"Salvation is of the LORD." -Jonah 2:9

" He will reprove the world of sin." -John 16:8 [KJV] Has the Spirit so convinced , so reproved you of sin, of the curse of the law of sin, of the wrath of God revealed against all sin; and of that sin of sins, unbelief, that whosoever lives and dies in, is under the wrath of God: so that you have fled for refuge to Jesus, and have taken shelter in His wounds, to be saved from all sin; then you are blessed: your soul is safe, your salvation is sure.  The Spirit has glorified the Redeemer in your eyes and to your heart. And Christ will glorify your soul with Him in His own kingdom. Is not the Spirit rightly styled the Comforter? Did He not act the part of a comforter, even in convincing of sin? What if your heart was broken and bled for sin, yet it was that you might be comforted with the love, and made joyful in the salvation of Jesus. But having thus convinced you of sin, and brought you to Christ for salvation, has the Spirit done with you? Is the work at an ...

"The Comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me." -Lamentations 1:16 [KJV] Whence is it, my soul, that those distressing thoughts arise? Pause, and inquire. Is the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, indeed withdrawn, when Jesus, thy Jesus, sweetly and graciously promised that He should abide for ever? This cannot be. Is the righteousness of Jesus less; or hath His blood to atone and cleanse, lost its efficacy? Oh no! Jesus' righteousness, and Jesus' all-atoning propitiation, like the almighty Author of both, must be eternally and everlastingly the same; "yesterday, and to-day, and for ever."   Hath God thy Father forgotten to be gracious? Oh no! God thy Father proclaimed from heaven that He is well pleased for His dear Son's righteousness' sake; and never, never, shall a word gone out of the Lord's mouth be altered. From whence then, my soul, is thy leanness, thy fears, and despondency? Canst thou not discover? Oh yes! It is all i...

"Woe to them that are at ease in Zion." -Amos 6:1 [KJV] John Bunyan says, in his plain, homely language: "A Christian man is never long at ease, When one fright's gone, another doth him seize."   Sin will never let him rest long, nor satan let him rest long, nor God let him rest long, nor his own fears let him rest long. He cannot be at ease till his conscience is purged with the blood of sprinkling; till his soul has been blest with a feeling sense and enjoyment of the love of God; till he has sweet manifestations of pardoning mercy, blessed revelations of Christ to his soul, with the voice and witness of the Spirit in his breast.  This is not the ease of Moab (Jeremiah 48:11) but the ease of which the Psalmist speaks when he says "His soul shall dwell at ease" (Psalm 25:13.) All ease but this is the sleep of the sluggard; carnal ease as opposed to spiritual. If then he drop into carnal ease, and for a time sin do not seem to plague, no...