Quotes for the Journey: God The best way to know God is to love many things. Vincent van Gogh

spirit

The majority of us do not enthrone God, we enthrone common sense.  We make our decisions and then ask the real God to bless our God's decision.       -Oswald Chambers     A tragic mistake that is often made is to assume that the will of God is bound to be something very dull and uninviting, if not positively unpleasant.  Consciously or not some persons look upon God as a hard taskmaster, or a severe parent. . . . The truth is that the will of God for us always means greater freedom, greater self-expression, newer and brighter experience, wider opportunity of service to others—life more abundant.      -Emmet Fox     I believe that life is given us so we may grow in love, and I believe that God is in me as the sun is in the colour and fragrance of a flower--the Light in my darkness, the Voice in my silence.       -Helen Keller     People substitute tradition for the living experience of the love of God.  They talk and think as though walking with God was attained by walking in the footsteps of people who walked with God.       -Francis Howgill     God doesn't do the work for you; he does the work through you.  It's not enough to look up; you must also look within.       -Patti LaBelle      The highest condition of the religious sentiment is when. . . the worshiper not only sees God everywhere, but sees nothing which is not full of God.       -Harriet Martineau

I once heard a man say he knew there was a God, he just didn’t think he needed Him.  It is nice to take care of yourself and be independent, but it is also nice to know that you have a resource to rely on in times of need.  If you are used to fending entirely for yourself, then when a catastrophe occurs you will expend a lot of energy looking for help at a time when you need your energy looking for help at a time when you need your energy for creative work.       -Bernie Siegel

The heavens are not filled with hostility.  The sky does not express a frown.  When I look up I do not contemplate a face of brass, but the face of infinite good will.  Yet when I was a child, many a picture has made me think of God as suspicious, inhumanly watchful, always looking round the corner to catch me at the fall.  That “eye,” placed in the sky of many a picture, and placed there to represent God, filled my heart with chilling fear. . . . Heaven overflows with good will toward us!  Our God not only wishes good, he wills it!       -John Henry Jowett

I can see, and that is why I can be happy, in what you call the dark, but which to me is golden. I can see a God-made world, not a man-made world.       -Helen Keller

In our first, most immature relationship with God, we perceive God as the big parent in the sky, the omnipresent, omnipotent flock of angels that supports us.  Based on this relationship, we grow and come to know ourselves and our abilities. We begin to use the support we have received in our life to serve. And as we serve our children, as we serve society, as we serve the world, as we serve our soul, we gradually discover ourselves to be pure instruments in the service of God.       -John Gray

A priest friend of mine has cautioned me away from the standard God of our childhoods, who loves you and guides you and then, if you are bad, roasts you:  God as a high school principal in a gray suit who never remembered your name but is always leafing unhappily through your files.        -Anne Lamott

It seems to be a general belief that the will of God is to make things distasteful for us, like taking bad-tasting medicine when we are sick, or going to the dentist.  Somebody needs to tell us that the sunrise is also God’s will.  There is the time of harvest, the harvest which will provide food and clothes for us, without which life could not be sustained on earth.  God ordered the seasons—they are his will.  In fact, the good things in life far outweigh the bad.  There are more sunrises than cyclones.      -Charles L. Allen

There's an old saying that God made us in His image, and we've been trying to return the favor ever since.  People often view God in a human image.  This God changes His mind, gets upset, answers some prayers but not others, loves some people but not others.  But even with that limited image, if we pray sincerely, we'll eventually realize that God is changeless.  He's the same all the time because He's not in time--time is in Him.        -Michael Beckwith

If someone were to ask me whether I believed in God, or saw God, or had a particular relationship with God, I would reply that I don't separate God from my world in my thinking.  I feel that God is everywhere.  That's why I never feel separated from God or feel I must seek God, any more than a fish in the ocean feels it must seek water.  In a sense, God is the "ocean" in which we live.       -Robert Fulghum

It is of course evident that everything in one’s religious life depends upon the sort of God one worships.  The character of the worshiper must necessarily be molded by the character of the object worshipped.  If it is a cruel and revengeful God, or a selfish and unjust God, the worshiper will be cruel, and revengeful, and selfish, and unjust, also.  If it is a loving, tender, forgiving, unselfish God, the worshiper will be loving, and tender, and forgiving, and unselfish, as well.       -Hannah Whitall Smith

God, you see, loves us in a way the world does not:  unconditionally.  Without an agenda.  With no fine print that says He loves us now, but it’s only an introductory-rate offer that will change after six months, based on prime interest rates.  With no campaign promise that He’ll love us, but only if we vote for Him or give to His campaign fund.  With no prenuptial agreement that says He’ll love us, but just in case, let’s put together a contract.    Grace promises that eternal life awaits not those who live a perfect life, say so many Hail Marys, never miss church, or donate so much money.  It awaits those who believe with a childlike faith.      -Bob Welch

I have never understood why it should be considered derogatory to the Creator to suppose that He has a sense of humor.       -Dean Inge

For many people, God is a frightening idea.  Asking God for help doesn't seem very comforting if we think of Him as something outside ourselves, or capricious, or judgmental.  But God is love and He dwells within us.  We are created in His image, or mind, which means that we are extensions of His love, or Sons and Daughters of God. . . . Rather than accepting that we are the loving beings that He created, we have arrogantly thought that we could create ourselves, and then create God.  We have made up a God in our image.  Because we are angry and judgmental, we have projected those characteristics onto Him.  But God remains who He is and always will be:  He is the energy, the thought of unconditional love.  He cannot think with anger or judgment.  He is mercy and compassion and total acceptance.       -Marianne Williamson

God does not die on the day when we cease to believe in a personal deity, but we die on the day when our lives cease to be illuminated by the steady radiance, renewed daily, of a wonder, the source of which is beyond all reason.       -Dag Hammarskjold

We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.  It's not just in some of us, it's in everyone.        -Nelson Mandela

God is bigger than any problem.  God in you is greater than any difficulty you have to meet.  God cares for you more than it is possible for any human being to realize.  God can help you in proportion to the degree in which you worship him.  You worship God by really putting your trust in him instead of in outer conditions, or in fear, or in depression, or in seeming dangers, and so forth.  You worship God by recognizing his presence everywhere, in all people and conditions that you meet; and by praying regularly.  You pray well when you pray with joy.        -Emmet Fox

Sleep, my child, and peace attend thee, All through the night; Guardian angels God will lend thee, All through the night; Soft the drowsy hours are creeping, Hill and dale in slumber sleeping, Love alone his watch is keeping-- All through the night. Old Welsh Air

God made sun and moon to distinguish the seasons, and day and night; and we cannot have the fruits of the earth but in their seasons.  But God hath made no decrees to distinguish the seasons of His mercies.  In Paradise the fruits were ripe the first minute, and in heaven it is always autumn. His mercies are ever in their maturity.       -John Donne

God will of necessity always be a hidden God.  His loudest cry is silence. If he does not manifest himself to us, we will say that he hides himself. And if he manifests himself, we will accuse him of veiling himself.  Ah! it is not easy for God to make himself known to us!        -Louis Evely

Nature is too thin a screen; the glory of the omnipresent God bursts through everywhere.       -Ralph Waldo Emerson

One of the most powerful concepts, one which is a sure cure for lack of confidence, is the thought that God is with you and helping you. This is one of the simplest teachings in religion, namely, that Almighty God will be your companion, will stand by you, help you, and see you through. No other idea is so powerful in developing self-confidence as this simple belief when practiced. To practice it simply affirm "God is with me; God is helping me; God is guiding me." Spend several minutes each day visualizing his presence. Then practice believing that affirmation.       -Norman Vincent Peale

God doesn't dwell on some distant cloud. God doesn't live in the church or in the temple or within the crystals, crosses and statues that we imbue with attributes of the divine. And God doesn't need our pleas or even our praise. To prostrate ourselves and plead for the things we want doesn't draw them nearer to us. Beseeching a faraway God only engenders feelings of separation and alienation. It is practicing the absence, not the presence, of God.    God is right here, wherever you are. God is within you and everywhere around you. God is omnipresent and omniscient. You never have to beg or bargain with God for anything. The Holy Spirit knows your needs even before you do. And it is God's very nature to fulfill your needs, at the time and in the manner that is best for you. There are many lessons we must learn in our lifetime, but none is more essential to our happiness than this one.    We never have to entreat God to be more kind and benevolent. God is kindness and benevolence. The very substance of God is love--the love that created you and me and all living things. It is the love within the little acorn that becomes the great oak tree, the love that protects the lilies of the field. God is the love that is breathing for you, the love that is beating your heart.       -Susan L. Taylor

God can dream a bigger dream for you than you can dream for yourself, and your role on Earth is to attach yourself to that divine force and let yourself be released to it.       -Oprah Winfrey

When I remember that the primary purpose of life is to feel and appreciate the presence of God, to live from a state of love and compassion, and to be of service to others, then instantly, like magic, I begin to feel at peace.       -Richard Carlson

Oh Thou who art!  Ecclesiastes names thee the Almighty.  Maccabees names thee Creator; the epistle to the Ephesians names thee Liberty. . . the Psalms name thee Wisdom and Truth; John names thee Light; the Book of Kings names thee Lord; Exodus calls thee Providence; Leviticus, Holiness; Esdras, Justice; Creation calls thee God; Man names thee Father; but Solomon names thee Compassion, and that is the most beautiful of all thy names.       -Victor Hugo

Human experience is already experience of God.  Our journey on earth is already a journey to heaven.  Seeing a sunrise or a flower is already seeing God.       -Carlo Carretto

Faith strips the mask from the world and reveals God in everything.  It makes nothing impossible and renders meaningless such words as anxiety, danger, and fear, so that the believer goes through life calmly and peacefully, with profound joy--like a child, hand in hand with his or her mother.       -Charles de Foucald

When we lose God, it is not God who is lost.       -Anon

God is to me that creative Force, behind and in the universe, who manifests Himself as energy, as life, as order, as beauty, as thought, as conscience, as love.       -Henry Sloane Coffin

Your mind cannot possibly understand God.  Your heart already knows.  Minds were designed for carrying out the orders of the heart.          -Emmanuel

Every conjecture we can form with regard to the works of God has as little probability as the conjectures of a child with regard to the works of an adult.       -Thomas Reid

Deep down in every man, woman, and child, is the fundamental idea of God.  It may be obscured by calamity, by pomp, by worship of other things, but in some form or other it is there. For faith in a Power greater than ourselves, and miraculous demonstrations of that power in human lives, are facts as old as man himself.       -Alcoholics Anonymous

God speaks to all individuals through what happens to them moment by moment.       -J.P. DeCaussade

God conceived the world,--that was poetry; He formed it,--that was sculpture; He colored it,--that was painting; He people it with living beings, --that was the grand, divine, eternal drama.       -Charlotte Cushman

The kingdom of God is within you.       -Luke 17:21

It's only by forgetting yourself that you draw near to God.       -Henry David Thoreau

We mustn't reserve communing with God just for morning and evening prayers, or for weekly worship service, or for when we feel burdened.  The goal is to realize that every moment is a meditation.  Allow yourself to marvel at the wonder of God's work all around us.  Throughout your day, let the sun, a tree, a piece of fruit remind you that everything you could ever want has been provided and can be found right here on earth.  While changing the baby's diaper, give thanks for the miracle of creation you hold in your hands. . . . The moment you begin to consider God first in everything you do, the world around you softens and your life becomes easier.  You'll feel healthier, happier and at peace with yourself.       -Susan L. Taylor

The deep emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.       -Albert Einstein

If we are completely honest with ourselves we know deep down in our hearts that the usual goals and strivings of self-sufficiency and self-fulfillment we have are not our real destiny.  We sense an uneasiness with the common, ordinary life of delights and pleasures, and begin to hear this quiet voice from the soul's depths, a whispering of a more meaningful, richer life.  We are in essence seeking God and feel that He is indeed drawing us to Him.  When we respond, it is to God that we are responding.       -Clara M. Matheson

The deepest need of humans is not food and clothing and shelter, important as they are.  It is God.  We have mistaken the nature of poverty, and thought it was economic poverty.  No, it is poverty of the soul, deprivation of God's recreating, loving peace.       -Thomas R. Kelly

We have all of us free access to all that is great, and good, and happy, and carry within ourselves a key to all the treasures that heaven has to bestow upon us.  We starve in the midst of plenty, groan under infirmities, with the remedy in our own hand; live and die without knowing and feeling anything of the One only God, whilst we have it in our power to know and enjoy it in as great a reality as we know and feel the power of this world over us; for Heaven is as near to our souls as this world is to our bodies; and we are created, we are redeemed, to have our conversation in it.       -William Law

God is in everyone and everything.  When we save each other or guide each other or just love each other, we are doing God's work.  So God dresses in Eskimo clothing or other disguises, and responds to us whether or not we are aware enough to hear, see, or feel God's loving guidance.  Everything is a tool of God, from DNA to the weather.       -Bernie Siegel

God is bigger than any problem.  God in you is greater than any difficulty that you have to meet.  God cares for you more than it is possible for any human being to realize.  God can help you in proportion to the degree in which you worship Him.  You worship God by really putting your trust in him instead of in outer conditions, or in fear, or in depression, or in seeming dangers, and so forth.  You worship God by recognizing His presence everywhere, in all people and conditions that you meet; and by praying regularly.  You pray well when you pray with joy.       -Emmet Fox

You must remember that our God has all knowledge and all wisdom, and that therefore it is very possible He may guide you into paths wherein He knows great blessings are awaiting you, but which, to the shortsighted human eyes around you, seem sure to result in confusion and loss.        -Hannah Whitall Smith

There is in all our strivings a profound homesickness for God.  When we touch another we touch God.  When we look at a flower, its radiance, its fragrance, its stillness is another moment's experience of something deeper within.  When we hold a baby, when we hear extraordinary music, when we look into the eyes of a great saint, what draws us is that deep homesickness for our true nature, for the peace and healing that is our birthright.  This homesickness for God directs us toward the healing we took birth for.       -Stephen Levine

God’s love is a gift that can make you forget yourself at times.  The Scottish writer George MacDonald said, “It is the heart that is not yet sure of its God that is afraid to laugh in his presence.”   God loves us as we are right now!  That’s one of the things I’m most grateful for.  I love the freedom to be myself in God.  I pray that a year from now, five years from now, I will be a godlier woman, but I know God won’t love me any more than he does right this minute.       -Sheila Walsh

God never gives up on us no matter how hard we try to get ourselves loose.  God does not let go.  That doesn’t mean he controls everything we do.  It doesn’t mean he puts a bridle on us and leads us by the nose.  He gives each one of us free will and common sense and a spirit that can communicate with his.  When we go through afflictions, he allows us to choose our response.  But no matter what our response may be, he sticks around to the bitter end.       -Barbara Johnson

All people are special, and all moments are golden.  There is no person and there is no time more special than another.  Many people choose to believe that God communicates in special ways and only with special people.  This removes the mass of the people from responsibility for hearing God’s message, much less receiving it (which is another matter), and allows them to take someone else’s word for everything.       -Neale Donald Walsch

There is nothing you need to do to make yourself more acceptable to God.  You don’t have to work harder, nor do you need to change the kind of work you do.  You don’t have to give more money to charitable organizations.  The reality is, God doesn’t want you to give anyone anything if you only do it to impress God!  God does not love you or find you acceptable because of anything that you do.  God loves you and accepts you because you are a part of God.       -Iyanla Vanzant

Once one has encountered God everything is changed.  One does not lead a charmed life—but it is amazing how charming the commonplace can become.  One still has heavy work to do but one works with assurance and poise.  One still has temptations to meet but they have been robbed of most of their power.  One runs into adversity but the inner certainty remains.       -Albert E. Day

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