John Owen: Hater of Sin, Lover of God

Here are the quotes, used and unused, from last night’s biographical address on John Owen.

If thou art, as many in this pretending age, a sign or title gazer, and comest into books as Cato into the theatre, to go out again,—thou hast had thy entertainment; farewell!  – In The Preface of the Death of Death in the Death of Christ

Heresy is a canker, but it is a spiritual one; let it be prevented by spiritual means: cutting off men’s heads is no proper remedy for it.

May it please your majesty, could I posses the tinker’s abilities for preaching, I would willing relinquish all my learnings.  – In reply to Charles II when asked why he would go hear such a tinker a John Bunyan preach

…I am going to him whom my soul has loved, or rather who has loved me with an everlasting love, – which is the whole ground of all my consolation.  The passage is very irksome and wearisome, through strong pains of various sorts, which are all issued in an intermitting fever.  I am leaving the ship of the church in a storm; but whilst the great Pilot is in it, the loss of a poor under-rower is inconsiderable.  – A letter to His friend Charles Fleetwood

I am glad to hear it; but O brother Payne! The long wished-for day is come at last, in which I shall see that glory in another manner than I have ever done or was capable of doing in this world.  – To Thomas Payne with arms uplifted and eyes heavenward on the morning of the day of his death.

The vigor, and power, and comfort of our spiritual life depends on the mortification of the deeds of the flesh.  – The Mortification of Sin

Do you mortify; do you make it you daily work; be always at it while you live; cease not a day from this work; be killing sin or it will be killing you.  – The Mortification of Sin

…sin is never less quite when it seems to be most quite, and its waters most deep when they are still…  – The Mortification of Sin

Sin always aims at the utmost; every time it raises up to tempt or entice, might it have its own course, it would go out to the utmost sin of its kind.  Every unclean thought or glance would be adultery if it could; every covetous desire would be oppression, every thought of unbelief would be atheism, might it grow to its head.  – The Mortification of Sin

He that shall call a man from mending a hole in the wall of his house, to quench a fire that is consuming the whole building is not his enemy.  – The Mortification of Sin

Be much in thoughtfulness of the excellency of the majesty of God and thine infinite, inconceivable distance from him.  …Think greatly of the greatness of God.  – The Mortification of Sin

Let no man, then, pretend to fear sin that doth not fear temptation to it.  They are too nearly allied to be separated.  Satan hath put them together so that it is very hard for any man to put them asunder.  He hates not the fruit who delights in the root.  – On Temptation

The ways of our entering temptation are so many, various, and imperceptible, – the means of it so efficacious and powerful, – the entrances of it so deceitful, subtle, insensible, and plausible, – our weaknesses, our unwatchfulness so unspeakable, – that we cannot in the least keep or preserve ourselves from it.  We fail in both wisdom and power for this work.  – On Temptation

Should you go into an hospital, and see many persons lying sick and weak, sore and wounded, with many filthy diseases and distempers, and should inquire of them how they fell into this condition, and they shall all agree to tell you of such or such a thing was the occasion of it, “By that I got my wound,” says one, “And my disease,” says another, – would it not make you a little careful how or what you had to do with that thing or place?  Should you go into a dungeon, and see many miserable creatures bound in chains for an approaching day of execution, and inquire the way and means whereby they were brought into that condition, and they should all fix on one and the same thing, would you not take care to avoid it?  – On Temptation

It will never be exhausted; it is not wasted by men’s spending on it; yea the more they draw out this treasure, the more it grows and abounds!  – Indwelling Sin

Fix you affections on heavenly things: this will enable you to mortify sin; fill them with the things that are above, let them be exercised with them, and so enjoy the cheifest place in them.  They are above blessed and suitable objects, meet for and answering unto our affections; – God himself, in his beauty and glory; the Lord Jesus Christ who is “altogether lovely, the cheifest of ten thousand;” grace and glory; the mysteries revealed in the gospel; the blessed promises thereby.  Were our affections filled up, taken up, and possessed with these things, as it is our duty that they be, – it is our happiness when they are, – what access could sin, with its painted pleasures, with its sugared poisons, with its envenomed baits, have unto our souls.  – Indwelling Sin

The Danger of men’s souls lieth not in a disability to attain a comprehension of longer or more subtle confessions of faith, but in embracing things contrary unto, or inconsistent with this foundation thereof.  – The Person of Christ

Nothing renders us so like unto God as our love unto Jesus Christ for he is the principle object of His love; – in him doth his soul rest – in him is he always well pleased.  Wherever this is wanting, whatever there may be besides, there is nothing of the image of God.  – The Person of Christ

There is no greater discovery of the depravation of our natures by sin and degeneracy of our wills from their original rectitude, than that – whereas we are so prone to the love of other things, and therein do seek for satisfaction unto our souls where it is not to be obtained – it is so hard and difficult to raise our hearts unto the love of God. Were it not for that depravation, he would always appear as the only suitable and satisfactory object of our love.  – The Person of Christ

An imaginary Christ will effect nothing in the minds of men but imaginary grace.  – The Person of Christ

A God-man was necessary for our atonement because…required that there should be an obedience yielded unto God, bringing more glory unto him than dishonor did arise and accrue from the disobedience of man.  – The Person of Christ

And although the life of faith and vision differ in degrees – or, as some think, in kind – yet have they both the same object, and the same operations, and there is a great cognation between them.  – The Person of Christ

This, therefore, deserves the severest of our thoughts, the best of our meditations, and our utmost diligence in them.  For if our future blessedness shall consist in being where he is, and beholding of his glory, what better preparation can there be for it that in a constant previous contemplation of that glory in the revelation that is made in the Gospel, unto this very end, that by a view of it we may be gradually transformed into the same glory?  – The Glory of Christ

For they all grow on this root of an over-valuation of temporal things… One real view of the glory of Christ and our concernment therein will give us full relief in this matter…When we have due apprehensions hereof, – when our minds are possessed with thoughts of it, – when our affections reach out after its enjoyments, – let pain, and sickness, and sorrows, and fears, and dangers, and death, say what they will, we shall have in readiness wherewith to combat with them and overcome them; and that on this consideration, that they are all outward, transitory, and passing away, whereas our minds are fixed on those things which are eternal, and filled with incomprehensible glory.  – The Glory of Christ

No man shall ever behold the glory of Christ by sight hereafter, who doth not on some measure behold it by faith here in this world.  …No man ought to look for anything in heaven, but what one way or other he hath some experience in this life.  – The Glory of Christ

There is more glory given to God by coming to Christ in believing, than in keeping the whole law; inasmuch as he has more eminently manifested the holy properties of his nature in the way of salvation by Christ, than in the giving of the law.   – The Glory of Christ

There is not anything that Jesus Christ is more delighted with, than that his saints should always hold communion with him as to this business of giving and receiving. For,-…1.This exceedingly honors him, and gives him the glory that is his due. …2. This exceedingly endears the souls of the saints to him, and constrains them to put a due valuation upon him, his love, his righteousness, and grace.  – Communion with God

The best biography I read of John Owen was Andrew Thomson’s Prince of the Puritans.  I have an extra copy that I will give away for free (to SLBC readers only).  Just leave a comment and state why you would like to learn about John Owen.  If by some miracle there is more than one reply if any I will choose the one I think best.