Jacob Ellis

“Many people, including many Christians, live out their lives under a weight of unforgivenness, blaming themselves for things that have gone wrong in their lives, blaming other people, particularly parents, children and spouses, for things that have gone wrong, feeling the weight of everyone else doing the same thing to them. Many people live with a sense of great obligation: obligation to God, to be impossibly perfect; obligation to other people, to be everything they need all the time; obligation to themselves, to achieve the highest results and position they possibly can. And since these obligations are usually impossible to attain, we live out our lives under a burden of guilt. Often people whom others regard as happy and sunny, outgoing and successful, are crippled inside with a sense of failure and inadequacy. And then there are, of course, the real sins, the real shortcomings: the violent temper, the sexual wrongdoings, the subtle cheating and lying and financial trickery to which most are tempted and many are prone. And over all this sorry mess, guilt both real and imaginary, is written the words, ‘It is finished.’ Jesus has dealt with it. The only reason for hanging on to that guilt and sense of failure is if you want to stop being one of Jesus’ friends. If you are a friend, you are a forgiven friend. Calvary achieved it. When you are invited to walk the way of the cross you are invited to do so as a forgiven friend. You’ve got nothing to prove any more. The only person worth trying to please loves you already so much that he died for you. If you are one of Jesus’ friends, every breath you take you should breathe in that sense of relief, of letting the past go, of forgiveness. That is the birthright of all who travel the way of the cross. This is the reality to be inserted into the tissue of the rest of our life.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today

“In the Lord, your labour is not in vain: what you do here in faith will stand, will last.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today

“We are the people called into Passiontide, into Gethsemane-tide, into prayer and fasting, into betrayal and suffering, into the ambiguous and agonizing position of wrestling with the purposes of God, into knowing that we might have got it wrong, into wondering in anguish if maybe there’s a different way after all, into being misunderstood by friends and family, into fightings without and fears within. The disciples fell asleep in the garden; we are called to stay awake, to be alert, to see what the issues are and what stand must be taken, to do business with the one Jesus called Abba, Father, even if voices all around us, and even within us, tell us we might be getting it all horribly wrong.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today

“There is a way by which any person, however sinful and unworthy, may draw near to God the Father. Jesus Christ has opened that way by the sacrifice he made for us upon the cross. The holiness and justice of God need not frighten sinners and keep them back. Only let them cry to God in the name of Jesus, and they shall find God upon the throne of grace, willing and ready to hear. The name of Jesus is a never-failing passport for our prayers. In that name, a person may draw near to God with boldness, and ask with confidence. God has engaged to hear him. Think of this. Is this not an encouragement? There is an Advocate and Intercessor always waiting to present the prayers of those who come to God through him. That advocate is Jesus Christ. He mingles our prayers with the incense of his own almighty intercession. So mingled, they go up as a sweet savor before the throne of God. Poor as they are in themselves, they are mighty and powerful in the hand of our High Priest and Elder Brother. The bank-note without a signature at the bottom is nothing but a worthless piece of paper. The stroke of a pen confers on it all its value. The prayer of a poor child of Adam is a feeble thing in itself — but once endorsed by the hand of the Lord Jesus, it avails much. There was an officer in the city of Rome who appointed to have his doors always open, in order to receive any Roman citizen who applied to him for help. Just so the ear of the Lord Jesus is ever open to the cry of all who need mercy and grace. It is his office to help them. Their prayer is his delight! Think of this. Is this not and encouragement? There”
― J.C. Ryle, A Call to Prayer