Dependence

August 28, 2011

These days of ours have sore need of a generation of praying men, a band of men and women through whom God can bring his great and his greatest movements more fully into the world. The Lord our God is not straitened within himself, but he is straitened in us, by reason of our little faith and weak praying. A breed of Christian is greatly needed who will seek tirelessly after God—who will give him no rest, day and night, until he hearkens to their cry. The times demand praying men who are all athirst for God’s glory, who are broad and unselfish in their desires, quenchless for God, who seek him late and early, and who will give themselves no rest until the whole earth be filled with his glory.

– E.M. Bounds –

August 26, 2011

There is no such thing as a Christianity without a cross. There is no such things as a Christianity without a cost. It costs everything.

– Nick Thompson –

August 10, 2011

Live near to God, and so all things will appear to you little in comparison with eternal realities.

– Robert Murray M’Cheyne –

July 25, 2011

Above all, we must be especially alert against the beginnings of temptation, for the enemy is more easily conquered if he is refused admittance to the mind and is met beyond the threshold when he knocks. — Someone has said very aptly: Resist the beginnings; remedies come too late, when by long delay the evil has gained strength. First, a mere thought comes to mind, then strong imagination, followed by pleasure, evil delight, and consent. Thus, because he is not resisted in the beginning, Satan gains full entry. And the longer a man delays in resisting, so much the weaker does he become each day, while the strength of the enemy grows against him.

– Thomas a Kempis –
from The Imitation of Christ

July 24, 2011

I tremble for those who are preaching the truth – the truth as it is in Jesus, the gospel in its simplicity, in its purity, in its fullness – but preaching it “in persuasive words of wisdom” and not “in demonstration of the Spirit and of power” (1 Cor 2.4), preaching it in the energy of the flesh and not in the power of the Holy Spirit.  There is nothing more deadly than the gospel without the Spirit’s power.

– RA Torrey –
from The Baptism with the Holy Spirit, 35-36

July 23, 2011

God’s work of refining and purifying the soul must go on until his servants are so humbled, so dead to self, that when called into active service, they may have an eye single to the glory of God.”

– EG White –
in Review and Herald April 10, 1894

July 22, 2011

But how is it possible that a believer, having sin in him–sin of such intense vitality, and such terrible power as we know the flesh to have–that a believer having sin should yet not be doing sin? The answer is: “In Him is no sin. He that abideth in Him sinneth not.” When the abiding in Christ becomes close and unbroken, so that the soul lives from moment to moment in the perfect union with the Lord its keeper, He does, indeed, keep down the power of the old nature, so that it does not regain dominion over the soul. We have seen that there are degrees in the abiding. With most Christians the abiding is so feeble and intermittent, that sin continually obtains the ascendency, and brings the soul into subjection. The divine promise given to faith is: “Sin shall not have dominion over you.” But with the promise is the command: “Let not sin reign in your mortal body.” The believer who claims the promise in full faith has the power to obey the command, and sin is kept from asserting its supremacy. Ignorance of the promise, or unbelief, or unwatchfulness, opens the door for sin to reign.

– Andrew Murray –

July 21, 2011

Dear Christian, in affliction abide in Christ. When you see it coming, meet it in Christ; when it is come, feel that you are more in Christ than in it, for He is nearer you than affliction ever can be; when it is passing, still abide in Him. And let the one thought of the Saviour, as He speaks of the pruning, and the one desire of the Father, as He does the pruning, be yours too: “Every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth, that it may bring forth more fruit.” So shall your times of affliction become your times of choicest blessing–preparation for richest fruitfulness.

— Andrew Murray –
from School of Obedience

July 20, 2011

All God’s giants have been weak men, who did great things for God because they reckoned on His being with them.

– Hudson Taylor –