Quotes About Transformation

You know, they straightened out the Mississippi River in places, to make room for houses and livable acreage. Occasionally the river floods these places. "Floods" is the word they use, but in fact it is not flooding; it is remembering. Remembering where it used to be. —Toni Morrison, "The Site of Memory

It was as though he no longer needed to drink to forget whatever it was he could not remember. Now he could not remember that he had ever forgotten anything. Perhaps that was why for the first time after that old day in France he was beginning to miss the presence of other people. Shadrack had improved enough to feel lonely. If he was lonely before, he didn't know because the noise he kept up, the roaring, the busyness protected him from knowing it.

Not hating him is not enough; liking, loving him is not useful. I have to alter things. I have to alter things. I have to be a shadow who wishes him well, mine the smokes of the dead left over from their lives.

But she had gone on a real trip, and now she was different. She got out of bed and lit the lamp to look in the mirror. (...) She looked for a long time and suddenly a shiver ran through her. I'm me, she whispered. Me. Nel didn't quite know what she meant, but on the other hand she knew exactly what she meant. I'm me. I'm not their daughter. I'm not Nel. I'm me. Me.

deathbreath was a prime creator, a great changer of minds and collector of hearts. Any decision made while inhaling it was as unreliable as it was fierce. Reason in moments of crisis was rare.

Lay em down, Sethe. Sword and shield. Down. Down. Both of em down. Down by the riverside. Sword and shield. Don't study war no more,. Lay all that mess down.

Ahora estaba convencido de que el afecto por ella había sido medicinal, como una aspirina. Efectivamente, tanto si se daba cuenta como si no, Lily desplazaba su desorden, su cólera y su vergüenza. Hasta el punto de que había llegado a convencerse de que el naufragio emocional estaba superado. En realidad, solo esperaba el momento más propicio para asomar

If you want to fly, you have to give up everything that weighs you down.

When he arrived he thought their flaws were normal; their disagreements ordinary. They were pleased by the accomplishments of their neighbors and their mockery of the lazy and the loose was full of laughter. Or used to be. Now, it seemed, the glacial wariness they once confined to strangers more and more was directed toward each other.

God can take your most monstrous failures and turn them into triumphs such as you never could imagine.

When you deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him, you die while you simultaneously truly live. That is when you experience the reality that "whoever loses his life for my sake will find it" (Matthew 16:25).

See, you can be part of a crowd who gathers at church or even comes together to do a Bible study, but unless you recognize your true humility before the living God and your complete dependence on Him and His Word, you will only be in the vicinity. You will only be part of the Jesus Fan Club. You will go untouched. Nothing will change within you because His power will not be released to you.

Whether you received brokenness or goodness from your own father, you are a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5: 17).

A person looking into a carnival mirror couldn't accurately describe the true person who is being reflected in the mirror. Neither can you accurately say what truth is when you look through the distorted mirror of your soul. The soul within you—how you see a matter—needs to be restored. You do this by exchanging your thoughts for God's truth.

When you got saved, God deposited deep down within you all of the righteousness that belongs to Jesus Christ. But you can't benefit unless you are willing to dig down deep with the shovel of truth so that God will release a brand-new you surrounded by the secure protection of a breastplate of His righteousness.

Are you progressing to be more and more like Jesus Christ? Are you investing in the moment rather than being bound by yesterday or worrying about tomorrow?

When you or I surrender before our owner, the all-powerful Adonai, and lay our insecurities, doubts, and hesitations before Him, we will be amazed time and again as God shows up in the most unlikely places and uses the most unlikely people—you and me.

Getting into God's kingdom comes by way of the process known as conversion, but getting God's kingdom to visibly manifest itself in the daily abundant life comes through your commitment.

Muchos de los que desmayan en sus vidas y experiencias físicas y tangibles se frustran cuando tratan de cambiar las situaciones y dinámicas externas sin hacer un cambio en su interior.

These westbound pioneers slogged through the morass on foot, or in wagons drawn by mules and oxen. Impossible for them to conceive that their mud march would one day become sport for modern Americans

We've always lived in the past in Selma, and we still do. But the past has changed on us. It included a lot of stories it didn't used to.

War, in short, concentrated the mind. It had proven possible to convert a whole country into a war machine around a war economy; why then, people asked, could something similar not be accomplished in pursuit of peace? There was no convincing answer.

The victory of conservatism and the profound transformation brought about over the course of the next three decades was thus far from inevitable: it took an intellectual revolution.

Nothing in its life so became the Soviet Union as the leaving of it