“For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him.”
– 1 Thessalonians 5:9-10
“For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him.”
– 1 Thessalonians 5:9-10
“Mind quite unfitted for devotion. Prayerless prayer.”
– Robert Murray M’Cheyne, The Biography of Robert Murray M’Cheyne, Kindle edition, location 283.
“When thou prayest, rather let thy hearts be without words, than thy words without a heart.”
– John Bunyan, Complete Works of John Bunyan, Kindle edition, location 5686.
“In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears…”
– Hebrews 5:7
“A spiritual prayer is when the heart and spirit pray; there are not only words but desires. It is excellent when a man can say, ‘Lord, my heart prays.’ Hannah ‘prayed in her heart’ (1 Sam. 1:13). The sound of a trumpet comes from within and the excellent music of prayer comes from within the heart. If the heart does not accompany duty, it is speaking, not praying.”
– Thomas Watson, The Godly Man’s Picture (East Peoria: Banner, 2009), 89, emphasis mine.
When you pray, are you actually praying or simply speaking?
“For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”
– Romans 5:6-11
I found numbers 12, 14, 19, 20, and 21 to be pretty convincing.
“‘If nothing will cure this disease, at least let the impossibility of pleasing men, and attaining your ends, suffice against so fruitless an attempt.’ And here I shall shew you how impossible it is, or, at least a thing which you cannot reasonably expect.”
Baxter expands on these in his A Christian Directory, vol. 1 (London: Richard Edwards, 1825), pages 559-572.
“A godly man loves the menaces of the Word. He knows there is love in every threat. God would not have us perish; he therefore mercifully threatens us, so that he may scare us from sin. God’s threats are like the buoy, which shows the rocks in the sea and threatens death to such as come near. The threat is a curbing bit to check us, so that we may not run in full career to hell. There is mercy in every threat.”
– Thomas Watson, The Godly Man’s Picture (East Peoria: Banner, 2009), 61.
photo: dweekly