6th Mark of Regeneration: Watchful Over Their Soul -J.C. Ryle

A Regenerate man is very careful of his own soul.

He endeavours not only to keep clear of sin—but also to keep clear of everything which may lead to it. He is careful about the company he keeps. He feels that evil communications corrupt the heart, and that evil is far more catching than good, just as disease is more infectious than health. He is careful about the employment of his time—his chief desire about it is to spend it profitably. He is careful about the books he reads—he fears getting his mind poisoned by mischievous writings. He is careful about the friendships he forms—it is not enough for him that people are kind, and amiable, and good-natured—all this is very well—but will they do good to his soul?

He is careful over his own daily habits and behaviour—he tries to recollect that his own heart is deceitful, and that the world is full of wickedness, that the devil is always labouring to do him harm, and therefore he would sincerely be always on his guard. He desires to live like a soldier in an enemy’s country, to wear his armour continually, and to be prepared for temptation. He finds by experience that his soul is ever among enemies, and he studies to be a watchful, humble, prayerful man.

Reader, I place this mark also before you. What would the Apostle say of you? Are you born of God?
~ J.C. Ryle
Regeneration, [Ross-shire, UK: Christian Focus, 2003], 38, 39.

Meditation in Glory… (1)

I know I shall live and not die, but through Jesus' power, joyfully see the dawn of a glorious Morning. I mean I will not go back but live for Jesus until the day every element of sin and Satan will be gone from me forever. I'm just a pilgrim in search of a City.

My happiness, yeah, my everlasting happiness lie in Jesus Christ. He is my pursuit of happiness and I shall obtain Him (apprehend but not comprehend Him). However, I blush and bow down my head in shame of the many times I have lived far below God's expectation. "O Jesus, help me to serve you to the end, be Thou forever near me, my Saviour and my Friend." If a man die shall he live again? The prospect is too awesome. I shall live eternally with Christ. 'Tis is thrilling.

Quotes for Today (1)

“Our life is like a journey, [yet] it is not God's will that we should march along casually as we please, but he sets the goal before us, and also directs us on the right way to it... wavering and limping and even creeping along the ground, they move at a feeble pace.” –Calvin

“Plato is my friend, Aristotle is my friend, but my best friend is truth”. Newton's scientific career had begun.

"There is nothing that is more deeply inlaid in the principles of the natures of all living creatures, and so of man himself, than a love unto and a care for the preservation and nourishing of their young. Many brute creatures will die for them; some feed them with their own flesh and blood; all deprive themselves of that food which nature directs them to as their best, to impart it to them, and act in their behalf to the utmost of their power.

Now, such is the efficacy, power, and force of indwelling sin in man, — an infection that the nature of other creatures knows nothing of, — that in many it prevails to stop this fountain, to beat back the stream of natural affections, to root up the principles of the law of nature, and to drive them unto a neglect, a destruction of the fruit of their own loins. Paul tells us of the old Gentiles that they were a]stororgoi , Romans 1:31, “without natural affection” That which he aims at is that barbarous custom among the Romans, who ofttimes, to spare the trouble in the education of their children, and to be at liberty to satisfy their lusts, destroyed their own children from the womb; so far did the strength of sin prevail to obliterate the law of nature, and to repel the force and power of it.

Examples of this nature are common in all nations; amongst ourselves, of women murdering their own children, through the deceitful reasoning of sin. And herein sin turns the strong current of nature, darkens all the light of God in the soul, controls all natural principles, influenced with the power of the command and will of God.

But yet this evil hath, through the efficacy of sin, received a fearful aggravation. Men have not only slain but cruelly sacrificed their children to satisfy their lusts. The apostle reckons idolatry, and so, consequently, all superstition, among the works of the flesh, Galatians 5:20; that is, the fruit and product of indwelling sin. Now, from hence it is that men have offered that horrid and unspeakable violence to the law of nature mentioned. So the psalmist tells us, Psalm 106:37,38. The same is again mentioned, Ezekiel 16:20,21, and in sundry other places. The whole manner of that abomination I have elsewhere declared. For the present it may suffice to intimate that they took their children and burnt them to ashes in a soft fire; the wicked priests that assisted in the sacrifice affording them this relief, that they made a noise and clamor that the vile wretches might not hear the woeful moans and cries of the poor, dying, tormented infants. I suppose in this case we need no farther evidence.

Naturalists can give no rational account, they can only admire the secret force of that little fish which, they say, will stop a ship in full sail in the midst of the sea; and we must acknowledge that it is beyond our power to give an account of that secret force and unsearchable deceit that is in that inbred traitor, sin, that can not only stop the course of nature, when all the sails of it, that carry it forward, are so filled as they are in that of affections to children, but also drive it backward with such a violence and force as to cause men so to deal with their own children as a good man would not be hired with any reward to deal with his dog. And it may not be to the disadvantage of the best to know and consider that they carry that about them and in them which in others hath produced” –John Owen