Top 180 John Owen Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “The root of an unmortified course is the digestion of sin without bitterness in the heart. When a man hath confirmed his imagination to such an apprehension of grace and mercy as to be able, without bitterness, to swallow and digest daily sins, that man is at the very brink of turning the grace of God into lasciviousness, and being hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.”

— John Owen

52. “Only what God has commanded in His word should be regarded as binding; in all else there may be liberty of actions.”

— John Owen

53. “Christ by his death destroying the works of the devil, procuring the Spirit for us, hath so killed sin, as to its reign in believers, that it shall not obtain its end and dominion.”

— John Owen

54. “When sin lets us alone we may let sin alone.”

— John Owen

55. “Assurance encourateth us in our combat; it delivers us not from it. We may have peace with God when we have done from the assaults of Satan.”

— John Owen

56. “To some men it is hard seeing a call of God through difficulties; when if it would but clothe itself with a few carnal advantages, how apparent it is to them! They can see it through a little cranny.”

— John Owen

57. “Let no man pretend to fear sin that does not fear temptation also! These two are too closely united to be separated. He does not truly hate the fruit who delights in the root.”

— John Owen

58. “Christ is the meat, the bread, the food of our souls. Nothing is in him of a higher spiritual nourishment than his love, which we should always desire.”

— John Owen

59. “Temptation is like a knife, that may either cut the meat or the throat of a man; it may be his food or his poison, his exercise or his destruction.”

— John Owen

60. “If a man teach uprightly and walk crookedly, more will fall down in the night of his life than he built in the day of his doctrine.”

— John Owen

61. “Meditate on the Word in the Word.”

— John Owen

62. “Let not that man think he makes any progress in holiness who walks not over the bellies of his lusts. He who doth not kill sin in this way takes no steps toward his journey’s end.”

— John Owen

63. “Temptations and occasions put nothing into a man, but only draw out what was in him before.”

— John Owen

64. “In or towards whomsoever the Holy Spirit puts forth His power, or acts his grace for their regeneration, he removes all obstacles, overcomes all oppositions, and infallibly produces the intended effect.”

— John Owen

65. “Let no man think to kill sin with few, easy, or gentle strokes. He who hath once smitten a serpent, if he follow not on his blow until it be slain, may repent that ever he began the quarrel. And so he who undertakes to deal with sin, and pursues it not constantly to the death.”

— John Owen

66. “We can have no power from Christ unless we live in a persuasion that we have none of our own.”

— John Owen

67. “See in the meantime that your faith brings forth obedience, and God in due time will cause it to bring forth peace.”

— John Owen

68. “There is not a day but sin foils or is foiled, prevails or is prevailed upon. It will always be so while we live in this world. Sin will not spare for one day. There is no safety but in a constant warfare for those who desire deliverance from sin’s perplexing rebellion.”

— John Owen

69. “Steadfastness in believing doth not exclude all temptations from without. When we say a tree is firmly rooted, we do not say the wind never blows upon it.”

— John Owen

70. “It is one thing to fear God as threatening, with a holy reverence, and another to be afraid of the evil threatened.”

— John Owen

71. “Then are we servants of God, then are we the disciples of Christ, when we do what is commanded us and because it is commanded us.”

— John Owen

72. “Labour to grow better under all your afflictions, lest your afflictions grow worse, lest God mingle them with more darkness, bitterness and terror.”

— John Owen

73. “Nothing shall be lost that is done for God or in obedience to Him.”

— John Owen

74. “Not to be daily mortifying sin, is to sin against the goodness, kindness, wisdom, grace, and love of God, who hath furnished us with a principle of doing it.”

— John Owen

75. “The custom of sinning takes away the sense of it, the course of the world takes away the shame of it.”

— John Owen

76. “Sin is never less quiet than when it seems to be most quiet.”

— John Owen

77. “God never intended for us to be left to pray on our own. God never changes His purpose, but He often does purpose a change.”

— John Owen

78. “The gospel shall be victorious. This greatly comforts and refreshes me.”

— John Owen

79. “Faith, if it be a living faith, will be a working faith.”

— John Owen

80. “A true saving knowledge of sin is to be had only in the Lord Christ: in him may we see the desert of our iniquities.”

— John Owen

81. “Christ did not die for any upon condition, if they do believe; but He died for all God’s elect, that they should believe.”

— John Owen

82. “The most tremendous judgment of God in this world is the hardening of the hearts of men.”

— John Owen

83. “Temptation gains power by persistent solicitations that beget thoughts that make evil less serious.”

— John Owen

84. “Men think all things would be very glorious, it they might be done according their mind. Perhaps, indeed, they would-but with their glory, not the glory of God.”

— John Owen

85. “Now nothing can prevent this but mortification; that withers the root and strikes at the head of sin every hour, so that whatever it aims at it is crossed in.”

— John Owen

86. “That wisdom which cannot teach me that God is love, shall ever pass for folly.”

— John Owen

87. “It must be observed, that the best of men, the most holy and spiritually minded, may have, nay, ought to have, their thoughts of spiritual things excited, multiplied, and confirmed, by the preaching of the word.”

— John Owen

88. “You have your season, and you have but your season; neither can you lie down in peace, until you have some persuasion that your work as well as your life is at an end.”

— John Owen

89. “The house built on the sand may oftentimes be built higher, have more fair parapets and battlements, windows and ornaments, than that which is built upon the rock; yet all gifts and privileges equal not one grace.”

— John Owen

90. “When the heart is once won to rest in God, to repose himself on him, he will assuredly satisfy it. He will never be as water that fails; nor hath he said at any time to the seed of Jacob, “Seek ye my face in vain.” If Christ be chosen for the foundation of our supply, he will not fail us.”

— John Owen

91. “When sin lets us alone we may let sin alone; but as sin is never less quiet than when it seems to be most quiet, and its waters are for the most part deep when they are still, so ought our contrivances against it to be vigorous at all times and in all conditions, even where there is least suspicion.”

— John Owen

92. “He that hath slight thoughts of sin never had great thoughts of God.”

— John Owen

93. “It is not the glorious battlements, the painted windows, the crouching gargoyles that support a building, but the stones that lie unseen in or upon the earth. It is often those who are despised and trampled on that bear up the weight of a whole nation.”

— John Owen

94. “The vigour, and power, and comfort of our spiritual life depends on the mortification of the deeds of the flesh.”

— John Owen

95. “If sin be subtle, watchful, strong, and always at work in the business of killing our souls, and we be slothful, negligent, foolish, in proceeding to the ruin thereof, can we expect a comfortable event? There is not a day but sin foils or is foiled, prevails or is prevailed on; and it will be so whilst we live in this world.”

— John Owen

96. “So great an advantage is given to sin and Satan by your temper and disposition, that without extraordinary watchfulness, care, and diligence, they will prevail against your soul.”

— John Owen

97. “He that stands still and suffers his enemies to double blows upon him without resistance, will undoubtedly be conquered in the issue.”

— John Owen

98. “By nature, since the entrance of sin, no man has any communion with God. He is light, we darkness; and what communion has light with darkness? He is life, we are dead – he is love, and we are enmity; and what agreement can there be between us?”

— John Owen

99. “Selfishness is the making a man’s self his own centre, the beginning and end of all he doeth.”

— John Owen

100. “Suppose a man to be a true believer, and yet finds in himself a powerful indwelling sin, leading him captive to the law of it, consuming his heart with trouble, perplexing his thoughts, weakening his soul as to duties of communion with God, disquieting him as to peace, and perhaps defiling his conscience, and exposing him to hardening through the deceitfulness of sin, – what.”

— John Owen