TEMPTATION

'Shall Satan keep a crafty watch, and shall Christians not keep a holy spiritual watch? Our whole life is beset with temptations. Satan watches all opportunities to break our peace, to wound our consciences, to lessen our comforts, to impair our graces, to slur our evidences, and to damp our assurances. Oh! what need then have we to be always upon out watch-tower, lest we be surprised by this subtle serpent. Watchfulness includes a waking, a rousing up of the soul. It is a continual, careful observing of our hearts and ways, in all the turnings of our lives, that we still keep close to God and his Word.

Watchfulness is nothing else but the soul running up and down, to and fro, busy everywhere; it is the heart busied and employed with diligent observation of what comes from within us, and what comes from without us and into us. Ah souls! you are no longer safe and secure than when you are upon your watch.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.247.

HUMILITY

'Humility keeps the soul free from many darts of Satan's casting, and snares of his spreading; as the low shrubs are free from many violent gusts and blasts of winds, which shake and rend the taller trees. The devil hath least power to fasten a temptation on him that is most humble. He that hath a gracious measure of humility, is neither affected with Satan's proffers nor terrified with his threatenings.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.246.

HUMILITY

'Humility will make a man have high thoughts of others and low thoughts of a man's self; it will make a man see much glory and excellency in others, and much baseness and sinfulness in a man's self; it will make a man see others rich, and himself poor; others strong, and himself weak; others wise, and himself foolish. Humility will make a man excellent at covering others' infirmities, and at recording their gracious services, and at delighting in their services; it makes a man joy in every light that outshines his own, and every wind that blows others good.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.210.

CHRISTIAN UNITY

'Ah! Christians, God loses much, and you lose much, and Satan gains much by this, that you do not, that you will not, walk lovingly together so far as your ways lie together. It is your sin and shame that you do not, that you will not, pray together, and hear together, and confer together, and mourn together, because that in some far lesser things you are not agreed together. What folly and madness is it in those whose way of a hundred miles lies fourscore and nineteen together, yet will not walk so far together, because they cannot go the other mile together; yet such is the folly and madness of many Christians in these days, who will not do many things they may do, because they cannot do everything they should do. I fear God will whip them into a better temper before he hath done with them. He will break their bones, and pierce their hearts, but he will cure them of this malady.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.207.

TEMPTATION

'In a calm prepare for a storm. The tempter is restless, impudent, and subtle; he will suit his temptations to your constitutions and inclinations. Satan loves to sail with the wind. If your knowledge be weak, he will tempt you with error; if your conscience be tender, he will tempt you to scrupulosity, and too much preciseness, as to do nothing but hear, pray, and read; if your consciences be wide and large, he will tempt you to carnal security; if you are bold-spirited, he will tempt you to presumption; if timorous, to desperation; if flexible, to inconstancy; if proud and stiff, to gross folly; therefore still fit for fresh assaults, make one victory a step to another. When you have overcome a temptation, take heed of unbending your bow, and look well to it, that your bow be always bent, and that it remains at strength. When you have overcome one temptation, you must be ready to enter the list with another.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.181.

TEMPTATION

'...let no saints judge themselves not to be beloved, because they are tempted. It is natural for saints to be tempted, that are dearly beloved, as it is for the sun to shine, or a bird to sing. The eagle complains not of her wings, nor the peacock of his train, nor the nightingale of her voice, because they are natural to them; no more should saints of their tempttaions, becasue they are natural to them.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.177.

SIN

'I cannot find in the whole book of God where he hath promised any such strength or power against this or that particular sin, as that the soul should be for ever, in this life, put out of a possibility of falling again and again into the same sins; and where God hath not a mouth to speak, I must not have a heart to believe. God will graciously pardon those sins to his people that he will not in this life effectually subdue in his people. I would go far to speak with that soul that can show me a promise, that when our sorrow and grief been so great, or so much, for this or that sin, that then God will preseve us from ever falling into the same sin. The sight of such a promise would be as life from the dead to many a precious soul, who desires nothing more than to keep close to Christ, and fears nothing more than backsliding from Christ.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.173.

FAITH

'Oh how doth Satan labour with might and main to work men to make false definitions of faith! Some he works to define faith too high, as that it is a full assurance of the love of God to a man's soul in particular, or a full persuasion of the pardon and remission of a man's own sin in particular. Saith Satan, What dost thou talk of faith? Faith is an assurance of the love of God, and of the pardon of sin; and this thou hast not; thou knowest thou art far off from this; therefore thou hast no faith. And by drawing men to make such a false definition of faith, he keeps them in a sad, doubting, and questioning condition, and makes them spend their days in sorrow and sighing, so that tears are their drink, and sorrow is their meat, and sighing is their work all the day long.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.148.

SIN & CHRISTIANS

'....believers must repent for their being discouraged by their sins. Their being discouraged by their sins will cost them many a prayer, many a tear, and many a groan; and that because their discouragements under sin flow from ignorance and unbelief. It springs from their ignorance of the richness, freeness, fullness, and everlastingness of God's love; and from their ignorance of the power, glory, sufficiency, and efficacy of the death and sufferings of the Lord Jesus Christ; and from their ignorance of the worth, glory, fullness, largeness, and completeness of the righteousness of Jesus Christ; and from their ignorance of that real, close, spiritual, glorious and inseperable union that it between Christ and their precious souls. Ah! did precious souls know and believe the truth of these things as they should, they would not sit down dejected and overwhelmed under the sense and operation of sin.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.147.

SIN & CHRISTIANS

'Ah! you lamenting souls, that spend you days in sighing and groaning under the sense and burden of your sins, why do you deal so unkindly with God, and so injuriously with your own souls, as not to cast an eye upon those precious promises of remission of sin which may bear up and refresh your spirits in the darkest night, and under the heaviest burden of sin?'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.145.

SATAN

'Though he can never rob a believer of his crown, yet such is his malice and envy, that he will leave no stone unturned, no means unattempted, to rob them of their comfort and peace, to make their life a burden and a hell unto them, to cause them to spend their days in sorrow and mourning, in sighing and complaining, in doubting and questioning. Surely we have no interest in Christ; our graces are not true, our hopes are the hopes of hycocrites; our confidence in our presumption, our enjoyments are delusions.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.142.

SUFFERING

'God will so order the afflictions that befall you in the way of righteousness, that your souls shall say, We would not for all the world but that we had met with such and such troubles and afflictions: for surely, had not these befallen us, it would have been worse and worse with us. Oh the carnal security, pride, formality, dead-heartedness, lukewarmness, censoriousness, and earthliness that God hath cured us of, by the trouble and dangers that we have met with in the ways and services of the Lord!'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.115.

SUFFERING

'The treasures of a saint are the presence of God, the pardon of sin, the joy of the Spirit, the peace of conscience, which are jewels that none can give but Christ, nor none can take away but Christ. Now why should a gracious soul keep off from a way of holiness because of afflictions, when no afflictions can strip a men of his heavenly jewels, which are his his ornaments and his safety here, and will be his happiness and glory hereafter? Why, a believer's treasure is always safe in the hands of Christ; his life is safe, his soul is safe, his grace is safe, his comfort is safe, and his crown is safe in the hand of Christ.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.113.

HAPPINESS

'...happpiness lies not on those things that cannot comfort a man upon a dying bed.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.110.

PRIDE

'...take heed of spiritual pride! Pride fills our fancies, and weakens our graces, and makes room in our hearts for error. There are no men on earth so soon entangled, and so easily conquered by error, as proud souls. Oh, it is dangerous to love to be wise above what is written, to be curious and unsober in your desire of knowledge, and to trust to your own capacities and abilities to undertake to pry into all secrets, and to be puffed up with a carnal mind. Souls that are thus a-soaring up above the bounds and limits of humility usually fall into the very worst of errors, as experience doth daily evidence.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.98.

TRUTH

'It is not he that receives most of the truth into his head, but he that receives most of the truth affectionately into his heart, that shall enjoy the happiness of having his judgment sound and clear...'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Agaisnt Satan's Devices, p.93.

SUFFERING

'Afflictions, they are but as a dark entry into your Father's house; they are but as a dirty lane to a royal palace.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.86.

SUFFERING

'Afflictions are a crystal glass, wherein the soul hath the clearest sight of the ugly face of sin.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.80.

MATERIALISM

'Prosperity hath been a stumbling-block, at which millions have stumbled and fallen, and broke the neck of their souls forever.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.73.

TEMPTATION

'It is impossible for that man to get the conquest of sin, that plays and sports with the occasions of sin. God will not remove the temptation, except you turn from the occasion. It is a just and righteous thing with God, that he should fall into the pit that will adventure to dance upon the brink of the pit, and that he should be a slave to sin, that he will not flee from the occasions of sin. As long as there is fuel in our hearts for a temptation, we cannot be secure. He that hath gunpowder about him had need keep far enough off from sparkles.'

Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices, p.67.