Faith is the acknowledgment of the entire absence of all goodness in us and the recognition of the cross as the substitute for all the lack on our part. Faith saves, because it owns the complete salvation of another and not because it contributes anything to that salvation.
Faith is not our Savior. It was not faith that was born at Bethlehem and died on Golgotha for us. It was not faith that loved us, and gave itself for us; that bore our sins in its own body on the tree; that died and rose again for our sins. Faith is one thing the Savior is another. Faith is one thing and the cross is another. Let us not confound them, nor ascribe to a poor, imperfect act of man that which belongs exclusively to the Son of the Living God.
An effective ministry must be the fruit of a holy, peaceful, loving intimacy with the Lord.
Ask God for anything but let Him judge as to the manner, measure, and timing of the giving. "Yet not my will, but Yours be done." (Luke 22:42)
A believing man will be a zealous man. Faith makes a man zealous. Faith shows itself by zeal. Not by zeal for a party or a system or an opinion; but by zeal for Christ yet zeal for the carrying on of His work on earth.
Life is a journey, not a home. Life is a road, not a city of habitation. The enjoyments and blessings we have, are but little inns on the roadside of life, where we may be refreshed for a moment, that we may with new strength press on to the end yet to the rest that remains for the people of God.
It is to the dead that the life comes; it is to the unlovable that the love comes; it is to the lost that the salvation comes.
The more fully that the gospel is preached, in the grand bold apostolic way, the more likely is it to accomplish the results which it did in the apostolic days.
The cross saves completely or not at all. Our faith does not divide the work of salvation between itself and the cross. It is the acknowledgment that the cross alone saves and that it saves alone. Faith adds nothing to the cross, nor to its healing virtue.
How fast we learn in the day of sorrow! Scripture shines out in a new effulgence every verse seems to contain a sunbeam, every promise stands out in illuminated splendor; things hard to be understood become in a moment plain.
In all unbelief there are these two things: a good opinion of one's self, and a bad opinion of God.
Do not heed the jar of man's warring opinions.
Jesus is in all respects fitted for his mighty work of redeeming. He is very man and very God. He is the seed of the woman, the seed of Abraham, the seed of David, the son of Mary yet God over all, blessed forever. Thus He can bear our sins. He can sympathize with our sorrows. He can fight our battles. He can love as a man, a fellow man, bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh.
[Horatius Bonar]
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