Criss Jami Quotes - Page 2

It often seems as though the silent, humble servant is secretly wiser and more discerning than the haughty master; yet through dutiful (and sometimes insecure) surrender he continues to serve and carry out petty orders in loyal acquiescence.
Criss Jami
Great artists are a little too gifted to be bound by boxes and labels, and in saying that, the label 'artist' is to be used lightly.
Criss Jami
Humility is, in a sense, admitting how egotistical you are.
Criss Jami
Excuses will become self-refuting. No man who does not believe that Jesus is the perfect, sinless Son of God can, in his desperation and love for sin, reasonably use and misconstrue Jesus' words that unless a Christian is perfect, then that Christian cannot judge sin. Otherwise this non-believer is unconsciously entertaining a belief that Jesus, unlike any other man to ever live, was indeed perfect and sinless in His judgments and therefore that Christian is supposed to be like Him.
Criss Jami
The more we love God, the more unpleasant sin becomes.
Criss Jami
One is not necessarily made self-centered because he is foolish, but one is very often made foolish because he is self-centered.
Criss Jami
Sanity for anyone is pretty much out of the question, as both the saint and the sinner appear only equally insane: the saint appears it for actually believing in a place of eternal torment; the sinner, for deciding to risk going to that place of eternal torment.
Criss Jami
God is so omnipotent yet man so impotent, the Divine masterpiece was not even in creating the universe, but in making sin boring to sinners.
Criss Jami
An over-indulgence of anything, even something as pure as water, can intoxicate.
Criss Jami
Nothing amuses people more than a cocky guy who starts losing.
Criss Jami
God's judgment is not like man's judgment. It is not a suspension of His Love but an extension of His Love. His justice is always righteous, so His judgment is always Love.
Criss Jami
Generally, there is a lot of truth value in stepping back, observing, then logically generalizing the extremes of what you see.
Criss Jami
If you assume that the new - and simply because it's new - is always to be better than the old, chances are you've never known anything valuable.
Criss Jami
There is nothing new under the sun but that of the Son. Man's rebellion against God has always been because he would rather fall in pride than rise in humility.
Criss Jami
Today's zealots are mostly those pretending to be anti-religious.
Criss Jami
A man who loves others based solely on how they make him feel, or what they do for him, is really not loving others at all - but loving only himself.
Criss Jami
Joy, like love, is an impenetrable, God-given state of being. The distinctions between joy and happiness and love and affection are important ones under the notion that happiness is an 'iffy' emotion, a highly dependent feeling both aroused and destroyed by external conditions apart from God. And the distinction between love and affection is parallel to such.
Criss Jami
There is such a thing as righteous judgment, but it seems that lately the word 'judgment' has become a curse word, period. The issue isn't whether or not we're insightful enough to avoid being judgmental, but whether or not we're secure enough to accept being judged. It is inevitable for every conscious human being to judge. It may spring from insight and experience and sincerity, and in such cases, it is quite beneficial on the receiving end.
Criss Jami
One of the Christian's biggest fears is appearing 'too Christian'. God forbid, because that's often characterized as god-awful! We want to be one, but without being 'one of them'.
Criss Jami
There is a difference between criticizing people and criticizing a people's uninformed ideals. That is, unless one defines himself or others by their ideals, then he is offended, and usually offended secretly. Because oddly enough, this person is the same person quickest to resort to dismissive name-calling, such as 'bigot' or 'zealot'. And oddly enough, he is always the one, the 'open-minded' one, who adamantly protests for, not only himself, but others not to listen to any type of scholarly theological truth inherently for the sake of his own personal, moral beliefs.
Criss Jami
I still believe that many Americans have a deep longing for that glorious moment when a sermon is more Biblical than American.
Criss Jami
God gives His deepest discernment and sharpest marksmanship to men who aim to expose His truth before an enemy's lies.
Criss Jami
It is not so much freedom of speech but the right to truth that great men protect.
Criss Jami
With enough mental gymnastics, just about any fact can become misshapen in favor to one's confirmation bias.
Criss Jami
Just because something isn't a lie does not mean that it isn't deceptive. A liar knows that he is a liar, but one who speaks mere portions of truth in order to deceive is a craftsman of destruction.
Criss Jami
The only thing more frustrating than slanderers is those foolish enough to listen to them.
Criss Jami
It is never just disagreement but always intellectual dishonesty that is the apologist's worst enemy. And its apprentice is ignorance.
Criss Jami
My heart goes out to some of those rather hostile yet highly intelligent individuals who may see problems really because they have solutions. That hostility is learned in defense; not offense. An often stubborn and prideful world, in its self-destructive, temporary bliss of ignorance, may be violently resistant to the watchful mind.
Criss Jami
The thing about stereotyping is it's usually just throwing rocks into a crowd hoping to hit somebody who deserves it.
Criss Jami
The disruption of science is one which abandons the method and seeks to conquer grounds outside its territory. It is not at all religion but this pseudo-science that is the enemy of science.
Criss Jami
Some people are ignorant of the world but educated in Scripture, and are therefore prone to missing the relevance of Scripture - these sometimes, later, amidst life's challenges and doubts, turn from the faith; other people are ignorant of Scripture but educated in the world, and are therefore prone to missing the truth of Scripture - they are often those who ridicule the faith. The apologist stands somewhere in the center. He articulates where some are prone to understanding the truth in beauty, others the beauty in truth - that of a spiritual Creator in relation to his scientific creation.
Criss Jami
When disinformation is running rampant, there are two ignorances that may emerge: the one is actually positive, a sort of pure and intentional emptying of the mind; but the other is of course negative and clogged and polluted.
Criss Jami
Honesty is not the same as truth. That is the obstacle of the notion of relative truths. I would like to put my trust in the lunatic. He is the one least concerned of what I think of him, the mark of an honest man. I can always depend on him to be completely honest in what he thinks and feels, about anything, no matter the consequences laid before him, however with no course of rationale, I cannot necessarily take his word for even the well-being of him in his own reality.
Criss Jami
The vanity of intelligence is that the intelligent man is often more committed to 'one-upping' his opponent than being truthful. When the idea of intelligence, rather than intelligence itself, becomes a staple, there is no wisdom in it.
Criss Jami
Maturity is when you're able to say, 'It's not just them. It's me.
Criss Jami
In each generation, there is this certain wisdom of the ages that gets reburied in the fleeting drivels of modernity; then, like a diamond in the rough, it is yet again unearthed by a very small minority who not only restores it, but also polishes it and presents it as something new, something highly valuable and refreshing as understood by the current.
Criss Jami
Even if there are instances in which it can be mistook by onlookers, never fool yourself into using misunderstood genius as an excuse to be a fool.
Criss Jami
To be truly positive in the eyes of some, you have to risk appearing negative in the eyes of others.
Criss Jami
Being nice merely to be liked in return nullifies the point.
Criss Jami
The most mesmerizing of artists is always like one who was merely drawing in the sand and people came to watch.
Criss Jami
What good is there in being blind, you ask? Well, maybe it's to see the beauty on the inside without being vainly distracted, or superficially blinded, by the ugly on the outside.
Criss Jami
The eye of danger and the face of fear are what really pull off a person's mask.
Criss Jami
They say that people fall in and out of love, but do they, too, fall in hate? Or fall into indifference? It has hindered men for ages the notion that one falls in love rather than decides to truly love, the notion that his lack of control, on the B-side, can also make him fall in hate or indifference without the responsibility to help it or control it.
Criss Jami
It's fallacious reasoning for the atheist to hate all religion due to men who manipulate religion to fit their own agendas. They are counterparts, therefore, if Truth is true, partners in crime. To believers, the atheist and the religiously corrupt boil down to the same person, the self-righteous: one denies Truth to fit his own agenda; the other manipulates Truth to fit his own agenda.
Criss Jami
For what religion has never had sects? Rest assured, Extremism is always the derrière.
Criss Jami
The hated man is the result of his hater's pride rather than his hater's conscience.
Criss Jami
Intelligent people, as some say, in their openness, are indeed slow to criticize, but conversely, in their openness to the concerns of others, the genuine are slow to fret about being criticized.
Criss Jami
What man ever openly apologizes for slander? It is not so much a feeling of slander as it is that of a massive lie, a misdeed not only to the slandered but also to those manipulated in the process. He has made them all, every one, his enemies, thereupon he is so overwhelmed with guilt that he will deny it until his grave.
Criss Jami
When making a point, there are 2 types of people who may disagree with you: those who can support their reasons, and the childish ones who are too worried about being told what to do.
Criss Jami
Whatever thing a man gets quickly enraged about is his idol, and whatever thing he makes his idol becomes his religion.
Criss Jami
Sure, some of us humans might be angry at a sovereign God about Hell, but know that that is about as meaningful as a few germs being angry at humans about bleach.
Criss Jami
Nothing frustrates people more than a cocky guy who's still winning.
Criss Jami
Great philosophers become immortal - they make undeniable impacts on culture.
Criss Jami
Speculation, movements having abandoned rational thought, echo chambers, projection, hypocrisy by little to no self-awareness, bewildering minds brainwashed and manipulative hearts manipulated - one is sure to find these à la people cock-sure in their biased and fanatical, immovable despising of persons. We would all do well to humbly re-think from time to time: 'Whom do I really hate? For what purpose?
Criss Jami
Feel what it's like to truly starve, and I guarantee that you'll forever think twice before wasting food.
Criss Jami
Tolerance never exists without negative judgment. It is the sentiment of having a negative opinion about something yet still putting up with it.
Criss Jami
The artist is often misunderstood because, stepping outside himself and holding most details in great tension, he's about as complex as a shape-shifter; or a head with faces on all sides, but not necessarily in the negative connotation as one being two-faced usually implies. For instance, to be misunderstood can mean to be improperly deemed a troublemaker when that is not one's true intent: you see, to troublemakers, the artist knows that the peacemaker may seem like a troublemaker; therefore he may, whether in honesty or in jest, at times, present himself as a troublemaker for perceptual, artistic flair. But then to the artless peacemakers, because of this they will interpret him as a troublemaker. This is why the artist has so few allies. To the troublemakers he's a troublemaker, yet still the peacemakers a troublemaker.
Criss Jami
On the inside, the copycats of the ruffians are more delicate than the copycats of prudes.
Criss Jami
It can be a good thing if deeper theology, or philosophy, only makes one more uncertain. It may lead to a healthy doubt; he may throw his hands up saying, 'God, I just don't know anymore. If you're out there, I'm giving it all to you.' From there, after the surrender, he is allowing God himself, rather than theories, books, and documents, to take over and lead him into all truth.
Criss Jami
Philosophy may serve as the bridge between theology and science. All atheism is a philosophy, but not all philosophy is atheism. Philosophy ('love of wisdom') is simply a tool depending on how one uses it, and in some cases, logically understanding the nature of God and existence.
Criss Jami