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J. C. Ryle

J. C. Ryle Quotes

Bishop of Liverpool

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Famous J. C. Ryle Quotes

“The cross is the foundation of the Bible: If you have not yet found out that Christ crucified is the foundation of the whole volume, you have hitherto read your Bible to very little profit. Your religion is a heaven without a sun, an arch without a keystone, a compass without a needle, a clock without a spring or weights, a lamp without oil. It will not comfort you; it will not deliver your soul from hell.”

“In Christ alone God’s rich provision of salvation for sinners is treasured up: by Christ alone God’s abundant mercies come down from heaven to earth. Christ’s blood alone can cleanse us; Christ’s righteousness alone can cleanse us; Christ’s merit alone can give us a title to heaven. Jews and Gentiles, learned and unlearned, kings and poor men--all alike must either be saved by the Lord Jesus, or lost forever.”

“Let us watch against pride in every shape - pride of intellect, pride of wealth, pride of our own goodness. Nothing is so likely to keep a person out of heaven, and prevent them from seeing Christ, as pride. So long as we think we are something we shall never be saved. Let us pray for and cultivate humility; let us seek to know ourselves correctly, and to find out our place in the sight of a holy God.”

“All the simplicity in the world can do no good, unless you preach the simple gospel of Jesus Christ so fully and clearly that everybody can understand it. If 'Christ crucified' has not His rightful place in your sermons, and sin is not exposed as it should be, and your people are not plainly told what they ought to believe, and be, and do - your preaching is of no use!”

“If we would be sanctified, our course is clear and plain—we must begin with Christ. We must go to him as sinners, with no plea but that of utter need, and cast our souls on him by faith, for peace and reconciliation with God.... If we would grow in holiness and become more sanctified, we must continually go on as we began, and be ever making fresh applications to Christ.”

“There are few professing Christians, it may be feared, who strive to imitate Christ in the matter of private devotion. There is abundance of hearing, reading, talking, professing, visiting, contributing to the poor and teaching at schools. But is there, together with all this, a due proportion of private prayer? Are believing men and women sufficiently careful to be frequently alone with God?”

“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.”

“Necessity is laid upon us. We must fight. There are no promises in the Lord Jesus Christ's epistles to the seven churches, except to those who 'overcome.' Where there is grace, there will be conflict. The believer is a soldier. There is no holiness without a warfare. Saved souls will always be found to have fought a fight.”

“No doubt a man may be saved, like the penitent thief, without having received the Lord's Supper. It is not a matter of absolute and indispensable necessity, like repentance, faith, and conversion. But it is impossible to say that any professing Christian is in a safe, healthy, or satisfactory condition of soul, who habitually refuses to obey Christ and attend the Lord's Table.”