Quotes

“Visit many good books, but live in the Bible. -Charles Spurgeon

The suffering of this world is the result of human sin and God’s rightful judgment on it. (Gen 3:7-19). All the good that remains in this world is God’s grace (James 1:17; 1 Cor 4:7). -Tim Keller

He that is not faithful in a little will not be faithful in much, and he that giveth entertainment to a small temptation will also to a greater, if put upon it. -Thomas Manton

Let no man think to kill sin with few easy or gentle strokes. He who hath once smitten a Serpent, if he follow not on his blow until it be slain, may repent that ever he begun the quarrel. -John Owen

We must earnestly and continually beseech God to impress the truths we read and hear deep into our hearts. –Aaron Garriott

What is home? Home is where things are the way you like them, where you have things set up the way that fit with your desires. What Paul is saying here is something that actually is one of the main themes of the Bible, that in our natural state, spiritually speaking, we’re not home. We’re exiles. We’re living in a world that does not fit in with our deepest desires at all. -Tim Keller

“Seek and read from the book of the Lord.” (Isaiah 34:16) Daily. Like a starving man finding food. Like a poor man finding gold. Like a lost man finding the way home. -John Piper

It is one thing to believe in God; it is quite another to believe God. –R.C. Sproul

Faithfulness in little things is a big thing. -John Chrysostom

The Christian life is not lived from mountaintop to mountaintop. Rather, the Christian life presses on in the valleys and depressions of life. It is one faithful step after another. -Jason Helopoulos

If you’re falling off a cliff, strong faith in a weak branch is fatally inferior to weak faith in a strong branch. Salvation is not finally based on the strength of your faith, but on the object of your faith. -Tim Keller

As those that watch over the pump in a ship, though they pump out all the water today, cannot say, that it will be empty tomorrow, or that yet their pumping is in vain, because it fills again, for if they cease to do it, it would sink the ship. So it is with sin. Think not that because it returns again that former striving is in vain. –John Preston

Regardless of how bad things may get, all believers can rest in the following truths: Jesus is alive. Jesus is reigning. Jesus is praying for you. Jesus is building His church. Jesus is preparing a place for you. Jesus is sanctifying you . Jesus loves you. -Dustin Benge

The Christian Gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to die for me, yet I am so loved and valued that Jesus was glad to die for me. This leads to deep humility and deep confidence at the same time. It undermines both swaggering and sniveling. -Tim Keller

There is an inseparable relationship between your affection for Christ and your affection for the Scriptures. –R.C. Sproul

God is the only comfort, He is also the supreme terror: the thing we most need, and the thing we most want to hide from. Some people talk as if meeting the gaze of absolute goodness would be fun. They need to think again. -C.S. Lewis

Read the Bible with reverence. Think in every line you read that God is speaking to you. -Thomas Watson

We will never have a quiet heart until we bring our own wills into harmony with that of God. -Elisabeth Elliot

Our Enemy is set on trying to destroy you, but he’ll settle with just getting you to become bored with the gospel. -Burk Parsons

Behavioral compliance to rules without heart-change will be superficial and fleeting. -Tim Keller

To love at all is to be vulnerable. -C.S. Lewis

Earthly riches are full of poverty. -Augustine

God looks upon a pardoned soul as if he had never sinned. -Thomas Watson

If you are a child of God, you will never be happy in sin. -Charles Spurgeon

If you want to flee from God, if you want to take refuge in your own feelings and in your own wisdom, if you want to run away from God, there will always be a ship to take you. -Tim Keller

Love all men. Always manifest yourself an enemy to contention, to envy, to backbiting and all such things inconsistent with a holy Christian love. -Jonathan Edwards

That Christ should die for me remains the greatest of all miracles in my esteem. -Charles Spurgeon

Prosperity may cause us to rise in the world, but affliction is needful to raise us above the world. -John Newton

Lord Jesus, You are my righteousness, I am your sin. You took on you what was mine; yet set on me what was yours. You became what you were not, that I might become what I was not. -Martin Luther

There is no hope for any of us until we confess our helplessness. -Elisabeth Elliot

The least sin can be no other than a denial that the Lord is the chief good. -David Clarkson

If you have Christ, you have all. But if you lose him, you lose all. -Hanserd Knollys

Dead fish swim down the stream — living fish swim against it. To swim against the common stream of evil shows grace to be alive. -Thomas Watson

God is light, sin is darkness; God is life, sin is death; God is heaven, sin is hell; God is beauty, sin is deformity. -Thomas Brooks

Does our faith depend on having every prayer answered as we think it should be answered, or does it rest on the character of a sovereign Lord? -Elisabeth Elliot

Most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself. -Martyn Lloyd-Jones

He became what we are so that He might make us what He is. -Athanasius

One reason we are so harried and hurried is that we make yesterday and tomorrow our business, when all that legitimately concerns us is today. -Elisabeth Elliot

The everlasting arms are round about you. Lean back in them and know your safety. The same hand that was nailed to the cross is holding you. The same wisdom that framed the heavens and the earth is engaged to maintain your cause . . . Ah! -J.C. Ryle

The ultimate goal of the human mind is to know God. -Augustine

It is the Gospel, and the Gospel alone, that holds out any hope for this troubled unhappy world. -Martyn Lloyd-Jones

“Who am I?” we can humbly and boldly declare: “I was conceived in sin, born a sinner, deserving of condemnation, but I have been born again by the Spirit, have been united to Jesus Christ, and am bound for glory. That’s who I am: my identity, by God’s grace, is in Christ.” -Burk Parsons

Once upon a time there was an addict who found his identity and worth in Jesus. ~~The end.~~ The beginning. -Matt Clark

The Word and the Spirit go together. Therefore if we will have the comforts of the Spirit, we must attend upon the Word. –Richard Sibbes

Without You, what am I to myself but a guide to my own self-destruction? -Augustine

There is not so much difference, before God, between children and grown persons as we are ready to imagine; we are all poor, ignorant foolish babes in his sight: our adult age don’t bring us so much nearer to God as we are apt to think. -Jonathan Edwards

If you cut yourself loose from divine authority, you set yourself up as a patsy for diabolical authority. -Anthony Esolen

It is faith and faith alone that can believe things fit into a pattern for good. The human evidence points in the other direction. -Elisabeth Elliot

Pride is the most hidden, secret, and deceitful of all lusts. -Jonathan Edwards

The ultimate test of our spirituality is the measure of our amazement at the grace of God. -Martyn Lloyd-Jones

I have a Savior because I am a sinner, and beauty is given to the child of God in exchange for ashes. -Elisabeth Elliot

All men are seeking their own happiness: some look for it in worldly things, some look for it in honor, some in riches, some in friends. But do you look for happiness in Jesus Christ? -Jonathan Edwards

Huge as this great universe is, God has complete power over it, as you have over the ball which you toss in your hand. -Charles Spurgeon

Often, in response to our pleadings, the word is Trust Me. -Elisabeth Elliot

However little we know of God, even the faintest notion implies that he is a being who is infinitely exalted above every creature. -Herman Bavinck

You can’t be “Spirit-led” if you aren’t Scripture-led. -Garrett Kell

Pride is the oldest and most common of sins. Humility is the rarest and most beautiful of graces. -J.C. Ryle

God takes more care of us than we take of ourselves. -Charles Spurgeon

Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty! just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints! This is the God whom we adore. This is he who invites us to lean upon his almighty arm, and promises to guide us with his unerring eye. -John Newton

God uses sinners – there is no one else to use. Pedestals are for statues. -Elisabeth Elliot

The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater. -J.R.R. Tolkien

I have a great need for Christ: I have a great Christ for my need. -Charles Spurgeon

What we believe about the future is one of the best predictions for how we act today. -Tim Keller

There is nothing more important, nothing more useful, and nothing more necessary than the promotion of the glory and kingdom of God! -Paul Washer

The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist. -Tim Keller

God is light, sin is darkness; God is life, sin is death; God is heaven, sin is hell; God is beauty, sin is deformity. -Thomas Brooks

God looks upon a pardoned soul as if he had never sinned. -Thomas Watson

Do you desire security? Here you have it. The Lord says to you, “I will never abandon you, I will always be with you.” -Saint Augustine

To live on Christ,- to draw all from Christ,- to do all in the strength of Christ,- to be ever looking unto Christ;- this is the true secret of spiritual prosperity. -J.C.Ryle

The truth is like a lion; you don’t have to defend it. Let it loose; it will defend itself. -Saint Augustine

Christ is the greatest good, the choicest good, the chiefest good, the most suitable good, the most necessary good. He is pure good, a real good, a total good, an eternal good, and a soul satisfying good. -Thomas Brooks

To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek him the greatest adventure; to find him, the greatest human achievement. -Saint Augustine

We don’t repent to get God to love us, we repent because God loves us. -Burk Parsons

Trials come to prove and improve us. -Augustine

Faithfulness means presence. Show up. -Dale Thackrah

I have a great need for Christ: I have a great Christ for my need. -Charles Spurgeon

If we consider the intrinsic evil of sin, we shall see that it is not a small thing, but a horrible evil in itself; a thing not to be laughed at, but feared, whether our own or others. -Thomas Manton

The consideration that we are forgiven by Christ 𝘴𝘰 𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘰𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘴 is a good reason why we should forgive others. -Matthew Henry

God can pick sense out of a confused prayer. -Richard Sibbes

God loves to show his wisdom when human help and wisdom fail. -Thomas Watson

To live on Christ,- to draw all from Christ,- to do all in the strength of Christ,- to be ever looking unto Christ;- this is the true secret of spiritual prosperity. -J.C.Ryle

When we focus on self we see nothing. When we focus on others we see the specks in their eyes. When we focus on Christ we see the logs in our own eyes. -Burk Parsons

If I were to judge a man I would not judge of him by his open profession, but by his domestic behaviors. What a man is at home, 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 he is indeed. -John Bunyan

Time is the ultimate currency and I should have been more tight fisted with it. –Naval Ravikant

God looks upon a pardoned soul as if he had never sinned. -Thomas Watson

The slender capacity of man’s heart cannot comprehend the unfathomable depth and burning zeal of God’s love toward us. -Martin Luther

There is a problem when sin doesn’t offend us, but correction does.

The absence of blessings—rejection, vanity, reviling, illness, poverty—often is the crucible in which we learn to love God for who he is. In our idolatry we make gifts out to be gods, and make the Giver into the errand boy of our desires. -David Powlison

In a word, the Holy Scripture is the highest and best of books, abounding in comfort under all afflictions and trials. -Martin Luther

Natural man’s sin is precisely this: He wants the benefits of God without God Himself.–R.C. Sproul

The forgiveness of his sins, the hope of the future, the certainty concerning salvation, do not depend upon the degree of holiness which the believer has achieved in life, but are firmly rooted in the grace of God and in the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. -Herman Bavinck

Sin promises so much. But it doesn’t deliver, and it charges a high price–broken lives, broken relationships, broken hopes. –Dr. Tim Chester

Jesus is the forgiver of our past. He not only erases our long list of sins, but writes in their place his lifetime of good deeds. His love transfigures our past by making our past his own. -Chad Bird

A lie is like a snowball: the further you roll it the bigger it becomes. -Martin Luther

This is the most dangerous trial of all, when there is no trial and every thing goes well; for then a man is tempted to forget God, to become too bold and to misuse times of prosperity. -Martin Luther

If there is a God, you owe him far more than a morally decent life. -Tim Keller

If you see yourself as a “little sinner” you will inevitably see Jesus as a “little savior”. -Martin Luther

All gospel truths center in Christ: so that to learn the truth, is to learn Christ. -Thomas Boston

We are never more in danger than when we think we are not. And we are never safer than when we feel our weakness, distrust our strength, and lean hard upon the arm of our Lord Jesus. -Scott Hubbard

How do we enjoy pizza, friendship, or any other good gift without committing idolatry? Not only by enjoying God more than his gifts, but also by enjoying him in them.

The more complicated life becomes, the more we need to quiet our souls before God. -Elisabeth Elliot

Christians should live in the world, but not be filled with it. A ship lives in the water; but if the water gets into the ship, she goes to the bottom. So Christians may live in the world; but if the world gets into them, they sink. -D.L. Moody

This is true religion, to approve what God approves, to hate what he hates, and to delight in what delights him. -Charles Hodge

If Christ has risen the Bible is true from Genesis to Revelation. The kingdom of darkness has been overthrown. Satan has fallen like lightning from heaven; and the triumph of truth over error, of good over evil, of happiness over misery, is forever secured. -Charles Hodge

We don’t believe something by merely saying we believe it, or even when we believe that we believe it. We believe something when we act as if it were true. -Dallas Willard

We can ignore pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world. -C.S. Lewis

Trust in the living God. Love the Lord, and let eternal things absorb your thoughts and engage your affections. -Charles Spurgeon

In a fallen world, we must be willing to face the fact that however lovingly we preach the gospel, if a man rejects it he will be miserable. It is dark out there. –Francis A. Schaeffer

I can see how it might be possible for a man to look down upon the earth and be an atheist, but I cannot conceive how a man could look up into the heavens and say there is no God. –Abraham Lincoln

I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else. –C.S. Lewis

Pride is self contending with God for preeminence. -Stephen Charnock

God knows exactly what he is doing. -Elisabeth Elliot

God is goodness itself, in whom all goodness is involved. All other things are but sparks of that fire, and drops of that sea. If you see any good in the creature, remember there is much more in the Creator. -Richard Sibbes

We may as well play with fire near gunpowder as play with temptations near lust. -Nicolas Claget

Satan gives Adam an apple, and takes away paradise. Therefore in all temptations consider not what he offers, but what we shall lose. -Richard Sibbes

Get your heart taken with Christ, this will make you a Christian indeed. This will make you humble, active, cheerful. A heart taken with Christ is Heaven on this side of Heaven. A Heaven on Earth. Glory in Clay. -Samuel Bolton

The whole end and object of theology is to know God! A Person! Not a collection of abstract truths, nor a number of philosophical propositions, but God! -Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Eighty and six years have I served Christ, nor has He ever done me any harm. How, then, could I blaspheme my King who saved me? -Polycarp

The humblest heart is always the joyfullest heart. –John Preston

God is our Refuge when we are weak, our Helper when we cannot cope. -Elisabeth Elliot

Repentance is not perfection. Repentance is the attitude that says, “I hate the things that killed the one who died for me.” -Todd Friel

Do not follow any road, but that which Christ trod. This road seems hard, but it is safe. -Augustine

Your relationship with God is the most central thing in your life. Every job you take, every place you live, every relationship you conduct, everything you do should be done with this question in mind: “How does this affect my relationship with God?-Tim Keller

When you are exhausted, God isn’t. When you are discouraged, God isn’t. When you are unfaithful, God isn’t. When you are weak, God isn’t. We have hope and a future because God isn’t like us. -Paul Tripp

God’s grace is the pleasure of God to magnify the worth of God by giving sinners the right and power to delight in God without obscuring the glory of God. -John Piper

God’s purpose is crystal clear. He wants to shape you and me into the image of His Son. -Elisabeth Elliot

The great paradox of the book of Proverbs is wise people are extremely aware of their foolishness; fools think they’re wise. To put it a little more starkly, if you don’t think you’re a fool, you’re a fool. -Tim Keller

Satan, like a fisherman, baits his hook according to the appetite of the fish. -Thomas Adams

Delight in his voice above all. Defer to his voice before all. And begin each day with his voice over all. -David Mathis

We hear God in his word. We see the nature of God in his word. We taste the goodness of God in his word. We enjoy God in his word. We fellowship with Christ in his word. -John Piper

I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I wish to be, and I am not what I hope to be, but by the grace of God I am not what I once was. -John Newton

Every now and then God prunes us. He thwarts our purposes. -Elisabeth Elliot

Though sin often brings immediate pleasure, it gives no lasting joy.–R.C. Sproul

I’m very concerned that our society is much more interested in information than wonder. In noise rather than silence. This is a noisy world. -Mr. Rogers

Satan can’t keep God from answering prayers, but he will keep us from asking. -Adrian Rogers

Let us resolve by God’s grace, that however poor and feeble our prayers may seem to be, we will pray on. –

J.C. Ryle

Discontent is an ungrateful sin, because we have more mercies than afflictions; and it is an irrational sin, because afflictions work for good. -Thomas Watson

When everything looked dead, finished, hopeless, that’s when the Messiah came! His second coming will be similar. No, he won’t come as a helpless baby born in a feed trough, but the glorious resurrected King of the Universe. Wait for him. Expect him. Don’t let the darkness fool you. The King is coming. -Tim Keller

Of all self-torture, that of importing future trouble into present account is, perhaps, the most insane. -Charles Spurgeon

Into our curse, Into our pain, Into our distress, Into our misery, Into our depravity, Into our sin, Enters the incarnate God, Jesus Christ, to make all things new. Rejoice! -Dustin Benge

One sign you’ve encountered God is you walk with a limp, not a strut. -Matt Smethurst

God is the absolutely independent One, the perfectly sovereign One. He is dependent upon us in no single respect, but we, both as we are naturally and as we are rationally and morally, are absolutely dependent upon Him. -Herman Bavinck

Worldlings may well be afraid, for they have an angry God above them, a guilty conscience within them, and a yawning hell beneath them; but we who rest in Jesus are saved from all these through rich mercy. -Charles Spurgeon

We meditate on God that we may love him and fear him; on sin, that we may abhor it; on hell, that we may avoid it; on heaven, that we may pursue it. -Thomas Manton

The baby born, is the Christ crucified. The baby crying, is the Christ who cried, “It is finished.” The baby sleeping, is the Christ who rose from the dead. -Dustin Benge

God is glorified not only by His glory’s being seen, but by its being rejoiced in. -Jonathan Edwards

It is not to be expected that we should love God supremely if we have not known him to be more desirable than all other things.-IsaacWatts

You’re not too lost for God to find. You’re not too dirty for God to clean. You’re not too broken for God to fix. You’re not too hurt for God to heal. You’re not too far for God to reach. You’re not too guilty for God to forgive. You’re not too sinful for God to save. -Shane Pruitt

Dissect, investigate, and weigh the Master’s teaching word by word, and each syllable will repay you. -Charles Spurgeon

Knowledge is good; knowledge is necessary. Love is better. A critical mind is a gift; a well-formed soul with deep and virtuous emotions is a greater gift. -John Piper

The nearer a man gets to God, the greater he sees his sin. -D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

When the Savior saves us today, He has already factored in our stupidity of tomorrow. -Shane Pruitt

The world’s one and only remedy is the cross. -Charles Spurgeon

Sin looks so good beforehand; only once you’ve swallowed the bait do you feel the hook. -Michael Reeves

The only sin Jesus ever had was ours. The only righteousness we can ever have is his. -A. W. Tozer

If I can understand every mystery in the universe by prompting a chatbot to answer every question I meet, and can streamline every workflow in my life with AI, and I have “all knowledge,” but I fail to become a more loving person — “I am nothing” (1 Cor. 13:2). -Tony Reinke

God has his purposes for your season of loss, sorrow, and even aimlessness. Trust him in it. Wait patiently for the Lord. He will come. -John Piper

The ancients stared at the stars most nights. We stare at screens most nights. Stars make the world feel huge. They remind us we are tiny. Screens often make the world feel small. They make us feel connected to everything. I wonder how much this contributes to our anxiety. -Gavin Ortlund

Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different. -C.S. Lewis

Trust is accepting what God sends into your life whether you understand it or not. -Tim Keller

Public faith means going public with what’s in your heart, with humility and respect for others, as we speak of the truth of the gospel. -Tim Keller

Be often thinking what would those that are now in hell give that they might live their lives over again. -John Bunyan

Nothing helps more powerfully against the devil, the world, and the flesh, than occupying oneself with God’s Word. -Martin Luther

Each time you fall He will pick you up again. And He knows perfectly well that your own efforts are never going to bring you anywhere near perfection. -C. S. Lewis

Push back against the age as hard as it pushes against you. What people don’t realize is how much religion costs. They think faith is a big electric blanket, when of course it is the cross. -Flannery O’conner

My confidence in the future rests in my confidence in the God who controls history. –R.C. Sproul

If God truly converts a man, He will continue working in that man, through teaching, blessing, admonition, and discipline. He will see to it that the work He has begun will be finished. -Paul Washer

The main lie of sin is that God and his ways are not satisfying. -John Piper

Till we sin, Satan is a parasite; but when once we are in the devil’s hands, he turns tyrant. -Thomas Manton

Where God’s Word is, there is God Himself, there God’s Spirit is at work, there God establishes His covenant, there He plants His church. -Herman Bavinck

God allows us to experience the low points of life in order to teach us lessons that we could learn in no other way. -C. S. Lewis

There are but two objects that I have ever desired to behold; the one is my own vileness, and the other is the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ; and I have always thought that they should be viewed together. -Charles Simeon.

Ignorance of the Bible is the root of all error. Knowledge of the Bible is the best antidote against modern heresies. – J.C. Ryle

If you want to become a Christian, all you need is nothing—but most people don’t have that. Most of us come with our recommendation letters, our resume, our morality, our money. -Tim Keller

Obedience is our task. The results of that task are God’s and God’s alone. -Elisabeth Elliot

Our love grows soft if it is not strengthened by truth, and our truth grows hard if it is not softened by love. -John Stott

Pride rots the soul. Every sin you think of can be traced back to the sin of pride. -Mike Riccardi

Do you want to grow in your love for God? Then you must grow in your understanding of His love for you. “We love because He first loved us.” – Jonny Ardavanis

The way to find your life is to lose your life. The way to get real power you can’t lose is to submit. The way to get real freedom you can’t lose is to serve. The way to get real riches you can’t lose is to give away. -Tim Keller

Blessed is that man who finds the strait and narrow way between high thoughts of self and hard thoughts of God. -Charles Spurgeon

For some people, worship is something just to get done with and get out of the way so that they can get on with the day and get on with their lives. For Christians, worship is life. -Burk Parson

Hard things happen. There is pain, there is anguish in this old weary battle. But we are not of those who shrink back. Our King is our courage, His presence our strength. And until He alone decrees we cease, we’ll put our feet on the floor in the morning and continue marching on.

If the Holy Spirit guides us, He will do it according to the Scriptures and never contrary to them. -George Muller

Repentance is a characteristic of the whole life, not the action of a single moment. -Sinclair Ferguson

No child of God sins to that degree as to make himself incapable of forgiveness. -John Bunyan

By craving to be more, man becomes less; and by aspiring to be self-satisfying, he falls away from Him who truly satisfies. -Augustine

As long as you are proud you cannot know God. A proud man is always looking down on thing and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down you cannot see something that is above you. -C.S. Lewis

Moses spent forty years thinking he was somebody; forty years learning he was nobody; and forty years discovering what God can do with a nobody. -Dwight L. Moody

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.-J.C. Ryle

It’s one thing to be grateful. It’s another to give thanks. Gratitude is what you feel. Thanksgiving is what you do. -Tim Keller

He has mercy on us so that we may enjoy him; we have mercy on each other in order to enjoy him. -Augustine

Satan’s device to draw the soul to sin is, to present the bait, and hide the hook. -Thomas Brooks

Be humble, talk little, think and pray much. -George Whitefield

To know Christ,” therefore, is the ultimate goal toward which the apostle sets the course of his life. -Hawthorne & Martin

We need to hear the Gospel every day, because we forget it every day. -Martin Luther

By craving to be more, man becomes less; and by aspiring to be self-satisfying, he falls away from Him who truly satisfies. -Augustine

Our happiness does not only have a beginning from God: it also has a true progress and eternal continuation. -Girolamo Zanchi

My faith rests not in what I am, or shall be, or feel, or know, but in what Christ is, in what he has done, and in what he is doing for me. -Charles Spurgeon

Affliction is one of God’s medicines. By it He often teaches lessons which would be learned in no other way. By it He often draws souls away from sin and the world, which would otherwise have perished everlastingly. -J.C. Ryle

No one can be robbed of his delights whose joy is Christ. -Augustine

The more we gaze upon Christ… the more we see his holiness, the more we see our lack of inherent holiness, the more we rest in our divinely declared and definitive holiness in Christ, the more we strive to grow in holiness, and, thus, …the more we gaze upon Christ. -Buck Parsons

If God is not at the center of your life, something else is. -Tim Keller

Worry is totally fruitless. -Elisabeth Elliot

Faith in God’s promises means not always following the expected, rational path. -Tim Keller

A deep sense of indwelling sin is essential to humble living. -Tony Reinke

I define courage as a habitual self-possession that masters the passion of fear, especially by the power of a deeper desire for a greater good.” Christian courage, then, is being animated by the greatest good. -Joe Rigney

God’s power works through human weakness for God’s glory. -Jeremy Treat

Christ allows repeated disappointments and trials and losses in the Christian life, not to grieve and weary us, but to train us to treasure Christ above all else, and to find in him the solution to all our spiritual disillusionments. -Tony Reinke

Satan promises the best, but pays with the worst: He promises honor and pays with disgrace. He promises pleasure and pays with pain. He promises profit and pays with loss. He promises life and pays with death. -Thomas Brooks

The church is like a river. If it gets wider instead of deeper it will lose its power. -Thomas Manton

If you are not guided by God, you will be guided by something or someone else. -Eric Liddell

God is the Author of all true happiness, the donor of all true happiness, the maintainer of all true happiness, and the center of all true happiness and blessedness. – Thomas Brooks

Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee. -Saint Augustine

Christ alone stands at the centre of God’s eternal purposes, Christ alone is the object of our saving faith, and therefore Christ alone must stand at the very centre of our theology. -Mike Reeves

Truthfulness is what you need in order to be human. It’s the fragile tissue that keeps your humanity together. -Tim Keller

Follow your desires? All kinds of predatory monsters do that. There are desires you should not have. All desires are steeped in choice, as choice is steeped in desire. We affirm, restrain, corroborate, reject, redirect, instigate, fuel, chill our desires. -Anthony Esolen

If any one should come to me and tell me any thing against a brother, I would not believe the whisperer till I had spoken with the other; for a cause can never be truly known nor judged of, till both parties have been heard. -William Bridge

What Jesus tells us about prayer makes no sense except on family terms. To trust and yet relentlessly bug God is something only a little child can do. -Tim Keller

Make a pile of your religious self-confidence, your good works, righteous moments, holy accomplishments. Every so-called gain. Every trophy. That’s the going rate for the Pearl of Great Price. -Tony Reinke

We cannot read a page of Scripture without running into the sovereignty of God, neither can we read very long without coming face-to-face with the harsh reality of the power of the evil one. -Buck Parsons

If we want to be faithful followers of Jesus, we need to pay careful attention to our habits. Because we hand over much of our lives to our habits, much more than we probably realize. -Jon Bloom

Satan gives Adam an apple, and takes away Paradise. In all temptations consider not what he offers, but what we shall lose. -Richard Sibbes

One day death will be spoken about like the myth of Thanatos today, a tragedy found only in old stories like Othello, some unimaginable catastrophe from a bygone age. -Tony Reinke

From poison and politics, good Lord deliver me. I think a political spirit as hurtful to the life of God in the soul as poison is to the bodily frame. -John Newton

One of the shortest prayers in the Bible: “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” (Luke 18:13) In God’s eyes, a humble and contrite heart is more valuable than a litany of good deeds done without love or humility. -Dustin Benge

Coincidence is often God’s way of remaining anonymous [when he wants to be]. -Einstein

If you’ve really met Jesus, he’ll either send you away sorrowful or he’ll turn you inside out and fill you with joy, but the one thing that’s impossible is indifference. If you’ve really met him, indifference is impossible. -Tim Keller

Grace is not only God’s disposition to do good for us when we don’t deserve it. It is an actual power from God that acts and makes good things happen in us and for us. -John Piper

The love of Jesus is the love you and I have been looking for all of our lives. -Tim Keller

It is thus by looking to Jesus, that the believer is enlightened and strengthened, and grows in grace and sanctification. -John Newton

Only in the gloriously revealed Christ do we find the object to satisfy our vast thirst for unending pleasures. -Tony Reinke

Cross and crown, death and resurrection, humiliation and exaltation lie on the same line. As Jesus Himself put it after His resurrection: It was necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and so enter His glory. -Herman Bavinck

God can be with you. God can love you. God can be working in your life. And God could be working through you, and you still suffer terribly. -Tim Keller

Nothing in life is supposed to be more important than God.

Trials are intended to make us think, to wean us from the world, to send us to the Bible, to drive us to our knees. -J.C. Ryle

Thank God, often and always. Pride and gloom do not grow easily in a thankful heart. -Mike Reeves

The first link between my soul and Christ is not my goodness but my badness, not my merit but my misery, not my riches but my need. -Charles Spurgeon

The sufficiency of my merit is to know that my merit is not sufficient. -Augustine

Can any thing give greater consolation or more substantial joy, than to be firmly persuaded, not only that there is an infinitely good and wise Being, but also that this Being preserves and continually governs the universe which he himself has framed, and holds the reins of all things in his powerful hand, that he is our father, that we and all our interests are his constant concern? – Robert Leighton

We are all neighbors. -Mr. Rogers

If you once love Him, you will study to please Him. -John Newton

The Christmas message is that there is hope for a ruined humanity—hope of pardon, hope of peace with God, hope of glory—because at the Father’s will Jesus Christ became poor, and was born in a stable so that thirty years later He might hang on a cross. –J.I. Packer

How wonderful it is that the gospel of Christ comes to us exactly as we are however weary and sad we may be. -Martin Lloyd Jones

Holiness can transfigure your life. It can make something glorious out of something ordinary. -Elisabeth Elliot

All that Jesus Christ has done for us, and now does for us, is done because He loves us. That love is the explanation for His death for us. -Sinclair Ferguson

The surest way to break the grip of creature comforts and economized mentalities is the discipling Word of Jesus. -Dale Bruner

God’s great story of glory is teeming with stories of the poor, the ill, the neglected, the scorned, but His presence turns the lowly into the exalted. -James Coffield

Unless the Holy Spirit comes in to change your heart, nobody serves God for God. Nobody is really seeking God. They’re seeking things from God.-Tim Keller

“‘Sin’ is the only noun in the English language that’s larger in its singular form. ‘Sin’ is a bigger category than ‘sins.’ At the deepest level, then, it’s rightly said that we aren’t sinners because we sin—we sin because we’re sinners.”–Matt Smethurst

A hypocrite may be willing to embrace Christ as a priest to save him from wrath, from the curse, from hell, from everlasting burnings, but he is never willing to embrace Christ as a prophet to teach him, and as a king to rule and reign over him. -Thomas Brooks

The gospel is only good news when we understand the bad news. –R.C. Sproul

The glory of Jesus Christ is that he is always out of sync with the world and therefore always relevant for the world. If he fit nicely, he would be of little use. The effort to remake the Jesus of the Bible so that he fits the spirit of one generation makes him feeble in another. Better to let him be what he is, because it is often the offensive side of Jesus that we need most. -John Piper

The church has always appreciated the fact that with the forgiveness of sins we are at the ultimate place – we are in relation to God. -Dale Bruner

Lord, make me rather gracious than great; inwardly holy than outwardly admired. -Thomas Brooks

Disordered loves lead to a disordered life. -James K.A. Smith

The essence of gospel-humility is not thinking more of myself or thinking less of myself, it is thinking of myself less. -Tim Keller

Salvation is not mainly the forgiveness of sins, but mainly the fellowship of Jesus. -John Piper

Wisdom is the right use of knowledge. To know is not to be wise. Many men know a great deal, and are all the greater fools for it. There is no fool so great a fool as a knowing fool. But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom. -Charles Spurgeon

God’s mercies are new every morning.

Every trial in the Christian life is ultimately for the believer’s sanctification and the glory of God. –Grant R. Castleberry

Scripture warns us that on this side of glory, there is not a one-to-one correlation between obedience and blessing. Faithful people are often successful, but sometimes they experience great defeat. –R.C. Sproul

A Christian isn’t a man who never goes wrong, but a man who is enabled to repent. -C.S. Lewis

We must learn to measure ourselves, not by our knowledge about God, not by our gifts and responsibilities in the church, but by how we pray and what goes on in our hearts. Many of us, I suspect, have no idea how impoverished we are at this level. -J.I. Packer

An inconvenience is always, whether we see it or not, a blessed inconvenience. -Elisabeth Elliot

There are only two kinds of people: those who say to God, ‘Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says, ‘All right, then, have it your way.’” -C.S. Lewis

There is almost nothing rarer in this world than true, genuine, deep, earnest repentance, because it means dethroning yourself and enthroning God. -Kevin DeYoung

Our culture tells us that the problem is outside us and the solution is inside us. The gospel tells us that the problem is inside us and the solution is outside us. -Dane Ortlund

Without the foundation of the Bible, a society descends into chaos—exactly as we’re seeing around us today.

Is God the object of our hearts’ deepest affections and longings, or is something else captivating us? -Matthew S. Miller

That which unites all true Christians is always more than that which separates them.

I thank God my salvation doesn’t rest upon my feelings. I would not give much for a hope that is anchored in my feelings. I would not give much for a hope based upon my treacherous heart. But I tell you that a hope that is based upon Jesus Christ’s word is a hope worth having. -D.L. Moody

When a man gets saved, he gets saved from God. The justice of God was coming for you. God saved you from Himself, God saved you for Himself, and God saved you by Himself. -Paul Washer

The rarest commodity in the world today is focused attention. -Os Guinness

Sometimes our character isn’t ready for what we’re praying for. -Lecrae

When I study a passage in the Bible, I always try to learn more about God’s character, so I can know Him better. -John MacArthur

I never saw a fruit-bearing Christian who was not a student of the Bible. -Dwight L. Moody

“Humility is the mother of giants. One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.” -G.K. Chesterton

Get your mind stored with Scripture, by diligently reading, and you will soon discover its value and power. –J.C. Ryle

We cannot truly know God, his will, or the way of salvation apart from the Bible. We need Scripture to live the truly good life. -Kevin DeYoung

A believer, like a sailor, is not to be surprised if the wind changes, but to learn the art of suiting himself to all winds for the time; and though many a poor sailor is shipwrecked, the poor believer shall gain his port. -John Newton

Our joy in Him may be a fluctuating thing: His joy in us knows no change. -Hudson Taylor

We only fully grasp the gospel when we understand, as Paul did, that we are the worst sinner we know. -Tim Keller

God knows not only what we need but when we need it. -Elisabeth Elliot

It is not he that reads most, but he that meditates most, that will prove the choicest, sweetest, wisest, and strongest Christian. -Thomas Brooks

Don’t be so focused on the cross you bear that you lose sight of the cross Jesus bore for you. -Ally Yarid

The idea of having faith in Jesus has come to be totally isolated from being his apprentice and learning how to do what he said. -Dallas Willard

Great faith is not trusting God to give us what we ask, but trusting God when He doesn’t. -Michael Svigel

I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the Word of God and to meditation on it. -George Muller

You can never err in being tender to the downcast. -Charles Spurgeon

The Seven Deadly Sins. Politics without principles. Wealth without work. Pleasure without conscience. Knowledge without character. Commerce without morality. Science without humanity. Worship without sacrifice. -Mahatma Gandhi

The more seriously you take yourself, the unhappier you’re going to be.

The Bible is not ultimately our story but God’s. God himself is the main character — and also the author who writes the action. -Stephen Witmer

No one in human history has ever been more approachable than Jesus Christ. -Dane Ortlund

He’s higher than a skyscraper and He’s deeper than a submarine. He’s wider than the universe and beyond my wildest dreams. He’s known me and He’s loved me since before the world began. How wonderful to be a part of God’s amazing plan. -Adam Thomas

The freedom of affluence opposes and contradicts the freedom of community life. –Wendell Berry

Resolve to soak yourself in Scripture, and don’t be diverted from soaking yourself in Scripture. Why? Because Jesus soaked Himself in Scripture. -Sinclair Ferguson

My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it Himself.

-C.S. Lewis, from the book, A Grief Observed

The church is a beautiful thing. -Andrew Peterson

The one thing God seems to honor and bless more than anything else is faith. –Jon Bloom

Never lose sight of your primary life’s goals: to become like Jesus, and to bring him glory. If those are in place, the rest will work out. -Richard Blackaby

All of us would be wiser if we would resolve never to put people down, except on our prayer lists. -D. A. Carson

Faith is not the belief that God will do what you want. Faith is the belief that God will do what is right.-Max Lucado

It needs saying from the outset that it’s always very easy to declare that other people are idiots, but only if you forget how idiotically difficult being human is. -Fredrik Backman

We are saved by faith alone but not by a faith that remains alone. -Martin Luther

The study of God is the highest science, the loftiest pursuit, and the mightiest discipline. -Charles Spurgeon

If you really want to be everything God wants you to be, then go straight to Jesus. -A.W. Tozer

Never before or since has more been lost and gained at the same time as at Jesus’ crucifixion. -Scott Sauls

Fear your God. Guard your mind. Obey your parents. Select your friends. Subdue your desires. Be faithful to your spouse. Watch your words. Work hard. Manage your money & serve others! –John MacArthur

There is no heart God cannot conquer. There is no life He cannot change. There is no past He cannot forgive. -Steve Lawson

If I live in Sin, make a trade of Sin, it will appear I hate God, resist his Will, contemn his Authority, cast Dung in his Face, grieve his good Spirit, and put the Devil into the very Throne of God. Shall I live in Sin? God forbid. -Benjamin Keach

The operation of the Church is entirely set up for the sinner: which creates much misunderstanding among the smug. -Flannery O’Conner

One road leads home and a thousand roads lead into the wilderness. -C.S. Lewis

Everything is needful that God sends; nothing can be needful that He withholds. -John Newton

In two decades of teaching theology, I have had countless students ask me why God doesn’t save everybody. Only once did a student come to me and say, “There is something I just can’t figure out. Why did God redeem me?” -R.C. Sproul, from the book, The Holiness of God.

For what you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing. It also depends on what kind of person you are. -C.S. Lewis

At some point, for all eternity, there will be no more unmerited suffering: this present darkness, “the age of evil,” will eventually be remembered as a brief flicker at the beginning of human history. Every evil done by the wicked to the innocent will have been avenged, and every tear will have been wiped away. -Tim Keller

Frodo: I wish the Ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened.
Gandalf: So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.
-J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said. You might want to think about that. You forget some things, dont you? Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget. -Cormac McCarthy, from the book, The Road