William Gurnall Quotes

Above all sins, guard against bold or arrogant ones. You are not beyond the danger of such. If caught in the web of presumptuous sin, call quickly to God for help. If you hesitate, you only give Satan time to entangle you more tightly. But if you cry out to God in true repentance, He will come at once to rescue you. The sooner you yield to the Spirit, the less damage is done to your soul.

The Christian in prayer comes up close to God, with a humble boldness of faith, and takes hold of him, wrestles with him; yea, will not let him go without a blessing ... They are only a few noble-spirited souls, who dare take heaven by force, that are fit for this calling.

Least doers are the greatest boasters.

Christ is the door that opens into God's presence and lets the soul into His very bosom, faith is the key that unlocks the door; but the Spirit is He that makes this key.

Count on the strength of your own godly attributes, and you will grow lax in your duties for Christ. Knowing you are weak keeps you from wandering too far from Him. When you see that your own cupboard is bare and everything you need is in His, you will go often to Him for supplies. But a soul who thinks he can take care of himself will say, "I have plenty and to spare for a long time. Let the doubting soul pray; my faith is strong. Let the weak go to God for help; I can manage fine on my own." What a sad state of affairs, to suppose that we no longer need the moment-by-moment sustaining grace of God.
Not only does overestimating the strength of our own goodness make us shun God's help, but it also makes us foolhardy and venturesome. You who boast about your spirituality are likely to put yourselves in all kinds of dangerous situations, then brag that you can handle them.

To forsake sin, is to leave it without any thought reserved of returning to it again.

Sometimes, perhaps, thou hearest another pray with much freedom and fluency, whilst thou canst hardly get out a few broken words. Hence thou art ready to accuse thyself and admire him, as if the gilding of the key made it open the door the better.

Bid faith look through the key-hole of the promise, and tell thee what it sees there laid up for him that overcomes; bid it listen and tell thee whether it cannot hear the shout of those crowned saints, as of those that are dividing the spoil, and receiving the reward of all their services and sufferings here on earth.

We are justified, not by giving anything to God,
what we do,
but by receiving from God, what Christ hath done for us.

We live by faith, and faith lives by exercise.

For a beggar to live at court is not so much as the King to dwell with him in his cottage.

We must come to good works by faith, and not to faith by good works.

We must not confide in the armour of God, but in the God of this armour, because all our weapons are only mighty through God.

Many think they shall not pay so dear for an error in judgment as for a sin in practice. Yea, some have such a latitude, that they fancy a man may be saved in any religion -

Blind zeal is soon put to a shameful retreat, while holy resolution, built on fast principles, lifts up its head like a rock in the midst of the waves.

God is almighty to pardon, but He will not use His power for a shameless sinner. He is able to save and help in time of need, but if you have not repented, how can you expect His aid? The same power God expends on the believer's salvation will be spent on your damnation, for He has bound Himself under oath to destroy every impenitent soul.

Set a strong guard about thy outward senses: these are Satan's landing places, especially the eye and the ear.

Truth lies deep, and must be digged for. Since

God hath made it a debt which one saint owes to another to carry their names to a throne of grace.

We are bid to take, not to make our cross.

Can Christ be in thou heart and thou not know it? Can one king be dethroned and another crowned in thy soul and thou hear no scuffle?

God would not rub so hard if it were not to fetch out the dirt that is ingrained in our natures. God loves purity so well He had rather see a hole than a spot in His child's garments.

You see when a soul comes over from Satan's quarters unto Christ, and has but once the experience of that sweetness which is in his service, there is no getting him back to his old drudgery; as

Grace in a decay is like a man pulled off his legs by sickness; if some means be not used to recover it, little service will be done by it, or comfort received from it. Therefore

Great comforts do, indeed, bear witness to the truth of thy grace, but not to the degree of it; the weak child is oftener in the lap than the strong one.

Whoever hath a seed time of grace pass over his soul, shall have his harvest time also of joy.

O how true are poor sinners to the devil's trust!

How many, alas, of the precious saints of God must we shut out from being believers, if there is no faith but what amounts to assurance ... shall we say their faith went away in the departure of their assurance?

We have peace with God as soon as we believe, but not always with ourselves. The pardon may be past the prince's hand and seal, and yet not put into the prisoner's hand.

The longer a soul hath neglected duty, the more ado there is to get it taken up.

God Himself underwrites your battle and has appointed His own Son 'the captain of your salvation'.

Satan with all his wits and wiles, shall never vanquish a soul armed with true grace; nay, he that hath this armour of God on shall vanquish him. Look

As you love your peace, Christian, be plain-hearted with God and man, and keep the king's highway.

Mercy should make us ashamed, wrath afraid to sin.

Too many read a chapter or two in the Bible, then for lack of interest put it down for weeks at a time and never look at it. Bernard compares the study of the Word and the mere reading of it to the difference between a close friendship and a casual acquaintance. If you want genuine knowledge, he says, you will have to do more than greet the Word politely on Sundays or nod reverently when you chance to meet it on the street. You must walk with it and talk with it every day of the week. You must invite it into your private chambers, and forego other pleasures and worldly duties to spent time in its company.

They love truth flourishing, who do not love it when it is confuting. They dare handle and look on the sword with delight when in a rich scabbard, who would run away to see it drawn.

Godliness is the child of truth, and it must be nursed by its own mother.

A minister, without boldness, is like a smooth file, a knife without an edge, a sentinel that is afraid to let off his gun. If men will be bold in sin, ministers must be bold to reprove.

Say not that thou hast royal blood in thy veins; say not that thou art born of God if thou canst not prove thy pedigree by daring to be holy!

Therefore tremble, O man, at any power thou hast, except thou usest it for God. Art thou strong in body; who hath thy strength? God, or thy lusts?

Compare not thyself with those that have less than thyself, but look on those that have far exceeded thee.

And they cannot be solid Christians, that are not instructed in the grounds of Christianity. The

Men are what they see and judge; though some do not fill up their light, yet none go beyond it.

There is no less wickedness potentially in the tamest sinner on earth, than in the devils themselves, and that one day thou, whoever thou art, wilt show to purpose, if God prevent thee not by his renewing grace. Thou

The providences of God to his saints here, while on this low bottom of earth, are mixed and parti-coloured, as was signified by the 'speckled' horses, Zech. 1:8, in

It is true, Christian, the debt thou owest to God must be paid in good and lawful money, but for thy comfort, here Christ is thy paymaster. Send

If thou beest ever so exact in thy morals, and not a worshiper of God, then thou art an atheist.

The mightier any is in the word, the more mighty he will be in prayer.

It is the image of God reflected in you that so enrages hell; it is this at which the demons hurl their mightiest weapons.

The grace thou hast will soon be less, if thou addest not more to it.

Faith hath an incarnating virtue, as they say of some strengthening meat; it feeds upon the promise, and that 'is perfect, converting' - or rather restoring - 'the soul,' Ps. 19:7. Though

As the eye of the body once put out, can never be restored by the creature's art, so neither can the spiritual eye lost by Adam's sin be restored by the teaching of men or angels. It is one of the diseases which Christ came to cure.

When God intends a mercy for his people, he stirs up the spirit of prayer in them. Fervency unites the soul and directs the thoughts to the work at hand. It will not allow diversions and denies all foreign thoughts seeking to intrude. Pray fervently or you do nothing. Cold praying is no more prayer than a painting of fire is fire. How can prayers that do not even warm your own heart move God's? A fervent prayer will never find a cold reception with God. Elijah's prayer called fire down from heaven because it carried fire up to heaven.

Compare Scripture with Scripture. False doctrines, like false witnesses, agree not among themselves.

Few are made better by prosperity, whom afflictions make worse.

It is one thing to know a truth, and another thing to know it by unction.

Godliness, as well as the doctrine of our faith, is a mystery.

God brings his grace into the heart by conquest.

Sometimes the soul is questioning whether it [has] any patience, any faith, till God comes and puts him into an afflicted estate, where he must exercise this faith or perish. Then it [the soul] appears like one that thinks he cannot swim, yet being thrown into the river, then uniting all his strength, he makes a shift to swim to land, and sees what he can do. How [often] have we heard Christians say, 'I thought I could never have endured such a pain, trusted God in such a straight! But now God [has] taught me what he can do for me, what he wrought in me.

In heaven we shall appear, not in armour, but in robes of glory. But here these are to be worn night and day; we must walk, work, and sleep in them, or else we are not true soldiers of Christ.

The regenerating Spirit is compared to the wind. His first attempts on the soul may be so secret that the creature knows not whence they come, or whither they tend; but, before he hath done, the sound will be heard throughout the soul.

The Christian must stand fixed to his principles, and not change his habit; but freely show what countryman he is by his holy constancy in the truth.

The Christian is bred by the Word, and he must be fed by it.

Fall to the work God sets thee about, and thou engagest his strength for thee. The way of the Lord is strength. Run from thy work, and thou engagest God's strength against thee; he will send some storm or other after thee to bring home his runaway servant. How oft hath the coward been killed in a ditch, or under some hedge, when the valiant soldier stood his ground and kept his place got off with safety and honor?

Christ bears with the saints' imperfections; well may the saints one with another.

The state of unregeneracy is a state of impotency.

Our enemies are on every side, so must our armour be.

We fear men so much, because we fear God so little.

The Christian's life should put his minister's sermon in print.

Second. - The Christian is to walk singularly, not after the world's guise, Rom. 12:2. We are commanded not to be conformed to this world, that is, not to accommodate ourselves to the corrupt customs of the world.

Pride of gifts robs us of God's blessing in the use of them.

Weak faith will as surely land the Christian in heaven as strong faith, for it is impossible the least dram of true grace should perish

All the plots of hell and commotions on earth have not so much as shaken God's hand to spoil one letter or line he has been drawing.

A pilot without his chart, a scholar without his book, and a soldier without his sword, are alike ridiculous. But, above all these, it is absurd for one to think of being a Christian, without knowledge of the word of God and some skill to use this weapon. - William Gurnall, The Christian in Complete Armour

Christ will bear no equal, and Satan no superior; and therefore, hold in with both thou canst not.

Justifying faith is not a naked assent to the truths of the gospel.

Satan's power is ministerial, appointed by God for the service and benefit of the saints. It

Humility is a necessary veil to all other graces.

Job's friends chose the right time to visit him, but took not the right course of improving their visit; had they spent the time in praying for him which they did in hot disputes with him, they would have profited him, and pleased God more.

The soldier is summoned to a life of active duty and so is the Christian.

Humble souls are fearful of their own strength.

Were there no devil, yet we should have our hands full, in resisting the corruptions of our own hearts; but

Praying is the same to the new creature as crying is to the natural. The child is not learned by art or example to cry, but instructed by nature; it comes into the world crying. Praying is not a lesson got by forms and rules of art, but flowing from principles of new life itself.

This is thy birth-day; thou wert before, but beganst to live when Christ began to live in thee. The

It is not, indeed, the bare knowing the truths of the gospel saves; but the gross ignorance of them, to be sure, will damn souls.

Cowards never won heaven. Do not claim that you are begotten of God and you have His royal blood running in your veins unless you can prove your lineage by His heroic spirit: to dare to be holy in spite of men and devils.

Paul was Nero's prisoner, but Nero was much more God's.

apply thyself to the use of those means which God hath appointed for the strengthening grace. If

Jerusalem above is a city whose builder and maker is God. Every grace, yea, every degree of grace, is a stone in that building, the topstone whereof is laid in glory, where saints shall more plainly see, how God was not only Founder to begin, but Benefactor also to finish the same. The glory of the work shall not be crumbled and piece-mealed out, some to God and some to the creature, but all entirely paid in to God, and he acknowledged all in all.

The Christian, like a chalice without a base, cannot stand on his own nor hold what he has received any longer that God holds him in His strong hands.