Top 217 Quotes & Sayings by John Wesley - Page 2

By justification we are saved from the guilt of sin…by sanctification we are saved from the power and root of sin

My ground is the Bible. Yea, I am a Bible-bigot. I follow it in all things, both great and small.

I want the whole Christ for my Savior, the whole Bible for my book, the whole Church for my fellowship, and the whole world for my mission field.

Do no harm. Do good. Stay in love with God.

October 6, 1774 I met those of our society who had votes in the ensuing election, and advised them 1. To vote, without fee or reward, for the person they judged most worthy 2. To speak no evil of the person they voted against, and 3. To take care their spirits were not sharpened against those that voted on the other side.

Oh Lord, let me not live to be useless.

The Church recruited people who had been starched and ironed before they were washed.

Bring me a worm that can comprehend a man, and then I will show you a man that can comprehend the Triune God.

It is good to renew ourselves, from time to time, by closely examining the state of our souls, as if we had never done it before; for nothing tends more to the full assurance of faith, than to keep ourselves by this means in humility, and the exercise of all good works.

The first priority of my life is to be holy, and the second goal of my life is to be a scholar.

When I was young I was sure of everything; in a few years, having been mistaken a thousand times, I was not half so sure of most things as I was before; at present, I am hardly sure of anything but what God has revealed to me.

Having, First, gained all you can, and, Secondly saved all you can, Then give all you can.

I have so much to do that I spend several hours in prayer before I am able to do it.

I judge all things only by the price they shall gain in eternity.

I continue to dream and pray about a revival of holiness in our day that moves forth in mission and creates authentic community in which each person can be unleashed through the empowerment of the Spirit to fulfill God's creational intentions.

Once in seven years I burn all my sermons; for it is a shame, if I cannot write better sermons now than I did seven years ago.

If I had 300 men who feared nothing but God, hated nothing but sin, and were determined to know nothing among men but Jesus Christ and Him crucified, I would set the world on fire.

Untold millions are still untold.

If we cannot think alike, at least we may love alike; and can anything but love beget love?

Anything that cools my love for Christ is the world.

I learned more about Christianity from my mother than from all the theologians in England.

Before I can preach love, mercy, and grace, I must preach sin, Law, and judgment. Preach 90% Law and 10% grace.

Do you not know that God entrusted you with that money (all above what buys necessities for your families) to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to help the stranger, the widow, the fatherless; and, indeed, as far as it will go, to relieve the wants of all mankind? How can you, how dare you, defraud the Lord, by applying it to any other purpose?

My fear is not that our great movement, known as the Methodists, will eventually cease to exist or one day die from the earth. My fear is that our people will become content to live without the fire, the power, the excitement, the supernatural element that makes us great.

The bible knows nothing of solitary religion.

The man who never fasts is no more in the way to heaven than the man who never prays.

Unless God has raised you up for this very thing, you will be worn out by the opposition of men and devils. But if God be for you, who can be against you? Are all of them together stronger than God? O be not weary of well doing!

My one aim in life is to secure personal holiness, for without being holy myself I cannot promote real holiness in others.

O, Begin! Fix some part of every day for private exercises... Whether you like it or no, read and pray daily. It is for your life; there is no other way; else you will be a trifler all your days... Do justice to your own soul; give it time and means to grow. Do not starve yourself any longer.

Purge me from every sinful blot; My idols all be cast aside: Cleanse me from every evil thought, From all the filth of self and pride. The hatred of the carnal mind Out of my flesh at once remove: Give me a tender heart, resigned, And pure, and full of faith and love.

I want to know one thing: The way to Heaven. How to land safe on that happy shore.

Do all the good you can, by all the means you can.

The greater the share the people have in government, the less liberty, civil or religious, does a nation enjoy.

Try all things by the written word, and let all bow down before it. You are in danger of [fanaticism] every hour, if you depart ever so little from Scripture; yea, or from the plain, literal meaning of an text, taken in connection with the context.

Wherever riches have increased, the essence of religion has decreased in the same proportion.

The readiest way to escape from our sufferings is, to be willing they should endure as long as God pleases.

Employ whatever God has entrusted you with, in doing good, all possible good, in every possible kind and degree.

By salvation I mean not barely according to the vulgar notion deliverance from hell or going to heaven but a present deliverance from sin a restoration of the soul to its primitive health its original purity a recovery of the divine nature the renewal of our souls after the image of God in righteousness and true holiness in justice mercy and truth.

All worldly joys are less than that one joy of doing kindnesses.

Until my work on this earth is done, I am immortal. But when my work for Christ is done ... I go to be with Jesus

There is no love of God without patience, and no patience without lowliness and sweetness of spirit.

Think not the bigotry of another is any excuse for your own.

You have nothing to do but to save souls; therefore spend and be spent in this work.

If doing a good act in public will excite others to do more good, then 'Let your light shine to all.' Miss no opportunity to do good.

It cannot be that the people should grow in grace unless they give themselves to reading. A reading people will always be a knowing people.

We are always open to instruction, willing to be wiser every day than we were before, and to change whatever we can change for the better.

I want to know one thing, the way to heaven; how to land safe on that happy shore. God Himself has condescended to teach the way; for this end He came from heaven. He hath written it down in a book. Give me that book! At any price give me the Book of God!

Give me one hundred men who love only God with all their heart and hate only sin with all their heart and we will shake the gates of hell and bring in the kingdom of God in one generation.

The wearing of costly array is directly opposite to being adorned with good works. Nothing can be more evident than this; for the more you lay out on your own apparel, the less you have left to clothe the naked, to feed the hungry, to lodge the stranger, to relieve those that are sick and in prison.

The bottom of the soul may be in repose, even while we are in many outward troubles; just as the bottom of the sea is calm, while the surface is strongly agitated.

On every occasion of uneasiness, we should retire to prayer, that we may give place to the grace and light of God and then form our resolutions, without being in any pain about what success they may have. In the greatest temptations, a single look to Christ, and the barely pronouncing his name, suffices to overcome the wicked one, so it be done with confidence and calmness of spirit.

Get all you can without hunting your soul, your body, or your neighbor. Save all you can, cutting off every needless expense. Give all you can. Be glad to give, and ready to distribute; laying up in store for yourselves a good foundation against the time to come, that you may attain eternal life.

Above all sing spiritually. Have an eye to God in every word you sing. Aim at pleasing him more than yourself, or any other creature. In order to do this attend strictly to the sense of what you sing, and see that your heart is not carried away with the sound, but offered to God continually; so shall your singing be such as the Lord will approve here, and reward you when he comes in the clouds of heaven.

My mother was the source from which I derived the guiding principles of my life.

Sing lustily and with a good courage. Beware of singing as if you were half dead, or half asleep; but lift up your voice with strength.

God grant that I may never live to be useless!

The Bible must be the invention of either good men or angels, bad men or devils, or of God. It could not be the invention of good men or angels, for they neither would or could make a book, and tell lies all the time they were writing it, saying, 'Thus saith the Lord,' when it was their own invention. It could not be the invention of bad men or devils, for they would not make a book which commands all duty, forbids all sin, and condemns their souls to hell for all eternity. Therefore, I draw this conclusion, that the Bible must be given by divine inspiration.

"Ever since the religion of Islam appeared in the world, the espousers of it...have been as wolves and tigers to all other nations, rending and tearing all that fell into their merciless paws, and grinding them with their iron teeth; that numberless cities are raised from the foundation, and only their name remaining; that many countries, which were once as the garden of God, are now a desolate wilderness; and that so many once numerous and powerful nations are vanished from the earth! Such was, and is at this day, the rage, the fury, the revenge, of these destroyers of human kind".

It is the work of God alone to justify, to sanctify, and to glorify.

I look upon all the world as my parish.