Quotes About Reflection

encontré una tacita de porcelana que se había caído de un poste. Recordé que cuando eramos chicos las rompíamos con la honda y eso me dio un poco de tristeza. Sin saber por qué me la guardé en el bolsillo y la fui acariciando con los dedos mientras pensaba en los tiempos del colegio, cuando creía que tenía una vida por delante.

Si pudiera me gustaría escribir con amor; pero si pudiera escribir con amor sería un hombre distinto al que soy.

Of my gardener I would say that he moves meditatively in the garden. He labours continually but without cruel haste; if he make changes, it is as the seasons make them. Like every good gardener, there is something priestly in his manner.

I have never met the man I could despair of after discerning what lies in me apart from the grace of God.

Am I as spontaneously kind to God as I used to be, or am I only expecting God to be kind to me? Am I full of the little things that cheer His heart over me, or am I whimpering because things are going hardly with me? There is no joy in the soul that has forgotten what God prizes.

If we have never had the experience of taking our commonplace religious shoes off our commonplace religious feet, and getting rid of all the undue familiarity with which we approach God, it is questionable whether we have ever stood in his presence.

The one thing that remains is looking in the face of God for ourselves.

Never be afraid when God brings back your past. Let your memory have its way with you. It is a minister of God bringing its rebuke and sorrow to you.

To say that 'prayer changes things' is not as close to the truth as saying, 'prayer changes me and then I change things.' God has established things so that prayer, on the basis of redemption, changes the way a person looks at things.

It is not true to say that God wants to teach us something in our trials. Through every cloud He brings our way, He wants us to unlearn something.

Prayer does not equip us for greater works—prayer is the greater work.

When someone thinks that to develop a holy life he must always be alone with God, he is no longer of any use to others.

When Jesus drives something home to you through His Word, don't try to evade it. If you do, you will become a religious impostor. Examine the things you tend simply to shrug your shoulders about, and where you have refused to be obedient, and you will know why you are not growing spiritually. As Jesus said, Ã¢â'¬Å"First . . . go . . . ." Even at the risk of being thought of as fanatical, you must obey what God tells you.

Beware of any work for God which enables you to evade concentration on Him. A great many Christian workers worship their work.

At least once a week examine yourself before God to see if your life is measuring up to the standard He has for you.

Beware of anything that would tarnish God's mirror in you. It is always something good stains it—good, but not best.

God's mark of approval, whenever you obey Him, is peace. He sends an immeasurable, deep peace; not a natural peace, "as the world gives," but the peace of Jesus. Whenever peace does not come, wait until it does, or seek to find out why it is not coming. If you are acting on your own impulse, or out of a sense of the heroic, to be seen by others, the peace of Jesus will not exhibit itself.

A Christian servant is one who perpetually looks into the face of God and then goes forth to talk to others.

Always make it a practice to stir your own mind thoroughly to think through what you have easily believed. Your position is not really yours until you make it yours through suffering and study. The author or speaker from whom you learn the most is not the one who teaches you something you didn't know before, but the one who helps you take a truth with which you have quietly struggled, give it expression, and speak it clearly and boldly.

The secret of a holy life is not in imitating Jesus, but in letting the perfections of Jesus be manifested in our mortal flesh.

If you open your mouth in the dark, you will speak while in the wrong mood--darkness is the time to listen.

O Lord, deliver me from this lust of always vindicating myself." Such a need for constant vindication destroys our soul's faith in God. Don't say, "I must explain myself," or, "I must get people to understand." Our Lord never explained anything—He left the misunderstandings or misconceptions of others to correct themselves.

Is the Lord Jesus Christ being abundantly satisfied by your life, or are you exhibiting a walk of spiritual pride before Him?

My vision of God is dependent upon the condition of my character. My character determines whether or not truth can even be revealed to me.