Quotes About Empathy

The world we live in is a house of pain, and we cannot live in it without it touching us. You will never be smart enough to escape its grasp. From the violence of childbirth to cut fingers and scraped knees, from sibling mockery and peer rejection to familial brokenness, suffering is part of every phase of human existence. We enter life through suffering's door and we exit life through suffering's door.

Padre de misericordias y Dios de toda consolación, quien nos consuela en todas nuestras tribulaciones, para que también nosotros podamos consolar a los que están sufriendo, por medio de la consolación con que nosotros somos consolados por Dios" (2Co 1:3-4 RVC). No tiene sentido recibir una compasión tan maravillosa y responderle a los demás con dureza e insensibilidad.

when you forget the grace that you've been given, it becomes very easy to respond to the people around you with nongrace.

The appropriateness of my responses to others is directly related to the accuracy of my view of myself, and for that there is grace too.

We would prefer to lob grenades of truth into people's lives rather than lay down our lives for them. But this is exactly what Christ did for us. Can we expect to be called to do anything less?

The fact is that no one gives grace better than someone who is convinced that he needs it, as well.

The more you see your sin, the more you will respond tenderly to other sinners and want for them the same grace you have received.

The more you see your sin, the more you will respond tenderly to other sinners and want for them the same grace you have received. And as you taste new life, you will begin to celebrate, in fresh new ways, the grace that is yours in Christ Jesus.

Si no respondemos al pecado de otro con un amor redentor, nos hacemos partícipes de su culpa.

It's natural to want mercy for yourself but justice for others. It's natural to be very aware of the sin others, yet blind to your own. If we are ever going to be people of mercy, we need bountiful mercy ourselves, because what stands in the way of our being a community of mercy is us.

You never have to feel or act as if you're alone in your suffering, because the One who sits on the throne at the right hand of the Father not only faced all the things that you now face, but he also faced the myriad of temptations that you and every other sufferer faces.

The smart kid teases the dumb kid. The athlete makes fun of the kid with two left feet. Something is so wrong inside us that we can't even handle blessing properly.

Self-righteousness means you don't see yourself or the other person with accuracy. It means you see his or her speck as a log and your log as a speck. So you are condemning of him or her and excusing of yourself. You treat the other person with judgment while you respond to yourself with patience.

When you remember mercy, you are humble, thankful, and tender.

you and I need to be open and approachable in the midst of our discouragement. We'll never get the help we need if we first demand that people sign on to our view of things before we are willing to open up to them and listen to what they have to say to us.

Love calls you to be silent when you want to speak, and to speak when you would like to be silent.

So much of our disappointment in relationships is not because we have an unrealistic view of others, but because we have a distorted view of ourselves.

The DNA of sin is selfishness (see 1 Cor. 5:15). Sin turns all of us in on ourselves. It reduces our circle of hopes and concerns to things that touch and involve us. It makes us all focused on and driven by our wants, needs, and feelings. Sin can so fill our eyes with our needs that we become functionally blind to the needs of others. We can be so focused on our interest that we have little interest in the interest of others.

You deal with others with grace when you walk around with the humble realization of how deep your need for grace was and continues to be.

When you think you're righteous, you expect others to be righteous as well, so you become demanding, judgmental, and constantly disappointed.

The things you do and say always tell you more about yourself than whoever you're speaking or responding to

For the believer, harsh, critical, impatient, and irritated responses to others are always connected to forgetting or denying who we are and what we have been given in Jesus.

It really is true that when you're living for you, the call to love others is always a burden for you

Humility is the soil in which mercy for others grows.