Quotes by Speakers - Page 155

[Y]ou have to stop loving and pursuing Christ in order to sin. When you are pursuing love, running toward Christ, you do not have opportunity to wonder, *Am I doing this right?* or *Did I serve enough this week?* When you are running toward Christ, you are freed up to serve, love, and give thanks without guilt, worry or fear. As long as you are running, you're safe.
Francis Chan
Because salvation is by grace through faith, I believe that among the countless number of people standing in front of the throne and in front of the Lamb, dressed in white robes and holding palms in their hands (see Revelation 7:9), I shall see the prostitute from the Kit-Kat Ranch in Carson City, Nevada, who tearfully told me that she could find no other employment to support her two-year-old son. I shall see the woman who had an abortion and is haunted by guilt and remorse but did the best she could faced with grueling alternatives; the businessman besieged with debt who sold his integrity in a series of desperate transactions; the insecure clergyman addicted to being liked, who never challenged his people from the pulpit and longed for unconditional love; the sexually abused teen molested by his father and now selling his body on the street, who, as he falls asleep each night after his last 'trick', whispers the name of the unknown God he learned about in Sunday school.'But how?' we ask.Then the voice says, 'They have washed their robes and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb.'There they are. There *we* are - the multitude who so wanted to be faithful, who at times got defeated, soiled by life, and bested by trials, wearing the bloodied garments of life's tribulations, but through it all clung to faith. My friends, if this is not good news to you, you have never understood the gospel of grace.
Brennan Manning
Trust and faith bring joy to life and help relationships grow to their maximum potential.
Joyce Meyer
[The] insistence on the absolutely indiscriminate nature of compassion within the Kingdom is the dominant perspective of almost all of Jesus' teaching.What is indiscriminate compassion? 'Take a look at a rose. Is is possible for the rose to say, "I'll offer my fragrance to good people and withhold it from bad people"? Or can you imagine a lamp that withholds its rays from a wicked person who seeks to walk in its light? It could do that only be ceasing to be a lamp. And observe how helplessly and indiscriminately a tree gives its shade to everyone, good and bad, young and old, high and low; to animals and humans and every living creature -- even to the one who seeks to cut it down. This is the first quality of compassion -- its indiscriminate character.' (Anthony DeMello, The Way to Love)...What makes the Kingdom come is heartfelt compassion: a way of tenderness that knows no frontiers, no labels, no compartmentalizing, and no sectarian divisions.
Brennan Manning
Do not ask directions from the people around you. Ask directions from the person who called you.
Bo Sánchez
In Love's service, only wounded soldiers can serve.
Brennan Manning
Our hearts of stone become hearts of flesh when we learn where the outcast weeps.
Brennan Manning
I want neither a terrorist spirituality that keeps me in a perpetual state of fright about being in right relationship with my heavenly Father nor a sappy spirituality that portrays God as such a benign teddy bear that there is no aberrant behavior or desire of mine that he will not condone. I want a relationship with the Abba of Jesus, who is infinitely compassionate with my brokenness and at the same time an awesome, incomprehensible, and unwieldy Mystery.
Brennan Manning
True faith manifests itself through our actions.
Francis Chan
Lord, when I feel that what I'm doing is insignificant and unimportant, help me to remember that everything I do is significant and important in your eyes, because you love me and you put me here, and no one else can do what I am doing in exactly the way I do it.
Brennan Manning
A priest once quoted to me the Roman saying that a religion is dead when the priests laugh at each other across the altar. I always laugh at the altar, be it Christian, Hindu, or Buddhist, because real religion is the transformation of anxiety into laughter.
Alan W. Watts
Everyone would like to have stronger faith. By themselves, the scriptures may not strengthen your faith, but being faithful to what they teach, does. In other words, faith cannot be separated from faithfulness.
John Bytheway
Silent solitude makes true speech possible and personal. If I am not in touch with my own belovedness, then I cannot touch the sacredness of others. If I am estranged from myself, I am likewise a stranger to others.
Brennan Manning
I have one desire now - to live a life of reckless abandon for the Lord, putting all my energy and strength into it.
Elisabeth Elliot
Faith does not eliminate questions. But faith knows where to take them.
Elisabeth Elliot
To have faith is to trust yourself to the water. When you swim you don't grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown. Instead you relax, and float.
Alan W. Watts
There is nothing at all that can be talked about adequately, and the whole art of poetry is to say what can't be said.
Alan W. Watts
Remember diamonds are created under pressure so hold on, it be your time to shine soon.
Sope Agbelusi
It is either an exciting or scary time to be a leader.
Miles Anthony Smith
Bird by bird buddy. Just take it bird by bird.
Anne Lamott
You can't break the broken.
Margarete Cassalina
Fear is the lack of faith in one's ability to create powerful solutions.
T.F. Hodge
Rulers are not anointed. They are created by the void of self-mastery.
T.F. Hodge
Get busy with the issue! In this regard, time is not friendly…nor should it be.
T.F. Hodge
Image is only temporal. Substance endures. Who said, "Image is everything"? And who believed it?
T.F. Hodge
This path was not that of my conscious choosing. But after persistent subconscious confrontation, I have finally embraced what is, 'souly' for me...and I am thankful, when called upon, to be able to share and give to those who seek their own way of the path.
T.F. Hodge
There is bound to be turbulence in the clouds of confusion before one can view the friendly skies, and an illuminated landing strip.
T.F. Hodge
Do not only think about it, but feel about it, also, before taking appropriate action.
T.F. Hodge
During moments of strife and 'dis-ease', check your flow and redirect your focus to that which is naturally good.
T.F. Hodge
When individuals and communities do not govern self, they risk being ruled by external forces that care less about the well-being of the village.
T.F. Hodge
Bling" is not an indication of riches. It is a product of value-based spending, to enrich the pockets of those outside of ones sphere of influence...the haves' bleeding the have-nots'.
T.F. Hodge
You may have the dark and cold street life, ruled by the lessor light of the moon. During this time I restore my temple, and later awake to greet the awesome radiance of the sun-star.
T.F. Hodge
Day or night, good or bad…all things from within.
T.F. Hodge
Life, for the living, is a gift of opportunity; an exercise of the will to choose.
T.F. Hodge
Though the earth contains greater energy and mass than any single being, linked together, "people make the world go-round".
T.F. Hodge
For the human experience, life in the natural world seems to require the application of meaning, in order to evoke purpose.
T.F. Hodge
Bravado may stir the crowd, but courage needs no audience.
T.F. Hodge
Solitude is the house of peace.
T.F. Hodge
To witness miracles unfold in your experience, count your blessings and be thankful. Perceived small blessings accumulate to be the most powerful.
T.F. Hodge
In the game of life, we all receive a set of variables and limitations in the field of play. We can either focus on the lack thereof or empower ourselves to create better realities with the pieces we play the game with.
T.F. Hodge
If you wish to transform, pretend this day until it is so.
T.F. Hodge
Perception can be one-sided or variant: "Glass half empty or half full." There usually is more than one way of perceiving. Thoroughly check your inner dialogue.
T.F. Hodge
It is more substantial to represent a purpose, rather than just a title.
T.F. Hodge
I choose many voices to consider and reckon with, rather than just one to tolerate.
T.F. Hodge
Today is not just another ordinary day. It is an opportunity to do, or say, something that just might inspire someone to greater becoming...especially a wayward youth.
T.F. Hodge
Having beef with someone is unnecessary and avoidable. Whatever the issue, if not positive, it is an opportunity to cut the excess fat from an unhealthy dietary network. Simply excuse yourself from the table of negativity and lean forward in peace.
T.F. Hodge
Both friend and enemy reside within us. One lives by the rule of compassion, the other by the rule of hard knocks. Though potential influence of either extreme is inevitable, our actions bear witness to the one we embrace.
T.F. Hodge
The Motto of Champions: If you are hurt, you can suck it up and press on. If injured, you can rebound and return bigger and better...and continue to inspire!
T.F. Hodge
Do not hate the player, nor the game...rule it!
T.F. Hodge
Though I think and speak of greater becoming, I, too, am an infinite work in progress.
T.F. Hodge
Freedom is realizing you have a choice.
T.F. Hodge
Divide the constant tide and random noisiness of energetic flow, with conscious recurring moments of empty mind, solitude, gratitude and deep...slow...breathing. Of this, the natural law of self-preservation demands.
T.F. Hodge
What surrounds us is what is within us.
T.F. Hodge
Your life experience is a moving picture, of which you are writer, director, performer, producer and critic.
T.F. Hodge
What you are, and who you are should provide greater clarity about where you have been and where you are headed. Although one distinguishes spiritual from physical nature, the ultimate unification of the two is the consequence of the struggle for internal, external and eternal – peace.
T.F. Hodge
What you do teaches faster, and has a lasting impression, far beyond what you say.
T.F. Hodge
When spontaneous demoralizing thoughts seep into your conscience, don't trip...allowing them to fester. These are random tests of your conviction and determination. Large or small, your reaction to such intrusions is a defining moment for which no one else, but you, can mitigate.
T.F. Hodge
Making a dream into reality begins with what you have, not with what you are waiting on.
T.F. Hodge
If you have a dream, keep it. But write it down and take appropriate actions to see it manifest.
T.F. Hodge
It is common to represent a title, but inspiring to represent a purpose.
T.F. Hodge