Richard Sibbes

We are like the child that lives and strives for a time blindly in the womb, but in this dark life of ours, there is a divine instinct, power, and faculty… that noting here can suffice: which shows.. that there is a condition which shall make a man fully happy; there must be a better life, which is, the spiritual life: for this life which we live in the flesh, is a thing of nothing… A Christian furnished with this spiritual life, can see Christ, and glory beyond all things in this life; he can look backwards, make use of all things past, see the vanity of things so admired of others, he can taste things nature doth not relish, he hath strength of reasons beyond all the apprehensions of reason: he is a man of strong working.
—Richard Sibbes “Saints Cordials”

There was first in Christ human flesh, abased flesh, and then glorious flesh. Abasement was first  necessary for Christ; he could not have performed the office of a servant, unless he had undertaken the condition of a servant. He must first be abased and then glorious, our ill must be his before good, his cause could be ours. And how could he undergo our ill, our sin and misery, and the curse due to us, unless abased? Our sins must be imputed to him, and then his righteousness and whatsoever is good is ours; so here is both the abasement of his condition and the excellency of his office to be a King, priest,  and prophet to his church.

—Richard Sibbes “A Description of Christ”

Some have, after conflict, wondered at the goodness of God, that so little and shaking faith should have upheld them in so great combats, when Satan had almost caught them. And, indeed, it is to be wondered, how much a little grace will prevail with God, for acceptance, and over our enemies for victory, if the heart be right. Such is the goodness of our sweet Saviour, that he delights still to show his strength in our weakness.
—Richard Sibbes “The Bruised Reed”

How does Christ give his Spirit to us? The Spirit, so necessary for us, is given by the ministry of the Gospel, which is the ministry of the Spirit (Gal. 3:2) When the love of God in Christ, and the benefits by Christ are laid open in the preaching of the gospel to us, God gives his Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ. Now God in Christ would save us by a triumphant and abundant love and mercy, and the Spirit of God never goes but where there is a magnifying of the love and mercy of God in Christ. Therefore, the ministry of the Gospel, which alone discovers the amity and love of God to mankind, being now reconciled in Christ, is accompanied with the Spirit… Christ is the first gift, and the Spirit is the second.
—Richard Sibbes “A Description of Christ”

Christ has conquered all in his own person, first, and he is God overall, blessed for evermore; and therefore, over sin, death, hell, Satan and the world. And as he has overcome them in himself, so he overcomes them in our hearts and consciences.
Christ sets up his kingdom in the conscience, and makes it a kind of paradise.
The Spirit of Truth, to whose tuition Christ has committed his church, and the truth of the Spirit is the Sceptre of Christ, abide forever…This truth must not only live forever, but likewise prevail over all that oppose it, for both the Word and the Spirit, are mighty in operation (Heb. 4:12)… A little faith strengthened by Christ will work wonders.
—Richard Sibbes “The Bruised Reed”

It is usual in the prophecies, especially of Isaiah, that evangelical prophet, when he foretells anything comfortable to the people in the promise of temporal things, he rises to confirm their faith in better things by adding thereto a prophecy and a promise of Christ the Messiah. Christ is called a servant… in respect of his condition (Phi. 2:7).  Christ took upon him the form of a servant; he emptied himself; he was the lowest of all servants in condition: none was ever as abased as our glorious Saviour.
Christ was an ambSufassador sent from the great God: a prophet, a priest, and a king… to bring God and man together again.
—Richard Sibbes “A Description of Christ.”

God will not quench the smoking flax, but blow it up till it flames. In smoking flax there is but little light… Grace is little at the first… Let us not be discouraged at the small beginnings of grace, but look on ourselves as “elected to be  blameless and without spot” (Eph. 1:4)… Christ will not quench small and weak beginnings. First, because this spark is from heaven, it is his own, it is kindled by his own Spirit. And secondly, it tends to the glory of his powerful grace in his children that he preserves light in the midst of darkness–a light in the midst of swelling waters of corruption.
–Richard Sibbes, “The Bruised Reed”

All grace comes by declaring: “The gospel is the power of God to salvation” (Rom. 1:16). Let the gospel–which is God’s judgment as to how men shall be saved, and how they shall walk in obedience by way of thankfulness to God–be declared. Then all that belong to God shall come in, and yield homage to it, and be brought in subjection… The devil knows this well enough. Therefore, he labours to hinder the declaration of judgment [the Word of God] by all means. He will not  have God’s judgments but men’s traditions declared. He knows the declaring of God’s judgments will quickly breed a change in men’s dispositions… They shall yield spiritual obedience and come in and be saved.
—Richard Sibbes “The Bruised Reed.”

The way to prevail is to get the victory over the pride of our own nature, by taking shame to ourselves, in humble confession to God; to overcome the unbelief of our hearts, by yielding to the promise of pardon; to set ourselves against those sins which have prevailed over us, in confidence of Christ’s assistance. Then, prevailing over ourselves, we shall easily prevail over all our enemies.
—Richard Sibbes “The Bruised Reed.”

Since Christ is thus comfortably set out to us, let us not believe Satan’s [mis]representations of him. When we are troubled in conscience for our sins, his manner is then to present him to the afflicted soul as a most severe judge armed with justice against us. But himself, as holding out a sceptre of mercy, and spreading his arms to receive us… In Christ all perfections of mercy and love meet. How great must that mercy be that lodges in so gracious a heart?
We are weak, but we are his; we are deformed, but yet bear his image… Christ finds matter of love from that which is his own in us.
–Richard Sibbes “The Bruised Reed.”

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The bruised reed is a man that for the most part is in some misery, as those were that came to Christ for help, and by misery brought to see sin as the cause of it…he is sensible of sin and misery, even unto bruising; and seeing no help in himself, is carried with restless desire to have supply from another, with some hope…of mercy. This spark of hope being opposed by doubting’s, and fears arising from corruption, makes him as smoking flax.
–Richard Sibbes, “The Bruised Reed.”

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There will be more glorious times when “when the kingdoms of the earth shall be the Lord Jesus Christ’s. (Rev 11:15), and he shall reign forever; then shall judgment and truth have their victory; then Christ will plead his own coming.
—Richard Sibbes “The Bruised Reed.”

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Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? hope thou in God; for I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance, and my God.—Ps. 42:11.

Moreover we see that a godly man can cast a restraint upon himself, as David here stays himself in falling. There is a principle of grace, that stops the heart, and pulls in the reins again when the affections are loose. A carnal man, when he begins to be cast down, sinks lower and lower, until he sinks into despair, as lead sinks into the bottom of the sea. “They sunk, they sunk, like lead in the mighty waters,” Exod. 15:5. A carnal man sinks as a heavy body to the centre of the earth, and stays not if it be not stopped: there is nothing in him to stay him in falling, as we see in Ahithophel and Saul, 2 Sam. 17:23, who, wanting a support, found no other stay but the sword’s point. And the greater their parts and places are, the more they entangle themselves; and no wonder, for they are to encounter with God and his deputy, conscience, who is King of kings, and Lord of lords. When Cain was cast out of his father’s house, his heart and countenance was always cast down, for he had nothing in him to lift it upwards. But a godly man, though he may give a little way to passion, yet, as David, he recovers himself. Therefore as we would have any good evidence that we have a better spirit in us than our own, greater than the flesh or the world, let us, in all troubles we meet with, gather up ourselves, that the stream of our own affections carry us not away too far.
Richard Sibbes—“The Souls Conflict within Itself” Chapter 6

{website Owner’s note: The whole of this works by Sibbes can be found on the old part of the site. Here)

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That the special office of the ministry of Christ, is to lay open Christ to hold up the tapestry and unfold the mysteries of Christ. That we should labour to be always speaking somewhat about Christ, or tending that way; when we speak of the law, let it drive us to Christ, when of moral duties  let it teach us to walk worthy of Christ or somewhat tending to Christ should be our theme and mark to aim at.
–Richard Sibbes–sermons on Canticles

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Grace conquers us first, and we by it, conquer all things—whether it be corruptions within us, or temptations without us. “Everyone that is born of God, overcomes the world.” (1 John 5:4)
—Richard Sibbes
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Truth is truth, and error, error. That which is unlawful is unlawful, whether men think so or not. God has put an eternal difference between light and darkness, good and evil, which no creature’s conceit can alter; and therefore no man’s judgment is the measure of things further than it agrees to the truth stamped upon such things themselves by God.
—Richard Sibbes
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Truth is truth, and error, error. That which is unlawful is unlawful, whether men think so or not. God has put an eternal difference between light and darkness, good and evil, which no creature’s conceit can alter; and therefore no man’s judgment is the measure of things further than it agrees to the truth stamped upon such things themselves by God.
—Richard Sibbes
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Whatsoever is good for God’s children they shall have it, for all is theirs to further them to heaven; therefore, if poverty be good, they shall have it; if disgrace be good, they shall have it; if crosses be good, they shall have them; if misery be good, they shall have it; for all is ours, to serve our greatest good.

God takes a safe course with his children. He permits the world to condemn them, that they may not be condemned with the world. The world hates them that they may not love the world, that they may be crucified to it. The world is to be crucified unto them; therefore they meet with such crosses and abuses and wrongs in the world. Because he will not suffer them to perish with the world, he sends them afflictions in and by the world.
—Richard Sibbes
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