Tag Archives: Good books

“Let me have one of the good solid Puritan volumes” by Charles Spurgeon

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“God gave Elijah forty days’ meat at one meal. Do you, dear friends, ever get meals such as that?

I do, when I read certain books. No modern thought books give me no such meat as that. But let me have one of the good solid Puritan volumes that are so little prized nowadays, and my soul can feed upon that.

You do the same, and see whether you do not find food that will last not merely for forty days, but that will make you strong to walk before the Lord even unto the Mount of God, there to bless and adore Him forever and ever.

But, oh, the milk-and-water diet that is too often given in these times! Well may we cry, ‘Where is the Lord God of Elijah?’

Oh, to be fed once more upon the doctrines of discriminating grace!

Oh, to be told continually of the love without a beginning, love without a change, love without an end!

Oh, to hear of an atonement that is an atonement, and that does indeed put away sin,—not the kind of atonement of which many talk today, which is all mist and cloud, and which accomplishes something or nothing according as men are pleased to let it!

We want again to have meat unto life eternal, to know the great truth of union to Christ, of being in Him, and so safe before the Lord, and made well-pleasing unto the Most High. God send us back this food!

Brothers and sisters, do not be satisfied until you get it. Turn from all other tables, and say, ‘Where is the Lord God of Elijah? Where is that flesh that is meat indeed, and that blood which is drink indeed?’

Be content with none but Christ. Have no gospel but Jesus Christ and Him crucified. May God so satisfy the souls of His saints that they shall be able either to serve well or to suffer well!

We are only strong either in patience or in zeal as the Lord God of Elijah feeds us with the Bread which came down from heaven, the Bread of life, Christ Jesus Himself. Lord, evermore give us this Bread!”

–Charles H. Spurgeon, “Where Is the God of Elijah?,” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons (vol. 44; London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1898), 44: 547.

“The most edifying product of Augustine’s pen” by Philip Schaff

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“The Confessions are the most profitable, at least the most edifying, product of Augustine’s pen; indeed, we may say, the most edifying book in all the patristic literature. They were accordingly the most read even during his lifetime, and they have been the most frequently published since. A more sincere and more earnest book was never written… Certainly no autobiography is superior to it in true humility, spiritual depth, and universal interest.

Augustine records his own experience, as a heathen sensualist, a Manichean heretic, an anxious inquirer, a sincere penitent, and a grateful convert. He finds a response in every human soul that struggles through the temptations of nature and the labyrinth of error to the knowledge of truth and the beauty of holiness, and after many sighs and tears finds rest and peace in the arms of a merciful Saviour.”

 –Philip Schaff, “Prolegomena” in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1 Ed. Philip Schaff (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1956), 1:11-12.