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Tell me, you vain professor, when did you shed a tear for the deadness, hardness, unbelief, or earthliness of your heart? Do you think that such an easy religion can save you? If so, we may invert Christ's words and say, 'Wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to life, and may there be that go in there.'

John Flavel

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John Flavel
Age: 61 †
Born: 1630
Born: January 1
Died: 1691
Died: June 26
Author
Cleric
Theologian
John Flavell
Johan Flavel
Johannes Flavel
Think
Religion
Professors
Invert
Thinking
Words
Shed
Hardness
Life
Christ
Gates
Unbelief
Easy
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Gate
Tell
Wide
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Save
Tear
Heart
Christianity
Broads
Way
Tears
Broad
Deadness

More quotes by John Flavel

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Christ bounds and terminates the vast desires of the soul He is the very Sabbath of the soul.
John Flavel
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If you neglect to instruct children in the way of holiness, will the devil neglect to instruct them in the way of wickedness? No if you will not teach them to pray, he will to curse, swear, and lie if ground be uncultivated, weeds will spring.
John Flavel
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When the world smiles upon us, and we have got a warm nest, how do we prophesy of rest and peace in those acquisitions, thinking with good Baruch, great things for ourselves, but Providence by a particular or general calamity overturns our plans (Jer. 45:4,5), and all this to turn our hearts from the creature to God.
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Creatures, like pictures, are fairest at a certain distance, but it is not so with Christ the nearer the soul approaches Him, and the longer it lives in the enjoyhment of Him, still the sweeter and more desirable He becomes.
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Sometimes God makes use of instruments for good to His people, who designed nothing but evil and mischief to them. Thus Joseph's brethren were instrumental to his advancement in that very thing in which they designed his ruin (Gen. 50:20).
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When God gives you comforts, it is your great evil not to observe His hand in them.
John Flavel
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To see a man humble under prosperity is one of the greatest rarities in the world.
John Flavel
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The Lord's supper is memorative, and so it has the nature and use of a pledge or token of love, left by a dying to a dear surviving friend.
John Flavel
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Guilt is to danger, what fire is to gunpowder a man need not fear to walk among many barrels of powder, if he have no fire about him.
John Flavel
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It is a common thing for men to benumb their own arms, and make them as dead and useless by leaning too much upon them: so it is in a moral as well as a natural way: all the prudence and pains in the world avail nothing without God. So saith the Psalmist, in Psalm cxxvii. 2.
John Flavel
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Christian, thou knowest thou carriest Gunpowder about thee, desire those that carry Fire to keep at a Distance from thee 'tis a dangerous Crisis when a proud Heart meets with flattering Lips.
John Flavel
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As the blood of Christ is the fountain of all merit, so the Spirit of Christ is the fountain of all spiritual life and until he quicken us and infuse the principle of the divine life into our souls, we can put forth no hand, or vital act of faith, to lay hold upon Jesus Christ.
John Flavel
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We acknowledge no righteousness but what the obedience and satisfaction of Christ yields us. His blood, not our faith his satisfaction, not our believing it, is the matter of our justification before God.
John Flavel
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There is no grace more excellent than faith no sin more execrable and abominable then unbelief. Faith is the saving grace and unbelief the damning sin. (Mark 16:16) ... Before Christ can be received, the heart must be emptied and opened: but men's heart's are full of self-righteousn ess and vain confidence (Rom 10:3).
John Flavel
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Surely if He would not spare His own Son one stroke, one tear, one groan, one sigh, one circumstance of misery, it can never be imagined that ever He should, after this, deny or withhold from His people, for whose sakes all this was suffered, any mercies, any comforts, any privilege, spiritual or temporal, which is good for them.
John Flavel
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The knowledge of Christ is profound and large. All other sciences are but shadows this is a boundless, bottomless ocean. Though something of Christ be unfolded in one age, and something in another, yet eternity itself cannot full unfold him.
John Flavel
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It is the duty of the saints, especially in times of straights, to reflect upon the performances of Providence for them in all the states and through all the stages of their lives.
John Flavel
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Observed duties maintain our credit but secret duties maintain our life.
John Flavel
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Did Christ finish His work for us? Then there can be no doubt but He will also finish His work in us.
John Flavel
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The Spirit must therefore first take hold of us before we can live in Christ, and when he doth so, then we are enabled to exert that vital act of faith, whereby we receive Christ.
John Flavel