Thomas Wilcox

“ Remember all the patterns of grace that are in heaven. Thou thinkest, Oh! what a monument of grace wouldst thou be! There are many thousands as rich monuments as thou canst be. The greatest sinner did never pass the grace of Christ. Do not despair: Hope still; when the clouds are blackest, even then look toward Christ, the standing pillar of the Father’s love and grace set up in heaven for all sinners to gaze upon continually. Whatsoever Satan or conscience say, do not conclude against thyself, Christ shall have the last word. ”

“ Nature can afford no balsam fit for the cure of a soul. Healing from duty and not from Christ, is the most desperate disease. Poor ragged nature, with all its highest improvements, can never spin a garment fine enough to cover the soul's nakedness. Nothing is fit for that use but Christ's perfect righteousness.
Whatever is of nature's putting on, Satan will come and plunder it, and leave the soul naked and upon to the wrath of God. All that nature can do will never make up the least dram of grace that can mortify sin, or look Christ in the face one day. ”

“ It it is easy to profess Christ with the mouth; but to confess him with the heart, as Peter, to be the Christ, the Son of the living God, the alone Mediator; that is above flesh and blood. Many call Christ a Saviour; few know him so. To see grace and salvation in Christ, is the greatest sight in the world; none can do thar, but at the same time they shall see that glory and salvation to be theirs. Sights will cause applications. I may be ashamed to think, in the midst of so much profession, that I have known little of the blood of Christ, which is the main thing of the gospel. ”

“ Think every thing better than thyself, and carry every self-loathing about thee, as one fit to be trampled upon by all saints. See the vanity of the world, and the consumption that is upon all things, and love nothing but Christ. Mourn to see so little of Christ in the world, so few needing him. Trifles please them better. To a secure soul Christ is but a fable, the Scriptures but a story. Mourn to think how many under baptism and church order, that are not under grace; looking much after duty and obedience, but little after Christ, little versed in grace. ”

“ That is a terrible point to nature, which cannot think of being stript of all, not having a rag of duty or righteousness left to look at. Self-righteousness and self-sufficiency are the darlings of nature, which she preserves as her life; that makes Christ seem ugly to nature, nature cannot define him; he is just directly opposite to all nature’s glorious interests. Let nature but make a gospel, and it would make it quite contrary to Christ. ”

“ If thou believest, thou must every day renounce thy obedience, thy sanctification, thy duties, thy graces, thy tears, thy meltings, thy humblings, and nothing but Christ must be held up; thou must take all out of God's hand. Christ is the gift of God; faith is the gift of God. ”

“ Set the broken disjointed bones with the grace of the gospel. High professor, despise not weak saints; thou mayest come to wish to be in the condition of the meanest of them. Overlook the infirmities of others, but be sensible of thy own. Visit sick beds and deserted souls much, they are excellent scholars in experience.
Abide in your calling, be dutiful to all relations as to the Lord. Be content with little of the world, little will serve. Think every little of the earth much, because unworthy the least. Think much of heaven not too little, because Christ is so rich and free. ”

“ God will look at nothing but Christ, and thou must look at nothing else. Christ is lifted on high, as the brazen serpent in the wilderness, that sinners at the ends of the earth, at the greatest distance may see him, and look towards him. ”

“ That opinion of free will, so cried up, will be easily confuted, as it in in the scripture, in the heart, who hath made any spiritual dealing with Jesus Christ, as to the application of his merits, and subjection to his righteousness. Christ is every-way too magnificent a person for a poor nature to; close withal, or to apprehend. Christ is so infinitely holy, nature can never believe him to be such, when it lies under full sight of sin. Christ is too high and glorious for nature so much as to touch. ”

“ Glorious professor, thou shalt be winnowed; every vein of thy profession will be tried to purpose. It is terrible to have it all come tumbling down, and to find nothing but it to bottom upon.
Soaring professor, see to thy waxen wings betimes, which will melt with the heat of temptations. What a misery is it to trade much, and break at length, and have no stock, no foundation laid for eternity in thy soul! ”

“ Christ foiled Satan with; in all the scripture there is not an ill word against a poor sinner stript of his own righteousness; nay, plainly points this man for the grace of the gospel and none alse. Believe but Christ's willingness, and that will make thee willing. If thou find thou cannot believe, remember it is Christ's work to make thee believe. Put him upon it. He works to will and to do; mourn for thy unbelief, which is setting up guilt above Christ, an undervaluing Christ, accounting his blood an unholy, a common and unsatisfying thing. ”

“ Ah, how nature storms, frets, and rageth at this, that all is of gift, and it can purchase nothing with its actings, and duties; that all workings are excluded, and of no value in heaven; that all must be of sovereign grace and unmerited free love and favour!
If nature had been to contrive the way of salvation, it would rather have put it in the hands of saints or angels, to sell it, than of Christ (who gives freely) whom therefore it suspects ”

“ Thou hast seen Christ all, and thyself absolutely nothing, who makest Christ all thy life and are dead to all righteousness besides? Thou art the Christian, one highly beloved, and who hath found favour with God, a favourite of heaven. ”

“ None but the self justified stands excluded from the gospel; Christ will look at the most abominable sinner before him, because to such an one Christ cannot be made justification; he is no sinner. To say in compliment, I am a sinner, is easy; but to pray with the publican, Lord, be merciful to me a sinner, is indeed the hardest prayer in the world. It is easy to say, I believe in Christ; but to see Christ full of grace and truth, out of whose fulness thou mayest receive grace for grace ”

“ Do not argue with Satan, he desires no better, bid him go to Christ and he will answer him; it is his office to be our advocate, his office to answer the law as our surety, his office to answer justice as our Mediator, he is sworn to that office; put Chrift upon it; if thou wilt do any thing thy self to give satisfaction for sin, thou renouncest Christ the righteous. ”

“ Christ's infinite satisfadion, not thy sanctification, must be thy justification before God. When the Lord shall appear terrible out of his holy place, fire shall consume that as hay and stubble. This will be found religion, only to bottom all upon the everlasting mountains of God’s love and grace in Christ, to live continually in the sight of Christ’s infinite righteousness and merits,they are sanctifying, without them the heart is carnal, and in those sights to see the full vileness, yet littleness of sin, and to see all pardoned ”

“ Bless God for shaking off false foundations, and for any way whereby he keeps the soul awakened and looking after Christ; better sickness and temptations, than security and slightness.
A slighty spirit will turn a profane spirit, and will sin and pray too. Slightness is the bane of profession, if it be not rooted out of the heart, by constant and serious dealings with, and beholdings of Christ in duties; it will grow more strong and more deadly, by being under church-ordinances.
Measure not thy grace by other attainments, but by Scripture-trials. ”

“ If thou hast seen Christ truly, thou has seen pure grace, pure righteousness in him every way infinite, far exceeding all sin an misery? It thou hast seen Christ, tho canst trample upon all righteousness of me and angels, so as to bring thee into acceptation with God. If thou hast seen Christ thou wouldst not do a duty without him for ten thousand worlds, 1 Cor. ”

“ Christ will be a pure Redeemer and Mediator, and thou must be an undone sinner, or Christ and thou wilt never agree. It is the hardest thing in the world to take Christ alone for righteousness; that is to acknowledge him Christ. Join any thing to him of thy own, and thou un-Christ him. ”

“ Keep always an humble, empty, and broken frame of heart, sensible of any spiritual miscarriage observant of all inwards workings, and fit for the highest communications. Keep not guilt in the conscience, but apply the blood of Christ immediately. God chargeth sin and guilt upon thee, to make thee look to Christ the brazen serpent. ”

“ There must be a divine nature first put into the soul, to make it lay hold on him, he lies so infinitely beyond the sight or reach of corrupt nature.
That Christ which natural free-will can apprehend, is but a natural Christ of man’s own making, not the Father’s Christ, nor Jesus the son of the living God, to whom nonc can come without the Father’s drawing, John vi. ”

“ Sin will hinder from glory in the cross of Christ; omitting little truths against light, may breed hell in the conscience; as well as committing the greatest sins against light. If thou hast been taken out of the belly of hell into Christ’s bosom, and made to sit among princes in the household of God. ”