J. C. Ryle

Prayer is the very life-breath of true Christianity.

Without a thorough conviction of sin, men may seem to come to Jesus and follow Him for a season, but they will soon fall away and return to the world.

The Christianity that saves is a thing personally grasped, personally experienced, personally felt and personally possessed.

True Christianity is not merely believing a certain set of dry abstract propositions: it is to live in daily personal communication with an actual living person - Jesus Christ.

The harvest of the Lord’s field is seldom ripened by sunshine only. It must go through its days of wind, rain and storm.

However corrupt our hearts, and however wicked our past lives, there is hope for us in the Gospel.

Sicknesses, losses, crosses, anxieties and disappointments seem absolutely needful to keep us humble, watchful and spiritual-minde d. They are as needful as the pruning knife to the vine and the refiner’s furnace to the gold.

Trials are intended to make us think, to wean us from the world, to send us to the Bible, to drive us to our knees.

The standard of the world, and the standard of the Lord Jesus, are indeed widely different. They are more than different. They are flatly contradictory one to the other.

A Christian is a walking sermon. They preach far more than a minister does, for they preach all week long.

Since Satan can't destroy the gospel, he has too often neutralized its usefulness by addition, subtraction or substitution.

The Gospel was not meant merely to reside in our intellect, memories, and tongues, but to be seen in our lives.

If you want to find out how much someone loves you, find out how much they pray for you.

Examine your own hearts. Do you see there any habit or custom which you know is wrong in the sight of God? If you do, don't delay for a moment in attacking it. Resolve at once to lay it aside. Nothing darkens the eyes of the mind so much, and deadens the conscience so surely, as an allowed sin. It may be a little one, but it is not any less dangerous.

Love should be the silver thread that runs through all your conduct. Kindness, gentleness, long suffering, forbearance, patience, sympathy, a willingness to enter into childish troubles, a readiness to take part in childish joys, - these are the cords by which a child may be led most easily, - these are the clues you must follow if you would find the way to his heart.

To be prayerless is to be without God, without Christ, without grace, without hope, and without heaven.

Never does a person see any beauty in Christ as a Savior, until they discover that they are a lost and ruined sinner.

Fear not because your prayer is stammering, your words feeble, and your language poor. Jesus can understand you.

A true Christian is one who has not only peace of conscience, but war within. He may be known by his warfare as well as by his peace.

There is a common, worldly kind of Christianity in this day, which many have, and think they have enough-a cheap Christianity which offends nobody, and requires no sacrifice-which costs nothing, and is worth nothing.