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

It makes the wounded spirit whole, And calms the troubled breast; 'Tis manna to the hungry soul, And to the weary rest. Dear Name! the Rock on which I build My Shield and Hiding-place; My never-failing Treasury fill'd With boundless stores of grace. By Thee my prayers acceptance gain, Although with sin defiled; Satan accuses me in vain, And I am own'd a child. Jesus! my Shepherd, Husband, Friend, My Prophet, Priest, and King; My Lord, my Life, my Way, my End, Accept the praise I bring. Weak is the effort of my heart, And cold my warmest thought; But when I see Thee as Thou art, I'll praise Thee as I ought. Till then I would Thy love proclaim With every fleeting breath; And may the music of Thy Name Refresh my soul in death! -preacher John Newton

"Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ." - I Peter 2:5 [KJV] God's people require many severe afflictions, harassing temptations, and many powerful exercises to hew them into anything like shape, to chisel them into any conformity to Christ's image. For they are not like the passive marble under the hands of the sculptor, which will submit without murmuring, and indeed without feeling, to have this corner chipped off, and that projecting angle rounded by the chisel; but God's people are living stones, and, therefore, feel every stroke. We are so tender-skinned that we cannot bear a thread of trouble to lie upon us, we shrink from even the touch of the probe. To be hewed, then, and squared, and chiselled by the hand of God into such shapes and forms as please Him, O what painful work it is!   But could the pillar know, could it tell what the sculptor w...

"It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in princes." -Psalm 118:8-9 [KJV] On true doctrine rests the worship of the true and living God. From error in doctrine springs the worship of a false god. There is a tendency among many religious people to undervalue true doctrine, to exalt morality at the expense of the character of God and the teachings of our Lord, and to deny the importance of a sound creed. I do not doubt that a sound creed has often covered an unsound life. But when I hear it said, "Such and such do not believe the doctrines of sovereign grace and substitution, but they love the Lord and are saved," I wonder and ask, "What then was the Bible written for?" Is it no infallible expression of the mind of God? Is it no standard of truth? Are we to believe what appeals to us and deny the rest? God forbid! God's Word declares the oneness of truth and condemns EVER...

"Accepted in the Beloved."   -Ephesians 1:6  [KJV] We are ever looking for something in self to make ourselves acceptable to God, and are often sadly cast down and discouraged when we cannot find that holiness, that obedience, that calm submission to the will of God, that serenity of soul, that spirituality and heavenly-mindedness which we believe to be acceptable in His sight. Our crooked tempers, fretful, peevish minds, rebellious thoughts, coldness, barrenness and death, our alienation from good, and headlong proneness to ill, with the daily feeling that we get no better but rather worse, make us think that God views us just as we view ourselves. And this brings on great darkness of mind and bondage of spirit, till we seem to lose sight of our acceptance in Christ, and get into the miserable dregs of self, almost ready to quarrel with God because we are so vile, and only get worse as we get older.   Now the more we get into these dregs of self, and the more we keep...

"The doctrine of free and sovereign grace is rather an encouragement to awakened and brokenhearted sinners than otherwise. If you are most unworthy of mercy and destitute of every plea, should you not be glad to hear that the Lord does not expect worthiness in those whom He saves; but that He Himself has provided the only plea by which He will accept us and a plea which cannot be overruled – the righteousness and mediation of His well-beloved Son? None are so bad but the gospel affords them a ground of hope; none are so good as to have any just ground of hope without it." -preacher John Newton

We won't make much headway in finding a solution if we do not understand the problem. A cure is not likely to be found if we have no knowledge of the disease. In the matter of salvation the problem is man's sin; the solution is God's grace. The disease is moral depravity and spiritual inability; the remedy is God's mercy in Christ. If a man is near-sighted, he only needs corrective glasses but if he is blind, he needs the miracle of sight! If a man is sick, he only needs medicinal aid, but if he is dead, he needs the miracle of life! If man has only strayed from the way, he needs directions, but if he is completely lost, he needs to be found! Here is the question to be settled by preachers and people 'What happened in the garden?' When one feels obliged to come to some conclusions on the subjects of election, irresistible grace and particular redemption, it would be wise for him to first determine the condition of the sinner who is to be saved. If a man was o...

"Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet: and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding place." -Isaiah 28:17  [KJV] Wherever God the Holy Ghost begins and carries on a work of grace in the heart, He will weigh up, and mete out, from time to time, all a man's religion and try every inch of the way whether it lies straight and level with the word and will of God. Depend upon it the Lord who "weigheth the spirits" (Prov erbs 16:2) , and by whom "actions are weighed" ( I Sam uel 2:3) , will put into his righteous and unerring scales both nature and grace, both human and divine teaching, and make us know which is full weight in heaven's court. The religion of the present day is too much to confuse everything of an experimental nature; to cover and obscure the work of grace in the heart.   But there can be no question that God will never suffer our religion, if, indeed...