J. C. Ryle Quotes

There are no lessons so useful as those learned in the school of affliction.

Whatever others around you think, don't you ever be ashamed of being a Christian.

If you do not love Christ, let me tell you plainly what is the reason. You have no sense of debt to him.

Knowledge of the Bible never comes by intuition.

Nothing so hardens the heart of man as a barren familiarity with sacred things.

Blessed are they who feel like pilgrims and strangers in this life, and whose best things are all to come!

People may refuse to see the truth of our arguments, but they cannot evade the evidence of a holy life.

The Word of God is ROCK. All else is sand.

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.

In justification the word to be addressed to man is believe - only believe; in sanctification the word must be 'watch, pray, and fight.'

Men fall in private long before they fall in public.

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.

God has linked holiness and happiness; and what God has joined together we must not think to put asunder.

What is the best safeguard against false doctrine? The Bible regularly read, regularly prayed over, regularly studied.

Such true worship will stand the test of Christ's great principle, “By their fruits you shall know them”. It sanctifies the Christian's life, and makes them walk with God, lifting them above fear and love of the world. It enables a Christian to show God to other folks. Such worship comes from heaven, and has the mark of God upon it.

No time is so well spent in every day as that which we spend upon our knees.

One single soul saved shall outlive and outweigh all the kingdoms of the world.

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!

The person that goes regularly and intelligently to the Lord's Table finds it increasingly hard to yield to sin and conform to the world.

If we are true Christians, we must not expect everything smooth in our journey to heaven. We must count it no strange thing, if we have to endure sicknesses, losses, bereavements, and disappointments, just like other men. Free pardon and full forgiveness, grace along the way, and glory at the endall this our Savior has promised to give. But He has never promised that we shall have no afflictions.

The Lord Jesus is "a friend who never changes." There is no fickleness about Him: those whom He loves, He loves to the end.

Oh, dear friend, if you love your children, I charge you, do not let the early impression of a habit of prayer slip by. If you train your children to do anything, train them, at least, to have a habit of prayer.

The true Christian does not need to be reminded that he has a crucified Master. He often thinks of Him.

Prayer is the mightiest weapon that God has placed in our hands.

We must give up the vain idea of trying to please everybody. That is impossible, and the attempt is a mere waste of time. We must be content to walk in Christ's steps, and let the world say what it likes.

I should as soon expect a farmer to prosper in business who contented himself with sowing his fields and never looking at them till harvest, as expect a believer to attain much holiness who was not diligent about his Bible reading, his prayers, and the use of his Sundays.

Let us never measure our religion by that of others, and think we are doing enough if we have gone beyond our neighbors.

A good conscience will be found a pleasant visitor at our bedside in a dying hour.

The doctrine of Christ crucified is the strength of a Minister. I, for one, would not be without it for all the world.

I must honestly declare my conviction that, since the days of the Reformation, there never has been so much profession of religion without practice, so much talking about God without walking with Him, so much hearing God's words without doing them.

Your trials, crosses, and conflicts are all temporary.

The true secret of spiritual strength is self-distrust and deep humilty.

Better to confess Christ 1000 times now and be despised by men, than be disowned by Christ before God on the day of Judgment.

Where no visible fruit can be found, there you may be sure is no conversion.

If we would know whether our faith is genuine, we do well to ask ourselves how we are living.

The world's idea of greatness is to rule, but Christian greatness consists in serving.

True worship leads to a more full knowledge of self, God, heaven, duty, doctrine, practice and experience.

We are all naturally self-righteous. It is the family disease of all the children of Adam.

Before Christ comes it is useless to expect to see a perfect Church.

Read the Bible daily. Make it part of your everyday business to read and meditate on some portion of God's Word. Gather your manna fresh every morning. Choose your own seasons and hours. Do not scramble over and hurry your reading. Give your Bible the best, and not the worst, part of your time. But whatever plan you pursue, let it be a rule of your life to visit the throne of grace and the Bible every day.

The faith that has not a sanctifying influence on the character is no better than the faith of devils.

Fathers and mothers, do not forget that children learn more by the eye than they do by the ear... Imitation is a far stronger principle with children than memory. What they see has a much stronger effect on their minds than what they are told.

Live as if you thought that Christ might come at any time.

There is more Bible buying, Bible selling, Bible printing and Bible distributing than ever before in our nation. We see Bibles in every bookstore - Bibles of every size, price and style. There are Bibles in almost every house in the land. But all this time I fear we are in danger of forgetting that to HAVE the Bible is one thing, and to READ it quite another.

To be Christian it will cost a man his love of ease.

True repentance is no light matter. It is a thorough change of heart about sin, a change showing itself in godly sorrow and humiliation - in heartfelt confession before the throne of grace - in a complete breaking off from sinful habits, and an abiding hatred of all sin. Such repentance is the inseparable companion of saving faith in Christ.

The only way to be really happy in such a world as this, is to be ever casting all our cares on God.

Amidst the flood of dangerous reading, I plead for my Master's book; I call upon you not to forget the book of the soul. Do not let newspapers, novels, and romances be read, while the prophets and Apostles be despised. Do not let the exciting and sensual swallow up your attention, while the edifying and the sanctifying can find no place in your mind.