Pray Big Prayers

Posted on February 22, 2017 by Matt Jury under Phillips Brooks

Pray the largest prayers. You cannot think a prayer so large that God, in answering it, will not wish you had made it larger. Pray not for crutches but for wings!

Phillips Brooks (1835-1893)

Christmas Is Always Young!

Posted on December 23, 2016 by Matt Jury under Phillips Brooks

The earth has grown old with its burden of care, but at Christmas it always is young, the heart of the jewel burns lustrous and fair, and its soul full of music breaks the air, when the song of angels is sung.

Phillips Brooks (1835-1893)

Only Fire Kindles Fire

Posted on April 25, 2016 by Matt Jury under Phillips Brooks

Nothing but fire kindles fire. To know in one’s whole nature what it is to live by Christ; to be His, not our own; to be so occupied with gratitude for what He did for us and for what He continually is to us that His will and His glory shall be the sole desires of our life . . . that is the first necessity of the preacher.

Phillips Brooks, Lectures on Preaching, originally published in 1877. Republished in 1989 by Kregel under the title The Joy of Preaching. As cited in “The Priority of Prayer in Preaching” by James Rosscup, The Masters Seminary Journal, Spring 1991.

Grace Is Sufficient

Posted on February 12, 2015 by Matt Jury under Phillips Brooks

O Lord, I do not pray for tasks equal to my strength; I ask for strength equal to my tasks.

Phillips Brooks (1835-1893)