1
We must depend upon the performance of the promise when all the ways leading
up to it are shut up.
--Matthew Henry
2
Do you feel inept, unqualified, or just not up to it? God understands your feelings, your doubts, your fears. He also knows your heart, and can work mightily in one that's yielded to Him. You are a diamond--a diamond in the rough--a diamond in the making. Place yourself in the hands of the Master Jeweler, Jesus Christ. Allow Him to chisel you, mold you, and refine you.
--Nancy Cobb and Connie Grisgby
3
O God! who is able and willing to assist me, what grounds have I not to place my whole confidence in you, to throw myself into the arms of your providence, and wait the effects of your bounty? You have care of all. I will therefore give myself up entirely to you, live always in your presence, and ever guide myself by your fear andlove. It is this grace I now ask of you, the God of my heart, and my portion forever.
--from The Book of Common Prayer
4
When your burden becomes too heavy, when life's ways become too dark, when
the heart is too sore, when you are ready to perish, it is not amiss to pray to God to open the heavens, and through a rift in the sky to shine down into your heart some of the light of the Glory World.
--B. H. Carroll
5
There is no pit so deep, either within you, or around you, that it can stop the ear of God when he inclines to listen. Be thy pit ever so horrible, and ever so deep, only you cry like David, and you will sooner or later share David's deliverance. As long as you have the knowledge and the feeling of the horrible pit that is in your heart you are in no real danger.
--Robert Bruce
6
When we cannot see the sunshine of God's face, it is blessed to cower down beneath the shadow of his wings.
--Charles Haddon Spurgeon
7
Swim through your temptations and troubles. Run to the promises; they are our Lord's branches hanging over the water so that His children may take a grip of them.
--Samuel Rutherford
8
Trust God where you cannot see Him. Do not try to penetrate the cloud He brings over you; rather look to the bow that is on it. The mystery is God's; the promise is yours.
--John MacDuff
9
You are valuable just because you exist. Not because of what you do or what you have done, but simply because you are.
--Max Lucado
10
God possesses infinite knowledge and awareness which is uniquely His. At all times, even in the midst of any type of suffering, I can realize that he knows, loves, watches, understands, and more than that, He has a purpose.
--Billy Graham
11
Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense regardless of how it turns out.
--Barbara Johnson
12
When our hearts are tenderly responsive . . . and it suits His greater plan, then the Lord will lift the thin veil that separates us. And we will be stunned to realize that He has been closer than our own breath all along.
--Patsy Clairmont
13
It takes some of us a lifetime to learn that Christ, our Good Shepherd, knows exactly what He is doing with us. He understands us perfectly.
--Phillip Keller
14
Faith recognizes the fact that God is in control of my life. Whether I believe it or not, it's a fact that God is in control of the world. If I don't believe it, I'm just robbing myself of the enjoyment of the fact.
--Paul Little
15
This is the purpose of pain for the redeemed: it is one of your Father's ways of speaking to you; it is the evidence of His limitless love, by which He would draw you farther from evil and closer to Him, the divine remedy which can cure you of pride and help you lean more trustingly on the Lord.
--Walter A. Maier
16
No sin the believer brings to God, when it comes to being weighed, is not greatly outweighed by the blood of Christ.
--G. V. Wigram
17
God loves and cares for us, even to the least event and smallest need of life.
--Henry Edward Manning
18
Because you are a special treasure to God, He is working to draw you into a deeper love for Him -- away from any idols in your life, away from rival interests, away from giving first place to His good gifts instead of to Him.
--Ruth Myers
19
The secret is Christ in me, not me in a different set of circumstances.
--Elisabeth Elliot
20
God's gift of faith and power are always adequate, no matter how desperate our situation has become. Exhaustion, frustration, tragedy may have burdened us down so that we despair of ever being free again. The pain may be unrelenting, the loss overwhelming, the loneliness damning. But God's power is great enough for our deepest desperation. You can go on. You can pick up the pieces and start anew. You can face your fears. You can find peace in the rubble. You can have courage. There is healing for your soul.
--Suzanne Dale Ezell
21
Anything big enough to occupy our minds is big enough to hang a prayer on.
--George MacDonald
22
God can change our circumstances, but sometimes He waits for us to show real desire for change as well as our faith in Him.
--Anne Graham Lotz
23
If only we would stop lamenting and look up, God is here. Christ is risen. The Spirit has been poured out from on high.
--A. W. Tozer
24
When we commit ourselves to times of solitude with the Lord, we cannot know what will happen... How we will change, in what directions we might grow. But we can be certain that time with God will result in something good, something beneficial for us and for those around us.
--Penelope J. Stokes
25
We should never attempt to bear more than one kind of trouble at a time. Some people try to bear three kinds - all they have had, all they have now, and all they expect to have.
--Edward Everett Hale
26
When we learn to say a deep, passionate yes to the things that really matter. . . then peace begins to settle onto our lives like golden sunlight sifting to a forest floor.
-- Thomas Kinkade
27
God often takes a course for accomplishing His purposes directly contrary to
what our narrow views would prescribe. He brings a death upon our feelings,
wishes, and prospects when He is about to give us the desire of our hearts.
-- John Newton
28
The wheels in a clock move contrary to each other, some one way, some
another, yet all serve the intent of the watchmaker, to show the time. So in
the world the providence of God may seem to run contrary to his promises;
one man takes this way, another runs that way, yet all in conclusion center
in the purpose of God the great creator.
--Richard Sibbes
29
Sometimes mid scenes of deepest gloom,
Sometimes where Eden's bowers bloom,
By waters still, o'er troubled sea,
Still 'tis His hand that leadeth me.
--Joseph H. Gilmore
30
We have ample evidence that the Lord is able to guide. The promises cover
every imaginable situation. All we need to do is to take the hand He
stretches out.
--Elisabeth Elliot
31
The stars may fall, but God's promises will stand and be fulfilled.
--J. I. Packer
