Quotes from Andy Stanley

Any admonition that declares that we must rule should be checked with the immediate reminder that Christ did not. It is the cross—not the boardroom, not the Oval Office, and not the box office—that is the absolute center of the Kingdom of God.

Simply recognizing the need for change does not define leadership. The leader is the one who has the courage to act on what he sees…A leader is someone who has the courage to say publicly what everybody else is whispering privately. It is not his insight that sets the leader apart from the crowd. It is his courage to act on what he sees, to speak up when everyone else is silent.

Leadership is not always about getting things done "right." Leadership is about getting things done through other people…When a leader can't find someone to hand things off to, it is time for him to look in the mirror. We must never forget that the people who follow us are exactly where we have led them.

Now then, my sons, listen to me; pay attention to what I say. Do not let your heart turn to her ways or stray into her paths. (vv. 24–25)

We have a tendency to measure ourselves against the people around us. They become our point of reference. A good coach will evaluate your performance against your potential. …if we are wise enough to listen, they will help us go further, faster.

Nobody matures past his or her need for prayer and meditation.

Grace is the offer of exactly what we do not deserve. Thus, it cannot be recognized or received until we are aware of precisely how undeserving we really are. It is the knowledge of what we do not deserve that allows us to receive grace for what it is. Unmerited. Unearned. Undeserved. For that reason, grace can only be experienced by those who acknowledge they are undeserving.

What gets our attention determines our direction and, ultimately, our destination. Or if you would prefer the short version: attention determines direction.

Experience is often a brutal teacher. Experience eats up you most valuable commodity:time. Learning from experience can eat up years. It can steal an entire stage of life.

The moment our love or concern for country takes precedence over our love for the people in our country, we are off mission. When saving America diverts energy, focus, and reputation away from saving Americans, we no longer qualify as the ekklesia of Jesus. We're merely political tools. A manipulated voting demographic. A photo op. Again, we lose our elevated position as the conscience of the nation. We give up the moral and ethical high ground.

How we treat, talk about, respond to, and care for one another is the identifying mark of a genuine Jesus follower. Not what we believe.

Kindness is love's response to weakness

One gets to the place one wants to be the same way one got to the place one didn't want to be—by putting one foot in front of the other and moving in a specific direction.

So let me take some pressure off. Your problem is not discipline. Your problem is not organization. Your problem is not that you have yet to stumble onto the perfect schedule. And your problem is not that the folks at home demand too much of your time. The problem is this: there's not enough time to get everything done that you're convinced—or others have convinced you—needs to get done.

We begin selling ourselves on what we want to do rather than what we ought to do. We listen to ourselves until we believe our own lies, and the we opt for happiness.

Our faith is anchored to a miscarriage of justice. The worst possible thing happened to the best possible person.

Your pain isn't a trophy to show off. It's not a story to tell. It's potentially poison to your soul. To refuse to forgive is to choose to self-destruct.

But, then, that's the point. In leadership, success is succession.

Everything somehow works out. Every decision has an outcome, and every path has a destination.

Pitchers don't need to hit well; they need to pitch well. Every step you create needs to do what it does best and nothing more. Focus allows you to pursue excellence, to zero in on the target. You can ruin a great pitcher by trying to make a hitter out of him, and you can ruin a great church…

In the critical arenas of life, you cannot make up for lost time. As

While nobody plans to mess up his life, the problem is that few of us plan not to.

It's deceiving but true that we rarely see any immediate consequences for neglecting a single installment of time in any arena of life. But if neglect becomes your pattern, you will eventually bump up against our third principle: 3. Neglect has a cumulative effect. You

Just because there isn't a "Thou shalt not" attached to a situation does not necessarily mean it is a "Thou shalt.