It is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy, that makes happiness.
Charles Spurgeon
A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.
A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you and were helped by you will remember you when forget-me-nots have withered. Carve your name on hearts, not on marble.
Anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrows, but only empties today of its strength.
By perseverance the snail reached the ark.
Wisdom is the right use of knowledge. To know is not to be wise. Many men know a great deal, and are all the greater fools for it. There is no fool so great a fool as a knowing fool. But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom.
Sincerity makes the very least person to be of more value than the most talented hypocrite.
Trials teach us what we are; they dig up the soil, and let us see what we are made of.
Beware of no man more than of yourself; we carry our worst enemies within us.
The Lord gets his best soldiers out of the highlands of affliction.
Of two evils, choose neither.
However weak we are, however poor, however little our faith, or however small our grace may be, our names are still written on His heart; nor shall we lose our share in Jesus' love.
Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to their tremendous difficulties.
You might not always get what you want, but you always get what you expect.
Free will carried many a soul to hell, but never a soul to heaven.
Revenge, lust, ambition, pride, and self-will are too often exalted as the gods of man's idolatry; while holiness, peace, contentment, and humility are viewed as unworthy of a serious thought.
Humility is to make a right estimate of one's self.
O God, we praise Thee for keeping us till this day, and for the full assurance that Thou wilt never let us go.
Grow in the root of all grace, which is faith. Believe God's promises more firmly than ever. Allow your faith to increase in its fullness, firmness, and simplicity.
The greatest enemy to human souls is the self-righteous spirit which makes men look to themselves for salvation.
'You are no saint,' says the devil. Well, if I am not, I am a sinner, and Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. Sink or swim, I go to Him; other hope, I have none.
My evidence that I am saved does not lie in the fact that I preach, or that I do this or that. All my hope lies in this: that Jesus Christ came to save sinners. I am a sinner, I trust Him, then He came to save me, and I am saved.
I think that is a better thing than thanksgiving: thanks-living. How is this to be done? By a general cheerfulness of manner, by an obedience to the command of Him by whose mercy we live, by a perpetual, constant delighting of ourselves in the Lord, and by a submission of our desires to His will.
I would go to the deeps a hundred times to cheer a downcast spirit. It is good for me to have been afflicted, that I might know how to speak a word in season to one that is weary.
True prayer is neither a mere mental exercise nor a vocal performance. It is far deeper than that - it is spiritual transaction with the Creator of Heaven and Earth.
Fill the earth with your songs of gratitude.
I groan daily under a body of sin and corruption. Oh for the time when I shall drop this flesh, and be free from sin!
When we tell the story of our own conversion, I would have it done with great sorrow, remembering what we used to be, and with great joy and gratitude, remembering how little we deserve these things.
If any of you should ask me for an epitome of the Christian religion, I should say that it is in one word - prayer. Live and die without prayer, and you will pray long enough when you get to hell.
We have come to a turning point in the road. If we turn to the right mayhap our children and our children's children will go that way; but if we turn to the left, generations yet unborn will curse our names for having been unfaithful to God and to His Word.
The first fresh hour of every morning should be dedicated to the Lord, whose mercy gladdens it with golden light.
A daily portion is really all we need. We do not need tomorrow's supply, for that day has not yet dawned, and its needs are still unborn.
A dark cloud is no sign that the sun has lost his light; and dark black convictions are no arguments that God has laid aside His mercy.
After many years of great mercy, after tasting of the powers of the world to come, we still are so weak, so foolish; but, oh! when we get away from self to God, there all is truth and purity and holiness, and our heart finds peace, wisdom, completeness, delight, joy, victory.
A vigorous temper is not altogether an evil. Men who are easy as an old shoe are generally of little worth.
Saving faith is an immediate relation to Christ, accepting, receiving, resting upon Him alone, for justification, sanctification, and eternal life by virtue of God's grace.
Lord Jesus, we come just as we are; this is how we came at first, and this is how we come still, with all our failures, with all our transgressions, with all and everything that is what it ought not to be, we come to Thee.
As for our great King, when we venture into His presence, let us have a purpose there. Let us beware of playing at praying; it is insolence toward God.
I believe that nothing happens apart from divine determination and decree. We shall never be able to escape from the doctrine of divine predestination - the doctrine that God has foreordained certain people unto eternal life.
If Christ has died for me, ungodly as I am, without strength as I am, then I cannot live in sin any longer, but must arouse myself to love and serve Him who has redeemed me.
Must is a hard nut to crack, but it has a sweet kernel.
None are more unjust in their judgments of others than those who have a high opinion of themselves.
No one knows who is listening, say nothing you would not wish put in the newspapers.
I desire to press forward for direction to my Master in all things; but as to trusting to my own obedience and righteousness, I should be worse than a fool and ten times worse than a madman.
If you believe in prayer at all, expect God to hear you. If you do not expect, you will not have. God will not hear you unless you believe He will hear you; but if you believe He will, He will be as good as your faith.
Giving is true having.
We are in a wrong state of mind if we are not in a thankful state of mind.
In the same way the sun never grows weary of shining, nor a stream of flowing, it is God's nature to keep His promises. Therefore, go immediately to His throne and say, 'Do as You promised.'
Nothing reflects so much honor on a workman as a trial of his work and its endurance of it. So it is with God. It honors Him when His saints preserve their integrity.
Do I live as carelessly and worldly as unbelievers while professing to be a follower of Jesus? If so, I am exposing Christianity to ridicule and leading people to speak evil of the holy name by which I am called.
