Inspirational Quotes

I’ve been nominated by Jennifer Nicole Wells to participate in The Quotes Challenge. Thanks so much. I do love quotes and as I see Jennifer does too. Jennifer’s quotes were all about LOVE, I’ll take a more generic approach and just pick a few I love.

Here are the rules:

• Post 3 of your favorite quotes each per day for 3 recurrent days. The quotes can be of any other people or it may come straight from your own heart. [due to time constraints I’ll be posting all in one post and I’ve thrown in an extra]
• Nominate 3 bloggers with each post to challenge them.
• Don’t forget to utter a thankful word to the person who nominated you.

This is the theme of this blog and my favorite quote. It came to life in me December 23, 2010. This is when I learned the depths of truth in these words.

Here’s just a few of my favorite quotes. For more check out the inspirational quotes category or the Inspirational Images Gallery page for more.

I’d like to encourage the following people to take up this quotes challenge and encourage the rest of us with their favorite quotes:

My Success is Your Success

Prayers and Promises

Family Love Does More

Jake Sprinter’s Inspirational Quotes

Self Reflection

Advocatemmmohan Aksharaalu

Abundance

Fear Not

To do or to be – that is the question.

Holy Fruit

Got Stress?

Rest

Healing Balm

Quotes for a Peaceful Attitude

CS Lewis	God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.
Francois Fenelon	Peace does not dwell in outward things, but within the soul; we may preserve it in the midst of the bitterest pain, if our will remains firm and submissive. Peace in this life springs from acquiescence to, not in an exemption from, suffering.
Robert J Sawyer	“Learning to ignore things is one of the great paths to inner peace.”
Joel Osteen	“God wants you to have a good life, a life filled with love, joy, peace, and fulfillment. That doesn’t mean it will always be easy, but it does mean that it will always be good.”
Joyce Meyer	Many people feel so pressured by the expectations of others that it causes them to be frustrated, miserable and confused about what they should do. But there is a way to live a simple, joy-filled, peaceful life, and the key is learning how to be led by the Holy Spirit, not the traditions or expectations of man.
Norman Vincent Peale	Be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind. Talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet. Make all your friends feel there is something special in them. Look at the sunny side of everything. Think only the best, be as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.
Francois Fenelon	Resign every forbidden joy; restrain every wish that is not referred to God’s will; banish all eager desires, all anxiety; desire only the will of God; seek him alone and supremely, and you will find peace.
Thomas Watson	God sweetens outward pain with inward peace
Joel Osteen	“It’s vital that you accept yourself and learn to be happy with who God made you to be. If you want to truly enjoy your life, you must be at peace with yourself.”
Joyce Meyer	“ We don’t have to work at trying to get rid of every stressful situation. We need to learn how to embrace peace. ”
Norman Vincent Peale	“I truly believe that if we keep telling the Christmas story, singing the Christmas songs, and living the Christmas spirit, we can bring joy and happiness and peace to this world.”

There is a Peace

There is a peace, through kingdoms fall and crumble,
A peace amid this hurricane of war,
A quiet peace that “passeth understanding”
While chaos rages at our very door.

There is a peace, not brought by worldly honor,
Nor at the price of many millions slain.
But by the blood of One, God’s Son, who suffered,
And even now, he did not die in vain!

There is a peace deep down within the Christian,
A rock on which to lean in time of storm,
A lasting peace that will outlive the ages,
In spite of those who ridicule and scorn.

There is a peace! Let’s cling to it and hold it
In life or death, in days of peace of war,
That quiet peace which “passeth understanding,”
Through chaos rages at our very door.

Alice Hansche Mortenson

 

Peace in All Things

Faith endures as seeing Him who is invisible (Heb. 11:27); endures the disappointments, the hardships, and the heart-aches of life, by recognizing that all comes from the hand of Him who is too wise to err and too loving to be unkind. But so long as we are occupied with any other object than God Himself, there will be neither rest for the heart nor peace for the mind. But when we receive all that enters our lives as from His hand, then, no matter what may be our circumstances or surroundings—whether in a hovel or prison-dungeon, or at a martyr’s stake—we shall be enabled to say, ” The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places” (Ps. 16:6). But that is the language of faith, not of sight nor of sense.

—Arthur W. Pink

Peace

The sun went down – a blaze of light
As twilight ushered in the night.
The moon arose – a silvery glow
I’m glad the Savour made it so.

The stars came out across the sky
To speak of other worlds on high,
And in my heart I found sweet peace,
From toil the night would bring release.

Vera Beall Parker

A Diet of Peace

No wise man can expect that…God should diet us with a continual feast. It would neither suit with our health, nor the condition of this pilgrimage. Live, therefore, on your peace of conscience as your ordinary diet; when this is wanting, know that God appointeth you a fast for your health; and when you have a feast of high joys, feed on it and be thankful! But when they are taken from you, gape not after them as the disciples did after Christ at His ascension; but return thankfully to your ordinary diet of peace.

—Richard Baxter

The Power of God

He gives me faith within myself
When it seems all in vain.
He gives me hope to battle on
And help my goals attain.
He gives me faith and inner strength
When I feel great despair,
And since I place my trust in Him
My life’s no longer bare.

 

By  Harold F Mohn

I Will Follow

Where you go, I’ll go
Where you stay, I’ll stay
When you move, I’ll move
I will follow…

All your ways are good
All your ways are sure
I will trust in you alone
Higher than my side
High above my life
I will trust in you alone

Where you go, I’ll go
Where you stay, I’ll stay
When you move, I’ll move
I will follow you
Who you love, I’ll love
How you serve I’ll serve
If this life I lose, I will follow you
I will follow you

Light unto the world
Light unto my life
I will live for you alone
You’re the one I seek
Knowing I will find
All I need in you alone, in you alone

In you there’s life everlasting
In you there’s freedom for my soul
In you there joy, unending joy
and I will follow

Check out the video for I Will Follow by Chris Tomlin

Trust His Heart

The Day My Soul Cried

“For every person who closed the door in my face, thank you. For every person who told me I wasn’t good enough, thank you. For every person who laughed and told me that I was wasting my time going to college, because I was going to fail, thank you. For every person who tried to break me, thank you. For every person who took my kindness for weakness, thank you. For every person who told me I was wasting time chasing my dreams because I would fail, thank you. It could of broke me. From the core of my heart, I thank you. I truly mean it, because if it weren’t for each of you I wouldn’t be who I am today. I wouldn’t of spend hours and loss sleep studying. I wouldn’t developed tough skin. You pushed me to think about what I “really” want out of life. You pushed me to master my craft. You helped me develop the drive, passion and determination. You pushed me to not wait for someone to believe in my vision, but to find a way to make things happen. I know you didn’t “intend” to, but I thank you for teaching me to believe in myself! and you taught me to trust in God and lean on my faith, not man. Thank You!”

Yvonne Pierre, The Day My Soul Cried: A Memoir

 

Forgiven

Pride may keep us from being humble but realizing how much Jesus has done for us, realizing we’re forgiven, will melt that pride as we realize who we are in Jesus. Check out these lyrics to the song Forgiven by Sanctus Real and remind yourself all God has done for you. Humble your heart before him. 

Well the past is playing with my head
And failure knocks me down again
I’m reminded of the wrong
That I have said and done
And that devil just won’t let me forget

In this life
I know what I’ve been
But here in your arms
I know what I am

I’m forgiven
I’m forgiven
And I don’t have to carry
The weight of who I’ve been
Cause I’m forgiven

My mistakes are running through my mind
And I’ll relive my days, in the middle of the night
When I struggle with my pain, wrestle with my pride
Sometimes I feel alone, and I cry

And in this life
I know what I’ve been
But here in your arms
I know what I am

Well, I’m forgiven
I’m forgiven
And I don’t have to carry
The weight of who I’ve been
‘Cause I’m forgiven

When I don’t fit in and I don’t feel like I belong anywhere
When I don’t measure up to much in this life
Oh, I’m a treasure in the arms of Christ

‘Cause I’m forgiven
Well, I’m forgiven
And I don’t have to carry
The weight of who I’ve been
‘Cause I’m forgiven.

Check out the video Forgiven by Sanctus Real

 

Quotes on Humility

Augustine	If you plan to build a tall house of virtues, you must first lay deep foundations of humility.
C S Lewis	“True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.”
Francois Fenelon	Whoever will labor to get rid of self, to deny himself according to the instructions of Christ, strikes at once at the root of every evil, and finds the germ of every good.
Joyce Meyer	The only way to uproot pride is humility—freedom from pride and arrogance, a modest estimation of your own worth. It doesn’t mean you think lowly of yourself, but it means you are very careful not to think more highly of yourself than you ought to.
Zig Ziglar	When you are tough on yourself, life is going to be infinitely easier on you.
Madeleine L’Engle	“In a very real sense not one of us is qualified, but it seems that God continually chooses the most unqualified to do his work, to bear his glory. If we are qualified, we tend to think that we have done the job ourselves. If we are forced to accept our evident lack of qualification, then there’s no danger that we will confuse God’s work with our own, or God’s glory with our own.”
Charles Wesley	Keep us little and unknown, prized and loved by God alone.
Augustine	Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility.
Ernest Hemingway	“There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.”
Mahatma Gandhi	“It is unwise to be too sure of one’s own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson	“A great man is always willing to be little.”
Blaise Pascal	Do you wish people to think well of you? Don’t speak well of yourself.
C S Lewis	“As long as you are proud you cannot know God. A proud man is always looking down on thing and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down you cannot see something that is above you.”
H Jackson Brown Jr	“Every person that you meet knows something you don’t; learn from them.”
J M Barrie	“Life is a long lesson in humility.”
Joyce Meyer	I think it’s safe to say that most sin stems from pride. It’s an independent spirit that wants to do its own thing without any authority or direction from anyone else.
Watchman Nee	Towards himself a Christian should have a broken spirit, but towards God it should be one of rejoicing always in Him. He rejoices not for its own sake nor because of any joyful experience, work, blessing or circumstance, but exclusively because God is his center.
Rick Warren	Pride builds walls between people, humility builds bridges.
Abraham Lincoln	“I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had no where else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day.”
Charles Spurgeon	Humility is to make a right estimate of one’s self.
Criss Jami	“To share your weakness is to make yourself vulnerable; to make yourself vulnerable is to show your strength.”
Martin Luther	“True humility does not know that it is humble. If it did, it would be proud from the contemplation of so fine a virtue.”
Albert Einstein	“A true genius admits that he/she knows nothing.”
C S Lewis	We must lay before him what is in us, not what ought to be in us.
Augustine	It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels.
Joni Eareckson Tada	Deny your weakness, and you will never realize God’s strength in you.
Andrew Murray	The only humility that is really ours is not that which we try to show before God in prayer, but that which we carry with us in our daily conduct.

Prayer of an Anonymous Abbess

Lord, thou knowest better than myself that I am growing older and will soon be old. Keep me from becoming too talkative, and especially from the unfortunate habit of thinking that I must say something on every subject and at every opportunity.

Release me from the idea that I must straighten out other peoples’ affairs. With my immense treasure of experience and wisdom, it seems a pity not to let everybody partake of it. But thou knowest, Lord, that in the end I will need a few friends.

Keep me from the recital of endless details; give me wings to get to the point.

Grant me the patience to listen to the complaints of others; help me to endure them with charity. But seal my lips on my own aches and pains — they increase with the increasing years and my inclination to recount them is also increasing.

I will not ask thee for improved memory, only for a little more humility and less self-assurance when my own memory doesn’t agree with that of others. Teach me the glorious lesson that occasionally I may be wrong.

Keep me reasonably gentle. I do not have the ambition to become a saint — it is so hard to live with some of them — but a harsh old person is one of the devil’s masterpieces.

Make me sympathetic without being sentimental, helpful but not bossy. Let me discover merits where I had not expected them, and talents in people whom I had not thought to possess any. And, Lord, give me the grace to tell them so.

Amen

Margot Benary-Isbert

 

A Prayer for Humility

The less I pray, the harder things get,
Trials and troubles, always beset.
The more I pray, the better things are,
I need wisdom that comes from afar.

His best answers come at His own pace,
We must be patient, and wait for His grace.
He alone knows what for us is best,
Sometimes He’ll say “No” to our request.

Delayed answers are trials of faith,
Honor Him, with your every breath.
Confidence in Him should be steadfast,
Our faith should be strong, one that will last.

To be humble means we can’t go alone,
We need His help, lest we stumble and groan.
Your faith is renewed when you pray,
So go to Him oft’ thru’ ev’ry day.

Much words without heart; this God does hate,
Few words from the heart; will ne’er frustrate.
When you pray, you grasp God’s willingness,
Prayer from the heart; He’ll always bless!

God makes many promises; all so great,
All null and void, ‘less we grab them in faith.
They can come to life for me and you,
By trust, faith and prayer; always true.

~ ~   Connie Kramer   ~ ~ 

 

Pride and Humility

Practice Humility

“These are the few ways we can practice humility:
To speak as little as possible of one’s self.
To mind one’s own business.
Not to want to manage other people’s affairs.
To avoid curiosity.
To accept contradictions and correction cheerfully.
To pass over the mistakes of others.
To accept insults and injuries.
To accept being slighted, forgotten and disliked.
To be kind and gentle even under provocation.
Never to stand on one’s dignity.
To choose always the hardest.”

~ ~   Mother Teresa   ~ ~ 

Hopes & Dreams

God plants dreams in people’s hearts.
But many people do not continue all the way to the
end in order to follow Him to the fulfillment of that dream.
Many get started and quit get started and quit get started and quit.
They do not continue because their broken heart overwhelms their hope.
They do not have any inner strength to carry them through to the end.
Jesus will bind up your wounds and heal your bruises.
His Word is the medicine for your soul.

~ ~   Joyce Meyer from Beauty for Ashes   ~ ~

Quotes for an Attitude of Hope

William Gurnall	Truly, hope is the saint’s covering, wherein he wraps himself, when he lays his body down to sleep in the grave: “My flesh,” saith David, “shall rest in hope.”
Anne Graham Lotz	“If God can bring blessing from the broken body of Jesus and glory from something that’s as obscene as the cross, He can bring blessing from my problems and my pain and my unanswered prayer. I just have to trust Him.”
Anne Lamott	“Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: You don’t give up.”
William Law	“Pray, and let God worry.”
Catherine Marshall	“God is the only one who can make the valley of trouble a door of hope.”
Barbara Crafton	“[I]t’s never too late. You can’t screw up so badly that God can’t find something worth building in the wreckage, that life can’t assert its return when it is time.”
Rick Warren	“What gives me the most hope every day is God’s grace; knowing that his grace is going to give me the strength for whatever I face, knowing that nothing is a surprise to God.”
Billy Graham	“I’ve read the last page of the Bible. It’s all going to turn out all right.”
William Gurnall	Hope fills the afflicted soul with such inward joy and consolation, that it can laugh while tears are in the eye, sigh and sing all in a breath; it is called “the rejoicing of hope” (Hebrews 3:6).
Corrie Ten Boom	“Joy runs deeper than despair.”
Joyce Meyer	God gives us hopes and dreams for certain things to happen in our lives, but He doesn’t always allow us to see the exact timing of His plan.
Thelma Wells	“God does not always heal us instantly the way we think. He is not a jack-in-the-box God. But God is walking with me through this.”
Tom Bodett	“They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world: someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.”
Joel Osteen	“You’ve got to believe that God is in control of your life. It may be a tough time but you’ve got to believe that God has a reason for it and he’s going to make everything good.”
Alfred Tennyson	“Hope Smiles from the threshold of the year to come, Whispering ‘it will be happier”
Alexander Pope	“Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.”
Pittacus Lore, from “I Am Number Four”	“When you have lost hope, you have lost everything. And when you think all is lost, when all is dire and bleak, there is always hope.”
Aristotle	“Hope is a waking dream.”
Dalai Lama XIV	No matter what sort of difficulties, how painful experience is, if we lose our hope, that’s our real disaster.”
Epicurus	“Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.”
Joyce Meyer	Positive minds full of faith and hope produce positive lives.