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268 illustrations
The abuses of the tongue are manifold, and malignity ranks foremost among them.
Yet we must consider the mangled victims left in their wake—those who trafficked in cunning and deception, proving specially obnoxious to the Almighty.
Yet here, God withdraws His all-vitalizing and all-blessing presence.
Three characteristics defined him: cruelty, determination, and worldliness.
A great many cannot afford to have Christ.
Maclaren captures the precise moment when courage evaporates: Peter had already 'repented now of, and alarmed for what might happen to him on account of, his ill-aimed blow at Malchus,' compounded by 'the nipping cold' that 'had taken all his...
This outburst reveals the nature of evil's opposition to Christ.
Similarly, when a musician strikes an out-of-tune instrument, he produces sound but the instrument's broken strings produce the jarring discord.
The accumulation of light things becomes overwhelmingly ponderous.
For thirty years, under the guardianship of the High Priest Jehoiada, the king remained faithful to his conscience and duty.
Years before, Elijah had anointed him king over Syria—a word that had festered in his ambitious heart while the decrepit Ben-hadad still nominally held the throne.
Cleanse Thou me from secret faults." — Psalm 19:12 Sin possesses a remarkable tenacity and cunning.
The flattery here is not gentle commendation but *kelalah* (curse)—a loud, vaunting display that intrudes itself on all occasions with busy, demonstrative energy.
Gaze not on beauty overmuch, lest it blast thee; nor too long, lest it blind thee; nor too near, lest it burn thee.
Thomas Carlyle observed with prescience: "There is a great necessity indeed of getting a little more silent than we are.
Maclaren observes that drunkenness, greed, and idolatry appear in interconnected succession—where one plague-spot infects the body politic, the others will not be far away.
It is through blindness and inconsonsideration that any man becomes entangled in the snares of the foolish woman.
These men had condemned an innocent man to death—yet their conscience remained untroubled.
Of all species of deception, self-deception proves most detrimental; it is like having a traitor within the fortress who betrays his country to the enemy.
First, the wicked man takes deliberate pains to devise evil, much as a miner searches for treasure in concealed depths.
Exell notes the critical distinction: it is not the place itself, but the way to it.
They streamed into the wilderness seeking baptism as a *talisman*, a magical protection against coming judgment.
Yet Christians must judge timidity differently than the world does.
When David hears of a wealthy man stealing a poor man's sole ewe lamb, his righteous fury blazes instantly: 'The man that did this thing shall die because he had no pity.' He condemns with the heat of genuine moral...