William Gurnall Quotes

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

The Word of God is too sacred a thing, and preaching too solemn a work, to be toyed and played with.

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

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.

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.

Christ hath told us He will come, but not when, that we might never put off our clothes, or put out the candle.

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.

Let thy hope of heaven master thy fear of death.

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.

Of all creatures in this visible world, light is the most glorious; of all light, the light of the sun without compare excels the rest.

And while God had work for Paul, he found him friends both in court and prison. Let persecutors send saints to prison, God can provide a keeper for their turn.

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.

The chains of love are stronger than the chains of fear.

Humble souls are fearful of their own strength.

CEASE to PRAY and thou will BEGIN to SIN.

Many lose heaven because they are ashamed to go in a fool's coat thither.

Furnish thyself with arguments from the promises to enforce thy prayers, and make them prevalent with God. The promises are the ground of faith, and faith, when strengthened, will make thee fervent, and such fervency ever speeds and returns with victory out of the field of prayer. The mightier any is in the Word, the more mighty he will be in prayer.

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

The Christian is to proclaim and prosecute an irreconcilable war against his bosom sins; those sins which have lain nearest his heart, must now be trampled under his feet.

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

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.

Nothing is more contrary to a heavenly hope than an earthly heart.

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

And therefore you who think so basely of the gospel and the professors of it, because at present their peace and comfort is not come, know it is on the way to them, and comes to stay everlastingly with them; whereas your peace is going from you every moment, and is sure to leave you without any hope of returning to you again. Look not how the Christian begins, but ends. The Spirit of God by his convictions comes into the soul with some terrors, but it closeth with peace and joy.

When people do not mind what God speaks to them in His word, God doth as little mind what they say to Him in prayer.

We need not borrow and take up sorrows upon use of the morrow, to make up our present load; as we read of daily bread, so of a daily cross, Luke ix. M, which we are bid to take, not to make.

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?

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.

The devil had as good have let Paul alone, for he no sooner comes into prison but he falls a preaching, at which the gates of Satan's prison fly open, and poor sinners come forth.

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.

Mercy should make us ashamed, wrath afraid to sin.

Prayer is nothing but the promise reversed, or God's Word formed into an argument, and retorted by faith upon God again.

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.

Hope fills the afflicted soul with such inward joy and consolation, that it can laugh while tears are in the eye, sigh and sing all in a breath; it is called "the rejoicing of hope" (Hebrews 3:6).

The Christian must trust in a withdrawing God.

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

God loves the saints as the purchase of his Son's blood. They cost him dear, and that which is so hardly got shall not be easily lost. He that was willing to expend his Son's blood to gain them, will not deny his power to keep them.

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

Pray often rather than very long at a time. It is hard to be very long in prayer, and not slacken in our affections.

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

Satan will be ready to help forward such thoughts as a fit medium to lift thee up , and slacken thy care in duty for the future. Such discoveries do indeed bear witness to the truth of thy grace, but not to the degree and measure of it. The weak child may be, yea, is, oftener in the lap than the strong.

It is not only our duty to pray for others, but also to desire the prayers of others for ourselves.

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

God is very precise in this point; he will say to such as invent ways to worship him of their own, coin means to mortify corruption, obtain comfort in their own mint: 'Who hath required this at your hands?' This is truly to be 'righteous over-much,' as Solomon speaks, when we will pretend to correct God's law, and add supplements of our own to his rule.

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

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.

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

What is Jordan that I should wash in it? What is the preaching that I should attend on it, while I hear nothing but what I knew before? What are these beggarly elements of water, bread, and wine? Are not these the reasonings of a soul that forgets who appoints the means of grace?