In yesterday’s devotion I shared a little bit of the biography and quotations of this great man of God. Today I would like to post some additional inspirational quotations from J. C. Ryle that I pray will encourage your soul and challenge you to draw closer to Christ.1
“Just as the telescope and microscope show us that there is order and design in all the works of God’s hand, from the greatest planet down to the least insect, so does the Bible teach us that there is wisdom, order, and design in all the events of our daily life. There is no such thing as ‘chance’, ‘luck’, or ‘accident’ in the Christian journey through this world.”
“The eye of God! Think of that. Everywhere, in every house, in every field, in every room, in every company, alone or in a crowd, the eye of God is always upon you.”
“We know but little of true Christianity, if we don’t feel a deep concern about the souls of unconverted people.”
“Do something, by God’s help, to make heaven more full and hell more empty.”
“It is not always those who have the most eminent gifts who are the most successful laborers for God. It is generally those who keep up closest communion with Christ and are most constant in prayer.”
“Let us read our Bibles reverently and diligently, with an honest determination to believe and practice all we find in them.”
“Be very sure of this,-people never reject the Bible because they cannot understand it. They understand it only too well; they understand that it condemns their own behavior; they understand that it witnesses against their own sins, and summons them to judgment.”
“How can we love sin, when we remember that because of our sins Jesus died?”
“Take away the cross of Christ, and the Bible is a dark book.”
“There is more to be learned at the foot of the Cross than anywhere else in the world.”
“Prayer is the mightiest weapon that God has placed in our hands.”
“Look to the cross, think of the cross, meditate on the cross, and then go and set your affections on the world if you can.”
“Christ’s death is the Christian’s life. Christ’s cross is the Christian’s title to heaven. Christ ‘lifted up’ and put to shame on Calvary is the ladder by which Christians ‘enter into the holiest,’ and are at length landed in glory.”
“There are few professing Christians, it may be feared, who strive to imitate Christ in the matter of private devotion. There is abundance of hearing, reading, talking, professing, visiting, contributing to the poor and teaching at schools. But is there, together with all this, a due proportion of private prayer? Are believing men and women sufficiently careful to be frequently alone with God?”
“Never let us be guilty of sacrificing any portion of truth on the altar of peace.”
“The temple in which the Lord Jesus delights most, is a broken and contrite heart, renewed by the Holy Spirit.”
“We have the truth and we need not be afraid to say so.”
“People may refuse to see the truth of our arguments, but they cannot evade the evidence of a holy life.”
“I want people to fill their minds with passages of Scripture while they are well and strong, that they may have sure help in the day of need. I want them to be diligent in studying their Bibles, and becoming familiar with its contents, in order that the grand old Book may stand by them and talk with them when all earthly friends fail.”
“The first step towards attaining a higher standard of holiness is to realize more fully the amazing sinfulness of sin.”
“Health is a good thing; but sickness is far better, if it leads us to God.”
“Churches may decay and perish; riches may make themselves wings and fly away-but he who builds their happiness on Christ crucified and union with Him by faith, that person is standing on a foundation which shall never be moved, and will know something of true peace.”
“Next to praying there is nothing so important in practical religion as Bible reading. By reading that book we may learn what to believe, what to be, and what to do; how to live with comfort, and how to die in peace. Happy is that man who possesses a Bible! Happier still is he who reads it! Happiest of all is he who not only reads it, but obeys it, and makes it the rule of his faith and practice!”
“If Christianity is a mere invention of man, and the Bible is not from God, how can infidels explain Jesus Christ? His existence in history they cannot deny. How is it that without force or bribery, without arms or money, He has made such an immensely deep mark on the world as He certainly has?”
“Surely if there be any habit which your own hand and eye should help in forming, it is the habit of prayer.”
1 All of these quotations below are from the following website:
TOP 25 QUOTES BY J. C. RYLE (of 374) | A-Z Quotes (azquotes.com)