Tag Archives: Thomas Manton

“Grace is the beginning of glory” by Thomas Manton

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“Grace is the beginning of glory, and glory is but grace perfected.

Grace is glory in the bud, and moulding, and making; for when the apostle would express our whole conformity to Christ, he only expresseth it thus, ‘We are changed into his image from glory to glory,’ (2 Cor 3:18), that is, from one degree of grace to another.

It is called glory, because the progress of holiness never ceaseth till it comes to the perfection of glory and life eternal. The first degree of grace is glory begun, and the final consummation is glory perfected.

All the degrees of our conformity to Christ are so called. It is a bud of that sinless, pure, immaculate estate which shall be without spot and wrinkle; the seed of that perfect holiness which shall be bestowed upon us hereafter.

Thus the spiritual life is described in its whole flux; it begins in grace, and ends in glory.

See the golden chain: Rom. 8:30, ‘Whom he hath called, them he also justified; and whom he justified, them he also glorified.’

There is no mention of sanctification, for that is included in glory.

Grace is but young glory, and differs from glory as an infant doth from a man; therefore by degrees the Lord will have you enter upon your everlasting inheritance.”

–Thomas Manton, The Works of Thomas Manton, Vol. 13 (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1870/2020), 13: 331.

“The extraordinary kindness of Christ” by Thomas Manton

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“I will pay my portion and share of thanks and respect. But this cannot be applied to this extraordinary kindness of Christ, for every man is indebted for the whole, not every man for a part of redemption.

God’s love to every one is infinite, and He hath paid an infinite price for thee, purchased an infinite happiness to thee.

His love to thee was without measure and bounds, so must thy thankfulness be to Him without stint and limit.

Though Christ died for others as well as thee, yet thou art bound to love Him no less than if it had been for thee alone.

He shed His whole blood for thee, and every drop was poured out for thy sake.”

–Thomas Manton, The Works of Thomas Manton, Vol. 2 (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1870/2020), 2: 296–297.

“As an expositor of Scripture, I regard Manton with unmingled admiration” by J.C. Ryle

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“As an expositor of Scripture, I regard Manton with unmingled admiration. Here, at any rate, he is ‘facile princeps’ (‘easily the first or best’) among the divines of the Puritan school.

The value of expository preaching is continually pressed on ministers in the present day, and not without reason.

The end of all preaching is to bring men under the influence of God’s Word; and nothing seems so likely to make men understand and value the Word as lectures in which the Word is explained.

It was so in Chrysostom’s days; it ought to be so again. The idea, no doubt, like every good theory, may be easily ridden to death; and I believe that with ignorant, semi-heathen congregations, a short pithy text often does more good than a long passage expounded.

But I have no doubt of the immense value of expository preaching, when people will bring their Bibles to the service, and accompany the preacher as he travels on, or go home to their Bibles after the service, and compare what they have heard with the written Word.

I hold it to be a prime excellence of Manton’s expository sermons that, while they are very full, they are never too long.

For my own part, I am painfully struck with the general neglect with which these expository works of Manton’s have been treated of late. Modern commentators who are very familiar with German commentaries seem hardly to know of the existence of Manton’s expositions.

Yet I venture boldly to say, that no student of the chapters I have named will ever fail to find new light thrown on their meaning by Manton. I rejoice to think that now at length these valuable works are about to become accessible to the general public.

They have been too long buried, and it is high time they should be brought to light. I value their author most highly as a man, a writer, and a theologian; but if I must speak out all I think, there is no part in which I value him more than as a homiletical expositor of Scripture.

It only remains for me to express my earnest hope that this new edition of Manton’s works may prove acceptable to the public, and meet with many purchasers and readers.

If any one wants to buy a good specimen of a Puritan divine, my advice unhesitatingly is, ‘Let him buy Manton.’

We have fallen upon evil days both for thinking and reading. Sermons which contain thought and matter are increasingly rare.

The inexpressible shallownesss, thinness, and superficiality of many popular sermons in this day is something lamentable and appalling.

Readers of real books appear to become fewer and fewer every year. Newspapers, and magazines, and periodicals seem to absorb the whole reading powers of the rising generation. What it will all end in God only knows.

The prospect before us is sorrowful and humiliating.

In days like these, I am thankful that the publishers of Manton’s Works have boldly come forward to offer some real literary gold to the reading public. I earnestly trust that they will meet with the success which they deserve.

If any recommendation of mine can help them in bringing out the writings of this admirable Puritan in a new form, I give it cheerfully and with all my heart.

J.C. RYLE,
Vicar of Stradbroke, Suffolk.
29th October 1870.”

–J.C. Ryle, “An Estimate of Thomas Manton,” in Thomas Manton, The Works of Thomas Manton, Vol. 2 (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1871/2020), 2: xvii–xix.

“Our safety lieth in God’s immutability” by Thomas Manton

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“The Lord is unchangeable in holiness and glory. He is a sun that shineth always with a like brightness.

God, and all that is in God, is unchangeable; for this is an attribute that, like a silken string through a chain of pearl, runneth through all the rest:

His mercy is unchangeable, ‘His mercy endureth forever,’ (Ps. 100:5).

So His strength, and therefore He is called ‘The Rock of ages,’ (Isa. 36:4).

So His counsel, Mutat sententiam, sed non decretum (as Bradwardine); He may change His sentence, the outward threatening or promise, but not His inward decree; He may will a change, but not change His will.

So His love is immutable; His heart is the same to us in the diversity of outward conditions: we are changed in estate and opinion, but God, He is not changed.

Well, then,—

1. The more mutable you are, the less you are like God. Oh! how should you loathe yourselves when you are so fickle in your purposes, so changeable in your resolutions!

God is immutably holy, but you have a heart that loveth to wander. He is always the same, but you are soon removed, (Gal. 1:6); ‘soon shaken in mind,’(2 Thess. 2:2); whirried with every blast, (Eph. 4:14), borne down with every new emergency and temptation.

The more you do ‘continue in the good that you have learned and been assured of,’ (2 Tim. 3:14), the more do you resemble the divine perfection.

2. Go to Him to establish and settle your spirits. God, that is unchangeable in Himself, can bring you into an immutable estate of grace, against which all the gates of hell cannot prevail; therefore be not quiet, till you have gotten such gifts from him as are without repentance, the fruits of eternal grace, and the pledges of eternal glory.

3. Carry yourselves to Him as unto an immutable good; in the greatest change of things see Him always the same: when there is little in the creature, there is as much in God as ever: (Ps. 102:26-27), ‘They shall perish, but Thou shalt endure; they shall all wax old as a garment: Thou art the same for ever, and Thy years have no end.’

All creatures vanish, not only like a piece of cloth, but like a garment. Cloth would rot of itself, or be eaten out by moths; but a garment is worn and wasted every day.

But God doth not change; there is no wrinkle upon the brow of eternity; the arm of mercy is not dried up, nor do His bowels of love waste and spend themselves.

And truly this is the church’s comfort in the saddest condition, that however the face of the creatures be changed to them, God will be still the same. It is said somewhere, that ‘the name of God is as an ointment poured out.’ (Song of Solomon 1:3)

Certainly this name of God’s immutability is as an ointment poured out, the best cordial to refresh a fainting soul. When the Israelites were in distress, all the letters of credence that God would give Moses were those, (Exod. 3:14), ‘I AM that I AM hath sent me unto you.’

That was comfort enough to the Israelites, that their God remained in the same tenor and glory of the divine essence; He could still say I AM. With God is no change, no past or present; He remaineth in the same indivisible point of eternity; and therefore saith, I AM.

So the prophet (Malachi 3:6), ἔγω κύριος, οὐκ ἠλλοίωμαι, ‘I am the Lord, that change not’ (or am not changed); ‘therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.’

Our safety lieth in God’s immutability; we cannot perish utterly, because He cannot change.”

–Thomas Manton, “Commentary on the Epistle of James,” The Works of Thomas Manton, Vol. 4 (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1871/2020), 4: 113-114. Manton is commenting on James 1:17.

“He lives to make you everlastingly happy” by Thomas Manton

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“Christ is a fit object for worship and service.

Every being is the more noble the more life it hath in it; the life of things is the commendation of them: Eccles. 9:4, ‘A living dog is better than a dead lion;’ better, that is, more noble.

Now, since Christ hath the noblest and the highest being, he liveth forever. The Scriptures often call upon us to trust in the living God: Ps. 42:2, ‘My soul thirsteth for the living God.’

Who would go to the dead cistern, and leave the living fountain? Alas! what is a man the better for a dead idol? All the satisfaction of the spirit lieth in the life of him whom we worship.

Now Christ is not only living, but living forever. Your hopes in Him will not run waste.

A prince, whose breath is in his nostrils, may uphold his favourites during his life, but upon his death they may be brought from the crown of their excellency to the dust of scorn and ignominy.

But Jesus Christ never dieth. As Bathsheba said to David, 1 Kings 1:21, ‘When my lord the king shall sleep with his fathers, I and my son Solomon shall be counted offenders.’ All their care and cost is lost.

But it cannot be so with Jesus Christ. He lives to make you everlastingly happy.”

–Thomas Manton, “A Practical Exposition Upon the 53rd Chapter of Isaiah,” The Works of Thomas Manton, Vol. 3 (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1870/2020), 3: 360.

“A man that is a stranger to meditation is a stranger to himself” by Thomas Manton

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“A man that is a stranger to meditation is a stranger to himself.”

–Thomas Manton, “A Sermon on Genesis 24:63,” The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, Volume 17 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1874), 17: 271.

“Grace is young glory” by Thomas Manton

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“Grace is young glory, and joy in the Holy Ghost is the suburbs of heaven. You enter upon your country and inheritance by degrees. Fulness of joy is for the life to come, and joy in the Holy Ghost is the beginning of it.

As the winds carry the odours and sweet smells of Arabia into the neighbouring provinces; so the joys of heaven, those sweet smells and odours of the upper paradise, are by the breathings and gales of the Spirit conveyed into the hearts of believers.

This is our advance-money, our taste in the wilderness, our morning-glances of the daylight of glory. Union with Christ is the beginning of heaven, it is heaven in the moulding and framing.”

–Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, Vol. 14 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1973), 14: 260.

“God’s glorious grace is the most dear to Him” by Thomas Manton

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“Grace is wronged by intercepting the glory of grace. It is the greatest sacrilege that can be to rob God of His glory, especially the glory of His grace. Above all things in the world, God’s glory is the most dear to Him; He cannot endure to have a partner.

Especially is the glory of His grace dear to him; it is the whole aim of all His dispensations to glorify grace: Eph. 1:6, ‘To the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved.’

You rob God of His chiefest honour when you take the crown of glory that is due to grace, and put it upon your own head.”

–Thomas Manton, “Several Sermons Upon Titus 2:11-14” in The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 16 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1874), 45–46.

“His everlasting arms can bear us up” by Thomas Manton

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“God is a great God, who taketh the care and charge upon Him of the sustentation and government of all things to their proper ends and uses. How soon would the world fall into confusion and nothing without His power and care!

Now this should recommend Him to our esteem and love. Oh, what a blessed thing is it to have an interest in this powerful and almighty God! All His strength and power is engaged for the meanest and weakest of His children.

1 Peter 1:5, ‘We are kept by the power of God to salvation;’ and therefore we are bidden to be ‘strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.’ Surely they are blessed that have such a mighty God on their side, and engaged with them against their enemies.

1 John 4:4, ‘Greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world.’ He can enable them to do their work, satisfy their desires, maintain them in the midst of opposition: John 10:29, ‘My father, which gave them Me, is greater than all.’

Such is the efficacy of His providence, that He can subject all things to Himself, make them servants, to do what He would have them. Oh, how safe is a Christian in the love and covenant and arms of an Almighty God, whom he hath made his refuge!

Our trials are many, and grace received is small in the best. But our God is great. He that made all things, and sustaineth all things, and governeth all things, and possesseth all things, is our God.

Surely ‘His grace is sufficient for us,’ 2 Cor. 12:9, and His everlasting arms can bear us up: Deut. 33:27, ‘The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.’ He can recover us from our falls, and lift us over all our difficulties.

If we could but rest upon His word and lean upon His power, why should we be discouraged? Oh, let us rejoice, then, not only in the goodness but greatness of that God whom we have chosen for our portion!”

–Thomas Manton, “Sermon XCVI – Psalm 119:91” in The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, Volume 7 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 418-419.