Jesus can make those happy who trust him and call him, whatever be their outward condition. He can give them peace of heart in a prison, contentment in the midst of poverty, comfort in the midst of bereavements, joy on the brink of the grave. There is a mighty fullness that is ready to be poured out on every one that will ask in prayer. Oh that people would understand that happiness does not depend on outward circumstances, but on the state of the heart.
– JC Ryle –
from A Call to Prayer
Christ was in an agony at prayer (Luke 22: 44). Many when they pray are rather in a lethargy, than in an agony. When they are about the world they are all fire; when they are at prayer, they are all Ice.
– Thomas Watson –
The trouble with many men is that they have got just enough religion to make them miserable. If there is not joy in religion, you have got a leak in your religion.
– Billy Sunday –
You will never find Jesus so precious as when the world is one vast howling wilderness. Then he is like a rose blooming in the midst of the desolation, a rock rising above the storm.
Hope fills the afflicted soul with such inward joy and consolation, that it can laugh while tears are in the eye, sigh and sing all in a breath; it is called “The rejoicing of hope.”
If I am not allowed to laugh in heaven, I don’t want to go there.
Laughter and tears are the warp and woof of life. If you leave them out of preaching, you are leaving out life itself.
A carnal heart thinks, I must have my wants made up or else it is impossible that I should be content. But a gracious heart says, “What is the duty of the circumstances God has put me into?”
– Jeremiah Burroughs –
from The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment, 1648
Our business is to love and delight ourselves in God.
– Brother Lawrence –