First Place In Your Thoughts

Friends, these things must have first place in your thoughts:

1. Your sins--to humble you and abase you before God.
2. God's free and rich and sovereign grace--to soften and melt you down into submission to His holy will.
3. The Lord Jesus Christ--to assist, help, strengthen, and influence you in all your duties and services.
4. The blessed Scriptures--to guide you and lead you, "and to be a lamp unto your feet, and a light unto your paths."
5. The afflictions of the godly--to draw out your charity, mercy, pity, sympathy and compassion to men in misery.
6. The glory and happiness of the eternal world--to arm you and steel you against all your sins, snares and temptations.

Thomas Brooks, The Golden Key to Open Hidden Treasures