Do you desire to subdue sin? Would you be holy? Would you imitate your Master? Do you desire to rise to superlative heights of spirituality? Are you wanting to be made like the angels of God, full of zeal and ardor for the Master’s cause? You cannot without the Spirit: “Without Me you can do nothing.” Oh branch of the vine, you can have no fruit without the sap! Oh child of God, you have no life within you apart from the life which God gives you through His Spirit!
– Charles Spurgeon –
Whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off the relish for spiritual things then it is sin for you, however, innocent it may be in itself.
– Susanna Wesley –
It is in the closet, in the morning watch, that our spiritual life is both tested and strengthened. There is the battlefield where it is to be decided every day whether God is to have all, whether our life is to be absolute obedience. If we truly conquer there, getting rid of ourselves into the hands of our Almighty Lord, the victory during the day is sure. It is there, in the inner chamber, proof is to be given whether we really delight in God, and make it our aim to love Him with our whole heart.
– Andrew Murray –
Prayer is the highest activity of the human soul, and therefore it is at the same time the ultimate test of a man’s true spiritual condition (there is nothing so much as prayer life that tells the truth about us as Christian people). Everything we do in the Christian life is easier than prayer.
– Martyn Lloyd-Jones –
If anyone would tell you the surest, shortest way to all happiness and all perfection, he must tell you to make it a rule to yourself, to thank God for every thing that happens to you.
– William Law –
from A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life
Spiritual Christians look upon the world not as a playground but as a battleground.
– AW Tozer –
– Heather Elyse –
If weak in prayer we are weak everywhere.
– Leonard Ravenhill –
David Brainerd was pursued by unearthly adversaries who were resolved to rob him of his reward. He knew he must never take off his armor, but lie down to rest with his corselet laced. The stains that marred the perfection of his lustrous dress and the spots of rust on his gleaming shield are imperceptible to us, but they were to him the source of much sorrow and ardency of yearning.
– from The Life of David Brainerd –