Every local church is the people of God, the body of Christ, built upon the foundation of Christ (1 Cor. 3:11, 16; 12:27), because in that location it is the same as what the church is in its entirety, and Christ is for that local church what he is for the universal church.
In the various local gatherings of believers, it is the one church of Christ that comes to expression.
~Herman Bavinck~
Reformed Dogmatics Vol. 4: Prolegomena (Grand Rapids, Michigan; Baker Academic; 2008) p. 281.
You are retired for your private devotions; you have opened the Bible, and you begin to read.
Now, do not be satisfied with merely reading through a chapter. Some people thoughtlessly read through two or three chapters—stupid people for doing such a thing!
It is always better to read a little and digest it, than it is to read much and then think you have done a good thing by merely reading the letter of the word.
For you might as well read the alphabet backwards and forwards, as read a chapter of Scripture, unless you meditate upon it, and seek to comprehend its meaning.
Merely to read words is nothing: the letter kills.
The business of the believer with his Bible open is to pray, “Lord, give me the meaning and spirit of your word, while it lies open before me; apply your word with power to my soul, threatening or promise, doctrine or precept, whatever it may be; lead me into the soul and marrow of your word.”
Also, it is not the form of prayer, but the spirit of prayer that shall truly benefit your souls.
That prayer has not benefited you, which is not the prayer of the soul.
You have need to say, “Lord, give me the spirit of prayer; now help me to feel my need deeply, to perceive your promises clearly, and to exercise faith upon them.”
In your private devotions, strive after vital godliness, real soul-work, the life-giving operation of the Spirit of God in your hearts.
~Charles Spurgeon~
Spurgeon’s Sermons
When you sailors see the haven before you, though you were mightily troubled before you could see any land, yet when you come near the shore and can see a certain land-mark, that contents you greatly. A godly man in the midst of the waves and storms that he meets with can see the glory of heaven before him and so contents himself. One drop of the sweetness of heaven is enough to take away all the sourness and bitterness of all the afflictions in the world.
~Jeremiah Burroughs~
The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment (Edinburgh, Scotland; The Banner of Truth Trust; 2009) p. 84.
[Commenting on The Lord’s Prayer in Luke 11:1-4:]
Daily bread and daily mercy are by far the most important things mortal man needs. It is the life of true faith to apply daily for fresh supplies of all our needs. Though washed, we need daily to wash our feet (John 13:10).
~J.C. Ryle~
The Crossway Classic Commentaries – Luke (Wheaton, Illinois, Crossway Books; 1997) eBook. Commentary on Luke 11:4
2) To fear God is to have such a holy awe of God upon our hearts, that we dare not sin. “Stand in awe and sin not.” Psalm 4:4. The wicked sin and fear not; the godly fear and sin not. “How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?” Gen 39:9… He who fears God will not sin, though it be ever so secret. “You shall not curse the deaf, nor put a stumbling-block before the blind—but shall fear your God.” Lev 19:14. Suppose you should curse a deaf man, he could not hear you; or suppose you were to lay a stumbling-block in a blind man’s way, and cause him to fall, he could not see you do it. But the fear of God will make you forsake sins which can neither be heard nor seen by men! The fear of God destroys the fear of man. The three Hebrew children feared God, therefore they feared not the king’s wrath. Dan 3:16. The greater noise, drowns the less; the noise of thunder, drowns the noise of a river. Just so, when the fear of God is supreme in the soul, it drowns all other carnal fear. It makes God to be God to us, when we have a holy filial fear of him.
~Thomas Watson~
The Ten Commandments (Portland, Oregan; MonergismBooks.com; 2010) eBook. Excerpted from “The Works of Thomas Watson” – The Ten Commandments; Part 2 – The Ten Commandments; Section 1 – The First Commandment; Part 5 – To have God to be God to us, is to FEAR him.
2. The second duty of piety wherein we must provoke ourselves, is, in HEARING of the Word. We may bring our bodies to the preaching of the Word with ease—but not our hearts, without offering violence to ourselves. When we come to the Word preached, we come to a business of the highest importance, therefore should stir up ourselves and hear with the greatest devotion. Luke xix. 48. “All the people were very attentive to hear him.” In the Greek it is “they hung upon his lip.”—When the Word is dispensed, we are to lift up the everlasting doors of our hearts, that the King of glory may enter in!
~Thomas Watson~
The Christian Soldier
Is it not a sin for a creature to doubt the word of its Maker? Is it not a crime and an insult to the Divinity, for me, an atom, a particle of dust, to dare to deny his words? Is it not the very summit of arrogance and extremity of pride for a son of Adam to say, even in his heart, “God I doubt thy grace; God I doubt thy love; God I doubt thy power?” Oh! sirs believe me, could ye roll all sins into one mass,–could you take murder, and blasphemy, and lust, adultery, and fornication, and everything that is vile and unite them all into one vast globe of black corruption, they would not equal even then the sin of unbelief. This is the monarch sin, the quintessence of guilt; the mixture of the venom of all crimes; the dregs of the wine of Gomorrah; it is the A1 sin, the master-piece of Satan, the chief work of the devil.
~Charles Spurgeon~
Spurgeon’s Sermons
The mystical and moral interpretation of Jesus’ suffering and death cannot even be maintained if it is not acknowledged beforehand that in a legal sense he suffered and died in our place. Now this is what Scripture teaches in the clearest terms, even though it does not use the expression “vicarious satisfaction” any more than the words “Trinity,” “incarnation,” “God-man,” and so on. For when it says that Christ, though personally without sin, has been put forward as an expiation to show God’s righteousness [Rom. 3:25], has been made to be sin for us [2 Cor. 5:21], became a curse for us [Gal. 3:13], bore our sins in his body on the tree [1 Pet. 2:24]; that God condemned sin in his flesh [Rom. 8:3] and punished him with the accursed death on the cross and that through him we now receive reconciliation and forgiveness, righteousness and life, indeed total and complete salvation–then we can construe the interconnection between all these scriptural pronouncements in no other way than that Christ put himself in our place, has borne the punishment of our sin, satisfied God’s justice, and so secured salvation for us.
~Herman Bavinck~
Reformed Dogmatics Vol. 3: Sin and Salvation in Christ (Grand Rapids, Michigan; Baker Academic; 2006) p. 398.
For we know that the spirit of regeneration and also all graces are bestowed on us through Christ; and then it is certain, that as nothing can proceed from us absolutely perfect, nothing can be acceptable to God without that pardon which we obtain through Christ. Thus it comes, that our works, performed by the odor of Christ’s grace, emit a sweet fragrance in God’s presence, while otherwise they would have a fetid smell.
~John Calvin~
Calvin’s Commentaries (Spokane, Washington; Olive Tree Bible Software; 2010) eBook. Excerpted from his commentary on Hebrews 13:21.
The Old Guys 
John Calvin – Romans 3:24
9 SepSince there remains nothing for men, as to themselves, but to perish, being smitten by the just judgment of God, they are to be justified freely through his mercy; for Christ comes to the aid of this misery, and communicates himself to believers, so that they find in him alone all those things in which they are wanting. There is, perhaps, no passage in the whole Scripture which illustrates in a more striking manner the efficacy of his righteousness; for it shows that God’s mercy is the efficient cause, that Christ with his blood is the meritorious cause, that the formal or the instrumental cause is faith in the word, and that moreover, the final cause is the glory of the divine justice and goodness.
~John Calvin~
Calvin’s Commentaries (Spokane, Washington; Olive Tree Bible Software; 2010) eBook. Excerpted from his commentary on Romans 3:24.
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