Thought for the Lord's Day - #63

And as a man of holiness prays for more holiness, so a man of holiness believes for more holiness. Psalm 51:7—in the Hebrew the words run in the future thus: "You will purge me from sin with hyssop, and I shall be clean: you will wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." In the sense of all his sinfulness and vileness, he believes that God will give out greater measures of purity and sanctity to him: "You will purge me, and I shall be clean: you will wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." Just so, in Psalm 65:3, "Iniquities prevail against me: as for our transgressions, you shall purge them away." Though for the present iniquity did prevail—yet he had faith enough to believe that God would purge him from his transgressions, and that he would mortify prevailing corruptions.

 - Thomas Brooks

The Crown and Glory of Christianity,
or,
HOLINESS, the Only Way to Happiness

Thought for the Lord's Day - #62

Every one seeketh not God, and far fewer find Him, because they seek amiss. He is to be sought far above all things, if men would find what they seek. Let feathers and shadows alone to children, and go seek your Well-Beloved. Your only errand to the world is, to woo Christ; therefore, put other lovers from about the house, and let Christ have all your love, without mincing or dividing it. It is little enough, if there were more of it. The serving of the world and sin hath but a base reward, and smoke instead of pleasures; and but a night-dream, for true ease to the soul. Go where ye will, your soul shall not sleep sound but in Christ's bosom. Come in to Him, and lie down, and rest you on the slain Son of God, and inquire for Him. I sought Him, and now, a fig for all the worm-eaten pleasures and moth-eaten glory out of heaven, since I have found Him, and in Him all I can want or wish. He hath made me a king over the world. Princes cannot overcome me. Christ hath given me the marriage-kiss, and He hath my marriage-love; we have made up a full bargain, that shall not go back on either side.

- Samuel Rutherford
Letter to John Carsen

Thought for the Lord's Day - #61

It is evident, from the scripture doctrine of divine Providence, that God brings about every man’s lot, and all the parts thereof. He sits at the helm of human affairs, and turns them whithersoever he listeth. “Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did he in heaven and in earth, in the seas and all deep places’ (Ps. 135:6). There is not anything whatsoever befalls us, without his overruling hand. The same Providence that brought us out of the womb, brings us to, and fixes us in the condition and place allotted for us, by him who ‘hath determined the times, and the bounds of our habitation’ (Acts 17:26). It overrules the smallest and most causal things about us, such as ‘hairs of our head falling on the ground’ (Matt. 10:29, 30); ‘A lot cast into the lap’ (Prov. 16:33). Yea the free acts of our will, whereby we choose for ourselves, for even ‘the king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of water’ (Prov. 21:1). And the whole steps we make, and which others make in reference to us; for ‘the way of man is not in himself; it is not man that walketh to direct his steps’ (Jer. 10:23). And this, whether these steps causing the crook [some one or other piece of adversity] be deliberate and sinful ones, such as Joesph’s brethren selling him into Egypt; or whether they be undesigned, such as manslaughter purely casual, as when one hewing wood, kills his neighbour with the ‘head of the axe slipping from the helve’ (Deut. 19:5). For there is a holy and wise Providence that governs the sinful and the heedless actions of men, as a rider doth a lame horse, of whose halting, not he, but the horses’ lameness, is the true and proper cause; wherefore in the former of these cases, God is said to have sent Joesph into Egypt (Gen. 45:7), and in the latter, to deliver one into his neighbour’s hand (Exod. 21:13).

God has, by an eternal decree, immoveable as mountains of brass (Zech. 6:1), appointed the whole of every one’s lot, the crooked parts thereof, as well as the straight. By the same eternal decree, whereby the high and low parts of the earth, the mountains and the valleys, were appointed, are the heights and the depths, the prosperity and adversity, in the lot of the inhabitants thereof determined, and they are brought about, in time, in a perfect agreeableness thereto.

The mystery of Providence, in the government of the world, is, in all the parts thereof, the building reared up of God, in exact conformity to the plan in his decree, ‘who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will’ (Eph. 1:12). So that there is never a crook in one’s lot, but may be run up to this original. Hereof Job piously sets us an example in his own case, “He is in one mind, and who can turn him? and what his soul desireth, even that he doth. For he perfometh the thing that is appointed for me; and many such things are with him’ (Job 18:13, 14).

- Thomas Boston
The Crook in the Lot:
Living with that thorn in your side

Thought for the Lord's Day - #60

For how in general doth the Holy Spirit teach us and enable us to pray? It is by these three things.

(1.) By giving us a spiritual insight into the promises of God and the grace of the covenant, whereby we know what to ask upon a spiritual view of the mercy and grace that God hath prepared for us.

(2.) By acquainting us with and giving us an experience of our wants, with a deep sense of them, such as we cannot bear without relief.

(3.) By creating and stirring up desires in the new creature, for his own preservation, increase and improvement.

And in answer unto these things, consisteth his whole work of sanctification in us. For it is his effectual communication unto us, of the grace and mercy prepared in the promises of the covenant through Jesus Christ; hereby doth he supply our spiritual want, and sets the new creature in life and vigour. So are our prayers an extract and copy of the work of the Holy Spirit in us, given us by himself.

And, therefore, by whomseover he is despised as a Spirit of supplication, he is so as a Spirit of sanctification also.

Now consider what it is that in your prayers you most labour about? Is it not that the body, the power, the whole interest, of sin in you may be weakened, subdued, and at length destroyed? Is it not that all the graces of the Spirit may be renewed daily, increased and strengthened, so as that you may be more ready and prepared for all duties of obedience? And what is all this but that holiness may be gradually progressive in your souls, that it may be carried on by new supplies and additions of grace, until it come to perfection?

- John Owen
Pneumatologia:
Or, A Discourse Concerning the Holy Spirit,
Wherein an Account is Given of His Name, Nature,
Personality, Dispensation, Operations, and Effects;
His Whole Work in the Old and New Creation is
Explained; and the Doctrine Concerning it Vindicated

(I added the paragraph breaks for clarity)

Thought for the Lord's Day - #58

God saw it needful for Adam to have a Sabbath in paradise. And if it were needful for him that was without sin, and had no clog of corruption to hinder him; nor ill example to seduce him; yet (l say) if he had need of this (as God in his wisdom saw he had) because his calling (though followed without tediousness) would yet partly have withdrawn his heart, that he could not so freely and wholly have given himself to the praising of God, and considering of his power, wisdom, and goodness; and therefore was to set one day apart from all works of his vocation, that he might wholly addict himself to religious and holy exercises, and with greater liberty and comfort do them; then what need have we, and how far is our necessity greater which are burdened with many corruptions of our own, and have temptation from many ill [precedents], and many allurements of the world, to pull our hearts from the worship of God, which are men of polluted lips ourselves, and dwell among people of polluted lips; and which cannot without far greater distraction, and weariness also, follow our callings. If Adam had need of a Sabbath when he had no corruption to hinder him, how much more have we, which both within and without are beset & on every side compassed with such strong impediments from ourselves and others, that when we have a Sabbath to bestow wholly and only on godliness and religion, can hardly and with much ado keep our hearts from wandering after the world and earthly things? If Adam had need in his innocence of this help, then no man in this world is so strong, as that he for that cause might exempt himself from keeping a Sabbath.

- John Dod

A Plain and Familiar Exposition of the Ten Commandments 

(hat tip: The Westminster Standards)

Thought for the Lord's Day - #57

Let Christians rejoice that, if a subtle, cruel, active, and powerful enemy is continually prowling about, the eye of infinite wisdom and love rests ever on them, the arm of never-tiring omnipotence is ever around them to protect and defend them.  The lion of hell is a chained lion, a muzzled lion, to Christians.  He may alarm, but he shall never devour them.  His chain is in the hand of his conqueror and their Lord.  It was very natural for Peter to put his brethren in mind of their great enemy.  He must have often thought of the words of our Lord Jesus, 'Simon, Simon, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat; but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not.' His experience is full of warning and encouragement.  It proves that if Christians are not cautious, though the lion of hell shall not be permitted to devour them, he may inflict wounds of which they will bear the marks till the close of life; and it finely illustrates our Lord's declaration,--'I give unto my sheep eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall any pluck them out of my hand.' Neither their own heedlessness, nor the malignity of their infernal foe, shall be able to accomplish their destruction.  Let him, then, that is born of God, 'keep himself, that the wicked one touch him not,' and let his joy, that he has a better keeper than himself, even the keeper of Israel, who never slumbers nor sleeps, not produce security, but encourage vigilance.  God keeps his people, not without but through their own watchfulness.

- John Brown (1784-1858)

The Christian's Great Enemy:

A Practical Exposition of 1 Peter 5:8-11

Thought for the Lord's Day - #56

long one today . . . sorry. But it's a good one, couldn't stop myself. But I guess, if you're in a rush -- just the first paragraph will do.

Faith presents the Christian with a cloud of witnesses to whom the promise hath been fulfilled; and these as great sinners as himself is. Scripture examples are promises verified.  They are book-cases, which faith may make use of by way of encouragement, as well as promises.  God would nev­er have left the saints’ great blots to stand in the Scriptures, to the view of the world in all succeeding generations, had not it been of such use and advan­tage to tempted souls, to choke this temptation, which of all other makes the most dangerous breach in their souls—so wide sometimes, that despair itself is ready to enter in at it.  Blessed Paul gives this very reason why such acts of pardoning mercy to great sin­ners are recorded, Eph. 2  He shows first what foul filthy creatures himself and other believers contem­porary with him were before they were made par­takers of gospel grace.  ‘Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh,’ Eph. 2:3; and then he magnifies the rich mercy of God, that rescued and took them out of that damned desperate state.  ‘But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,... hath quickened us together with Christ,’ ver. 4.

And why must the world know all this?  O, God had a design and plot of mercy in them to more than themselves—‘That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness to­ward us through Christ Jesus,’ ver. 7  Wherever the gospel comes this shall be spoken of, what great sins he had forgiven to them, that unbelief might have her mouth stopped to the end of the world, and this ar­row which is so oft on Satan’s string made headless and harmless.  God commanded Joshua to take twelve stones out of the midst of Jordan and set them up.  And observe the reason, ‘That this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones?  Then ye shall answer them, That the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel for ever,’ Joshua 4:6, 7.  Thus God hath, by his pardoning mercy, taken up some great notorious sinners out of the very depths of sin, who lay at the very bottom, as it were, of hell, swallowed up and engulfed in all manner of abomination; and these he hath set up in his word, that when any poor tempted souls to the end of the world—who are even overwhelmed with fears from the greatness of their sins—shall see and read what God hath done for these, they may be relieved and comforted with these examples, by God intended to be as a memorial of what he hath done for others in time past, so a sign what he shall do, yea, will, for the greatest sinners to the world’s end, upon their repen­tance and faith.  No sins, though as great and many as the waters of Jordan themselves, shall be able to stand before the mercy of God’s gracious covenant, but shall all be cut off and everlastingly pardoned to them.

O who can read a Manasseh, a Magdalene, a Saul, yea, an Adam—who undid himself and a whole world with him—in the roll of pardoned sinners, and yet turn away from the promise, out of a fear that there is not mercy enough in it to serve his turn? These are as landmarks, that show what large bound­aries mercy hath set to itself, and how far it hath gone, even to take into its pardoning arms the great­est sinners, that make not themselves incapable thereof by final impenitency.  It were a healthful walk, poor doubting Christian, for thy soul to go this circuit, and oft to see where the utmost stone is laid and boundary set by God’s pardoning mercy—farther than which he will not go—that thou mayest not turn in the stone to the prejudice of the mercy of God by thy own unbelief, nor suffer thyself to be abused by Satan’s lies, who will make nothing to remove God’s land‑mark, if he may by it but increase thy trouble of spirit, though he be cursed for it himself.  But if, after all this, thy sins seems to exceed the proportion of any one thou canst find pardoned in Scripture —which were strange—yet faith at this plunge hath one way left beyond all these examples for thy soul’s succour, and that is to fix thy eye on Christ, who, though he never had sin of his own, yet laid down his life to procure and purchase pardon for all the elect, and hath obtained it; they are all, and shall, as they come upon the stage, be pardoned.  ‘Now,’ saith faith, ‘suppose thy sins were greater than any one saint’s; yet are they as great as all the sins of the elect to­gether?’  Thou darest not surely say or think so.  And cannot Christ procure thy pardon, who art but a sin­gle person, that hath done it for so many millions of his elect?  Yea, were thy sins as great as all theirs are, the sum would be the same; and God could forgive it if it lay in one heap, as well as now when it is in several.  Christ is ‘the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world,’ John 1:29.  See here all the sins of the elect world trussed up in one fardel, and he carries it lightly away into the land of forgetfulness. Now faith will tell thee, poor soul, that the whole vir­tue and merit of Christ’s blood, by which the world was re­deemed, is offered to thee, and shall be com­municated to thy soul in particular.  Christ doth not retail and parcel out his blood and the purchase of it, some to one and some to another; then thou mightest say something; but he gives his whole self to the faith of every believer.  All is yours, you are Christ’s.  O, what mayest thou not, poor soul, take up from the promise, upon the credit of so great a Redeemer?

 - William Gurnall

The Christian in Complete Armour

Thought for the Lord's Day - #55

That Christ should love man when he was most unlovely, that man's extreme misery should but inflame Christ's affections of love and mercy -- this melts the believing soul. That Christ should leave the eternal bosom of his Father; that he who was equal with God should come in the form of a servant; that he who was clothed with glory, should be wrapped in rags; that he whom the heaven of heavens could not contain should be cradled in a manger; that from his cradle to his cross, his whole life should be a life of sorrows and sufferings; that the judge of all flesh should be condemned; that the Lord of life should be put to death; that he who was his Father's joy should in anguish of spirit cry out, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' that that head which was crowned with honour, should be crowned with thorns; that those eyes which were as a flame of fire, which were clearer than the sun, should be closed up by the darkness of death; that those ears which were accustomed to hear nothing but hallelujahs, should hear nothing but blasphemies; that that face which was white and ruddy should be spit upon by the beastly Jews; that that tongue which spoke as never any man spoke, yes, as never any angel spoke, should be accused of blasphemy; that those hands which swayed both a golden scepter and an iron rod, and those feet that were as fine brass, should be nailed to the cross -- and all this for man's transgression, for man's rebellion! Oh! the sight of these things, the believing of these things, the acting of faith on these things, makes a gracious soul to break and bleed, to sigh and groan, to mourn and lament! That faith which accompanies salvation is more or less a heartbreaking, a heart-melting faith.

 - Thomas Brooks

Heaven on Earth

(haven't done one of these in forever, need to get back to it)

"Many have Pardon with God that Have not Peace with Themselves"

LXIII. To LADY FINGASK

MADAM, -- Grace, mercy, and peace be to you. -- Though not acquainted, yet, at the desire of a Christian, I make bold to write a line or two unto you, by way of counsel, howbeit I be most unfit for that.

I hear, and I bless the Father of lights for it, that ye have a spirit set to seek God, and that the posture of your heart is to look heavenward, which is a work and cast of the Mediator Christ's right hand, who putteth on the heart a new frame. For the which I would have your Ladyship to see a tie and bond of obedience laid upon you, that all may be done, not so much from obligation of law, as from the tie of free love; that the law of ransom-paying by Christ may be the chief ground of all our obedience, seeing that ye are not under the law, but under grace. Withal, know that unbelief is a spiritual sin, and so not seen by nature's light; and that all which conscience saith is not Scripture. Suppose that your heart bear witness against you for sins done long ago: yet, because many have pardon with God that have not peace with themselves, ye are to stand and fall by Christ's esteem and verdict of you, and not by that which your heart saith.

Let faith hing by this small thread, that He loved you before He laid the corner-stone of the world, and therefore He cannot change His mind; because He is God and resteth in His love. Neither is sin in you a good reason wherefore ye should doubt of Him, or think, because sin has put you in the courtesy and reverence of justice, that therefore He is wrath with you: neither is it presumption in you to lay the burden of your salvation on One mighty to save, so being that ye lay aside all confidence in yourself, your worth and righteousness. True faith is humble, and seeth no way to escape but only in Christ. And I believe that ye have put an esteem and high price upon Christ: and they cannot but believe and so be saved, who love Christ and to whom He is precious. And it were not like God, if ye should choose Him as your liking and He not choose you again. Nay, He has prevented you in that, for ye have not chosen Him, but He has chosen you.

And the more your Ladyship drink of this love, there is the more room, and the greater delight and desire for this love. Be homely, and hunger for a feast and fill of His love; for that is the borders and march of heaven. Nothing has a nearer resemblance to the color and hue and lustre of heaven than Christ loved. Remember what He is. When twenty thousand millions of heaven's lovers have worn their hearts threadbare of love, all is nothing, yea, less than nothing, to His matchless worth and excellency. Oh so broad and so deep as the sea of His desirable loveliness is! Glorified spirits, triumphing angels, the crowned and exalted lovers of heaven, stand without His loveliness and cannot put a circle on it.

Alas! what do I? I but spill and lose words in speaking highly of Him who will bide and be above the music and songs of heaven, and never be enough praised by us all; to whose boundless and bottomless love I
recommend your Ladyship.

ST ANDREWS, March 27, 1640

(copied from CCEL)

Why the Son of God Loved Me and Gave Himself for Me

I'm just having another one of those days where I'm not sure I have anything to say. But when I read this quotation over at Patrick’s Pensees, I was glad I didn't have something planned so I could steal it outright.

Moreover, I really needed this. Thanks, Patrick.

If you ask, Why he made so much ado about a worthless creature, raised out of the dust of the ground at first, and had now disordered himself, and could be of no use to him? We have an answer at hand, Because he loved us. If you continue to ask, But why did he love us? We have no other answer but because he loved us; for beyond the first rise of things we cannot go.

Thomas Manton

Thought for the Lord's Day - #52

Our happiness consists in due subordination and conformity to Christ, and therefore let us labor to carry ourselves as He did to His Father, to His friends, to His enemies. In the days of His flesh He prayed whole nights to His Father. How holy and heavenly-minded was He, that took occasion from vines, stones and sheep to be heavenly-minded, and when He rose from the dead His talk was only of things concerning the kingdom of God, in His converse to His friends. He would not quench the smoking flax, nor break the bruised reed; He did not cast Peter in the teeth with his denial, He was of a winning and gaining disposition to all; for His conduct to His enemies, He did not call for fire from heaven to destroy them but shed many tears for them that shed His blood. "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!" (Matt. 23:37), and upon the cross, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). So that if we will be minded like unto Christ, consider how He carried Himself to His Father, to His friends, to His enemies, yea to the devil himself. When He comes to us in wife, children; friends, etc. we must do as Christ did, say to Satan, "Get thee hence," and when we deal with those that have the spirit of the devil in them, we must not render reproach, but answer them, "It is written."

Thought for the Lord's Day - #49

No man shall ever behold the glory of Christ by sight hereafter, who doth not in some measure behold it by faith here in this world. Grace is a necessary preparation for glory, and faith for sight Where the subject (the soul) is not previously seasoned with grace and faith, it is not capable of glory or vision. Nay, persons not disposed hereby unto it cannot desire it, whatever they pretend; they only deceive their own souls in supposing that so they do. Most men will say with confidence, living and dying, that they desire to be with Christ, and to behold his glory; but they can give no reason why they should desire any such thing,-only they think it somewhat that is better than to be in that evil condition which otherwise they must be cast into for ever, when they can be here no more. If a man pretend himself to be enamoured on, or greatly to desire, what he never saw, nor was ever represented unto him, he doth but dote on his own imaginations. And the pretended desires of many to behold the glory of Christ in heaven, who have no view of it by faith whilst they are there in this world are nothing but self-deceiving imaginations.

- John Owen

Thought for the Lord's Day - #46

stumbled across John Bunyan's Scriptural Poems the other day, interesting little ditties, I must say. His paraphrase of the Lord's Prayer provokes a thought or two.

Our Father which art in heav'n, thy name alone
Be hallowed. Thy glorious kingdom come.
Thy will be done on earth as 'tis in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread. And ev'n
As we remit our debtors, grant remission
To us. And lead us not into temptation,
But from all evil do thou us deliver;
For th' kingdom, power and glory's thine for ever.
Amen.

Thought for the Lord's Day - #44

Though sense of God’s love fail, faith may continue to be strong. For faith is not grounded upon sense and feeling, but upon God’s gracious promises, immutable, goodness and infallible truth. Yea, when sense and feeling cease, then faith which the evidence of things not seen, begins it chief work. And the most excellent faith shows itself most clearly when we have no sense or feeling, or when we feel the opposite.

- John Ball

(via Patrick's Pensees, had to share this one...)

Thought for the Lord's Day - #42

God delights in our temptations, and yet hates them; he delights in them when they drive us to prayer; he hates them when they drive us to despair. The Psalm says: "An humble and contrite heart is an acceptable sacrifice to God," etc. Therefore, when it goes well with you, sing and praise God with a hymn: goes it evil, that is, does temptation come, then pray: "For the Lord has pleasure in those that fear him;" and that which follows is better: "and in them that hope in his goodness," for God helps the lowly and humble, seeing he says: "Thinkest thou my hand is shortened that I cannot help?" He that feels himself weak in faith, let him always have a desire to be strong therein, for that is a nourishment which God relishes in us.

- Martin Luther

Thought for the Lord's Day - #41

No man can estimate the great charge God is at only in maintaining birds and such creatures, comparatively nothing worth. I am persuaded that it costs him, yearly, more to maintain only the sparrows, than the revenue of the French king amounts to. What then, shall we say of all the rest of his creatures?

- Martin Luther

Thought for the Lord's Day - #40

The greater God's gifts and works, the less are they regarded. The highest and most precious treasure we receive of God is, that we can speak, hear, see, etc.; but how few acknowledge these as God's special gifts, much less give God thanks for them. The world highly esteems riches, honor, power, and other things of less value, which soon vanish away, but a blind man, if in his right wits, would willingly exchange all these for sight. The reason why the corporal gifts of God are so much undervalued is, that they are so common, that God bestows them also upon brute beasts, which as well as we, and better, hear and see. Nay, when Christ made the blind to see, drove out devils, raised the dead, etc., he was upbraided by the ungodly hypocrites, who gave themselves out for God's people, and was told that he was a Samaritan, and had a devil. Ah! the world is the devil's, whether it goes or stands still; how, then, can men acknowledge God's gifts and benefits? It is with us as with young children, who regard not so much their daily bread, as an apple, a pear, or other toys. Look at the cattle going into the fields to pasture, and behold in them our preachers, our milk-bearers, butter-bearers, cheese and wool bearers, which daily preach unto us faith in God, and that we should trust in him, as in our loving Father, who cares for us, and will maintain and nourish us.

- Martin Luther

Thought for the Lord's Day - #39

If every attribute of the Deity were a distinct member, purity would be the form, the soul, the spirit to animate them. Without holiness, his patience would be an indulgence to sin, his mercy a fondness, his wrath a madness, his power a tyranny, his wisdom an unworthy subtlety. Holiness gives decorum to them all.

Stephen Charnock

Thought for the Lord's Day - #36

in honor of Juliette's baptism this morning:

In brief, a participation of the seal of the covenant is a spiritual blessing. This the seed of believers was once solemnly invested in by God himself This privilege he hath nowhere revoked, though he hath changed the outward sign; nor hath he granted unto our children any privilege or mercy in lieu of it now under the gospel, when all grace and privileges are enlarged to the utmost. His covenant promises concerning them, which are multiplied, were confirmed by Christ as a true messenger and minister; he gives the grace of baptism unto many of them, especially those that die in their infancy, owns children to belong unto his kingdom, esteems them disciples, appoints households to be baptized without exception. And who shall now rise up, and withhold water from them? … The end of [Christ’s] message and of his coming was, that those to whom he was sent might be ‘blessed with faithful Abraham,’ or that ‘the blessing of Abraham,’ promised in the covenant, ‘might come upon them’ (Gal. 3:9, 14). To deny this, overthrows the whole relation between the old testament and the new, the veracity of God in his promises, and all the properties of the covenant of grace … (II Sam. 23:5)

- John Owen

Thought for the Lord's Day - #32

Self-righteousness cleaves to us, as naturally and as closely as our skins, nor can any power, but that of an Almighty Hand, flay us of it". . .until you are endued with a faith in Christ’s righteousness, your body is no better than 'the living coffin of a dead soul'.

- Augustus Toplady