Thomas Boston Quotes

       Thomas Boston
       1676-1732
      
       Thomas Boston was a Scottish church leader. He was educated at Edinburgh, and licensed in 1697 by the presbytery of Chirnside. In 1699 he became minister of the small parish of Simprin, where there were only 90 examinable persons.
      
       His autobiography is a record of Scottish life, with humorous touches, intentional and otherwise. His books, The Fourfold State, The Crook in the Lot, and his Body of Divinity and Miscellanies, had a powerful influence over the Scottish peasantry. His Memoirs were published in 1776 (ed. GD Low, 1908). An edition of his works in 12 volumes appeared in 1849.

Affliction doth not rise out of the dust or come to men by chance; but it is the Lord that sends it, and we should own and reverence His hand in it.     Topics: Affliction     Source: Of the Decrees of God, Commentary on the Shorter Catechism. Whoever be the instruments of any good to us, of whatever sort, we must look above them, and eye the hand and counsel of God in it, which is the first spring, and be duly thankful to God for it. And whatever evil of crosses or afflictions befalls us, we must look above the instruments of it to God.     Topics: Affliction     Source: Of the Decrees of God, Commentary on the Shorter Catechism. God hath decreed the end, so He hath decreed the means that are proper for attaining that end; so that these two must not be separated.     Topics: God Has God decreed all things that come to pass? Then there is nothing that falls out by chance, nor are we to ascribe what we meet with either to good or ill luck and fortune. There are many events in the world which men look upon as mere accidents, yet all these come by the counsel and appointment of Heaven.     Topics: God Consider the end of God's decrees - and this is no other than His own glory. Every rational agent acts for an end; and God being the most perfect agent, and His glory the highest end, there can be no doubt but all His decrees are directed to that end. "For to Him are all things" (Rom. 11.36).     Topics: God     Source: Of the Decrees of God, Commentary on the Shorter Catechism. It is our duty to look to God's commands, and not to His decrees; to our own duty, and not to His purposes. The decrees of God are a vast ocean, into which many possibly have curiously pried to their own horror and despair; but few or none have ever pried into them to their own profit and satisfaction.     Topics: Obedience They that would keep themselves pure must have their bodies in subjection, and that may require, in some cases, a holy violence.     Topics: Purity Again, the glory of one attribute is more seen in one work than in another: in some things there is more of His goodness, in other things more of His wisdom is seen, and in others more of His power. But in the work of redemption all His perfections and excellencies shine forth in their greatest glory.     Topics: Redemption     Source: Of the Decrees of God, Commentary on the Shorter Catechism. A righteous man may make a righteous work, but no work of an unrighteous man can make him righteous. Now we become righteous only by faith, through the righteousness of Christ imputed to us.     Topics: Righteousness A man shall as soon force fruit out of a branch broken off from the tree and withered, as work righteousness without believing in, and uniting with Christ. These are two things by which those that hear the gospel are ruined.     Topics: Righteousness It is great folly to cast your sins upon Satan who tempted you, or upon your neighbor who provoked you; but it is a far greater sin, nay horrid blasphemy, to cast it upon God Himself. A greater affront than this cannot be offered to the infinite holiness of God.     Topics: Sin For as the sun darts its beams upon a dunghill, and yet is no way defiled by it; so God decrees the permission of sin... yet is not the author of sin.     Topics: Sin