Quotes About Discernment

As we wisely gain knowledge through the everyday stuff, and grapple with the development of our discernment through everyday stuff, we'll use what we have to our advantage in making better decisions. (41)

remember not every face-to-face confrontation needs a verbal response

There is no magic formula for being able to discern God's voice. We can learn to recognize it the way we recognize the voices of those close to us: by knowing Him. And when we know Him, we can tell if what we're feeling led to do is from Him or not.

1 Samuel 25:25

coated with unmet expectations. So, what do I do? Well, I've found it tremendously helpful to list the expectations I have of a relationship in which I'm feeling slighted. Then I prayerfully discern whether or not my expectations are realistic or unrealistic. And if I can't really discern one way or the other, I ask. I ask God. I ask that person. I ask someone wise who knows both of us well.

If we pay attention to foolish things or things that fuel foolishness in us, we will bankrupt our perspective. And we will be more likely to fall prey to Satan's schemes.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

The Best Yes is what we're after. Best Yes answers are much more likely to happen when we are in the habit of seeking wisdom. We have to put our hearts and our minds in places where wisdom gathers, not scatters.

I've just reached the age when I don't bother with people I have to make allowances for." Toward

gauging the truth of a person merely by looking is a fool's habit.

Instinct is the nose of the mind.

Do not listen to your enemy, Odysseus had once told me. Look at them. It will tell you everything.

What you feel good after one time, you feel rotten after the next. And it is difficult to know in advance. And morality shouldn't be experimental, I don't think.

secret of the warrior-heart of Jesus. Second, a warrior is cunning. He knows when to fight and when to run; he can sense a trap and never charges blindly ahead;

You must ask God what he thinks of you, and you must stay with the question until you have an answer. The battle will get fierce here. This is the last thing the Evil One wants you to know.

Thus we might not know we have a sage at the table, for he will remain silent while the "experts" prattle on and on.

Jesus said, "Do not throw your pearls to pigs" (Matt. 7:6). By this we don't think he was calling some people pigs. He was saying, "Look—be careful that you do not give something precious to someone who, at best, cannot recognize its beauty, or at worst, will trample on it." Consider your feminine heart and beauty your treasure, your pearls.

Now, if I am having a hard time hearing God's voice, or being certain that I have heard, I will sometimes try on one answer, then the other. Still in a posture of quiet listening, I will add to my prayers, Are you saying yes, Jesus? Are you saying you want us to go? Pause. Listen. Or are you saying no—you don't want us to go? Often as we try on one answer or another, our spirit can feel the guidance of the Holy Spirit through a confirmation, or a strong sense of reservation.

Pressure nearly always guarantees you will have a hard time discerning what God is saying, if you hear anything at all. Pressure

There are three types of intelligent persons: the first so intelligent that being called very intelligent must seem natural and obvious; the second sufficiently intelligent to see that he is being flattered, not described; the third so little intelligent that he will believe anything. I knew I belonged to the second kind.

A glance at any human should be enough to dispel any notion that it is the work of an intelligent being.

A man shrewd enough and clever enough to amass such a fortune in ten years does not throw together

I doubt it. I'll give any book a hundred pages, and if by then the writer can't hold my attention I'll put it away. There are too many good books I want to read to waste time with a bad one." ?

we must determine whether on the one hand Christianity is still to represent to us a definite teaching from above, or whether on the other its utterances have been from time to time so strangely at variance, that we are necessarily thrown back on our own judgment individually to determine, what the revelation of God is, or rather if in fact there is, or has been, any revelation at all.