We have a great deal of activity, but we accomplish little; many services but few conversions; much machinery but few results.
– RA Torrey –
Of Whom Shall I Be Afraid – Alexander MacLaren
Only he who can say, “The Lord is the strength of my life” can say, “Of whom shall I be afraid?”
– Alexander MacLaren –
The Old Cross – AW Tozer
The old cross is a symbol of death. It stands for the abrupt, violent end of a human being. The man in Roman times who took up his cross and started down the road had already said good-bye to his friends. He was not coming back. He was going out to have it ended. The cross made no compromise, modified nothing, spared nothing; it slew all of the man, completely and for good. It did not try to keep on good terms with its victim. It struck cruel and hard, and when it had finished its work, the man was no more.
– AW Tozer –
The Reality of the Cross – Alexander Smellie
The cross which my Lord bids me take up and carry may assume different shapes. I may have to content myself with a lowly and narrow sphere, when I feel that I have capacities for much higher work. I may have to go on cultivating year after year, a field which seems to yield me no harvests whatsoever. I may be bidden to cherish kind and loving thoughts about someone who has wronged me—be bidden speak to him tenderly, and take his part against all who oppose him, and crown him with sympathy and succor. I may have to confess my Master amongst those who do not wish to be reminded of Him and His claims. I may be called to “move among my race, and show a glorious morning face,” when my heart is breaking.
There are many crosses, and every one of them is sore and heavy. None of them is likely to be sought out by me of my own accord. But never is Jesus so near me as when I lift my cross, and lay it submissively on my shoulder, and give it the welcome of a patient and unmurmuring spirit.
He draws close, to ripen my wisdom, to deepen my peace, to increase my courage, to augment my power to be of use to others, through the very experience which is so grievous and distressing, and then—as I read on the seal of one of those Scottish Covenanters whom Claverhouse imprisoned on the lonely Bass, with the sea surging and sobbing round—I grow under the load.
– Alexander Smellie –
The Fulfillment of One Spiritual Comfort – Thomas Brooks
As all lights cannot make up the want of the light of the sun, so all temporal comforts cannot make up the want of one spiritual comfort.
– Thomas Brooks –
1608-1680
Prevailing Prayers – Charles G. Finney
I have known persons to pray till they were all wet with perspiration, in the coldest weather in winter. I have known persons pray for hours, till their strength was all exhausted with the agony of their minds. Such prayers prevailed with God.
– Charles G. Finney –