Holiness: It's Nature, Hindrances, Difficulties, and Roots

I've started reading a classic book by J.C. Ryle called "Holiness." This book as a lot of rich, spiritual truth in it and I want to share some great excerpts!

Chapter 1: Sin

"Sin in short, is that vast moral disease which affects the whole human race, of every rank, and class, and name, and nation, and people, and tongue; a disease from which there never was but one born of woman that was free; It consists in doing, saying, thinking, or imagining, anything that is not in perfect conformity with the mind and law of God." (pg. 14)

"Sin is a disease which pervades and runs through every part of our moral constitution and every faculty of our minds. The understanding, the affections, the reasoning powers, the will, are all more or less infected. Even the conscience is so blinded that it cannot be depended on as a sure guide, and is likely to lead men wrong as right, unless it is enlightened by the Holy Ghost. In short, "from the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness" about us (Isa. 1:6). The disease may be veiled under a thin covering of courtesy, politeness, good manners, and outward decorum; but it lies deep down in the constitution." (pg.16)

"Men will never come to Jesus, and stay with Jesus, and live for Jesus, unless they really know why they are to come, and what is their need. Those whom the Spirit draws to Jesus are those whom the Spirit has convinced of sin. Without thorough conviction of sin, men may seem to come to Jesus and follow Him for a season, but they will soon fall away and return to the world." (pg. 23)

Chapter 2: Sanctification

"The Spirit is compared to the wind, and, like the wind, He cannot be seen by our bodily eyes. But just as we know there is a wind by the effect it produces on waves, and trees, and smoke, so we may know the Spirit is in a man by the effects He produces in the man's conduct. It is nonsense to suppose that we have the Spirit, if we do not "walk in the Spirit"(Gal. 5:25). We may depend on it as a positive certainty, that where there is no holy living, there is no Holy Ghost." (pg. 30)

"There are no spiritual gains without pains. I should as soon expect a farmer to prosper in business who contented himself with sowing his fields and never looking at them till harvest, as expect a believer to attain much holiness who was not diligent about his Bible reading, his prayers, and the use of his Sundays. Our God is a God who works by means, and He will never bless the soul of that man who pretends to be so high and spiritual that he can get on without them." (pg.33)

"Evidence, evidence, evidence, will be the one thing wanted when the great white throne is set, when the books are opened, when the graves give up their tenants, when the dead are arraigned before the bar of God. Without some evidence that our faith in Christ was real and genuine, we shall only rise again to be condemned." (pg.35)

"No man can possibly be happy in a place where he is not in his element, and where all around him is not congenial to his tastes, habits, and character. When an eagle is happy in an iron cage, when a sheep is happy in the water, when an owl is happy in the blaze of noonday sun, when a fish is happy on the dry land-then, and not till then, will I admit that the unsanctified man could be happy in heaven." (pg.35)

Chapter 5: The Cost

"For want of "counting the cost," many of our Lord Jesus Christ's hearers went back after a time, and "walked no more with Him" (John 6:66). When they first saw His miracles, and heard His preaching, they thought, "the kingdom of God would immediately appear." But when they found that there were hard doctrines to be believed, and hard work to be done, and hard treatment to be borne, their faith gave way entirely, and proved to be nothing at all. In a word, they had not 'counted the cost,' and so made shipwreck of their profession." (pg.84)