A Mediator, Strong and Mighty

Ye may yourself ebb and flow, but your Lord is this day as He was yesterday. And it is your comfort that your salvation is not rolled upon wheels of your own making, neither have ye to do with a Christ of your own shaping: God hath singled out a Mediator, strong and mighty; if ye and your burdens were as heavy as ten hills or hells, he is able to bear you, and save you to the uttermost.

—Samuel Rutherford

The Leading Mercy of All

It is true, the leading mercy of all, is God himself, Christ himself, the Spirit himself; one God in three Persons, is their God; made over to them in that word, "I will be your God." Here is the fountain-mercy of all mercies, of which they may sing, saying, "This God is our God for ever and ever, and will be our guide even unto death." And indeed to sing of mercy, is to sing of a merciful God.

—Ralph Erskine

Won by Love

Man is won by love: "With meekness instruct those that oppose themselves" (2 Tim. ii. 25). This is like the small rain upon the tender grass.

—Thomas Manton

"grace worketh most freely when it worketh upon nothing."

There is excellency enough in God: he requireth only sense of emptiness in us. God loveth to make all his works creations; and grace worketh most freely when it worketh upon nothing.

—Thomas Manton

Gospel-Service

This is gospel-service, gospel-holiness, when love makes you to read, and love makes you to pray, and love makes you to meditate, and love makes you to wait on ordinances, and love influences your whole practice.

—Ralph Erskine

Preaching and Praising Him

We may preach this wonderful Lord while we live, but we will never out-preach him; we may praise him to eternity, but shall never out-praise him: "Blessed are they that dwell in his house, they will be still praising him; yea, they will be like him, for they will see him as he is."

—Ralph Erskine

"see him [Christ], and take him as God all-sufficient"

"If you think you can do any thing without him [Christ], you are not worthy of him; and you go cross to this revelation made of him. But if you can do nothing, and have nothing at all, and would have one to do all for you, and to be all to you; then see him, and take him as God all-sufficient, to do all your works in you and for you; and to be your all for grace and glory; and thus to see him, is to see the Father, and all his fullness in him; and thus to take him into your heart, is to take him indeed, and his Father's blessing with him."

—Ralph Erskine

"The fairer that Christ is seen, the viler does the believer see himself"

The same light that discovers the greatness of God, discovers the meanness of the creature; the holiness of God seen, discovers the vileness of the creature; the fulness of God being seen, then appears the emptiness of the creature, and the baseness thereof: hence the holiest of men, upon the discovery of the Lord, must cry out, "Behold, I am vile!" Isaiah vi. 5. Then is the soul ashamed and confounded, when the Lord is discovered as pacified towards it, Ezek. xvi. 63. O! did not the sight of the glory of God in Christ, believer, make the haughtiness of man to fall, and the loftiness of man to be laid low? The fairer that Christ is seen, the viler does the believer see himself; and then self-wisdom, self-righteousness, self-love, are dashed down to the ground, and covered with shame and blushing.

—Ralph Erskine

Christ and Our Hearts

In a word, one may be said to have seen Christ, when he comes with a word of grace, and work of power, and opens the locked heart, and melts the hard heart, and fixes the wandering heart, and humbles the proud heart, and heals the plagued heart, and draws the backward heart, and frees the fettered heart, spiritualizes the carnal heart, raises the drooping heart, helps and curbs the unbelieving heart, and comforts the dejected heart; and when he is pleased to give his convincing, quickening, strengthening, sanctifying, and directing presence:

—Ralph Erskine

"It is God wooeth you;"

The great work of the ministers is like that of Eliezer, Abraham's servant, to seek a match for our master's son. Our way to win you is to tell you what he is; he is God-man in one person; he is man, that you may not be afraid of him; God, that he may be sufficient to do you good; 'the Lord of lords,' 'King of kings,' the 'heir of all things,' the 'Saviour of the world;' 'this is your beloved, ye daughters of Jerusalem.' He knoweth your wants, is able to supply them, though you are unworthy. Come, he needeth no portion with you; we can bring nothing to him, he hath enough in himself; as Esther, the poor virgin, had garments out of the king's wardrobe, Esther ii. 12, and the perfumes and odours given her on the king's cost. Therefore come to him; it is danger to neglect him: 'See that ye refuse not him that speaketh from heaven,' Heb. xii. 25. It is God wooeth you; he will take you with nothing, he is all-sufficient; you bringing him nothing but all-necessity, he will protect you, maintain you, give you a dowry as large as heart can wish. Therefore leave not till you come to 'I am my beloved's, and he is mine.'

—Manton

"God's mercy is overfull."

Certainly, there is more of God's mercy than in men's sins; our ephah is full, but God's mercy is overfull. And there is enough in God to supply all our wants;

—Thomas Manton

If your sins were 'as red as crimson,' saith God, 'I will make them as white as wool,' &c., Isa. i. 18. Crimson sins, double-dyed sins, it is no matter what they are, if we come to God. There is more mercy in him than sin in us.

—Richard Sibbes

His Fulness is Received and Returned

In the creature's knowing, esteeming, loving, rejoicing in, and praising God, the glory of God is both exhibited and acknowledged; his fulness is received and returned. Here is both an emanation and remanation. The refulgence shines upon and into the creature, and is reflected back to the luminary. The beams of glory come from God, and are something of God, and are refunded back again to their original. So that the whole is of God, and in God, and to God, and God is the beginning, middle and end in this affair.

—Jonathan Edwards

Teaching to Adorn

Modesty teaches us not to expose those parts to view which no necessity, no good end or use will justify: Humility teaches us to avoid curiosity in decking a vile Body, which ere long must be a feast for Worms: Good husbandry will teach us not to lay out on the Back, what should feed the Bellies of a poor Family. And Holiness will teach us, not to keep such a stir about the Outward, when the Inward Man is Naked. Charity will teach us, not to expend superfluously on thy own Carcass, when so many of thy Fathers Children want necessary Food and Raiment. And Godly wisdom will teach us, not to trifle out those precious Minutes between the Comb, and the Glass, (inter pectinum & speculum) between Curling and Painting, which should be laid out on, and for Eternity.

...

To be accounted honourable by him [God], and made beautiful by him, is true Honour, real Beauty. In his Judgment stands our absolution, or condemnation; in his Sentence, our life, or death; to him, and by him we stand or fall.

—Samuel Annesley

Every Moment

[W]e subsist upon God's goodness and providence every moment.

—Thomas Manton

All without our merit, and against merit.

We paid nothing for God's love; nothing for Christ, the Son of his love; nothing for his Spirit, the fruit of his love; nothing for sanctifying grace and faith, the effects of his Spirit dwelling and working in our hearts; nothing for pardon, we have all freely; nothing for daily bread, protection, maintenance; and shall pay nothing for glory, when we come to receive it: "Looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life" (Jude 21). It is all without our merit, and against merit: we should regard this, especially when we are apt to say in our hearts, This is for our righteousness; as Haman thought none so fit for honour and preferment as himself: Haman thought so in his heart (Esther vi. 6). So proud-hearted, self-conceited sinners say in their hearts, God seeth more in them than in others. Alas! you are not only unworthy of Christ, the Spirit, grace, and glory, but the air you breathe in, and the ground you tread upon. What did the Lord see in you to judge you meet for such an estate? "I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies, and of all the truth" (Gen. xxxii. 10).

—Thomas Manton

"Mercy hath its name from misery."—Thomas Manton

Mercy hath its name from misery. Misericordia is nothing else but the laying of the misery of others to heart, with intention of affording them relief and succour. In God it noteth his readiness to do good to the miserable, notwithstanding sin. The motion cometh from within, from his own breast and bowels: for 'our God is pitiful and of tender mercy,' James v. 11; and the act of it is extended and reached out unto the creature in seasonable relief, for the throne of grace was erected for this purpose, Heb. iv. 11

—Manton

Misericors est, cui alterius miseria cordi est—mercy hath its name from misery, and is no other thing than laying another's misery to heart, not to despise it, nor to add to it, but to help it. And therefore, if thou be miserable, and knowest it indeed, his [God's] nature giveth a strong inclination to succour the miserable.

—Manton

The Gift

The gospel offers Christ freely to sinners as the gift, not the sale of God, and even so faith receives him. The believer comes to Christ with an empty hand, not only as an undeserving, but as an hell-deserving sinner; he comes to Christ as to one that justifies the ungodly, Rom. iv. 5. "Unto him that worketh not, but believeth in him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.

—John Flavel

Our Election

But certain it is, that our election cometh only and wholly of the benefit and grace of God, for the merits of Christ's passion, and for no part of our merits and good works: as St. Paul disputeth and proveth at length in the epistle to the Romans and Galatians, and divers other places, saying, Si ex operibus, non ex gratia; si ex gratia, non ex operibus.

—Cranmer

Wholly and Only for Christ's Sake

As justification is granted wholly for Christ's sake, so it was doubtless wise in itself, and seemed wise and good to God that it should be granted to the believer in such a way that he should see and know that it was granted wholly and only for Christ's sake; and that as he is really and wholly dependent on Christ for this inestimable blessing, so he should be made sensible of this his dependence, and cordially consent to it. But this is faith. Besides, faith more than any other grace ascribes to all beings their proper place and character. By faith in Christ, as just now observed, we acknowledge and feel our own entire dependence on him. We see his glorious excellence and all-sufficiency, and our own sinfulness and ill-desert; and to see and feel all this is to ascribe to Christ his proper place and character, and to acknowledge and feel and assume our own. And this temper will naturally lead us to right views of Christ, and will bind us most strongly to him. Faith also makes us willing to receive justification as a free gift. It disposes us to be sincerely thankful for it, and to relish and prize it, and all its consequent blessings; and in these respects also it renders the believer the proper subject of justification and the proper heir of heaven.

—Jonathan Edwards

Nothing to do at all.

Now, faith to take is covenanted; and this whole covenant, and all salvation in it, is laid to your hand; all is given, when the covenant is given. Why, Sir, I think you leave nothing to do at all. Yea, as much as you can do, and that is just nothing. If you can believe by your own power, then I will take back my word; but that I know you cannot do: and I give you as much to do as my text allows, which offers all, when it offers Christ as a covenant to you. But will you tell me, what the worse are you, that you who can do nothing, get nothing to do; and that he who can do all things, gets all the work and all the praise? Are you not pleased with these terms, to have all freely, without money, and without price?

—Ralph Erskine

When you die...

When you die, you hope you shall go to Heaven: But if you shall go to Heaven when you die, Heaven will come to you before you die.

—Jeremiah Burroughs

Christ Dispels the Darkness

Christ dispels the darkness of the mind, by the light of his word; the darkness of sin, by the light of his most holy merits; and the darkness of calamity, by the light of his comforting grace.

—Benjamin Keach

Uncontrollable

The Supreme being must needs be an unaccountable and uncontroulable Being.

—John Flavel

His will is uncontrollable.

—Ralph Erskine

"The gospel is an art or science to teach us to love God."

[T]rue faith in Christ breedeth sincere love to God: Gal. iv. 6,'Faith worketh by love.' The true office of faith is to persuade the soul of the astonishing wonders of God's love shown in the redemption by Christ: 'We have known and believed the love that God hath to us,' 1 John iv. 16. And why? Not only that we may gaze on it with amazement, but 'that we may love him again who loved us first,' ver. 19. That this love may make a due impression upon us, and melt us into all love and respect to God, who pitied us in our lost estate, and provided so full and costly a remedy for us. The gospel is an art or science to teach us to love God.

—Thomas Manton

How We May Give No Account

We cannot answer the Demands of GOD's Justice, for one of a thousand. And, therefore, as when Alcibiades went to visit Pericles, but was refused Admission, with this Excuse, That he was then busy studying, how to give up his Accounts to the State; Tell him, saith he, that it were wiser for him to study how he might give no Account. So, truly, since we can give no good Account, it will be our Wisdom to study, how we may give no Account, nor be ourselves answerable for what we have done. This can no otherwise be, than by getting an Interest in JESUS CHRIST, that He may answer, and make up our Accounts for us at that Day; and, at every Item reckoned up against us, may say, it is discharged, blotted, and crossed out, by His own most precious Blood. This is the only way for us, who are such desperate Debtors, to appear with Confidence before our great Creditor.

—Ezekiel Hopkins

"he will never be content with anything: if all-sufficiency be not enough"

And I will tell you one thing, that he who cannot be contented with a God, and his favour; with a Christ, and his blood; with a Covenant, and its fulness; he will never be content with anything: if all-sufficiency be not enough to thee, when can emptiness and vanity please and satisfy thee?

—Obadiah Sedgwick

Only Christ is the true Pastor

Only Christ is the true Pastor, and those only are the true Church who acknowledge him to properly be their only Pastor: opposite to him are thieves who do not feed the sheep, but kill them: and hirelings also, who forsake the flock in time of danger, because they feed it only for their own profit and gains.

—Geneva Bible Translation Notes