From Lectures on Revivals of Religion, by Charles G. Finney
Confess and forsake your sins. God will never lead you as one of his hidden ones, and let you into his secrets, unless you confess and forsake your sins. Not be always confessing and never forsake, but confess and forsake too.
Faith must always have evidence. A man cannot believe a thing, unless he sees something which he supposes to be evidence.
The conversion of a sinner consists in his obeying the truth.
This travail of soul, is that deep agony, which persons feel when they lay hold on God for such a blessing, and will not let him go till they receive it.
Truth by itself will do nothing but harden men in impenitence.
Winning souls is converting men.
A revival of religion is the renewal of the first love of Christians, resulting in the awakening and conversion of sinners to God.
Religion is obedience to God, the voluntary submission of the soul to the will of God.
The Gospel will never produce any great effects, until ministers talk to their hearers, in the pulpit, as they talk in private conversation.
It is therefore impossible it should take place without his agency, for it consists in his acting right.
Truth is the food for the mind—it is what gives the mind strength.
Go and inquire among the obscure members of the church, and you will always find that somebody had been praying for a revival, and was expecting it—some man or woman had been agonizing in prayer.
Nothing tends more to cement the hearts of Christians than praying together.
Facts, real or supposed, should be used to show the truth.
Entire consecration to God is indispensable to the prayer of faith. You must live a holy life, and consecrate all to God—your time, talents, influence—all you have.
Pray for ministers, that God would give them this wisdom to win souls.
If you will then go over the ground the second time, and give your solemn and fixed attention to it, you will find that the things you have put down will suggest other things of which you have been guilty, connected with them, or near them.
If you mean to be meek under persecution, and exemplify the temper of the Saviour, and honor religion in this way, you need to be filled with the Spirit.
If you have much of the Spirit of God, it is not unlikely you will be thought deranged, by many. We judge men to be deranged when they act differently from what we think to be prudent and according to common sense.
There is so little principle in the church, so little firmness and stability of purpose, that unless the religious feelings are awakened and kept excited, counter worldly feeling and excitement will prevail.
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