Faith

January 3, 2014

Tenacity is more than endurance, it is endurance combined with the absolute certainty that what we are looking for is going to transpire. Tenacity is more than hanging on, which may be but the weakness of being too afraid to fall off. Tenacity is the supreme effort of a man refusing to believe that his hero is going to be conquered . . . If our hopes are being disappointed just now, it means that they are being purified . . . One of the greatest strains in life is the strain of waiting for God.

– Oswald Chambers –

January 2, 2014

It is a safe thing too to trust Him to fulfill the desire which He creates …

– Amy Carmichael –

December 31, 2013

Where we have failed is in the practical application of the teaching concerning the crucified life. Too many have been content to be armchair Christians, satisfied with the theology of the cross. Plainly Christ never intended that we should rest in a mere theory of self-denial. His teaching identified His disciples with Himself so intimately that they would have had to be extremely dull not to have understood that they were expected to experience very much the same pain and loss as He Himself did.

The healthy soul is the victorious soul and victory never comes while self is permitted to remain unjudged and uncrucified. While we boast or belittle we may be perfectly sure that the cross has not yet done its work within us. Faith and obedience will bring the cross into the life and cure both habits.

– AW Tozer –
From Man – The Dwelling Place of God, ch. 18, “Boasting or Belittling”

December 12, 2013

Daily living by faith on Christ is what makes the difference between the sickly and the healthy Christian, between the defeated and the victorious saint.

– AW Pink –

December 10, 2013

…I thank Thee that Thou art risen from the dead, that at this very moment Thou dost indwell me in the person and power of Thy divine Spirit; that Thou hast never expected of me anything but failure, yet Thou hast given to me Thy strength for my weakness, Thy victory for my defeat, Thyself for all my bankruptcy! I step out now, by faith, into a future that is limited only by what Thou art! To me to live is Christ!

– Ian Thomas –

December 7, 2013

But feelings cannot be our ultimate authority because, as we all know, they are so changeable, and unreliable. They come and they go, and you never know what they may be. ‘I dare not trust the sweetest frame’, says a hymn-writer, because it may have gone by tomorrow. If I am to be governed by my feelings I shall find myself constantly changing—sometimes happy, sometimes miserable, sometimes feeling that all is well, sometimes that everything is going wrong, sometimes thrilled by reading the Bible, at other times having to force myself to get something out of it, feeling dry, arid, dull, stupid! Is not that your experience? If so, how can you rely on feelings as your authority?

Then remember, too, that feelings can be so easily counterfeited. If what is nice is of necessity good, if what gives me a pleasant, comfortable feeling must be right, then I have no answer whatsoever to the cults. I would just have to say: ‘Well, go to them. Anything that makes you feel better, anything that gives you a kind of release and relief is good; follow it. Anything that makes you a better man must be right, go after it.’ If we rely merely upon the pragmatic test of what makes me feel better we have no standard at all. I cannot criticize any teaching. It is so entirely subjective that I have no standard whatsoever.

– Martyn Lloyd-Jones –

December 6, 2013

Fact is fact. Truth is truth. It does not matter how you feel. We do not listen to our feelings. We believe the truth of God’s Word.

– Eric Ludy –

December 5, 2013

I would believe God’s word before my feelings any day. How do we deal with an inquirer who has accepted Christ, but who lacks assurance that he has eternal life? We do not ask him to look at his feelings, but we take him to some such passage as John 3.36. We tell him to read it and he reads: ‘He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.’ ‘Who says that?’ we ask. ‘God says it.’ ‘Is it true?’ ‘Oh, certainly it is true; God says it.’ ‘ Who does God say has everlasting life?’ ‘He that believeth on the Son.’ ‘Do you believe on the Son?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘What have you then?’ ‘O, I don’t know, I don’t feel yet that I have eternal life,’ ‘ But what does God say?’ ‘He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.’ ‘Are you going to believe God or your feelings?’ We hold the inquirer right there until on the simple, naked word of God, feeling or no feeling, he says, ‘I know I have eternal life because God says so,’ and afterward the feeling comes.

– RA Torrey –

December 4, 2013

It is a common temptation of Satan to make us give up the reading of the Word and prayer when our enjoyment is gone; as if it were of no use to read the Scriptures when we do not enjoy them, and as if it were no use to pray when we have no spirit of prayer.

– George Müller –