John Owen Quotes

To kill sin is the work of living men; where men are dead (as all unbelievers, the best of them, are dead), sin is alive, and will live.

Mortification is the soul's vigorous opposition to self, wherein sincerity is most evident.

There is not a day but sin foils or is foiled, prevails or is prevailed on; and it will be so whilst we live in this world.

the whole Pelagian poison of free-will ... a clear exaltation of the old idol free-will into the throne of God ... That the decaying estate of Christianity have invented.

Temptation gains power by persistent solicitations that beget thoughts that make evil less serious

There is a state of perfect peace with God to be attained under imperfect obedience.

Sin will be always acting, if we be not always mortifying, we are lost creatures.

Your state is not at all to be measured by the opposition that sin makes to you, but by the opposition you make to it.

It is a throne of grace that God in Christ is represented to us upon; but yet is is a throne still whereon majesty and glory do reside, and God is always to be considered by us as on a throne.

We cannot enjoy peace in this world unless we are ready to yield to the will of God in respect of death. Our times are in His hand, at His sovereign disposal. We must accept that as best.

I wish thy lot, now bad, still worse, my friend, for when at worst, they say, things always mend.

Leanness of body and soul may go together.

We admit no faith to be justifying, which is not itself and in its own nature a spiritually vital principle of obedience and good works.

Not to be daily mortifying sin, is to sin against the goodness, kindness, wisdom, grace, and love of God, who hath furnished us with a principle of doing it.

Without a sincere and diligent effort in every area of obedience, there will be no sucessful mortification of any one besetting sin.

We need to attend diligently to the state of our soul, and to deal fervently and effectively with God about it.

Only what God has commanded in His word should be regarded as binding; in all else there may be liberty of actions.

I did not hear what I should have listened to.

If we believe not with faith divine and supernatural, we believe not at all.

Meditate on the Word in the Word.

To some men it is hard seeing a call of God through difficulties; when if it would but clothe itself with a few carnal advantages, how apparent it is to them! They can see it through a little cranny.

Men think all things would be very glorious if they might be done according to their mind. Perhaps, indeed, they would-but with their glory, not the glory of God.

It being our duty to mortify... we must be at work. He that is appointed to kill an enemy, if he leave striking before the other ceases living, does but half his work.

Consider that it is not failing in this or that attempt to come to Christ, but a giving-over of your endeavors, that will be your ruin.

Would a soul continually eye His everlasting tenderness and compassion...[then] it could not bear an hour's absence from Him; whereas now, perhaps, it cannot watch with him one hour.

The least grace is a better security for heaven than the greatest gifts or privileges whatsoever.

A river continually fed by a living fountain may as soon end its streams before it come to the ocean, as a stop be put to the course and progress of grace before it issue in glory.

Let, then, the word be preached, and the sins of men will be rebuked, lust will be restrained, and some oppositions will be made against sin, though that be not the effect aimed at.

The natural man "cannot see or discern that divine excellency in the Scripture, without an apprehension whereof no man can believe it aright to be the word of God."

If the ravens leave the Tower, Britain will fall.

Morality divorced from the doctrines of the gospel is not that holiness which the gospel requires.