Amy Carmichael

Someone gave me a bit of brick and a little slab of marble from Rome. It was wonderful to touch one of them and think, Perhaps the Apostle Paul or one of the martyrs touched this as they passed. But how much more wonderful is it to think that we have, for our own use, the very same sword our Lord used when the Devil attacked Him. [Brooke Foss] Westcott says "The Word of God" in Ephesians 6:17 means "a definite utterance of God". We know these "definite utterances" - we have the same Book that He had, and we can do as He did. So let us learn the "definite utterances" that they may be ready in our minds; ready for use at the moment of need - our sword which never grows dull and rusty, but is always keen and bright. So once more I say, let us not expect defeat but victory. Let us take fast hold and keep fast hold of our sword, and we shall win in any assault of the enemy.

Jessie Penn-Lewis

The believer's death with Christ upon His Cross therefore means being crucified to the world in all its aspects. Not to be a miserable, joyless person, but one filled with the joy and glory of another world. It is not the "cross" that makes us miserable, but the absence of it. It is a delivering Cross - a Cross that liberates you to have the very foretaste of heaven in you, as already sharers of the power of the age to come.... Glory to God for the Cross that severs us from the world, and the world-spirit, and makes a way for us into another world where all is peace and joy and love.
http://www.worldinvisible.com/library/jessiepenn-lewis/8791/8791tc.htm

Alan Redpath

If I disobey the inner voice of His Spirit, I will lose the fullness. I can never lose the relationship, but I will lose the fullness. When there's disobedience in the Christian life the fullness ceases. He is there but He is grieved. And you soon know when you've lost the fullness, because the joy is gone. The fellowship is gone. The reality of the presence of Christ is gone. It's Satan's delight to tell me that once he's got me, he will keep me. But at that moment I can go back to Him. And I know that if I confess my sins, God is faithful and just to forgive me.
http://www.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/GUIDES/238.htm

Jean Ingelow

There are often bound to us, in the closest intimacy of social or family ties, natures hard and ungenial, with whom sympathy is impossible, and whose daily presence necessitates a constant conflict with an adverse influence. There are, too, enemies, - open or secret, - whose enmity we may feel yet cannot define. Our Lord, going before us in this hard way, showed us how we should walk. It will be appropriate to the solemn self-examination of the period of Lent to ask ourselves, Is there any false friend or covert enemy whom we must learn to tolerate, to forbear with, to pity and forgive?
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/jean-ingelow

Phillips Brooks

You must learn, you must let God teach you, that the only way to get rid of your past is to make a future out of it. God will waste nothing.

Richard J. Foster

Our problem is that we assume prayer is something to master the way we master algebra or auto mechanics. That puts us in the "on-top" position, where we are competent and in control. But when praying, we come "underneath," where we calmly and deliberately surrender control and become incompetent... The truth of the matter is, we all come to prayer with a tangled mass of motives altruistic and selfish, merciful and hateful, loving and bitter. Frankly, this side of eternity we will never unravel the good from the bad, the pure from the impure. God is big enough to receive us with all our mixture. That is what grace means, and not only are we saved by it, we live by it as well. And we pray by it.
http://www.quakerinfo.com/foster.shtml

Author Unknown

When life knocks you to your knees, and it will, why, get up! If it knocks you to your knees again, as it will, well, isn't that the best position from which to pray?

John MacArthur

The cost of true greatness is humble, selfless, sacrificial service. The Christian who desires to be great and first in the kingdom is the one who is willing to serve in the hard place, the uncomfortable place, the lonely place, the demanding place, the place where he is not appreciated and may even be persecuted. Knowing that time is short and eternity is long, he is willing to spend and be spent. He is willing to work for excellence without becoming proud, to withstand criticism without becoming bitter, to be misjudged without becoming defensive, and to withstand suffering without succumbing to self pity.
http://www.gty.org/

John Baillie

Dear Father, take this day's life into Thine own keeping. Control all my thoughts and feelings. Direct all my energies. Instruct my mind. Sustain my will. Take my hands and make them skilful to serve Thee. Take my feet and make them swift to do Thy bidding. Take my eyes and keep them fixed upon Thine everlasting beauty. Take my mouth and make it eloquent in testimony to Thy love. Make this day a day of obedience, a day of spiritual joy and peace. Make this day's work a little part of the work of the Kingdom of my Lord Christ, in whose name these my prayers are said. Amen.
http://www.baillie.lib.ed.ac.uk/biog/2361.html

William Gurnall

Furnish thyself with arguments from the promises to enforce thy pravers, and make them prevalent with God. The promises are the ground of faith, and faith, when strengthened, will make thee fervent, and such fervency ever speeds and returns with victory out of the field of prayer...The mightier any is in the Word, the more mighty he will be in prayer.