THE CHRISTIAN IN COMPLETE ARMOR...quotes by William Gurnall

There is a profound reality to spiritual warfare. Most contemporary books and teachings about "standing against the wiles of the devil" are more based on superstition than the truth of God's Word (binding and loosing Satan; shouting to the devil in prayer; casting Lucifer out of buildings and sanctuaries before a time of ministry, etc.). Those kinds of antics do not represent biblical Christianity or spiritual courage. It's really doubt looking for proof and they call it faith. It's just comic-book Christianity (like watching some Carman videos). In the end it has no effect in real spiritual warfare.

William Gurnall has written the quintessential book about our daily battle with the enemy of our soul. His book, thoroughly enriched from the truth of Scripture, will bring give you strength, hope, and encouragement in what it means to "put on the whole armor of God" (Eph. 6:10-18). If you don't have this excellent tome I would highly recommend it to you as being a staple volume in your "Berean" library.

Here are some powerful quotes taken from Gurnall's classic, "The Christian in Complete Armour." All of us are indebted to Mark Reynold's for assembling these excellent highlights. May they be nourishment for your heart and soul.

"Submit yourselves therefore to God; 

resist the devil and he will flee from you" (James 4:7). 

In spiritual warfare, our primary duty is not to fight demons... 

but to live for Christ!

"Paul was Nero's prisoner, but Nero was much more God's. (I:9)

No, the Christian must stand fixed to his principles, and not change his habit; but freely show what countryman he is by his holy constancy in the truth. (I:14)

Take heart therefore, O ye saints, and be strong; your cause is good, God himself espouseth your quarrel, who hath appointed you his own Son, General of the field, called 'the Captain of our salvation,' Heb 2:10. (I:16)

Blind zeal is soon put to a shameful retreat, while holy resolution, built on fast principles, lifts up its head like a rock in the midst of the waves. (I:17)

O take heed of this squint eye to our profit, pleasure, honour, or anything beneath Christ and heaven; for they will take away your heart ... that is, our love, and if our love be taken away, there will be little courage left for Christ. (I:18)

We must not confide in the armour of God, but in the God of this armour, because all our weapons are only 'mighty through God,' 2 Cor 10:4 (I:53)

Thus you see it is not armour as armour, but as armour of God, that makes the soul impregnable. (I:54)

I do not bid thee try the truth of thy grace by such a power as is peculiar to stronger grace, but by that power which will distinguish it from false [grace]. (I:57)

Whihle the Christian commits a sin he hates it; whereas the [hypocrite] loves it while he forbears it. (I:57)

If thou beest never so exact in thy morals, and not a worshipper of God, then thou art an atheist. (I:60)

In heaven we shall appear, not in armour, but in robes of glory. But here these are to be worn night and day; we must walk, work, and sleep in them, or else we are not true soldiers of Christ. (I:64)

The longer a soul hath neglected duty, the more ado there is to get it taken up.... (I:65)

Grace is of a stirring nature, and not such a dead thing, like an image, which you may lock up in a chest, and none shall know what God you worship. No, grace will show itself; it will walk with you into all places and companies; it will buy with you, and sell for you; it will have a hand in all your enterprises .... (I:69)

And doth not God deserve the best service thou canst do him in thy generation? (I:70)

Therefore it should be our care, if we would not yield to the sin, not towalk by, or sit at, the door of the occasion. (I:74)

Truth with self-denial [is] a better pennyworth, than error with all its flesh-pleasing. (I:82)

As you love your peace, Christian, be plain-hearted with God and man, and keep the king's highway. (I:83)

The proper seat of sin is the will, of comfort the conscience. (I:85)

It is true, Christian, the debt thou owest to God must be paid in good and lawful money, but, for thy comfort, here Christ is thy paymaster. (I:89)

Love refuseth nothing that love sends. (I:89)

A rent garment is catched by every nail, and the rent made wider. Renew therefore thy repentance speedily, whereby this breach may be made up, and worse prevented... (I:95)

Again, [Satan] will ask the Christian what was the time of his conversion. Art thou a Christian, will he say, and dost thou not know when thou commencedst? Now ... content thyself with this, that thou seest the streams of grace, ....; you may know the sun is up, though you did not observe when it rose. (I:96)

Behold therefore thy God at work, and promise thyself that what he is about, will be an excellent piece. (I:110)

Love cannot think any evil of God, nor endure to hear any speak evil of him, but it must take God's part.... (I:118)

Mercy should make us ashamed, wrath afraid to sin. (I:118)

Few are made better by prosperity, whom afflictions make worse. (I:118)

It is no policy to let thy lusts have arms, which are sure to rise and declare against thee when thine enemy comes. (I:124)

Take heed thou makest not the least child thine enemy by offering wrong to him; God will right the wicked even upon the saint. (I:126)

Thou hast no life to lose, because thou hast given it already to Christ, nor can man take away that without God's leave. (I:127)

Sin disabled man to keep God's law, but it doth not enfranchise or disoblige him that he need not keep it. (I:132)

His subject thou art whom thou crownest in thy heart, and not whom thou flatterest with thy lips. (I:134)

Christ will bear no equal, and Satan no superior; and therefore, hold in with both thou canst not. (I:134)

No, it is some noble enterprise I would have thee think upon, how thou mayst advance the name of Christ higher in thy heart, and [in the] world too, as much as in thee lies. (I:138)

Therefore tremble, O man, at any power thou hast, except thou usest it for God. Art [thou] strong in body; who hath thy strength? God, or thy lusts? (I:144)

When Satan finds the good man asleep, then he finds our good God awake; therefore thou art not consumed, because he changeth not. (I:146)

Bid faith look through the key-hole of the promise, and tell thee what it sees there laid up for him that overcomes; bid it listen and tell thee whether it cannot hear the shout of those crowned saints, as of those that are dividing the spoil, and receiving the reward of all their services and sufferings here on earth. (I:150)

Christ counts it his honour, that he is a king of a willing people, and not of slaves. (I:155)

All his commands are acts of grace, it is a favour to be employed about them. (I:155)

How can God stoop lower than to come and dwell with a poor humble soul? which is more than if he had said, such a one should dwell with him; for a beggar to live at court is not so much as the king to dwell with him in his cottage. (I:161)

O if once our hearts were but filled with zeal for God, and compassion to our people's souls, we would up and be doing, though we could but lay a brick a day, and God would be with us. (I:167)

And when God comes to reckon with his workmen, the ploughman and the sower shall have his penny, as well as the harvest-man and the reaper. (I:167)"