J C Ryle Quotes

#1. The beginning of the way to heaven, is to feel that we are on the way to hell. - J. C. Ryle

Randy Alcorn

#2. J.C. Ryle is an evangelical champion ... One of the bravest and best of men.

Charles Spurgeon

#3. To be truly happy - a man must have sources of gladness which are not dependent on anything in this world. - J. C. Ryle

Randy Alcorn

#4. "A humble and prayerful person will find a thousand things in the Bible, which the proud student will utterly fail to discern." ~ J.C. Ryle

J.C. Ryle

#5. No man can die unless Jesus opens the mystic door of death.

J.C. Ryle

#6. Growth in grace is one way to be happy in our religion. God has wisely linked together our comfort and our increase in holiness.

J.C. Ryle

#7. He does not regard the quantity of faith, but the quality. He does not measure its degree, but its truth. He will not break any bruised reed, nor quench any smoking flax. He will never let it be said that any perished at the foot of the cross.

J.C. Ryle

#8. Sin forsaken is one of the best evidences of sin forgiven.

J.C. Ryle

#9. The love of our Lord Jesus Christ towards sinners is strikingly shown in His steady purpose of heart to die for them.

J.C. Ryle

#10. The union with Christ which produces no effect on heart and life is a mere formal union, which is worthless before God. The faith which has not a sanctifying influence on the character is no better than the faith of devils.

J.C. Ryle

#11. A man's state before God may always be measured by his prayers.

J.C. Ryle

#12. There must not only be good preaching, but good hearing.

J.C. Ryle

#13. True faith will always show itself by its fruits ... I suspect that, with rare exceptions, men die just as they have lived.

J.C. Ryle

#14. Pride comes from not knowing yourself and the world. The older you grow, and the more you see, the less reason you will find for being proud. Ignorance and inexperience are the pedestal of pride; once the pedestal is removed - pride will soon come down.

J.C. Ryle

#15. Tell me what a man does in the matter of Bible-reading and praying, in the matter of Sunday, public worship, and the Lord's Supper, and I will soon tell you what he is, and on which road he is travelling.

J.C. Ryle

#16. The heart that has really tasted the grace of Christ, will instinctively hate sin.

J.C. Ryle

#17. The highest form of selfishness is that of the man who is content to go to heaven alone.

J.C. Ryle

#18. How can we love sin, when we remember that because of our sins Jesus died?

J.C. Ryle

#19. Here again is one grand element of a preacher's success. He must labour by all means to be understood. It was a wise saying of Archbishop Usher, To make easy things seem hard is every man's work; but to make hard things easy is the work of a great preacher.

J.C. Ryle

#20. There is one subject in religion, about which you can never know too much. That subject is Jesus Christ the Lord.

J.C. Ryle

#21. Am I honest? Am I sincere? Do I really desire first the praise of God?

J.C. Ryle

#22. If we would have good ministers, we must remember our Lord's example, and pray for them. Their work is heavy. Their responsibility is enormous. Their strength is small. Let us see that we support them, and hold up their hands by our prayers.

J.C. Ryle

#23. When you cannot answer a skeptic, be content to wait for more light; but never forsake a great principle.

J.C. Ryle

#24. Prayer is the surest remedy against the devil and besetting sins.

J.C. Ryle

#25. If you would train your children rightly, train them in the way they should go and not in the way they would.

J.C. Ryle

#26. There is a common, worldly kind of Christianity in this day, which many have, and think they have enough-a cheap Christianity which offends nobody, and requires no sacrifice-which costs nothing, and is worth nothing.

J.C. Ryle

#27. A trial is an instrument by which our Father in heaven makes Christians more holy.

J.C. Ryle

#28. It is not possible to say too much about Christ. But it is quite possible to say too little about hell.

J.C. Ryle

#29. Prayer is the mightiest weapon that God has placed in our hands.

J.C. Ryle

#30. Never let us be guilty of sacrificing any portion of truth on the altar of peace.

J.C. Ryle

#31. O Christian, look up and take comfort. Jesus has prepared a place for you, and those who follow Him shall never perish, neither shall anyone pluck them out of His hands.

J.C. Ryle

#32. The true cure for self-righteousness is self-knowledge.

J.C. Ryle

#33. Christmas is a season which almost all Christians observe in one way or another. Some keep it as a religious season. Some keep it as a holiday. But all over the world, wherever there are Christians, in one way or another Christmas is kept.

J.C. Ryle

#34. There is but one fountain of comfort for a man drawing near to his end, and that is the Bible ... All comfort from any other source is a house built upon sand.

J.C. Ryle

#35. A man may just as soon read the Scripture without eyes, as understand the spirit of it without grace.

J.C. Ryle

#36. Blessed are they who feel like pilgrims and strangers in this life, and whose best things are all to come!

J.C. Ryle

#37. Men fall in private long before they fall in public.

J.C. Ryle

#38. Pride makes us rest content with ourselves - think we are good enough as we are - keep us from taking advice - refuse the gospel of Christ - turn every one to his own way. But pride never reigns anywhere so powerfully as in the heart of a young man.

J.C. Ryle

#39. Christ's death is the Christian's life. Christ's cross is the Christian's title to heaven. Christ "lifted up" and put to shame on Calvary is the ladder by which Christians "enter into the holiest," and are at length landed in glory.

J.C. Ryle

#40. We should no more tolerate false doctrine that we would tolerate sin.

J.C. Ryle

#41. I maintain that to tell a person they are born again, while they are living in carelessness or sin, is a dangerous delusion.

J.C. Ryle

#42. Ignorance of Scripture is the root of every error in religion, and the source of ever heresy. To be allowed to remove a few grains of ignorance, and to throw a few rays of light on God's precious word, is, in my opinion, the greatest honor that can be put on a Christian.

J.C. Ryle

#43. Let your Christianity be so unmistakable, your eye so single, your heart so whole, your walk so straightforward, that all who see you may have no doubt whose you are, and whom you serve.

J.C. Ryle

#44. The Bible applied to the heart by the Holy Ghost is the chief means by which men are built up and established in the faith, after their conversion. It is able to cleanse them, to sanctify them, to instruct them in righteousness, and to furnish them thoroughly for all good works.

J.C. Ryle

#45. Nothing perhaps affects man's character more than the company he keeps

J.C. Ryle

#46. If you and sin are friends, you and God are not yet reconciled.

J.C. Ryle

#47. Experience supplies painful proof that traditions once called into being are first called useful, then they become necessary. At last they are too often made idols, and all must bow down to them or be punished.

J.C. Ryle

#48. Children are very quick observers; very quick in seeing through some kinds of hypocrisy, very quick in finding out what you really think and feel, very quick in adopting all your ways and opinions. You will often discover that, as the father is, so is the son.

J.C. Ryle

#49. Since Satan can't destroy the gospel, he has too often neutralized its usefulness by addition, subtraction or substitution.

J.C. Ryle

#50. We corrupt the Word of God most dangerously, when we throw any doubt on the plenary inspiration of any part of Holy Scripture.

J.C. Ryle

#51. Nothing so hardens the heart of man as a barren familiarity with sacred things.

J.C. Ryle

#52. Look to the cross, think of the cross, meditate on the cross, and then go and set your affections on the world if you can.

J.C. Ryle

#53. The hand of the wicked can't stir one moment before God allows them to begin, and ... one moment after God commands them to stop.

J.C. Ryle

#54. If you profess to be a child of God, leave it to the Lord Jesus to sanctify you in His own way.

J.C. Ryle

#55. Wherever we may be, or whatever our circumstances, the Lord Jesus sees them. We are never beyond the reach of His care.

J.C. Ryle

#56. So long as you do not quarrel with sin, you will never be a truly happy man.

J.C. Ryle

#57. If you do not love Christ, let me plainly tell you what is the reason: You have no sense of debt to Him.

J.C. Ryle

#58. That preaching is sadly defective which dwells exclusively on the mercies of God and the joys of heaven, yet never sets forth the terrors of the Lord and the miseries of hell.

J.C. Ryle

#59. The rulers of the earth plan, and scheme, and make laws, and change laws, and war, and pull down one, and raise up another. But they little think that they rule only by the will of Jesus, and that nothing happens without the permission of the Lamb of God.

J.C. Ryle

#60. We must wrestle earnestly in prayer, like men contending with a deadly enemy for life.

J.C. Ryle

#61. The cause of Christ does not need less working, but it does need among the workers, more praying.

J.C. Ryle

#62. Make it a part of every day's business to read and meditate on some portion of God's Word. Private means of grace are just as needful every day for our souls as food and clothing are for our bodies.

J.C. Ryle

#63. Without the blessing of the Lord, your best endeavors will do no good. He has the hearts of all men in His hands, and except He touch the hearts of your children by His Spirit, you will weary yourself to no purpose. Water, therefore, the seed you sow on their minds with unceasing prayer.

J.C. Ryle

#64. Fear puts an end to openness of manner; fear leads to concealment; fear sows the seed of much hypocrisy, and leads to many a lie.

J.C. Ryle

#65. Let us read the Bible reverently and diligently, with an honest determination to believe and practice all we find in it.

J.C. Ryle

#66. The chief end for which Christ lived and died: To provide eternal redemption for sinners.

J.C. Ryle

#67. When I speak of a man growing in grace, I mean simply this - that his sense of sin is becoming deeper, his faith stronger, his hope brighter, his love more extensive, his spiritual mindedness more marked.

J.C. Ryle

#68. A zealous man feels that like a lamp he is made to burn; and if consumed in burning, he has but done the work for which God appointed him. Such a one will always find a sphere for his zeal. If he cannot preach and work and give money, he will cry and sigh and pray.

J.C. Ryle

#69. Jesus hears us, and in His own good time will give an answer ... He may sometimes keep us long waiting ... but He will never send us empty away.

J.C. Ryle

#70. He and sin must quarrel, if he and God are to be friends.

J.C. Ryle

#71. The Bible alone gives a true and faithful account of man. It does not flatter him as novels and romances do; it does not conceal his faults and exaggerate his goodness, it paints him just as he is.

J.C. Ryle

#72. Faith in the Lord Jesus is the only sure medicine for troubled hearts.

J.C. Ryle

#73. We never know who they are that God will draw, and have nothing to do with it. Our duty is to invite all, and leave it to God to choose the vessels of mercy.

J.C. Ryle

#74. Let us not expect too much from our own hearts here below. At our best we shall find in ourselves daily cause for humiliation, and discover that we are needy debtors to mercy and grace every hour.

J.C. Ryle

#75. The harvest of the Lord's field is seldom ripened by sunshine only. It must go through its days of wind, rain and storm.

J.C. Ryle

#76. If God has given His Son to die for us, let us beware of doubting His kindness and love in any painful providence of our daily life.

J.C. Ryle

#77. The very sermon that we needlessly miss, may contain a precious word in season for our souls.

J.C. Ryle

#78. Without holiness on earth we shall never be prepared to enjoy heaven. Heaven is a holy place. The Lord of heaven is a holy Being. The angels are holy creatures. Holiness is written on everything in heaven ... How shall we ever be at home and happy in heaven if we die unholy?

J.C. Ryle

#79. A true Christian is one who has not only peace of conscience, but war within. He may be known by his warfare as well as by his peace.

J.C. Ryle

#80. Meekness is one of the brightest graces which can adorn the Christian character.

J.C. Ryle

#81. We may love money without having it, just as we may have money without loving it.

J.C. Ryle

#82. Live as if you thought that Christ might come at any time.

J.C. Ryle

#83. Let us learn to be patient in the days of darkness, if we know anything of vital union with Christ.

J.C. Ryle

#84. If Christ had not gone to the cross and suffered in our stead, the just for the unjust, there would not have been a spark of hope for us. There would have been a mighty gulf between ourselves and God, which no man ever could have passed.

J.C. Ryle

#85. People will never set their faces decidedly towards heaven, and live like pilgrims, until they really feel that they are in danger of hell.

J.C. Ryle

#86. What young men will be, in all probability depends on what they are now, and they seem to forget this. Youth is the planting time of full age, the molding season in the little space of human life, the turning point in the history of man's mind.

J.C. Ryle

#87. Prosperity is a great mercy, but adversity is a greater one, if it brings us to Christ.

J.C. Ryle

#88. There is no fickleness about Jesus: those whom He loves, He loves to the end.

J.C. Ryle

#89. To be prayerless is to be without God, without Christ, without grace, without hope, and without heaven.

J.C. Ryle

#90. Surely if there be any habit which your own hand and eye should help in forming, it is the habit of prayer.

J.C. Ryle

#91. Let us awake to a sense of the perilous state of many professing Christians. 'Without holiness no man shall see the Lord'; without sanctification there is no salvation (Hebrews 12:14). Then what an enormous amount of so-called religion there is which is perfectly useless!

J.C. Ryle

#92. No time is so well spent in every day as that which we spend upon our knees.

J.C. Ryle

#93. A right heart leans on Christ, hangs on Christ, builds on Christ and cleaves to Christ.

J.C. Ryle

#94. Christ is never fully valued, until sin is
clearly seen.

J.C. Ryle

#95. The fear of punishment, the desire of reward, the sense of duty, are all useful arguments, in their way, to persuade people to holiness. But they are all weak and powerless, until a person loves Christ.

J.C. Ryle

#96. He that has trained his children for heaven,
rather than for earth- for God rather than for man- he is the parent who will be called wise at the last.

J.C. Ryle

#97. Surely none are so crazy as those who are content to live unprepared to die. Surely the unbelief of men is the most amazing thing in the world.

J.C. Ryle

#98. We know nothing of humility by nature, for we are all born proud.

J.C. Ryle

#99. Sin and the devil will always find helpers in our hearts.

J.C. Ryle

#100. It is thoroughly Scriptural and right to say "faith alone justifies." But it is not equally Scriptural and right so say "faith alone sanctifies.

J.C. Ryle