Quotes by Authors - Page 126

Before you call yourself a Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu or any other theology, learn to be human first.
Shannon L. Alder
A tearless heart is a callous heart.
Jim George
In a world of limited resources, our wealth is at the expense of the poor. To put it simply, if we have it, others cannot.
Richard J. Foster
An act of kindness is uplifting to the soul.
Lailah Gifty Akita
The word 'survivor' carries a weight of remembrance that has broken the minds and bodies of more than a few men and women. It also contains a humbling light of recognition that compels many to do whatever they can to help reinforce the efforts of those who might be 'at risk' of not just giving up on their dreams, but of giving up on their continued existence.
Aberjhani
Beauty is wasted on the self-absorbed.
Lorii Myers
Being a leader is not about finding ways to get others to serve you, but knowing how to serve your followers.
A.J. Darkholme
Perhaps a seemingly dull, boring person is not a person who lacks personality, but rather a person with so much personality most other things bore them.
Criss Jami
A homely face does not guarantee a homely character. Appearance is the body, character is the spirit, and the soul bears the most vital qualities.
Michael Bassey Johnson
Compassion means removal of suffering – suffering of the self and the others.
Amit Ray
It is not loving to impose our own grid onto others. We need to understand their situation and their needs accurately, and this comes from listening to them, not coming in with our own assumptions.
Matt Perman
Mostly we think of people with great authority as higher up, far away, hard to reach. But spiritual authority comes from compassion and emerges from deep inner solidarity with those who are 'subject' to authority. The one who is fully like us, who deeply understands our joys and pains or hopes and desires, and who is willing and able to walk with us, that is the one to whom we gladly give authority and whose 'subjects' we are willing to be.It is the compassionate authority that empowers, encourages, calls forth hidden gifts, and enables great things to happen. True spiritual authorities are located in the point of an upside-down triangle, supporting and holding into the light everyone they offer their leadership to.
Henri J.M. Nouwen
Give Compassion: Every day the average person fights epic battles never told just to survive.
Ken Poirot
You can't fix things with a hug, but you can't make them any worse either.
Dean Koontz
We'd incorporated Asia into our bones - its colours and laughter, its smells, its rhythms, its tolerance and patience, its compassion, its lack of ageism.
Jane Wilson-Howarth
May we find more grace to do good deeds.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Make choices in life that don't leave people bitter, worse off or confused. Any choice that leads you to do this is a choice that didn't include God in the decision making process.
Shannon L. Alder
Arrange your life in such a way that you don't make choices based on fear of God, instead of love of God.
Shannon L. Alder
A best friend is the one person that doesn't leave you worse off by their actions or yours.
Shannon L. Alder
Pour God's love out of you in pitcher fulls, not thimbles.
Shannon L. Alder
Storms don't come to teach us painful lessons, rather they were meant to wash us clean.
Shannon L. Alder
Depression can seem absurdly self aggrandizing to those who do not experience it, But that does not make it any less painful to those who do.
Richard Brookhiser
You may possibly become rich by just caring about yourself and what you want to gain from life but you cannot possibly enrich the lives of everyone you meet that way. The pathway to enlightenment and transformation and liberation is the heart not the mind.
Rasheed Ogunlaru
Have you ever stopped to think that maybe you were wrong? Maybe, you only saw your point of view and you never once put yourself in the other person's shoes. Maybe, walking away from the senseless drama and spiteful criticism isn't the best thing to do. Maybe, for just once in your life you could wear another person's confusion, pain or misunderstanding. Maybe, your future doesn't require explaining yourself or offering an explanation for your indifference, but your character and reputation does. What if one day you find out that you didn't have all the information you thought you did? What if you find out that your presence was needed for healing? What if you only knew half of it and the other half was just your fear and anger translating everything you experienced? What if you were wrong? What if the same thing happened to you?
Shannon L. Alder
Jesus loved manhood so much, that He delighted to honour it; and since it is a high honour, and indeed, the greatest dignity of manhood, that Jesus is the Son of man,
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Try to show grace, mercy and compassion, for one day you may need them.
Wayne Gerard Trotman
You shut your door to these poor women," he said so they could hear him, "and you'll answer for it the rest of your lives. You won't sleep. You'll choke on drinks. The food you eat'll block up your bowels and you'll die of your own shit.
Glendon Swarthout
Only love and compassion can bring true and lasting transformation
Rasheed Ogunlaru
There are miracles and glory in every child. Our glory lies in empowering them to flourish their glory.
Amit Ray
Now I need to speak directly and with compassion to those who have already pushed open the door of premarital sex. The monster has been released. You've lost your virginity and may have been sexually active for years. Perhaps you've been carrying a load of guilt for doing what you knew was wrong.
James C. Dobson
Unless we understand how the twists and turns of life operate to make us, we cannot comprehend who and what we are. Without self-awareness, we are blind to registering the intertexture of other people’s inner life. Gracefully enduring personal hardships expands our minds to extend sympathy and empathy for other people. By casting our personal life experiences into a supple storytelling casing, we create the translucent membrane that quarters the fusion of our flesh, nerves, blood, and bones. Self-understanding is an essential step in loving the entire world.
Kilroy J. Oldster
The day you find out who you are is when you look back and realize that it was never the words, rather your actions that defined you.
Shannon L. Alder
Look at every creature from the window of compassion with the eyes of love!
Mehmet Murat ildan
The greatest lesson you might ever learn in this life is this: It is not about you.
Shannon L. Alder
Yoga exercises are the best connecting tools for unity, human dignity, health, equality, global peace and compassion.
Amit Ray
A seed cannot grow in stone. It requires fertile soil & water. Compassion is the soil where life grows.
Amit Ray
There's no room for hate and violence in this world. We must learn to be more kind, compassionate, empathetic, and sympathetic to humanity.
Germany Kent
Broken hearts behave in a million different ways- some of them are most unpredictable. More often than not such persons build walls around them and drive their loved ones crazy with their erratic behavior. Don’t give up on them at this time; it is now that they need you the most. Give them time and space. Then nurse them, mend their broken feathers and send them on their way fully recovered ready to face the world.
Latika Teotia
Understanding comes with compassion and compassion comes with truthfulness
Amit Abraham
I am grateful to realize that my desires do not entitle me to add to another's suffering.
Zoe Weil
One of the most important things you can do on this earth is to let people know they are not alone.
Shannon L. Alder
The exaggerated dopamine sensitivity of the introvert leads one to believe that when in public, introverts, regardless of its validity, often feel to be the center of (unwanted) attention hence rarely craving attention. Extroverts, on the other hand, seem to never get enough attention. So on the flip side it seems as though the introvert is in a sense very external and the extrovert is in a sense very internal - the introvert constantly feels too much 'outerness' while the extrovert doesn't feel enough 'outerness'.
Criss Jami
Sensitive people care when the world doesn't because we understand waiting to be rescued and no one shows up. We have rescued ourselves, so many times that we have become self taught in the art of compassion for those forgotten.
Shannon L. Alder
Sometimes, you will go through awful trials in your life and then a miracle happens--God heals you. Don’t be disheartened when the people you love don’t see things like you do. There will be Pharisees in your life that will laugh it off, deny that it happened, or will mock your experience based on righteousness they think you don't possess. God won't deny you a spiritual experience because you are not a spiritual leader. He loves everyone equal. The only people that really matter in life are the people that can “see” your heart and rejoice with you.
Shannon L. Alder
Fruit is always the miraculous, the created; it is never the result of willing, but always a growth. The fruit of the Spirit is a gift of God, and only He can produce it. They who bear it know as little about it as the tree knows of its fruit. They know only the power of Him on whom their life depends
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
If your fundamental is a man dying on the cross for his enemies, if the very heart of your self-image and your religion is a man praying for his enemies as he died for them, sacrificing for them, loving them - if that sinks into your heart of hearts, it's going to produce the kind of life that the early Christians produced. The most inclusive possible life out of the most exclusive possible claim - and that is this is the truth. But what is the truth? The truth is a God become weak, loving and dying for the people who opposed him, dying forgiving them.
Timothy J. Keller
Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful. ~John 14:27
Anonymous
The radical hermeneutic of suspicion that characterizes all of post-modernity is essentially nihilistic, denying the very possibility of creative or healing love. In the cross and resurrection of Jesus we find the answer: the God who made the world is revealed in terms of a self-giving love that no hermeneutic of suspicion can ever touch, in a Self that found itself by giving itself away, in a Story that was never manipulative but always healing and recreating, and in a Reality that can truly be known, indeed to know which is to discover a new dimension of knowledge, the dimension of loving and being loved.
N.T. Wright
We instinctively tend to limit for whom we exert ourselves. We do it for people like us, and for people whom we like. Jesus will have none of that. By depicting a Samaritan helping a Jew, Jesus could not have found a more forceful way to say that anyone at all in need - regardless of race, politics, class, and religion - is your neighbour. Not everyone is your brother or sister in faith, but everyone is your neighbour, and you must love your neighbour.
Timothy J. Keller
The Lord's mercy often rides to the door of our hearts on the black horse of affliction. Jesus uses the whole range of our experiences to wean us from earth and woo us to Heaven.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
When Christ at a symbolic moment was establishing His great society, He chose for its cornerstone neither the brilliant Paul nor the mystic John, but a shuffler, a snob, a coward – in a word, a man. And upon this rock He has built His Church, and the gates of Hell have not prevailed against it. All the empires and the kingdoms have failed, because of this inherent and continual weakness, that they were founded by strong men and upon strong men. But this one thing, the historic Christian Church, was founded on a weak man, and for that reason it is indestructible. For no chain is stronger than its weakest link.
G.K. Chesterton
Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” So we can confidently say, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?” (Hebrews 13:5–6)
John Piper
You can't stand for Jesus without a Christ-like spirit.
John Yates
But should we accept this negative view of power? Is power all bad? Specifically, can Christians share in this devaluation of power and discipline as inherently evil? Can we who claim to be disciples - who are called and predestined to be conformed to the likeness of the Son (Rom. 8:29) - be opposed to discipline and formation as such? Can we who are called to be subject to the Lord of life really agree with the liberal Enlightenment notion of the autonomous self? Are we not above all called to subject ourselves to our Domine and conform to his image? Of course, we are called not to conform to the patterns of 'this world' (Rom. 12:2) or to our previous evil desires (1 Peter 1:14), but that is a call not to nonconformity as such but rather to an alternative conformity through a counterformation in Christ, a transformation and renewal directed toward conformity to his image. By appropriating the liberal Enlightenment notion of negative freedom and participating in its nonconformist resistance to discipline (and hence a resistance to the classical spiritual disciplines), Christians are in fact being conformed to the patterns of this world (contra Rom. 12:2).
James K.A. Smith
If economies collapse and lawlessness rules and resources are scarce, many people who claim with their mouths that they follow Jesus... will abandon him with their lives.
Brandon Andress
Jesus was a man for simple people. He didn't make his messages incredibly complex. If you were a person that had the eyes to see and the ears to hear... then his message was easily understood.
Brandon Andress
People have been fed a Lean Cuisine® in the name of Jesus and told that it was a feast and they’ve decided there must not be much to this faith stuff after all. People see folks who bear the name of Christ who are acting loudly out of fear and have decided that peace must be found elsewhere. People are hungry to be a part of something that matters and to know that they matter.
Peggy Haymes
We read about the name Jesus was given at his birth; Immanuel, meaning “God with us”. This God wasn’t content with dwelling in fiction, this God wasn’t content living with the seraphim and this God wasn’t content with bulls and goats anymore. This God wanted to dwell with you, with all of your mess, with all of your failures with all the dirtiness that is you; he wanted to sit with you. Here’s the amazing thing, God doesn’t care if you’re a catholic, a Lutheran, Post modern or Emergent; he wants to sit with you.
Ricky Maye
Violence promises us something we all deeply desire, something we genuinely want; violence promises us peace. Violence promises us, that in the end, when the last battle is fought, the last bomb is dropped, and the last enemy is slain, we will have what we always dreamed of – safety, a world without suffering, death or bloodshed; a world at rest. Yet, these are the very things Christ offers with the Kingdom of God. A world where the lamb will lay down with the lion, where swords are beaten into plowshares, where mercy and justice flow down like the waters, where every tear will be wiped away from our eyes, and where there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. Christ and violence seem to offer the same final result, the two being competitors for our allegiance.
Ronnie McBrayer
Being a “friend of sinners” is an accusation that Christians should wear as a badge of honor, for nothing could honor Jesus more, and nothing is more revealing of who God actually is.
Ronnie McBrayer