All Quotes By Tag: God

“God didn’t give fear a body. God gave love a body.”

“Omnipotent-benevolent simply means that God is all-powerful and well-meaning.”I understand the concept. It’s just . . . there seems to be a contradiction.”Yes. The contradiction is pain. Man’s starvation, war, sickness . . .”Exactly!’ Chartrand knew the camerlengo would understand. ‘Terrible things happen in this world. Human tragedy seems like proof that God could not possibly be both all-powerful and well-meaning. If He loves us and has the power to change our situation, He would prevent our pain, wouldn’t He?’The camerlengo frowned. ‘Would He?’Chartrand felt uneasy. Had he overstepped his bounds? Was this one of those religious questions you just didn’t ask? ‘Well . . . if God loves us, and He can protect us, He would have to. It seems He is either omnipotent and uncaring, or benevolent and powerless to help.”Do you have children, Lieutenant?’Chartrand flushed. ‘No, signore.”Imagine you had an eight-year-old son . . . would you love him?”Of course.”Would you let him skateboard?’Chartrand did a double take. The camerlengo always seemed oddly “in touch” for a clergyman. ‘Yeah, I guess,’ Chartrand said. ‘Sure, I’d let him skateboard, but I’d tell him to be careful.”So as this child’s father, you would give him some basic, good advice and then let him go off and make his own mistakes?”I wouldn’t run behind him and mollycoddle him if that’s what you mean.”But what if he fell and skinned his knee?”He would learn to be more careful.’The camerlengo smiled. ‘So although you have the power to interfere and prevent your child’s pain, you would choose to show your love by letting him learn his own lessons?”Of course. Pain is part of growing up. It’s how we learn.’The camerlengo nodded. ‘Exactly.”

“If your heart takes more pleasure in reading novels, or watching TV, or going to the movies, or talking to friends, rather than just sitting alone with God and embracing Him, sharing His cares and His burdens, weeping and rejoicing with Him, then how are you going to handle forever and ever in His presence…? You’d be bored to tears in heaven, if you’re not ecstatic about God now! ”

“You never enjoy the world aright, till the Sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens, and crowned with the stars: and perceive yourself to be the sole heir of the whole world, and more than so, because men are in it who are every one sole heirs as well as you. Till you can sing and rejoice and delight in God, as misers do in gold, and Kings in sceptres, you never enjoy the world.Till your spirit filleth the whole world, and the stars are your jewels; till you are as familiar with the ways of God in all Ages as with your walk and table: till you are intimately acquainted with that shady nothing out of which the world was made: till you love men so as to desire their happiness, with a thirst equal to the zeal of your own: till you delight in God for being good to all: you never enjoy the world.”

“The Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel dined with me, and I asked them how they dared so roundly to assert, that God spoke to them; and whether they did not think at the time, that they would be misunderstood, & so be the cause of imposition.Isaiah answer’d, I saw no God, nor heard any, in a finite organical perception; but my senses discover’d the infinite in every thing, and as I was then persuaded, & remain confirm’d; that the voice of honest indignation is the voice of God, I cared not for consequences but wrote.”

“To love someone is to desire and work toward their becoming the best version of themselves. The one person in all the universe who can do this perfectly for you is God.”

“The saints, too, had wandering minds. The saints, too, had constantly to recall their constantly wandering mind-child home. They became saints because they continued to go after the little wanderer, like the Good Shepherd.”

“We weren’t meant to outlive God.”

“ابتلع معي يقينان أبتهل إلى الله دائمًا أن لا يحرمني منهما: يقيني بعدله ، ويقيني برحمته. إن ضاعا منِّي ، فإن حياتي كّلها ستؤول إلى خراب عظيم و مخزٍ لن يُقيله شيء ،ولن يغفره شيء.”

“He was a wise man who invented God.”

“Any patch of sunlight in a wood will show you something about the sun which you could never get from reading books on astronomy. These pure and spontaneous pleasures are ‘patches of Godlight’ in the woods of our experience.”

“Man is timid and apologetic; he is no longer upright; he dares not say “I think,” “I am,” but quotes some saint or sage. He is ashamed before the blade of grass or the blowing rose. These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. Before a leaf-bud has burst, its whole life acts; in the full-blown flower there is no more; in the leafless root there is no less. Its nature is satisfied, and it satisfies nature, in all moments alike. But man postpones or remembers; he does not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the past, or, heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on tiptoe to foresee the future. He cannot be happy and strong until he too lives with nature in the present, above time.”

“I decided I would fill the emptiness in me with God and with paint.”

“But no matter how much evil I see, I think it’s important for everyone to understand that there is much more light than darkness.”

“It may be a species of impudence to think that the way you understand God is the way God is. (60).”