Awe of God

“ God heals all our Atheism, by the knowledge of himself, and of Jesus Christ whom he hath sent; by giving us faith, a divine evidence and conviction of God and of the things of God: in particular, of this important truth, Christ loved me, and gave himself for me. By repentance and lowliness of heart, the deadly disease of pride is healed: that of self-will by resignation, a meek and thankful submission to the will of God. And for the love of the world in all its branches, the love of God is the sovereign remedy. ”

“ The happiness of seeing God is promised to those, and those only, who are pure in heart. None but the pure are capable of seeing God, nor would it be a felicity to the impure. What pleasure could an unsanctified soul take in the vision of a holy God? ”

“ But have I made you understand that it really is possible for one who has apprehended even imperfectly the illimitable extent of the goodness of Christ and the divine nature of that goodness, to feel heartily and sincerely that, of all things in heaven and earth and in the waters under the earth, the goodness and power and wisdom of God in Christ are the fittest objects for our love, our trust and our reverence, in other words, for our worship? ”

“ We must have the love that brings the humility and self-sacrifice of Jesus. Don't let us put in the first place the gifts we may possess; if we do, we shall have very little blessing. But we should seek, in the first place, that the Spirit of God should come as a light and power of holiness from the indwelling Jesus. Let the first work of the Holy Spirit be to humble you deep down in the very dust, so that your whole life shall be a tender, broken-hearted waiting on God, in the consciousness of mercy coming from above. ”

“ O ye suffering ones! all ye whom the Father is chastening! come and see Jesus suffering, giving up His will, being made perfect, sanctifying Himself. His suffering is the secret of His Holiness, of His Glory, of His Life. Will you not thank God for anything that can admit you into the nearer fellowship of your blessed Lord? Shall we not accept every trial, great or small, as the call of His love to be one with Himself in living only for God’s will. This is Holiness, to be one with Jesus as He does the will of God, to abide in Jesus who was made perfect through suffering. ”

“ We are to ‘worship Him in the beauty of holiness,’ ‘to sing praise at the remembrance of His Holiness;’ it is only in the spirit of worship and praise and joy that we fully can know God as holy. Much more, it is only under the inspiration of adoring love and joy that we can ourselves be made holy. It is as we cease from all fear and anxiety, from all strain and effort, and rest with singing in what Jesus is in His finished work as our sanctification, as we rest and rejoice in Him, that we shall be made partakers of His Holiness. ”

“ And as we begin to know Him in His infinite righteousness, in His fiery burning zeal against all that is sin, and His infinite self-sacrificing love to free the sinner from his sin, and to bring him to His own perfection, we shall learn to wonder at and worship this glorious God, to feel and deplore our terrible unlikeness to Him, to long and cry for some share in the Divine beauty and blessedness of this Holiness. ”

“ What mark, then, of our possessing no love of God can equal this, that we are without love to Jesus Christ?—that neither the visibility of His divine excellence, nor His participation of all our human sufferings, can reach our hearts and command our affections?
In examining whether you love God, examine how you are affected by His benefits. These are so numerous and so distinguished that they ought to excite our most ardent gratitude: night and day they are experienced by us; they pervade every moment of our being. ”

“ I never seemed to be so unhinged from myself, and to be so wholly devoted to God. My heart was swallowed up in God most of the day. In the evening I had such a view of the soul’s being enlarged, to contain more holiness; that my soul seemed ready to separate from my body, to obtain it. I then wrestled in an agony for divine blessings; and had my heart drawn out in prayer for some Christian friends, beyond what I ever had before.—I feel differently now from whatever I did under any sweet enjoyments before; more engaged to live to God for ever. ”

“ If you want to understand the reason, look at God, and look at man. Look at God. Who is God? The great Being for whom alone the universe exists; in whom alone it can have its happiness. It came from Him. It can not find any rest or joy but in Him. Oh, that Christians understood and believed that God is a fountain of happiness, perfect, everlasting blessedness! What would the result be? Every Christian would say, "The more I can have of God, the happier. The more of God's will, and the more of God's love, and the more of God's fellowship, the happier." ”

“ But the Christian feels his love of God excited by every fresh goodness. The mercies of God have accompanied you through every stage of your journey; and they are exhibited to you in His word as stretching through a vast eternity. Are these the only benefits you can receive without gratitude, and suffer to pass unregarded How, then, can any love of God dwell in your bosom? ”

“ This was some time before his sufferings in the garden. But while we admire his outward beauty as man, what vast beauty possessed his mind—wisdom, prudence, chastity, holiness, zeal, understanding, faith, hope, love, and joy; in the principle—mercy, commiseration, pity, affection, patience, gratitude, and fidelity. Look at his actions, and they all correspond with the holy principles of his mind, and this holy nature was the image of God, the exemplar pattern and likeness of the new man of grace in the souls of God’s children ”

“ Some may think one way more excellent, and some another. But the thing is, to live in the will of God. For some months past, when I have been peculiarly devoted to this, I have felt such a guidance of his Spirit, and the unction which I have received from the Holy One, has so taught me of all things, that I needed not any man should teach me, save as this anointing teacheth.”
“When you speak upon acquaintance with Jesus, it is food to the soul. And when you preach of devotedness to God, and living to him, it is the joy of one’s heart.” ”

“ Yet another is, Their advance in holiness; holiness of heart and holiness of conversation: the latter naturally resulting from the former; for a good tree will bring forth good fruit. And all inward holiness is the immediate fruit of the faith that worketh by love. By this the blessed Spirit purifies the heart from pride, self-will, passion; from love of the world, from foolish and hurtful desires, from vile and vain affections. Beside that sanctified afflictions have (thro’ the grace of God) an immediate and direct tendency to holiness. ”

“ And the Christian life has suffered loss, where believers have not been distinctly guided to see that, even in our relation as creatures, nothing is more natural and beautiful and blessed than to be nothing, that God may be all; or where it has not been made clear that it is not sin that humbles most, but grace, and that it is the soul, led through its sinfulness to be occupied with God in His wonderful glory as God, as Creator and Redeemer, that will truly take the lowest place before Him. ”

“ And therefore all the blessing and deliverance from sin, that ever happened to any one from any kind or degree of faith, and application to Christ, is sure to be had from this state of heart, which stands continually turned to him in a desire of being led and governed by his spirit of patience, meekness, humility and resignation to God. O Theogenes, could I help you to perceive what a good there is in this state of heart, you would desire it with more eagerness, that the thirsty hart desireth the water-brooks, you would think of nothing, desire nothing, but constantly to live in it. ”

“ What may make me more to love mine even-Christians than to see in God that He loveth all that shall be saved as it were all one soul?
For in every soul that shall be saved is a Godly Will that never assented to sin, nor ever shall. ”

“ Why does not such love make me hate those sins which grieve him, and hide him from my sight? I sometimes make vain resolutions, in my own strength, that I will think of God. Reason, and scripture, and experience, teach me that such a life is happiness and holiness; that by ‘beholding his glory,’ I should be changed ‘into his image, from glory to glory,’ and be freed from those anxieties which make me unhappy: and that, every motive to duty being strong, obedience would be easy. ”

“ Beloved, if thou hast this hope in thyself, purify thyself as he is pure. While thou beholdest what manner of love the Father hath given thee, that thou shouldst be called a child of God: cleanse thyself from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God: and let all thy thoughts, words, and works be a spiritual sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God through Christ Jesus! ”

“ Our text to-day reveals a new and specially beautiful feature of the Divine Holiness in its relation to the individual. The High and Lofty One, whose name is Holy, and whose only fit dwelling-place is eternity, He looks to the man who is of a humble and contrite heart; with him will He dwell. God’s Holiness is His condescending Love. As it is a [p118] consuming fire against all who exalt themselves before Him, it is to the spirit of the humble like the shining of the sun, heart-reviving and life-giving. ”

“ If, in our study of the pathway of Holiness, there has been awakened in us the desire to accept and adore, and stand complete in, all the will of God, let us in the very first place seek to recognise that will in everything that comes on us. The sin of him who vexes us is not God’s will. ”

“ It is only as we know the Holiness of God as Fire, and bow before His righteous judgment, that we can appreciate the preciousness of the blood or the reality of the redemption. As long as we only think of the love of God as goodness, we may aim at being good; faith in God who redeems will waken in us the need and the joy of being holy in Christ. ”

“ By the grace of God is sometimes to be understood, that free love, that unmerited mercy, by which I a sinner, thro’ the merits of Christ, am now reconciled to God. But in this place it rather means, that power of God the Holy Ghost, which worketh in us both to will and to do, of his good pleasure. As soon as ever the grace of God, in the former sense, his pardoning love is manifested to our soul, the grace of God, in the latter sense, the power of his Spirit, takes place therein. And now we can perform, thro’ God, what to man was impossible. ”

“ Believer, claim in faith the death and the life of Jesus as thine. Enter in His grave into the rest from self and its work—the rest of God. With Christ, who committed His spirit into the Father's hands, humble thyself and descend each day into that perfect, helpless dependence upon God. God will raise thee up and exalt thee. ”

“ And if the Holiness of God is to become ours, to rest upon us, and enter into us, there must be, without ceasing, the holy fear that trembles at the thought of grieving the infinite sensitiveness of this Holy One by our sins, and yet side by side, and in perfect harmony with it, the deep longing to behold the Beauty of the Lord, an admiration of its Divine glory, and a joyful surrender to be His alone. ”

“ There are moments in our lives big with the issues of our future. God's purposes concerning the soul have a certain order. He gives one grace; if we correspond to that He gives another; if we do not correspond, we lose those that depended on it; sometimes, even, we lose our salvation altogether. This is the key of your destiny—fidelity to grace. You have an inspiration from God: He speaks to your soul. Oh, listen to Him, and obey Him! To one He says: "Abandon, O sinner, your evil life, and turn to Me with all your heart." "Now is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation!" ”

“ Do you thirst for holiness? Do you follow after holiness? Do you prize it above all prosperity and worldly greatness? Do you hate every sin, and long to be rid of it as your most irksome burden, and use all God’s means against it as far as you know them? If it be thus with you, Christ hath set his stamp upon your hearts, and hath set you as a seal upon his heart. ”

“ Tit. 2:12, 13 Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world, looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ. ”

“ As such the Divine will manifests itself in two modes—in its pure love as Goodness, in its holy harmony as Righteousness. These two do not exist separately, but permeate each other in reciprocal immanence, just as God in His Holiness is love, and in His love is holiness. In goodness the Divine love shows itself as the pleasure in well-being. ”

“ Let the discovery of the lack of this grace stir us to larger expectation from God. Let us look upon every brother who tries or vexes us, as God's means of grace, God's instrument for our purification, for our exercise of the humility Jesus our Life breathes within us. And let us have such faith in the All of God, and the nothing of self, that, as nothing in our own eyes, we may, in God's power, only seek to serve one another in love. ”