John Armstrong

“ I scarcely know how to fast; I shrink from this cross; I behold so few fasting that I excuse myself through the general neglect, or soften the interpretation of Thy words. I desire to amend, to practise abstinence in things allowed, that from things not allowed I may the more easily abstain, that I may have a more docile and obedient will, that in great matters I may the more easily resist the motions of the flesh. ”

“ Give my household grace to live soberly and strictly, that the ministry be not blamed, and that mine may be a household fearing Thee. Make my wife, children, servants, all under me or given to my charge, self-denying and devout, that they may thus help me in the ministry, and so help the salvation of this flock. May we live as a house, that has renounced the world. “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Teach us to serve Thee more and more, and to deny ourselves, and to walk by faith, and to love the things of the Spirit, and to cast out hence the spirit of the world. ”

“ When I wake up, before all things let me remember Thy Cross, that bitter tree of Thy death, that sweet tree of our life, the place of Thy shame and of our hope, where Thou wast delivered to death, and we freed from death, where Thou didst die, and whence we did begin to live, whereon Thou didst suffer, and wherein we glory. ”

“ As, according to the liberty of the Gospel, Thou hast not commanded us, Lord, in the particulars of our fasts, teach me to choose such modes and degrees of abstinence as may best serve to godliness and the subjection of self. As I now fall short in this duty, so keep me from all excess to the hurt of bodily health or of my usefulness. Keep me both from formal fasting and from thinking much of it, and also from being ashamed to confess that I fast.
Enable me also, O Lord, to take up the cross of almsgiving and to rejoice therein. I should take from myself and bestow upon the poor ”

“ Make this, through the in-dwelling of the Holy Ghost, a house of peace, and prayer, and love. Knit us together in most holy love, love most spiritual, love like unto Thine own, not worldly affection, but that which is eternal. ”

“ Thy Priests should oppose softness by strictness, self-indulgence by self-denial, sumptuousness by simplicity in their living. Surely we are bound to give an example of strictness: strict preaching with easy living. Gospel doctrine with worldly conversation, much speaking of the mortified spirit with much intercourse with the worldly-minded, and fellowship with them in their pleasures and mode of life, will cause the world to misbelieve our words, and to accept our practices. ”

“ Teach me so to give unto the hungry, and the thirsty, and the stranger, and the naked, and the widow, and the fatherless, and the captive, as though I saw Thee an hungered, and thirsty, and naked, and sick, and in prison ”