Richard Sibbes Quotes

If believers decay in their first love, or in some other grace, yet another grace may grow and increase, such as humility, their brokenheartedness; they sometimes seem not to grow in the branches when they may grow at the root; upon a check grace breaks out more; as we say, after a hard winter there usually follows a glorious spring.

that which is begun in self-confidence will end in shame.

Possibilitas tua mensura tua'(What is possible to you is what you will be measured by).

There is not a minute of time in all of our life but we must either be near to God or we will be undone.

The love of a wife to her husband may begin from the supply of her necessities, but afterwards she may also love his person: so the soul first loves Christ for salvation, but when it is brought to him, and finds what sweetness there is in him, then the soul loves him for himself, and esteems his person, as well as rejoices in his benefits.

If Christ has once possessed the affections, there is no dispossessing of him again. A fire in the heart overcomes all fires without.

Self-emptiness prepares us for spiritual fullness.

Providence is the perpetuity and continuance of creation.

Christ quickens none but the dead. Why do not the papists attain to this grace of justification? They never see themselves wholly dead, but join some life to the natural estate of man. Therefore Christ quickens them not.

Sin is not so sweet in the committing as it is heavy and bitter in the reckoning.

When we grow careless of keeping our souls, then God recovers our taste of good things again by sharp crosses.

It is good to divert our sorrow for other things to the root of all, which is sin. Let our grief run most in that channel, that as sin bred grief, so grief may consume sin.

Satan gives Adam an apple, and takes away paradise. Therefore in all temptations consider not what he offers, but what we shall lose.

Poverty and affliction take away the fuel that feeds pride.

See a flame in a spark, a tree in a seed. See great things in little beginnings.

The wronged side is always the safest.

The depths of our misery can never fall below the depths of mercy.

See here, for our comfort, a sweet agreement of all three persons: the Father giveth a commission to Christ; the Spirit furnisheth and sanctifieth to it; Christ himself executeth the office of a Mediator. Our redemption is founded upon the joint agreement of all three persons of the Trinity.

A man may be a false prophet and yet speak the truth.

Measure not God's love and favour by your own feeling. The sun shines as clearly in the darkest day as it does in the brightest. The difference is not in the sun, but in some clouds which hinder the manifestation of the light thereof.

We cannot say this or that trouble shall not befall, yet we may, by help of the Spirit, say, nothing that doth befall shall make me do that which is unworthy of a Christian.

Whatsoever God takes away from His children, He either replaces it with a much greater favor or else gives strength to bear it.

The winter prepares the earth for the spring, so do afflictions sanctified prepare the soul for glory.

What unthankfulness is it to forget our consolations, and to look upon matters of grievance. To think so much upon two or three crosses as to forget an hundred blessing.