's Verdict.

No One In This Earthly Prison Of The Body Has Sufficient Strength Of His Own To Press Forward With A Due Degree Of Watchfulness, And The Great Majority [of Christians] Are Kept Down With Such Great Weakness That They Stagger And Halt And Even Creep On The Ground, And So Make Very Slight Advances.

For Even If The Word In His Immeasurable Essence United With The Nature Of Man Into One Person, We Do Not Imagine That He Was Confined Therein. Here Is Something Marvellous: The Son Of God Descended From Heaven In Such A Way That, Without Leaving Heaven, He Willed To Be Borne In The Virgin's Womb, To Go About The Earth, And To Hang Upon The Cross; Yet He Continuously Filled The World Even As He Had Done From The Beginning.

God Does Not Bestow His Spirit On His People In Order To Set Aside The Use Of His Word, But Rather To Render It Fruitful.

There Is Nothing In Afflictions Which Ought To Disturb Our Joy.

Nothing, Including Human Suffering, Happens By Chance.

The Gospel Acts Without Threats... It Teaches Us About The Supreme Goodwill Of God Towards Us.

Assuredly There Is But One Way In Which To Achieve What Is Not Merely Difficult But Utterly Against Human Nature: To Love Those Who Hate Us, To Repay Their Evil Deeds With Benefits, To Return Blessings For Reproaches. It Is That We Remember Not To Consider Men's Evil Intention But To Look Upon The Image Of God In Them, Which Cancels And Effaces Their Transgressions, And With Its Beauty And Dignity Allures Us To Love And Embrace Them.

When Pain And Suffering Strike, Our Faith Is Well Founded If It Is Standing On The Promises Of God. For All Of God's Promises Have Strong Confirmation In Christ.

Yet Consider Now, Whether Women Are Not Quite Past Sense And Reason, When They Want To Rule Over Men.

The Evil In Our Desires Typically Does Not Lie In What We Want, But That We Want It Too Much.

I Exhort All, Who Reverence The Word Of The Lord, To Read It, And Diligently Imprint It On Their Memory.

As By The Revolt Of The First Man, The Image Of God Could Be Effaced From His Mind And Soul, So There Is Nothing Strange In His Shedding Some Rays Of Grace On The Reprobate, And Afterwards Allowing These To Be Extinguished.

The Blood Of Christ Is Necessary To Purge The Faults Clinging To Our Best Works.

Let Us Consider This Settled, That No One Has Made Progress In The School Of Christ Who Does Not Joyfully Await The Day Of Death And Final Resurrection.

Now We Shall Possess A Right Definition Of Faith If We Call It A Firm And Certain Knowledge Of God's Benevolence Toward Us, Founded Upon The Truth Of The Freely Given Promise In Christ, Both Revealed To Our Minds And Sealed Upon Our Hearts Through The Holy Spirit.

If There Had Been Any Unbelief In Mary, That Could Not Prevent God From Accomplishing His Work In Any Other Way Which He Might Choose. But She Is Called Blessed, Because She Received By Faith The Blessing Offered To Her, And Opened Up The Way To God For Its Accomplishment.

Satan, Who Is A Wonderful Contriver Of Delusions, Is Constantly Laying Snares To Entrap Ignorant And Heedless People.

All The More Vile Is The Stupidity Of Those Persons Who Open Heaven To All The Impious And Unbelieving Without The Grace Of Him Whom Scripture Commonly Teaches To Be The Only Door Whereby We Enter Into Salvation.

There Cannot Be A Surer Rule, Nor A Stronger Exhortation To The Observance Of It, Than When We Are Taught That All The Endowments Which We Possess Are Divine Deposits Entrusted To Us For The Very Purpose Of Being Distributed For The Good Of Our Neighbour.

The Surest Source Of Destruction To Men Is To Obey Themselves.

A Dog Barks When His Master Is Attacked. I Would Be A Coward If I Saw That God's Truth Is Attacked And Yet Would Remain Silent.

Men Are Undoubtedly More In Danger From Prosperity Than From Adversity. For When Matters Go Smoothly, They Flatter Themselves, And Are Intoxicated By Their Success

We Should Never Insult Others On Account Of Their Faults, For It Is Our Duty To Show Charity And Respect To Everyone.

If God Contains The Fullness Of All Good Things In Himself Like An Inexhaustible Fountain, Nothing Beyond Him Is To Be Sought By Those Who Strike After The Highest Good And All The Elements Of Happiness.

For We Are Not All Equally Afflicted With The Same Disease Or All In Need Of The Same Severe Cure. This Is The Reason Why We See Different Persons Disciplined With Different Crosses. The Heavenly Physician Takes Care Of The Well-being Of All His Patients; He Gives Some A Milder Medicine And Purifies Others By More Shocking Treatments, But He Omits No One; For The Whole World, Without Exception, Is Ill (deut 32:15).

You Must Submit To Supreme Suffering In Order To Discover The Completion Of Joy.

He Makes This Favor Common To All, Because It Is Propounded To All, And Not Because It Is In Reality Extended To All; For Though Christ Suffered For The Sins Of The Whole World, And Is Offered Through God’s Benignity Indiscriminately To All, Yet All Do Not Receive Him.

The True Wisdom Of Man Consists In The Knowledge Of God The Creator And Redeemer.

Knowledge Of God

They Babble And Talk Absurdly Who, In The Place Of God's Providence, Substitute Bare Permission - As If God Sat In A Watchtower Awaiting Chance Events , And His Judgments Thus Depended Upon Human Will.

There Is No Wisdom But That Which Is Founded On The Fear Of God, Which Solomon Also Declares To Be The Chief Part Of Wisdom.

Christian Inspirational

Man With All His Shrewdness Is As Stupid About Understanding By Himself The Mysteries Of God, As An Ass Is Incapable Of Understanding Musical Harmony.

Wherefore All Theology, When Separated From Christ, Is Not Only Vain And Confused, But Is Also Mad, Deceitful, And Spurious; For, Though The Philosophers Sometimes Utter Excellent Sayings, Yet They Have Nothing But What Is Short-lived, And Even Mixed Up With Wicked And Erroneous Sentiments.

Faith Is A Knowledge Of The Benevolence Of God Toward Us, And A Certain Persuasion Of His Veracity.

For It Is Better, With Closed Eyes, To Follow God As Our Guide, Than, By Relying On Our Own Prudence, To Wander Through Those Circuitous Paths Which It Devises For Us.

Our Assurance, Our Glory, And The Sole Anchor Of Our Salvation Are That Christ The Son Of God Is Ours, And We In Turn Are In Him Sons Of God And Heirs Of The Kingdom Of Heaven, Called To The Hope Of Eternal Blessedness By God's Grace, Not By Our Worth.

When I Took The Leap, I Had Faith I Would Find A Net; Instead I Learned I Could Fly.

It Is No Small Honour That God For Our Sake Has So Magnificently Adorned The World, In Order That We May Not Only Be Spectators Of This Beauteous Theatre, But Also Enjoy The Multiplied Abundance And Variety Of Good Things Which Are Presented To Us In It.

We Must Remember That Satan Has His Miracles, Too.

Christian Inspirational

Since We Are All Naturally Prone To Hypocrisy, Any Empty Semblance Of Righteousness Is Quite Enough To Satisfy Us Instead Of Righteousness Itself.

Those Little Children Have Not Yet Any Understanding To Desire His Blessing; But When They Are Presented To Him, He Gently And Kindly Receives Them, And Dedicates Them To The Father By A Solemn Act Of Blessing.

I Gave Up All For Christ, And What Have I Found? Everything In Christ.

Justification By Faith Is The Hinge On Which All True Religion Turns.

At This Day . . . The Earth Sustains On Her Bosom Many Monster Minds, Minds Which Are Not Afraid To Employ The Seed Of Deity Deposited In Human Nature As A Means Of Suppressing The Name Of God. Can Anything Be More Detestable Than This Madness In Man, Who, Finding God A Hundred Times Both In His Body And His Soul, Makes His Excellence In This Respect A Pretext For Denying That There Is A God? He Will Not Say That Chance Has Made Him Different From The Brutes; . . . But, Substituting Nature As The Architect Of The Universe, He Suppresses The Name Of God.

So Great And Boundless Is God's Wisdom That He Knows Right Well How To Use Evil Instruments To Do Good.

If Everything Proceeded According To Their Wishes, They Would Not Understand What It Means To Follow God.

Though Satan Instils His Poison, And Fans The Flames Of Our Corrupt Desires Within Us,we Are Yet Not Carried By Any External Force To The Commission Of Sin, But Our Own Flesh Entices Us, And We Willingly Yield To Its Allurements.

Free-will Cannot Will Good And Of Necessity Serves Sin.

The Denial Of Ourselves Which Christ Has So Diligently Commanded His Disciples From The Beginning Will At Last Dominate All The Desires Of Our Heart.

When Our Faith Is Tested By Suffering "as Gold Is Tried In A Furnace" And We Depend With Confidence On God And Rely Entirely On His Help, We Will Be Granted The Most Excellent Gift Of Patience And Through Faith We May Victoriously Persevere To The End.

No Task Will Be So Sordid And Base, Provided You Obey Your Calling In It, That It Will Not Shine And Be Reckoned Very Precious In God's Sight.

There Is Not One Blade Of Grass, There Is No Color In This World That Is Not Intended To Make Men Rejoice.

We Have Been Adopted As Sons By The Lord With This One Condition; That Our Life Expresses Christ, The Bond Of Our Adoption. Accordingly, Unless We Give And Devote Ourselves To Righteousness, We Not Only Revolt From Our Creator With Wicked Perfidy, But We Also Abjure Our Savior Himself.

Nevertheless, Our Constant Efforts To Lower Our Estimate Of The Present World Should Not Lead Us To Hate Life Or To Be Ungrateful Toward God. For This Life, Though It Is Full Of Countless Miseries, Deserves To Be Reckoned Among The Divine Blessings Which Should Not Be Despised. Therefore, If We Discover Nothing Of God's Goodness In It, We Are Already Guilty Of No Small Ingratitude Toward Him.

The Human Heart Has So Many Crannies Where Vanity Hides, So Many Holes Where Falsehood Works, Is So Decked Out With Deceiving Hypocrisy, That It Often Dupes Itself.

If The Gospel Be Not Preached, Jesus Christ Is, As It Were, Buried.

To Be Christians Under The Law Of Grace Does Not Mean To Wander Unbridled Outside The Law, But To Be Engrafted In Christ, By Whose Grace We Are Free From The Curse Of The Law, And By Whose Spirit We Have The Law Engraved Upon Our Hearts.

Man's Nature, So To Speak, Is A Perpetual Factory Of Idols.

It Is Not Lawful For You To Make A Compromise With God: To Try To Fulfill Part Of Your Duties And To Omit Others At Your Own Pleasure.

Free Will Does Not Enable Any Man To Perform Good Works, Unless He Is Assisted By Grace; Indeed, The Special Grace Which The Elect Alone Receive Through Regeneration. For I Stay Not To Consider The Extravagance Of Those Who Say That Grace Is Offered Equally And Promiscuously To All

When God Designs To Forgive Us He Changes Our Hearts And Turns Us To Obedience By His Spirit.

Every Person, On Coming To The Knowledge Of Himself, Is Not Only Urged To Seek God, But Is Also Led As By The Hand To Find Him.

Were The Judgments Of Mankind Correct, Custom Would Be Regulated By The Good. But It Is Often Far Otherwise In Point Of Fact; For, Whatever The Many Are Seen To Do, Forthwith Obtains The Force Of Custom. But Human Affairs Have Scarcely Ever Been So Happily Constituted As That The Better Course Pleased The Greater Number. Hence The Private Vices Of The Multitude Have Generally Resulted In Public Error, Or Rather That Common Consent In Vice Which These Worthy Men Would Have To Be Law.

Let This Be Our Rule For Goodwill And Helpfulness, That Whenever We Are Able To Assist Others We Should Behave As Stewards Who Must Someday Give An Account Of Ourselves.

Faith Alone Saves, But The Faith That Saves Is Not Alone.

Augustine Does Not Disagree With This When He Teaches That It Is A Faculty Of The Reason And The Will To Choose Good With The Assistance Of Grace; Evil, When Grace Is Absent.

Indeed, A Christian Ought To Be Disposed And Prepared To Keep In Mind That He Has To Reckon With God Every Moment Of His Life.

Tears That Are Shed In Time Of Affliction Are Rarely Tears Of Penitence, But More Likely They Are Shed Out Of Self Pity And Pain Or Sorrow.

It Must Be Plain Also That We Should Not Anxiously Strive For Riches And Honors By Relying On Our Own Diligence Or Cleverness Or By Depending On The Favor Of Men Or By Trusting In The Notion Of Good Luck, But That We Should Always Expect The Lord To Direct Us To The Lot He Has Provided For Us.

Seeing That A Pilot Steers The Ship In Which We Sail, Who Will Never Allow Us To Perish Even In The Midst Of Shipwrecks, There Is No Reason Why Our Minds Should Be Overwhelmed With Fear And Overcome With Weariness.

After 50 Years, Is It Not Clear That God Has Raised Up New Illnesses Connected With Fornication? From Where Do These Things Come If Not From The Hand Of God? [in Response To These Diseases] The World Was Astounded, And People Were Terrified For A Time, But They Have Not, To This Day, Observed The Hand Of God.

We Must Not Think That [god] Takes No Notice Of Us, When He Does Not Answer Our Wishes: For He Has A Right To Distinguish What We Actually Need.

But A Faithful Believer Will In All Circumstances Mediate On The Mercy And Fatherly Goodness Of God.

Scripture Urges And Warns Us That Whatever Favors We May Have Obtained From The Lord, We Have Received Them As A Trust On Condition That They Should Be Applied To The Common Benefit Of The Church.

I Have Never Seen Either A Drop Of Piety Or A Grain Of Truth Or Ingenuousness - Nay, I Have Never Found Common Sense In Any Jew.

For There Is No One So Great Or Mighty That He Can Avoid The Misery That Will Rise Up Against Him When He Resists And Strives Against God.

Everyone Flatters Himself And Carries A Kingdom In His Breast.

We Are Not To Look To What Men In Themselves Deserve But To Attend To The Image Of God Which Exists In All And To Which We Owe All Honor And Love.

A Man That Extols Himself Is A Fool And An Idiot

We May Rest Assured That God Would Never Have Suffered Any Infants To Be Slain Except Those Who Were Already Damned And Predestined For Eternal Death.

Faith Does Not Proceed From Ourselves, But Is The Fruit Of Spiritual Regeneration.

Let Our Chief Goal, O God, Be Your Glory, And To Enjoy You Forever.

We Are Nowhere Forbidden To Laugh.

Christian Inspirational

I Don't Need To Compromise My Principles, Because They Don't Have The Slightest Bearing On What Happens To Me Anyway.

The Lord Has Not Redeemed You So You Might Enjoy Pleasures And Luxuries Or So That You Might Abandon Yourself To Ease And Indolence, But Rather So You Should Be Prepared To Endure All Sorts Of Evils.

For Though We Very Truly Hear That The Kingdom Of God Will Be Filled With Splendor, Joy, Happiness And Glory, Yet When These Things Are Spoken Of, They Remain Utterly Remote From Our Perception, And As It Were, Wrapped In Obscurities, Until That Day.

Nearly All The Wisdom We Possess, That Is To Say, True And Sound Wisdom, Consists Of Two Parts: The Knowledge Of God And Of Ourselves.

Knowledge Of God

How Can It Be Said That The Weakness Of The Human Will Is Aided So As To Enable It To Aspire Effectually To The Choice Of Good, When The Fact Is, That It Must Be Wholly Transformed And Renewed?

For Our Hearts Are Enfeebled By Prosperity, So That We Cannot Make The Effort To Pray.

Where Riches Hold The Dominion Of The Heart, God Has Lost His Authority.

Faith And Hope...are The Wings By Which Our Souls, Rising Above The World, Are Lifted Up To God.

All Truth Is God's Truth.

The Unborn Baby, Though Enclosed In The Womb Of Its Mother, Is Already A Human Being, And Should Not Be Robbed Of The Life Which It Has Not Yet Begun To Enjoy.

You Cannot Imagine A More Certain Rule Or A More Powerful Suggestion Than This, That All The Blessings We Enjoy Are Divine Deposits Which We Have Received On This Condition That We Distribute Them To Others.

God Orders What We Cannot Do, That We May Know What We Ought To Ask Him.

The Scriptures Should Be Read With The Aim Of Finding Christ In Them. Whoever Turns Aside From This Object, Even Though He Wears Himself Out All His Life In Learning, He Will Never Reach The Knowledge Of The Truth.

Wherever We See The Word Of God Purely Preached And Heard, There A Church Of God Exists, Even If It Swarms With Many Faults.

We Must Always Speak Of The Efficacy Of The Ministry In Such A Manner That The Entire Praise Of The Work May Be Reserved For God Alone.

The Vices Of Which We Are Full We Carefully Hide From Others, And We Flatter Ourselves With The Notion That They Are Small And Trivial; We Sometimes Even Embrace Them As Virtues.

The Excellence Of The Church Does Not Consist In Multitude But In Purity.

If God Does Nothing Random, There Must Always Be Something To Learn.

In Truth We Know By Experience That Song Has Great Force And Vigour To Move And Inflame The Hearts Of Men To Invoke And Praise God With A More Vehement And Ardent Zeal.

Their [the Jews] Rotten And Unbending Stiffneckedness Deserves That They Be Oppressed Unendingly And Without Measure Or End And That They Die In Their Misery Without The Pity Of Anyone.

No Man Is Excluded From Calling Upon God, The Gate Of Salvation Is Set Open Unto All Men: Neither Is There Any Other Thing Which Keepeth Us Back From Entering In, Save Only Our Own Unbelief.

Hatred Grows Into Insolence When We Desire To Excel The Rest Of Mankind And Imagine We Do Not Belong To The Common Lot; We Even Severely And Haughtily Despise Others As Our Inferiors.

True It Is, That He Who Has Taken Off His Affection From The Goods Of This World Has Already Sold All, And Has Made Himself Poor, So Far As Depends Upon Himself; But The Fruit And The Proof Of This Spiritual Poverty Are, Patiently To Endure The Loss Of Worldly Goods, And Without Any Regret, When It Pleases Our Heavenly Father That We Should Be Despoiled Of Them.

My Heart I Give You, Lord, Eagerly And Entirely.

Doubtful Prayer Is No Prayer At All.

There Is No Knowing That Does Not Begin With Knowing God.

The Door Is Closed To Prayer Unless It Is Opened With The Key Of Trust.

The Poor Yield To The Rich, The Common People To The Upper Ten, The Servants To Their Masters, The Ignorant To The Scholars; But There Is Nobody Who Does Not Imagine That He Is Really Better Than Others.

If Grace Acts In Us, Grace, And Not We Who Do The Work, Will Be Crowned.

There Are People Who Are Known To Be Very Liberal, Yet They Never Give Without Scolding Or Pride Or Even Insolence.

Prosperity Inebriates Men, So That They Take Delights In Their Own Merits.

We Must Observe That The Knowledge Of God Which We Are Invited To Cultivate Is Not That Which, Resting Satisfied With Empty Speculation, Only Flutters In The Brain, But A Knowledge Which Will Prove Substantial And Fruitful Whenever It Is Duly Perceived And Rooted In The Heart.

Knowledge Of God

The Flesh Is Willing To Flatter Itself, And Many Who Now Give Themselves Every Indulgence, Promise To Themselves An Easy Entrance Into Life. Thus Men Practice Mutual Deception On Each Other And Fall Asleep In Wicked Indifference.

Elisabeth, Again, While She Praises Her, Is So Far From Hiding The Divine Glory, That She Ascribes Everything To God. And Yet, Though She Acknowledges The Superiority Of Mary To Herself And To Others, She Does Not Envy Her The Higher Distinction, But Modestly Declares That She Had Obtained More Than She Deserved.

Unless We Fix Certain Hours In The Day For Prayer, It Easily Slips From Our Memory.

Hours In The Day

Without Knowledge Of Self There Is No Knowledge Of God.

Knowledge Of God

It Is Entirely The Work Of Grace And A Benefit Conferred By It That Our Heart Is Changed From A Stony One To One Of Flesh, That Our Will Is Made New, And That We, Created Anew In Heart And Mind, At Length Will What We Ought To Will.

Prayer Doesn't Change Things - God Changes Things In Answer To Prayer.

For It Was Not After We Were Reconciled To Him By The Blood Of His Son That He Began To Love Us, But He Loved Us Before The Foundation Of The World, That With His Only Begotten Son We Too Might Be Sons Of God Before We Were Anything At All.

All Men Were Created To Busy Themselves With The Labor For The Common Good.

Whomever The Lord Has Adopted And Deemed Worthy Of His Fellowship Ought To Prepare Themselves For A Hard, Toilsome, And Unquiet Life, Crammed With Very Many And Various Kinds Of Evil.

No One Will Calmly And Quietly Submit To Bear The Cross Except Those Who Have Learned To Seek Their Happiness Beyond This World.

It Is Therefore Faith Alone Which Justifies, And Yet The Faith Which Justifies Is Not Alone.

Can True Repentance Exist Without Faith? By No Means. But Although They Cannot Be Separated, They Ought To Be Distinguished.

When We Recognize The Rod Of A Father, Should We Not Show Ourselves Docile Children Rather Than Rebelliously Desperate Men Who Have Been Hardened In Their Evil Doings?

Seeing God Hath Thus Set Us At Liberty, What Rashness It Is For Worms Of The Earth To Make New Laws; As Though God Had Not Been Wise Enough.

Joy And Patience Are Far Above Our Strength... We Must Persevere In Prayer That He May Not Permit Our Hearts To Faint... Prayer And Perseverance Are Necessary In Our Daily Conflicts. The Best Remedy To The Weariness Is Diligence In Prayer.

Let Us Be Peaceable As Near As We Can: Let Us Relent Of Our Own Right: Let Us Not Strive For These Worldly Goods, Honour And Reputation: Let Us Bear All Wrongs And Outrages, Rather Than Be Moved To Any Debate Through Our Own Fault. But In The Meanwhile, Let Us Fight For God's Truth With Tooth And Nail.

Whensoever God's Truth Is Defaced Or When Any Man Turns Away From The Pure Simplicity Of The Gospel, We Must Not In Any Wise Spare Him, But Although The Whole World Should Set Itself Against Us, Yet Must We Maintain The Case With Invincible Constancy, Without Bending For Any Creature.

Against The Persecution Of A Tyrant The Godly Have No Remedy But Prayer.

Prayers Belong Strictly To The Worship Of God. Fasting Is A Subordinate Aid, Which Is Pleasing To God No Farther Than As It Aids The Earnestness And Fervency Of Prayer.

For Until Men Recognize That They Owe Everything To God, That They Are Nourished By His Fatherly Care, That He Is The Author Of Their Every Good, That They Should Seek Nothing Beyond Him - They Will Never Yield Him Willing Service. Nay, Unless They Establish Their Complete Happiness In Him, They Will Never Give Themselves Truly And Sincerely To Him.

The Pastor Ought To Have Two Voices: One, For Gathering The Sheep; And Another, For Warding Off And Driving Away Wolves And Thieves. The Scripture Supplies Him With The Means Of Doing Both.

There Is No Golden Mean Between These Two Extremes; Either This Early Life Must Become Low In Our Estimation, Or It Will Have Our Inordinate Love.

It Is Certain That Not One Drop Of Rain Falls Without God's Sure Command.

That Man Is Truly Humble Who Neither Claims Any Personal Merit In The Sight Of God, Nor Proudly Despises Brethren, Or Aims At Being Thought Superior To Them, But Reckons It Enough That He Is One Of The Members Of Christ, And Desires Nothing More Than That The Head Alone Should Be Exalted.

The Principle Exercise Which The Children Of God Have Is To Pray. For In This Way They Give True Proof Of Their Faith.

If True Religion Is To Beam Upon Us, Our Principle Must Be, That It Is Necessary To Begin With Heavenly Teaching, And That It Is Impossible For Any Man To Obtain Even The Minutest Portion Of Right And Sound Doctrine Without Being A Disciple Of Scripture.

Original Sin, Therefore, Appears To Be A Hereditary, Depravity And Corruption Of Our Nature, Diffused Through All The Parts Of The Soul, Rendering Us Obnoxious To The Divine Wrath And Producing In Us Those Works Which The Scripture Calls 'works Of.

To Will Is Human, To Will The Bad Is Of Fallen Nature, But To Will The Good Is Of Grace.

Faith Consists Not In Ignorance, But In Knowledge - Knowledge Not Of God Merely...but When We Recognize God As A Propitious Father Through The Reconciliation Made By Christ, And Christ As Given To Us For Righteousness, Sanctification, And Life.

The Lord Commands Us To Do Good Unto All Men Without Exception, Though The Majority Are Very Undeserving When Judged According To Their Own Merits. But Scripture Here Helps Us Out With An Excellent Argument When It Teaches Us That We Must Not Think Of Man's Real Value, But Only Of His Creation In The Image Of God To Which We Owe All Possible Honor And Love.

Human Will Does Not By Liberty Obtain Grace, But By Grace Obtains Liberty.

The More We Are Oppressed By The Cross, The Fuller Will Be Our Spiritual Joy.

But A Most Pernicious Error Widely Prevails That Scripture Has Only So Much Weight As Is Conceded To It By The Consent Of The Church. As If The Eternal And Inviolable Truth Of God Depended Upon The Decision Of Men!

When The Bible Speaks, God Speaks.

Faith And Patience Are Exceptional Virtues In Those That Suffer. Patience Is The Fruit And Evidence Of Faith.

Lawful Worship Consists In Obedience Alone.

The Most Accomplished In The Scripture Are Fools, Unless They Acknowledge That They Have Need Of God For Their Schoolmaster All The Days Of Their Life.

The Sufferings Of Christ Are The Means Of Forgiveness Of Sin And Eternal Glory

The First Part Of A Good Work Is The Will, The Second Is Vigorous Effort In The Doing Of It. God Is The Author Of Both. It Is, Therefore, Robbery From God To Arrogate Anything To Ourselves, Either In The Will Or The Act.

When We Come To A Comparison Of Heaven And Earth, Then We May Indeed Not Only Forget All About The Present Life, But Even Despise And Scorn It.

But The Present Life Should Never Be Hated, Except Insofar As It Subjects Us To Sin, Although Even That Hatred Should Not Properly Be Applied To Life Itself.

The Fire Of Affliction Reveals The Quality Of Our Faith

Faith Is Like An Empty, Open Hand Stretched Out Towards God, With Nothing To Offer And Everything To Recieve

The Whole World Is A Theatre For The Display Of The Divine Goodness, Wisdom, Justice, And Power, But The Church Is The Orchestra, As It Were—the Most Conspicuous Part Of It; And The Nearer The Approaches Are That God Makes To Us, The More Intimate And Condescending The Communication Of His Benefits, The More Attentively Are We Called To Consider Them.

We Explain Justification Simply As The Acceptance With Which God Receives Us Into His Favor As Righteous Men. And We Say That It Consists In The Remission Of Sins And The Imputation Of Christ’s Righteousness.

Hence That Dread And Amazement With Which As Scripture Uniformly Relates Holy Men Were Struck And Overwhelmed Whenever They Beheld The Presence Of God. Men Are Never Duly Touched And Impressed With A Conviction Of Their Insignificance Until They Have.

The Effect Of Our Knowledge Rather Ought To Be, First, To Teach Us Reverence And Fear; And, Secondly, To Induce Us, Under Its Guidance And Teaching, To Ask Every Good Thing From [god], And, When It Is Received, Ascribe It To Him. For How Can The Idea Of God Enter Your Mind Without Instantly Giving Rise To The Thought, That Since You Are His Workmanship, You Are Bound, By The Very Law Of Creation, To Submit To His Authority?-- Hat Your Life Is Due To Him?-- Hat Whatever You Do Ought To Have Reference To Him.

No One Has Rightly Denied Himself Unless He Has Wholly Resigned Himself To The Lord And Is Willing To Leave Every Detail To His Good Pleasure. If We Put Ourselves In Such A Frame Of Mind, Then, Whatever May Happen To Us, We Shall Never Feel Miserable Or Accuse God Falsely Because Of Our Lot.

Holiness Is Not A Merit By Which We Can Attain Communion With God, But A Gift Of Christ, Which Enables Us To Cling To Him, And To Follow Him.

God Is Not Limited To Any Person, But Calls Freely Whomsoever He Pleases, And Bestows On Those Who Are Called Whatever Rewards He Thinks Fit.

But Prosperity, And The Happy Issue Of Events, Ought Also To Be Attributed To His Grace, In Order That He May Always Receive The Praise Which He Deserves, That Of Being A Merciful Father, And An Impartial Judge. About The Close Of The Psalm, He Inveighs Against Those Ungodly Men Who Will Not Acknowledge God's Hand, Amid Such Palpable Demonstrations Of His Providence.

True Wisdom Consists In Two Things: Knowledge Of God And Knowledge Of Self.

Knowledge Of God

Christ's Intercession Is The Continual Application Of His Death To Our Salvation.

The Answer Of Our Prayers Is Secured By The Fact That In Rejecting Them God Would In A Certain Sense Deny His Own Nature.

It Is A Sign Of A Perverse And Treacherous Disposition To Wound The Good Name Of Another, When He Has No Opportunity Of Defending Himself.

For Earthly Princes Lay Aside Their Power When They Rise Up Against God, And Are Unworthy To Be Reckoned Among The Number Of Mankind. We Ought, Rather, Utterly To Defy Them.

There Is No Worse Screen To Block Out The Spirit Than Confidence In Our Own Intelligence.

Christian Inspirational

The Whole Comes To This, That Christ, When He Produces Faith In Us By The Agency Of His Spirit, At The Same Time Ingrafts Us Into His Body, That We May Become Partakers Of All Spiritual Blessings.

If People Mean That Man Has In Himself The Power To Work In Partnership With God's Grace They Are Most Wretchedly Deluding Themselves.

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