The proof of spiritual maturity is not how pure you are but awareness of your impurity. That very awareness opens the door to grace.
Philip YanceyRead
We grow up hungry for love, and in ways so deep as to remain unexpressed we long for our Maker to love us.
Interpretation
This quote expresses the deep human desire for love and connection with our creator.
Philip Yancey's quote highlights the inherent longing within every individual for love, pointing to a profound relationship with our Maker. This desire often runs deep and remains unspoken, suggesting that our quest for love is not just a mere desire for human affection, but an innate yearning for the divine connection that nurtures our souls.
In practice
In a speech about love and relationships, one might use this quote to illustrate the depth of human emotional needs.
The proof of spiritual maturity is not how pure you are but awareness of your impurity. That very awareness opens the door to grace.
If my activism, however well-motivated, drives out love, then I have misunderstood Jesus’ gospel. I am stuck with law, not the gospel of grace.
In the stories of extravagant grace given to us by Jesus, there are no loopholes disqualifying us from God's love.
Parents learn the uses of power and its limits. They can insist on certain outward behavior but cannot change inner attitudes. They can require obedience but not goodness - and certainly not love.
Prayer is to the skeptic a delusion, a waste of time. To the believer it represents perhaps the most important use of time.
I once heard a theologian remark that in the Gospels people approached Jesus with a question 183 times whereas he replied with a direct answer only three times. Instead, he responded with a different question, a story, or some other indirection. Evidently Jesus wants us to work out answers on our own, using the principles that he taught and lived.
Or had she always loved him? It's likely. Restricted as she was from speaking, she wanted him to kiss her. She wanted him to drag her hand across and pull her over. It didn't matter where. Her mouth, her neck, her cheek. Her skin was empty for it, waiting.
When you serve others, when you make somebody else’s life better, when you lift up people, when you help heal those that are hurting, not only are they being blessed, but you’re being blessed.
Antipathy, dissimilarity of views, hate, contempt, can accompany true love.
To keep your marriage brimming, With love in the loving cup, Whenever you're wrong, admit it; Whenever you're right, shut up.
I have seen romanticism outlast the realistic. I have seen men forget the beautiful women they have possessed, forget the prostitutes, and remember the first woman they idolized, the woman they could never have. The woman who aroused them romantically holds them.
What were all the world's alarms To mighty Paris when he found Sleep upon a golden bed That first dawn in Helen's arms?
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.