Sin has not only put a film on the eye, but destroyed the capacity to see. It has ruined the faculty of spiritual insight, and struck the soul with blindness. The only perfect cure is the salve of experimental grace. A man may have all the learning in the world, and all the culture the schools can afford, and yet be a mere novice in spiritual understanding.
– Asbury Lowrey –
We religious leaders need to look very much more deeply. We can so easily have talks with people, and they can say we have helped, write us grateful letters, even stand steady for a time till the juice we have put into them runs out; but, we may have brought them no hunger for God—because that hunger is no ache in our own heart—nor brought them anywhere near to the end of self.
– Florence Allshorn –
Press them to believe on Him immediately, intersperse prayers with your exhortations preacher and thereby call down fire from heaven even the fire of the Holy Ghost, speak every time my dear brother as if it were your last, weep out if possible every argument and as it were compel them to cry “behold how he loveth us”!
– George Whitefield –
Bring thy lust to the gospel, not for relief, but for further conviction of its guilt: look on him whom thou hast pierced, and be in bitterness. Say to thy soul, What have I done? What love, what mercy, what blood, what grace, have I despised and trampled on! Is this the return I make to the Father for his love, to the Son for his blood, to the Holy Ghost for his grace? Do I thus requite the Lord? Have I defiled the heart that Christ died to wash, which the blesses Spirit hath chosen to dwell in? And can I keep myself out of the dust? What can I say to the dear Lord Jesus? How shall I hold up my head with any boldness before him? Do I account communion with him of so little value that for this vile lust’s sake I have scarce left him any room in my heart? How shall I escape, if I neglect so great salvation? In the mean time, what shall I say to the Lord? Love, mercy, grace, goodness, peace, joy, consolation; I have despised them all, and esteemed them as a thing of naught, that I might harbour a lust in my heart.
– John Owen –
from The Mortification of Sin
Radical Christians are not people who wear Christian t-shirts. Radical Christians are those who bear fruit of the Holy Spirit. … A little boy, Andrew, a Muslim shot him five times through the stomach and left him on a sidewalk simply because he said, “I am so afraid, but I can not deny Jesus Christ! Please don’t kill me! But I will not deny Him!” He died in a pool of blood, and you talk about being a radical Christian because you wear a t-shirt!
– Paul Washer –
You may say, “God doesn’t hate anybody. God is love.” No, my friend. You need to understand something. Jesus Christ taught, the prophets taught, the apostles taught this: that apart from the grace of God revealed in Jesus Christ our Lord the only thing left for you is the wrath, the fierce anger of God because of your rebellion and your sin.
– Paul Washer –
Whenever we have to confront somebody about sin, there ought to be a little bit of a tear in our heart, if not in our eyes. We need to be reminded that but for the grace of God, the capacity for sin in us could break out.
– Crawford Loritts –
The Christian is a person who makes it easy for others to believe in God.
– Robert Murray M’Cheyne –
Christianity has become dramatic with us. When Christians in free countries win a soul for Christ, the new believer may become a member of a quietly living church. But when those in captive nations win someone, we know that he may have to go to prison and that his children may become orphans. The joy of having brought someone to Christ is always mixed with this feeling that there is a price that must be paid. We had met an entirely new type of Christian—the Christian of the Underground Church.
– Richard Wurmbrand –
from Tortured for Christ