Christian Leaders

"After all there is a weariness that cannot be prevented. It will come on. The work brings it on. The cross brings it on. Sometimes the very walk with God brings it on, for the flesh is weak; and at such moments we hear softer and sweeter than it ever floated in the wondrous air of Mendelssohn, "O rest in the Lord," for it has the sound of an immortal requiem: " Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord, for they rest from their labors.""

"God cannot lie; and if, fleeing for refuge, you have run to the hope set before you in the gospel — if, nestling in some invitation or promise of God's changeless word, you are resolved that Death and the Judgment shall find you there, you are safe. The way to honor God is to trust His truth, and hidden in His word you are also hidden in His love. Rest there."

"Whosoever is really earnest for Divine direction, more anxious to know what the Lord would have him do than to know what is for his own present ease or worldly interest, and who confides the case to Him who giveth wisdom liberally, and upbraideth not, may count on it very confidently that the Lord will send forth His light."

"You will find that for a smoking flax there is no specific like heaven's oxygen; for a faint and flickering piety there is no cure comparable to the one without which all our own exertions are but an effort to light a lamp in a vacuum — the breath of the Holy Spirit."

"There under the cross is the sinner's sanctuary — there, my friend, is the place for you and me. The first smiling look we shall get from God will be when looking unto Jesus; and the first time that we shall experience the alacrity of a lightened conscience, the relief and elasticity of the great life-burden lifted off, will be when we have laid our sins on the Lamb of God."

"The truth is the Tree of Life knows no seasons. High up among its branches spring warbles all the year; and they are only the poor pensioners underneath who count the months, and tell an autumn and a winter."

"In Christ's word there is both Christ's doctrine and Christ's heart, — the fact which He announces, and the feeling with which He proclaims it; and in order to be really Biblical, in order to be completely Christian, we must unite the two. If a man wants either, just to that extent Christ's word does not dwell in him."

"Truth is a rock, and on that rock faith plants its foot, and feels secure. But even on the rock you cannot live long without an atmosphere, and the believer's atmosphere is love. That atmosphere, is viewless, invisible, often forgotten; still it is real, and it is vital. " The words that I speak are spirit," says the Saviour. Over and above the resting place which weary spirits have found at His feet, which guilty consciences have found in His arms, there is an afflatus gone forth from those words of His, which to inhale and be surrounded with is like entering heaven's vestibule."

"Rejoice in Christ Jesus, for in Him you are complete. His righteousness is over you, His strong arm is around you; and he who puts his soul in Christ's keeping shall never perish nor come into condemnation. This is a safe place to rest in. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?""

"Let the Bible itself dwell in you — Christ's own word in Christ's own tone — the truth as it was in Jesus — truth dissolved in love, and redolent of sanctity."

"Beloved, you that have faith in the fountain, frequent it. Beware of two errors which are very natural and very disastrous; beware of thinking any sin too great for it; beware of thinking any sin too small."

"If you are really anxious to learn the way to God, He has not left Himself without a witness, nor you without a teacher. Go to the recorded Christ, and look at that history; listen to those words which survive in the Gospels. And go to the living Christ, to Him who has said, "lam the Light of the world, he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." And dim as may be your outset — more of night than morning in your twilight, as you follow on you shall know the Lord, and with the light that radiates from Himself, your path will shine brighter and brighter unto the perfect day."

"We are weary and heavy laden, and our heavenly Father offers to carry us and our affairs in His own everlasting arms. And so far as the weariness is concerned, we consent; we consent to be carried and find rest to our souls. But " heavy laden," — no, we cannot part with the heavy load. This responsibility, this nervousness about the absent, this household worry, this mercantile venture, this literary experiment, this invalid friend, we cannot transfer to Him who says, "Cast thy burden on the Lord," but even our bleared and sleepy eyes we open from time to time to see that it is still there, and ("O fools and slow of heart!") when we can guard it no longer, the relaxing arms are still in attitude as if they enclasped it, all unconscious that it is now better cared for elsewhere."

"Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. In its doctrinal largeness let it inhabit your convictions, and in its Divine lovingness let it be infused into your spirit, and let its lifesome energy inspire your character."

"Having made an expiation for sins, He is set down on God's right hand for ever. There is no more that even Immanuel can do. This is Love's extremest effort, God's last and greatest gift, God's own sacrifice. Can there be any escape for those who neglect so great salvation?"

"Brethren, is not this the Saviour that you need? one who can save you from the utmost depths of depravity, in the utmost corner of the earth, on the utmost inch of time? One who can save you amidst the utmost urgency of fierce temptations, and who in the uttermost extreme of exhausted nature, when heart and flesh do faint and fail, completes the work, and seals the salvation for evermore?"

"You have only to cast your life-long guilt, your ungodliness, your evil thoughts and wicked words, your sinful soul itself, into this crime-canceling, sin-annihilating, soul-cleansing Fountain, in order to obliterate from God's creation your foul transgressions, and yet leave the Divine perfection fair as ever. The sin which a Saviour's blood dissolves is the only sin which, after being once committed, is totally extinguished."

"It was not till Jesus had cried, "It is finished," and from His riven side the soldier's spear had fetched the blood and water; it was not till then, that the fountain sealed of Incarnate Love became the fountain opened of Redeeming merit, and that the Siloah began to flow, which ever since has flowed adown the oracles of God."

"Brethren, whatever the temptation is, our safety is not in habits of virtue. It is not in sturdy resolution and strength of character. It is not even in the timely thought of sin's consequences; but our safety is in the Saviour. Christ ever lives and ever intercedes; and it is our strength, our triumph, to rush into His arms of omnipotent protection."

"Christ is the great Burden bearer — the Lamb of God who beareth the sin of the world; but in order to enjoy the benefit of His interposition, I must distinctly and for myself take advantage of it. Conscious of my lost estate, I must seek a personal share in the common salvation."

"Whatever Jesus is, the glorious Godhead is; and to have fellowship with the Son is to have fellowship with the Father. To know the love of Christ is to be filled with all the fullness of God."

"What Jesus spoke was Truth; the way He spoke was gracious. He spoke the truth in love. God is love, and the Son of God spoke lovingly."

"The Bible is a treasure. It contains enough to make us rich for time and eternity. It contains the secret of happy living. It contains the key of Heaven. It contains the title-deeds of an inheritance incorruptible, and that fadeth not away. It contains the pearl of great price. Nay, in so far, as it reveals them as the portion of us sinful worms, it contains the Saviour, and the living God Himself."

"The Saviour who flitted before the patriarchs, through the fog of the old dispensation, and who spake in time past to the fathers by the prophets, articulate but unseen, is the same Saviour who, on the open heights of the gospel, and in the abundant daylight of this New Testament, speaks to us. Still, all along, it is the same Jesus, and that Bible is from beginning to end, all of it, the word of Christ."

"A Christian is a believer in Jesus. He believes that if he only throws his own lost and sinful soul on the Redeemer, there is in His sacrifice sufficient merit to cancel all his guilt, and in His heart sufficient love to undertake the keeping of his soul for all eternity. He believes that Jesus is a Saviour. He believes that His heart is set on His people's holiness, and that it is only by making them new creatures, pure-minded, kind-hearted, unselfish, devout, that He can fit them for a home and a life like His own, that He can fit them for the occupations and enjoyments of heaven. And believing all this he prays and labors after holiness."

"The word of God is solid; it will stand a thousand readings; and the man who has gone over it the most frequently and the most carefully is the surest of finding new wonders there."

"If there is a sentence in the creed which we cannot say together, there is nothing in Christ which we would wish to be different; and heresies of the heart are quite as dangerous, and to me as estranging, as errors in the head."

"Even when the shadows of trial are falling around us, let us "pass through the cloud" with the sustaining motive— "All my wish, O God, is to please and glorify Thee!""

"If, like Jacob, you trust God in little things, He may answer you by great things."

"Seek to mingle gentleness in all your rebukes; bear with the infirmities of others; make allowance for constitutional frailties; never say harsh things, if kind things will do as well."

"Character is the product of daily, hourly actions, and words, and thoughts; daily forgivenesses, unselfishness, kindnesses, sympathies, charities, sacrifices for the good of others, struggles against temptation, submissiveness under trial. Oh, it is these, like the blending colors in a picture, or the blending notes of music, which constitute the man."

"All Christ's public acts were consecrated by prayer, — His baptism, His transfiguration, His miracles, His agony, His death. He breathed away His spirit in prayer. " His last breath," says Philip Henry, "was praying breath.""

"Faith does not first ask what the bread is made of, but eats it. It does not analyze the components of the living stream, but with joy draws water from the " wells of salvation.""

"Heaven is attracting to itself whatever is congenial to its nature, is enriching itself by the spoils of earth, and collecting within its capacious bosom whatever is pure, permanent, and divine."

"What delight will it afford to renew the sweet counsel we have taken together, to recount the toils, the combats, and the labor of the way, and to approach, not the house, but the throne of God, in company, in order to join in the symphonies of heavenly voices, and lose ourselves amidst the splendors and fruitions of the beatific vision."

"When I looked at the conduct of the whites who were called Christians, and saw them drunk, quarreling, and fighting, cheating the poor Indians, and acting as if there was no God, I was led to think there could be no truth in the white man's religion, and felt inclined to fall back again to my old superstitions."

"The friendship of high and sanctified spirits loses nothing by death but its alloy; failings disappear, and the virtues of those whose faces we shall behold no more appear greater and more sacred when beheld through the shades of the sepulchre."

"I first said "No; that is the white man's God, and the white man's religion; and that God would not have anything to do with the Indians." …I thought that God could only understand English... I then met with Peter Jones, who was converted a few months before me, and, to my surprise, I hear him return thanks, at meal, in Ojibway. This was quite enough for me. I now saw that God could understand me in my Ojibway, and therefor went far into the woods and prayed, in the Ojibway tongue."

"Wisdom and truth, the offspring of the sky, are immortal; while cunning and deception, the meteors of the earth, after glittering for a moment, must pass away."

"The Bible is the treasure of the poor, the solace of the sick, and the support of the dying; and while other books may amuse and instruct in a leisure hour, it is the peculiar triumph of that book to create light in the midst of darkness, to alleviate the sorrow which admits of no other alleviation, to direct a beam of hope to the heart which no other topic of consolation can reach; while guilt, despair, and death vanish at the touch of its holy inspiration."

"What other book besides the Bible could be heard in public assemblies from year to year, with an attention that never tires, and an interest that never cloys?"

"While the passion of some is to shine, of some to govern, and of others to accumulate, let one great passion alone influence our breasts, the passion which reason ratifies, which conscience approves, which Heaven inspires, — that of being and doing good."

"We should be more anxious that our afflictions should benefit us than that they should be speedily removed from us."

"He [Kippis] might be a very clever man by nature for aught I know, but he laid so many books upon his head that his brains could not move."

"Call things by their right names... Glass of brandy and water! That is the current but not the appropriate name: ask for a glass of liquid fire and distilled damnation."

"If ever Christianity appears in its power, it is when it erects its trophies upon the tomb; when it takes up its votaries where the world leaves them; and fills the breast with immortal hope in dying moments."

"Settle it therefore in your minds, as a maxim never to be effaced or forgotten, that atheism is an inhuman, bloody, ferocious system, equally hostile to every useful restraint and to every virtuous affection; that, leaving nothing above us to excite awe, nor round us to awaken tenderness, it wages war with heaven and with earth: its first object is to dethrone God, its next to destroy man."

"Eternity invests every state, whether of bliss or of suffering, with a mysterious and awful importance, entirely its own. It gives that weight and moment to whatever it attaches, compared to which all interests that know a period fade into absolute insignificance."

"His imperial fancy has laid all Nature under tribute, and has collected riches from every scene of the creation and every walk of art."

"Faith is a practical habit, which, like every other, is strengthened and increased by continual exercise. It is nourished by meditation, by prayer, and the devout perusal of the Scriptures; and the light which it diffuses becomes stronger and clearer by an uninterrupted converse with its object, and a faithful compliance with its dictates."