Richard Sibbes Quotes & Sayings

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

A Christian is the greatest freeman in the world; he is free from the wrath of God, free from hell and damnation, form the curse of the law; but then, though he be free in these respects, yet, in regard of love, he is the greatest servant. Love abaseth him to do all the good that he can; and the more the Spirit of Christ is in us, the more it will abase us to anything wherein we can be serviceable. — Richard Sibbes

The love of a wife to her husband may begin from the supply of her necessities, but afterwards she may love him also for the sweetness of his person; so the soul first loves Christ for salvation but when she is brought to Him and finds what sweetness there is in Him then she loves Him for Himself. — Richard Sibbes

It is a destructive addition to add anything to Christ — Richard Sibbes

Moses, without any mercy, breaks all bruised reeds, and quenches all smoking flax. For the law requires personal, perpetual and perfect obedience from the heart, and that under a most terrible curse, but gives no strength. It is a severe task master, like Pharaoh's, requiring the whole tale ofbricks and yet giving no straw. Christ comes with blessing after blessing, even upon those whom Moses had cursed, and with healing balm for those wounds which Moses had made. — Richard Sibbes

And there is a proud kind of moderation likewise, when men will take upon them to censure both parties, as if they were wiser than both, — Richard Sibbes

THE SECOND OBSERVATION CONCERNING the weak and small beginnings of grace is that Christ will not quench the smoking flax. This is so for two principal reasons. First, because this spark is from heaven: it is his own, it is kindled by his own Spirit. And secondly, it tends to the glory of his powerful grace in his children that he preserves light in the midst of darkness, a spark in the midst of the swelling waters of corruption. THE — Richard Sibbes

Better to be in trouble with Christ, than in peace without him. — Richard Sibbes

Here see the opposite disposition between the holy nature of Christ, and the impure nature of man. Man for a little smoke will quench the light; Christ ever we see cherisheth even the least beginnings. How bare he with the many imperfections of his poor disciples. If he did sharply check them, it was in love, and that they might shine the brighter. Can we have a better pattern to follow than this of him by whom we hope to be saved? — Richard Sibbes

In all their jollity in this world, the wicked are but as a book fairly bound, which when it is opened is full of nothing but tragedies. So when the book of their consciences shall be once opened, there is nothing to be read but lamentations and woes. — Richard Sibbes

Perfect refining is for another world, — Richard Sibbes

Those that look to be happy must first look to be holy. — Richard Sibbes

He "binds up the broken-hearted" (Isa. 61:1). As a mother is tenderest toward the most diseased and weakest child, so does Christ most mercifully incline to the weakest. Likewise he puts an instinct into the weakest things to rely upon something stronger than themselves for support. The vine steadies itself upon the elm, and the weakest creatures often have the strongest shelters. The consciousness of the church's weakness makes her willing to lean on her Beloved and to hide herself under his wing. — Richard Sibbes

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. — Richard Sibbes

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

God can pick sense out of a confused prayer. — Richard Sibbes

Beauty. We must know for our comfort that Christ was not anointed to this great work of Mediator for lesser sins only, but for the greatest, — Richard Sibbes

He establishes every purpose by counsel (Prov. 20:18). God, indeed, uses carnal men to very good service, but without a thorough altering and conviction of their judgment. He works by them, but not in them. Therefore they do neither approve the good they do nor hate the evil they abstain from. — Richard Sibbes

Nay, [2] after conversion we need bruising, that (1) reeds may know themselves to be reeds, and not oaks; even reeds need bruising, by reason of the remainder of pride in our nature, and to let us see that we live by mercy. And (2) that weaker Christians may not be too much discouraged when they see the stronger shaken and bruised. — Richard Sibbes

It were a good strife amongst Christians, one to labour to give no offence, and the other to labour to take none. The best men are severe to themselves, tender over others. — Richard Sibbes

A curse lies upon those that, when the truth suffers, have not a word to defend it. — Richard Sibbes

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. — Richard Sibbes

Death is only a grim porter to let us into a stately palace. — Richard Sibbes

What a support to our faith is this, that God the Father, the party offended by our sins, is so well pleased with the work of redemption! — Richard Sibbes

The wronged side is always the safest. — Richard Sibbes

If our faith were but as firm as our state in Christ is secure and glorious, what manner of men should we be? — Richard Sibbes

The way to cover our sin is to uncover it by confession. — Richard Sibbes

This bruising is required before conversion that so the Spirit may make way for himself into the heart by levelling all proud, high thoughts, and that we may understand ourselves to be what indeed we are by nature. We love to wander from ourselves and to be strangers at home, till God bruises us by one cross or other, and then we 'begin to think', and come home to ourselves with the prodigal (Luke 15:17). It is a very hard thing to bring a dull and an evasive heart to cry with feeling for mercy. Our hearts, like criminals, until they be beaten from all evasions, never cry for the mercy of the judge. — Richard Sibbes

God takes a safe course with His children, that they may not be condemned with the world, He permits the world to condemn them, that they may not love the world, the world hates them ... — Richard Sibbes

A man knows no more in religion than he loves and embraceth with the affections of his soul. — Richard Sibbes

Satan gives Adam an apple, and takes away Paradise. Therefore in all temptations let us consider not what he offers, but what we shall lose. — Richard Sibbes

That which is begun in self-confidence will end in shame. — Richard Sibbes

Ministers by their calling are friends of the Bride, and to bring Christ and his Spouse together, and therefore ought, upon all good occasions, to lay open all the excellencies of Christ, — Richard Sibbes

If we desire to end our days in joy and comfort, let us lay the foundation of a comfortable death now betimes. To die well is not a thing of that light moment as some imagine: it is no easy matter. But to die well is a matter of every day. Let us daily do some good that may help us at the time of our death. Every day by repentance pull out the sting of some sin,that so when death comes, we may have nothing to do but to die. To die well is the action of the whole life. — Richard Sibbes

It is better to go bruised to heaven than sound to hell. — Richard Sibbes

As when things are cold we bring them to the fire to heat and melt, so bring we our cold hearts to the fire of the love of Christ; consider we of our sins against Christ, and of Christ's love towards us; dwell upon this meditation. Think what great love Christ hath showed unto us, and how little we have deserved, and this will make our hearts to melt, and be as pliable as wax before the sun. Secondly, — Richard Sibbes

Self-emptiness prepares us for spiritual fullness. — Richard Sibbes

The whole life of a Christian should be nothing but praises and thanks to God; we should neither eat nor sleep, but eat to God and sleep to God and work to God and talk to God, do all to His glory and praise. — Richard Sibbes

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

The whole conduct of a Christian is nothing else but knowledge reduced to will, affection and practice. — Richard Sibbes

When blindness and boldness, ignorance and arrogance, weakness and willfulness, meet together in men, it renders them odious to God, burdensome in society, dangerous in their counsels, disturbers of better purposes, intractable and incapable of better direction, miserable in the issue. Where Christ shows his gracious power in weakness, he does it by letting men understand themselves so far as to breed humility, and magnify God's love to such as they are. — Richard Sibbes

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. — Richard Sibbes

To show that the creature cannot be so low but there is somewhat in God above the misery of the creature, his mercy shall triumph over the basest estate where he will show mercy. Therefore there is mercy above all mercy and love above all love, in that Christ was a servant. — Richard Sibbes

Think what great love Christ has showed unto us, and how little we have deserved, and this will make our hearts to melt and be as pliable as wax before the sun. — Richard Sibbes

Physicians, though they put their patients to much pain, will not destroy their nature, but will raise it up by degrees. Surgeons will pierce and cut but not mutilate. A mother who has a sick and self-willed child will not cast it away for this reason. And shall there be more mercy in the stream than there is in the spring? Shall we think there is more mercy in ourselves than in God, who plants the feeling of mercy in us? — Richard Sibbes

Nothing is so certain as that which is certain after doubts. Shaking settles and roots. — Richard Sibbes

for Christ is set out here as a mild Saviour to weak ones; and, for time to come, his powerful care and love is never interrupted, until he bring forth judgment to victory. And thereupon it is that both the means of salvation and grace wrought by means, and glory the perfection of grace, come all under one name of the kingdom of God so oft; because whom by means he brings to grace, he will by grace bring to glory. — Richard Sibbes

This is a life of faith, for God will try the truth of our faith, so that the world may see that God has such servants as will depend upon His bare word. — Richard Sibbes

God knows we have nothing of ourselves, therefore in the covenant of grace he requires no more than he gives, but gives what he requires, and accepts what he gives. — Richard Sibbes

In the small seeds of plants lie hidden both bulk and branches, bud and fruit. In a few principles lie hidden all comfortable conclusions of holy truth. All these glorious fireworks of zeal and holiness in the saints had their beginning from a few sparks. — Richard Sibbes

Heaven is not heaven without Christ. It is better to be in any place with Christ than to be in heaven itself without him. All delicacies without Christ are but as a funeral banquet. Where the master of the feast is away, there is nothing but solemnness. What is all without Christ? I say the joys of heaven are not the joys of heaven without Christ; he is the very heaven of heaven. — Richard Sibbes

The soul is never quiet till it comes to God ... and that is the one thing the soul desireth. — Richard Sibbes

God will have the body partake with the soul-as in matters of grief, so in matters of joy; the lanthorn shines in the light of the candle within. — Richard Sibbes

Whatsoever is good for God's children they shall have it, for all is theirs to further them to heaven; therefore, if poverty be good, they shall have it; if disgrace be good, they shall have it; if crosses be good, they shall have them; if misery be good, they shall have it; for all is ours, to serve for our greatest good. — Richard Sibbes

The eye being a tender part, and soonest hurt, how watchful is man by nature over that, that it take no hurt. So the heart, being a tender thing, let us preserve it by all watchfulness to keep blows from off it. It is a terrible thing to keep a wound of some great sin upon the conscience, for it makes a way for a new breach; because when the conscience once begins to be hardened with some great sin, then there is no stop, but we run on to commit sin with all greediness. 9. — Richard Sibbes

Gospel repentance is not a little hanging down of the head. It's a working of the heart until your sin becomes more odious to you than any punishment for it. — Richard Sibbes

God's truth always agrees with itself. — Richard Sibbes

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. — Richard Sibbes

Discouragements, then, must come from ourselves and Satan, who laboureth to fasten on us a loathing of duty. — Richard Sibbes

There is more mercy in Christ than sin in us. — Richard Sibbes

Does God take care of beasts, and not of his more noble creature? And therefore we ought to judge charitably of the complaints of God's people which are wrung from them in such cases. Job had the esteem with God of a patient man, notwithstanding those passionate complaints. — Richard Sibbes

It is atheism to pray and not wait on hope. — Richard Sibbes

Glory follows afflictions, not as the day follows the night but as the spring follows the winter; for the winter prepares the earth for the spring, so do afflictions sanctified prepare the soul for glory. — Richard Sibbes

Poverty and affliction take away the fuel that feeds pride. — Richard Sibbes

In trouble we are prone to forget all that we have heard and read that makes for our comfort. Now what is the reason that a man comes to think of that which otherwise he should never have called to mind? The Holy Spirit brings it to his remembrance; He is a Comforter, bringing to mind useful things at such times when we have most need of them. — Richard Sibbes

Weakness with watchfulness will stand, when strength with too much confidence fails. Weakness, with acknowledgement of it, is the fittest seat and subject for God to perfect his strength in; for consciousness of our infirmities drives us out of ourselves to him in whom our strength lies. — Richard Sibbes

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

God sees fit that we should taste of that cup of which his Son drank so deep, that we might feel a little what sin is, and what his Son's love was. But our comfort is that Christ drank the dregs of the cup for us, and will
succor us, so that our spirits may not utterly fail under that little taste of his displeasure which we may feel. He became not only a man but a curse, a man of sorrows, for us. He was broken that we should not be broken; he was troubled, that we should not be desperately troubled; he became a curse, that we should not be accursed. Whatever may be wished for in an all sufficient comforter is all to be found in Christ. — Richard Sibbes

holy despair in ourselves is the basis for true hope. In God the fatherless find mercy (Hos. 14:3). If men were more fatherless, they should feel more God's fatherly affection from heaven, for the God who dwells in the highest heavens dwells likewise in the lowest soul (Isa. 57:15). — Richard Sibbes

A sharp reproof sometimes is a precious pearl, and a sweet balm. The wounds of secure sinners will not be healed with sweet words. — Richard Sibbes

What is the gospel itself but a merciful moderation, in which Christ's obedience is esteemed ours, and our sins laid upon him, wherein God, from being a judge, becomes our Father, pardoning our sins and accepting our obedience, though feeble and blemished? We are now brought to heaven under the covenant of grace by a way of love and mercy. — Richard Sibbes

The Christian will desire to see the beauty of God in his house, that his soul might be ravished in the excellency of the object, and that the highest powers of his soul, his understanding, will, and affections might be fully satisfied, that he might have full contentment. — Richard Sibbes

Therefore, when we find our heart inflamed with love to God, we may know that God hath shined upon our souls in the pardon of sin; and proportionally to our measure of love is our assurance of pardon. Therefore we should labour for a greater measure thereof, that our hearts may be the more inflamed in the love of God. — Richard Sibbes

No sin is so great but the satisfaction of Christ and His mercies are greater; it is beyond comparison. Fathers and mothers in tenderest affections are but beams and trains to lead us upwards to the infinite mercy of God in Christ. — Richard Sibbes

God has decreed it so, that where tenderness of heart is, there mercy shall follow ... — Richard Sibbes

Christ came down from heaven, and emptied himself of majesty in tender love to souls; shall we not come down from our high conceits to do any poor soul good? Shall man be proud after God hath been humble? — Richard Sibbes

Nothing in the world of so good use, as the least dram of grace. — Richard Sibbes

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

For where God intends to do any good, he first works in them a gracious disposition: after which he looks upon his own work as upon a lovely object, and so doth give them other blessings. God crowns grace with grace. By — Richard Sibbes

Where Christ's Spirit is, it will bring men from their altitudes and excellencies, and make them to stoop to serve the church, and account it an honour to be an instrument to do good. — Richard Sibbes

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. — Richard Sibbes

In the godly, holy truths are conveyed by way of a taste; gracious men have a spiritual palate as well as a spiritual eye. Grace alters the spiritual taste. — Richard Sibbes

Christ does not choose you because you are good, but to make you good. — Richard Sibbes

Let weak Christians know that a spark from heaven, though kindled under green wood that sobs and smokes, yet it will consume all at last. — Richard Sibbes

What do the Scriptures speak but Christ's love and tender care over those that are humbled? — Richard Sibbes

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

When we shoot an arrow, we look to the fall of it; when we send a ship to sea, we look for its return; and when we sow seed, we look for a harvest; so likewise when we sow our prayers, through Christ, in God's bosom, shall we not look for an answer and observe how we speed? It is a seed of atheism to pray and not to look how we speed. But a sincere Christian will pray and wait, and strengthen his heart with promises out of the Word, and never leave praying and looking up till God gives him a gracious answer. — Richard Sibbes

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. — Richard Sibbes

Every creature thinks itself best in its own element, that is the place it thrives in, and enjoys its happiness in; now Christ is the element of a Christian. — Richard Sibbes

The more we see the grace of God in Christ, the spirit of fear is diminished and replaced by a spirit of love and boldness. — Richard Sibbes

God's children improve all advantages to advance their grand end; they labour to grow better by blessings and crosses, and to make sanctified use of all things. — Richard Sibbes

Faith, whereby especially Christ rules, sets the soul so high that it looks down on all other things as far below, as having represented to it, by the Spirit of Christ, riches, honor, beauty and pleasures of a higher nature. — Richard Sibbes

We are only safe when we wisely make use of all good advantages that we have access to. By going out of God's ways we go out of His government, and so lose our good frame of mind, and find ourselves overspread quickly with a contrary disposition. When we draw near to Christ (James 4:8), in His ordinances, He draws near to us. — Richard Sibbes

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

When we go to God by prayer, the devil knows we go to fetch strength against him, and therefore he opposes us all he can. — Richard Sibbes

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

Providence is the perpetuity and continuance of creation. — Richard Sibbes

It should be the art of Christians to present death as a passage to a better life, to labour to bring our souls into such a condition, as to think death not to be a death to us, but the death of itself. Death dies when I die, and I begin to live when I die. It is a sweet passage to life. We never live till we die. — Richard Sibbes

We must neither bind where God looseth, nor loose where God bindeth, nor open where God shutteth, nor shut where God openeth; the right use of the keys is always successful. — Richard Sibbes

It is Christ's manner to trouble our souls first, and then to come with healing in his wings. — Richard Sibbes