Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him” – this is the most sublime utterance of faith in the whole of the Bible.
The life of faith brings the two into a right relation. Common sense is not faith, and faith is not common sense; they stand in the relation of the natural and the spiritual; of impulse and inspiration. Nothing Jesus Christ ever said is common sense, it is revelation sense, and it reaches the shores where common sense fails. Faith must be tried before the reality of faith is actual.
If it is an impossibility, it is the thing we have to ask. If it is not an impossible thing, it is not a real disturbance. God will do the absolutely impossible.
If our hopes seem to be experiencing disappointment right now, it simply means that they are being purified.
The main idea in the region of religion is – Your eyes upon God, not on men. Do not have as your motive the desire to be known as a praying man. Get an inner chamber in which to pray where no one knows you are praying, shut the door and talk to God in secret. Have no other motive than to know your Father in heaven. It is impossible to conduct your life as a disciple without definite times of secret prayer:.
God’s mark of approval, whenever you obey Him, is peace. He sends an immeasurable, deep peace; not a natural peace, “as the world gives,” but the peace of Jesus. Whenever peace does not come, wait until it does, or seek to find out why it is not coming. If you are acting on your own impulse, or out of a sense of the heroic, to be seen by others, the peace of Jesus will not exhibit itself.
If our devotion is to the cause of humanity, we will be quickly defeated and broken-hearted, since we will often be confronted with a great deal of ingratitude from other people. But if we are motivated by our love for God, no amount of ingratitude will be able to hinder us from serving one another.
Whenever we put other things first, there is confusion.
Be careful that you don’t become a hypocrite by spending all your time trying to get others right with God before you worship Him yourself.
Huge waves that would frighten an ordinary swimmer produce a tremendous thrill for the surfer who has ridden them.
We must continually maintain an adventurous attitude toward Him, despite any potential personal risk.
If you believe in Jesus, you are not to spend all your time in the calm waters just inside the harbor, full of joy, but always tied to the dock. You have to get out past the harbor into the great depths of God, and begin to know things for yourself – begin to have spiritual discernment.
The vital relationship which the Christian has to the Bible is not that he worships the letter, but that the Holy Spirit makes the words of the Bible spirit and life to him.
Paul’s secret joy was that God took him as a blatant rebel against Jesus Christ, and made him a captive – and that became his purpose.
The only thing you know is that God knows what He is doing.
The marvel of the Redemptive Reality of God is that the worst and the vilest can never get to the bottom of His love.
The battle is not against sin or difficulties or circumstances, but against being so absorbed in work that we are not ready to face Jesus Christ at every turn.
It is not so true that “prayer changes things” as that prayer changes me and I change things.
It is not the thing we spend the most time on that moulds us most; the greatest element is the thing that exerts most power.
Jesus Christ’s life was an absolute failure from every standpoint but God’s. But what seemed failure from man’s standpoint was a tremendous triumph from God’s, because God’s purpose is never man’s purpose.