Holiness: For the Will of God Is Your Sanctification – 1 Thessalonians 4:3 [Annotated, Updated]

by J.C. Ryle

Because they do not count the cost, the hearers of powerful evangelical preachers often come to miserable ends. They are stirred and excited into professing what they have not really experienced. They receive the Word with a joy so extravagant that it almost startles mature Christians. They continue for a time with such zeal and fervor that they seem likely to outgain all others. They talk and work for spiritual purposes with such enthusiasm that they make older believers feel ashamed, but when the novelty and freshness of their feelings is gone, a change comes over them. They prove to have been nothing more than stony-ground hearers.