101 Quotable Christians

Greetings All,

     It has been a while since I sent out a "thought" since I was vacationing ("on holiday" for my British friends!) in my homeland -- New England. During that time I picked up a book (actually a few books). One was entitled "101 Quotable Christians," published by Barbour Publishing Co. and listing no author/editor.
     I went through the book (as always) with a yellow marker in hand and highlighted some that I thought were very good.  I now offer them to you with the hope that they may encourage you or give you some helpful insights. As is printed on the back cover of the book: "A great quotation can provide thought, brighten a day, even change a life..." I pray it is so!  Enjoy.

"Grace is not given because we have done good works, but in order that we may be able to do them." 

St. Augustine  (400 A.D.)

"Men would sooner believe that the Gospel is from heaven if they saw more such effects of it upon the hearts and lives of those who profess it."

Richard Baxter  (1650 A.D.)

"You want me to tell you why God is to be loved and how much? I answer that the reason for loving God is God Himself; and the measure of love due Him is immeasurable love... We are to love God for Himself because of a twofold reason: Nothing is more reasonable, and nothing is more profitable. When one asks:  Why should I love God? he may mean, What is lovely in God? or  What shall I gain by loving God?   In either case, the same cause of love exists, namely, God Himself... Ought He not be loved in return, when we think who loved, whom He loved, and how much He loved."

Bernard of Clairvaux (1125 A.D. - author of the hymn "Be Thou My Vision.")

"Will God ever ask you to do something you are not able to do?  The answer is yes -- all the time!  It must be that way, for God's glory and kingdom. If we function according to our ability alone, we get the glory. If we function according to the power of the Spirit within us, God gets the glory. He wants to reveal Himself to a watching world."

Henry Blackaby (2009 A.D.)

"The church is looking for better methods; God is looking for better men... The Holy Spirit does not flow through methods but through men."

E. M. Bounds (1880 A.D.)

"Let all our employment be to know God; the more one knows Him, the more one desires to know Him... Do not always scrupulously confine yourself to certain rules, or particular forms of devotion, but act with a general confidence in God, with love and humility... There is not in the world a kind of life more sweet and delightful than that of a continual conversation with God." 

Nicolas Herman or "Brother Lawrence" (1670 A.D.)

"The end to which we ought to purpose ourselves is to become, in this life, the most perfect worshipers of God we can possibly be, as we hope to be through all eternity."

Nicolas Herman or "Brother Lawrence"

"Compassion is the sometimes fatal capacity for feeling what it's like to live inside somebody else's skin... The life I touch for good or ill will touch another life, and in turn another, until who knows where the trembling stops or in what far place my touch will be felt."

Frederick Buechner  (2004 A.D.)

     "That there exists in the human mind, and indeed by natural instinct, some sense of Deity, we hold to be beyond dispute, since God Himself, to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of His Godhead, the memory of which He constantly renews and occasionally enlarges, that all to a man, being aware that there is a God, and that He is their Maker, may be condemned by their own conscience when they neither worship Him nor consecrate their lives to His service... 

     Until men feel that they owe everything to God, that they are cherished by His paternal care, and that He is the author of all their blessings, so that nothing is to be looked for apart from Him, they will never submit to Him in voluntary obedience.  No, unless they place their entire happiness in Him, they will never yield up their whole selves to Him in truth and sincerity." 

John Calvin (1646 A.D.)

"The word "comfort" is from two Latin words meaning "with" and "strong" -- He is with us to make us strong. Comfort is not soft, weakening commiseration, it is true, strengthening love... All along, let us remember we are not asked to understand, but simply obey." 

Amy Carmichael  (1920 A.D.)

"Remember -- a cup brimful of sweetness cannot spill even one drop of bitter water, no matter how hard or suddenly it is jarred."

Amy Carmichael

"Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become popular." 

G. K. Chesterton  (1900 A.D.)

"Love not the world.  Nothing that it contains is worth the life and consecration of an immortal soul... He who seeks God in tangible form misses the very thing he is seeking, for God is a Spirit." 

Henry Drummond (1880 A. D.) 

Many Christians look with regret to mistakes from their past, thereby feeding an ongoing sense of shame and deadening their joy in the present.  Yet, as Francois Fenelon (1690 A.D.) wisely points out,"The wise and diligent traveler watches all his steps, and keeps his eyes always directed to that part of the path which is immediately before him. He does not incessantly look backwards to count his steps and examine his footprints."

"As all the rivers are gathered into the ocean, which is the meeting place of all the waters in the world, so Christ is that ocean in which all true delights and pleasures meet."

John Flavel   (1650 A.D.)

Blessings on your day.  In Christ's Service, Pastor Jeff

The Believers Intimate Communion With Christ

Greetings All,

     Yesterday (my day off) I had the chance to read many selections from Charles Spurgeon's devotional called "Morning by Morning."
     There were many selections worthy of sharing, but one in particular stood out above the rest and I caught myself thinking: "This could only have been written by one who had experienced the reality of Christ in a deep and profound way."
     It is based on a passage from the Song of Solomon, which he relates to the believers love-experience with Jesus. If you are a believer I trust that as you read this you will be saying the occasional "amen" (or translated, "yes, this is true").  Enjoy.

     "I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my lover, tell him I am faint with love." (Song of Solomon 5:8)

     "Such is the language of the believer panting after present fellowship with Jesus: he is faint for his Lord.  Gracious souls are never perfectly at ease unless they are in a state of nearness to Christ; for when they are away from Him they lose their peace. The nearer to Him, the nearer to the perfect calm of heaven. The nearer to Him, the fuller the heart is, not only of peace, but of life, and vigor, and joy -- for these all depend on constant spiritual intercourse with Jesus.

     What the sun is to the day, what the moon is to the night, what the dew is to the flower, such is Jesus to us. What bread is to the hungry, clothing to the naked, the shadow of a great rock to the traveler through a sun-scorched land, such is Jesus Christ to us.  And, therefore, if we are not consciously one with Him, little marvel if our spirit cries in the words of the Song: 'I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved, tell him I am faint with love.'

     This earnest longing after Jesus has a blessing with it: 'Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness.' And if that be the case for righteousness, how much more for those who thirst after the Righteous One. Blessed is that hunger, since it comes from God. If I may not have the full-blown blessedness of being filled, I would seek the same blessedness in its sweet bud, pining in emptiness and eagerness until I am filled with Christ. 

     If I may not feed on Jesus, it shall be next door to heaven to hunger and thirst after Him. There is a hallowedness about that hunger, since it sparkles among the beatitudes of our Lord. But the blessing involves a promise. Such hungry ones 'shall be filled' with what they are desiring. If Christ thus causes us to long after Himself, He will certainly satisfy those longings; and when He does come to us -- as He will -- oh, how sweet it will be."

     Those who do not know Christ, or have not experienced the reality of His presence filling their  soul, will not understand Spurgeon's words.  Until the Holy Spirit enables our spirits to "taste and see that the Lord is good;" until one personally experiences the soul-strengthening and heart-satisfying presence of the Tribune God filling them, they will not be able to grasp how much it makes one yearn for ever further expressions of His fullness, love and grace.

     A. W. Tozer once penned the words: "O God, I have tasted of Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more... I want to want Thee, I long to be filled with longing, I thirst to be made more thirsty still."  The yearning is sometimes as pleasant as the filling and just as much an expression of our desire and love for Him.

     Or as Bernard of Clairvaux once wrote (words since put to music by Edward Caswall, in the hymn "Jesus, the very Thought of Thee"): "The love of Jesus, what it is, none but His loved ones know."  In fact, in a verse from that hymn not found in most hymnals, Clairvaux utters the same truth as Spurgeon. Speaking of Jesus he writes:

"Celestial Sweetness unalloyed,

Who eat Thee hunger still;

Who drink Thee do still feel a void,

Which only Thou canst fill."

     Jesus, may you come and fill anew the hearts of your people!

In Him, Pastor Jeff