Monthly Archives: March 2011

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Getting Wisdom

The Lord gives Wisdom
For the LORD gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding; he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path; for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul; (Pro 2:6-10 ESV)

Wisdom Through Faith
If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; (Jas 1:5-7 ESV)

The Lord is Wisdom
but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. (1Co 1:24 ESV)
And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, (1Co 1:30 ESV)

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When We Grieve The Spirit

Though the Spirit of God be given to believers, and worketh in them, yet believers themselves may do or omit such things as may obstruct the working, and obscure the very being of the Spirit of God in them. … He dealeth with us in his evidencing and comforting work, as we deal with him in point of tenderness and obedience to his dictates; there is a grieving, yea, there is a quenching of the Spirit by the lusts and corruptions of those hearts in which he dwelleth; and though he will not forsake his habitation, as a Spirit of sanctification, yet he may for a time desert it as a Spirit of consolation, Psal. 51:11.

- John Flavel, from The Method of Grace in The Gospel Redemption, volume 2 of Works, page 334

The Method of Grace is a series of 35 sermons preached by Flavel found in volume 2 of the collected works.

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God Never Changes His Mind

God never changes His mind with respect to what He has purposed to do. God’s purposes are eternal, all of them. He purposes nothing anew. He decreed infinite ages back every act and every event, little and great, that ever comes to pass. And these events don’t grow out of conceit of any of His old purposes, and by thinking more upon the matter. Nor does He ever add to His purposes. He purposes nothing anew. Men purpose and form resolutions as they find occasion; they mend their designs and form them more perfectly by thinking longer upon them. But it is not so with God.

It is not with God as it is with man. Although man may have amassed a great treasure of knowledge, yet he cannot have in actual view but a few things at the same moment. Though there may be many things treasured up in the memory, and the mind may have a habitual knowledge of them, yet it actually sees and thinks of what it knows but now and then. But God has all things, every moment, as in actual view. There is no succession in His thoughts. He doesn’t sometimes think of one thing and sometimes of another; but everything and every circumstance was perfectly in His understanding and before His mind in actual view from all eternity-and is so still without one moments intermission.

-Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), from a sermon entitled, God Never Changes His Mind [The Puritan Pulpit American Series: Jonathan Edwards; 2004, Soli Deo Gloria Publications]

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The Conference

The Ligonier 2011 National Conference started today in Orlando, FL. Thanks to a dear friend, I am able to attend. R.C. isn’t feeling too well but the conference has been great so far and the bookstore is AWESOME! I’ll post some pictures over the weekend. Looking forward to hearing Piper.

I heard (and saw) Tim -the blogging legend- Challies speak today. Tim is an interesting fellow. He has an i-phone implant and a super computer with a wireless server for a brain. Ok, obviously he does not have an i-phone implant.

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Longing For Deliverance

I have heard it said that getting people saved is easy; it’s the getting them lost that’s hard. People do not long for deliverance until they realize they are lost, and hopeless without deliverance. Longing for deliverance starts with conversion and continues throughout the Christian’s sojourn on earth, until we are delivered from this body of death. Longing for deliverance is not just a fruit of being a believer but as Owen said it ‘is a grace in itself.’ It is the very work of God and we know that He works all things together for our good. We, along with any good longing or affection in us, is the work of God according to His good pleasure. And He makes us to long for Him.

“Longing, breathing, and panting after deliverance is a grace in itself, that hath a mighty power to conform the soul into the likeness of the thing longed after. Hence the apostle, describing the repentance and godly sorrow of the Corinthians, reckons this as one eminent grace that was then set on work, ”Vehement desire,” 2 Cor. 7:11. And in this case of indwelling sin and the power of it, what frame doth he express himself to be in? Rom. 7:24. His heart breaks out with longings into a most passionate expression of desire of deliverance. Now, if this be the frame of saints upon the general consideration of indwelling sin, how is it to be heightened and increased when thereunto is added the perplexing rage and power of any particular lust and corruption! Assure thyself, unless thou longest for deliverance thou shalt not have it.”

-John Owen, from The Mortification of Sin in Believers, volume 6 of Works, page 59-60

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The End For Which God Gave Us A Being

Getting acquainted with Thomas Boston (1676-1732). I love how saturated with the concernment of the glory of God that his heart made evident through the medium of his writings. It is quotes like the one below that has caused me to seek counsel and instruction from the Puritans. I am blessed and reproved by their constant exultation of Christ; blessed to remember Christ and reproved when I forget Him, usually due to self-concern. Boston’s writings are passionate and they plead with us to make Christ our everything.

It is the disposition of a child of God, to submit his lot and condition in the world to the Lord, to be cut and carved as may serve his glory. Without this, one cannot be a child of God. For it is inseparable from the character of such an one, in whatever state he is, therewith to be content. Hence the apostle Paul could say, ‘As alway, so now also, Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death,’ Phil. 1:20.

It is the duty of all men to sanctify the holy name of God, to reverence, adore and honour it, in their hearts, lips, and lives. O! let us then be excited to the practice of this duty, considering that it is the end for which God gave us a being; that if we do not hallow it, we contradict this very petition, praying for a thing we have no mind to comply with; that if we live in the neglect of this duty, God will get honour to himself by inflicting heavy judgments upon us in this life, and by making us eternal monuments of his vengeance in the next; that when we come to encounter with the king of terrors, it will tend to sweeten the awful prospect, that we have made it our business to glorify the name of God; that we will loose nothing, but be great gainers, by honouring the name of the Lord; for they that do so shall be reckoned among his jewels, and be a royal diadem in the Lord’s hand; they shall be happy in death, and be safely conveyed to Immanuel’s land where glory dwells. Let us then make it the principal business of our lives to glorify God, that so we may come to enjoy him for ever.

-Thomas Boston, from A Body of Divinity, volume 2 of Works, page 570

(Also, The Works of Thomas Boston have just been added to the Free Puritan Works page for download in pdf format)

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More PDF Puritans!

If you make your way over to the Free Puritan Works page, you will see a few more authors have been added. Again, these are pdf copies of the books I have uploaded to the site. This is a great way to get acquainted with these authors before investing in hard copies, which of course I wholeheartedly encourage you to do. Nothing really can substitute reading a real book.

The new additions are as follows:

The Sermons of Charles H. Spurgeon, 19 volumes
The Works of David Clarkson, 3 volumes
The Letters of Samuel Rutherford, in one volume
The Works of Thomas Boston, 12 volumes

If there are any Puritans you would like to see added, please let me know. Happy reading!

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He Wages For The Soul

When a tyrant goes to dispossess a neighbouring prince of what is lawfully his own: the men that he employeth at arms to overcome, and get the land, they fight for half-crowns, and the like, and are content with their wages: But the tyrant is for the kingdom, nothing will serve him but the kingdom. This is the case: Men when they persecute, are for the stuff, but the devil is for the soul, nor will any thing less than that satisfy him. Let him then that is a sufferer ‘commit the keeping of his soul to God:’ lest stuff, and soul, and all be lost at once.

-John Bunyan, from Advice To Sufferers, volume 2 of Works, page 696