God proved His love on the Cross. When Christ hung, and bled, and died, it was God saying to the world, 'I love you.'
Billy GrahamRead
Before prayer changes others, it first changes us.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Prayer has the power to transform our own hearts and minds before it influences others.
This quote by Billy Graham emphasizes the transformative power of prayer, suggesting that its primary effect is on the person who prays. Before attempting to change the world or others through our requests to a higher power, prayer first prompts self-reflection, personal growth, and a change in perspective, leading to profound internal shifts that can ultimately influence external circumstances and relationships.
Themes
PrayerChangeTransformationSelf-ReflectionSpirituality
In practice
Example use cases
In a sermon addressing the congregation about the power of prayer.
More from Billy Graham
All quotes βThe wonderful news is that our Lord is a God of mercy, and He responds to repentance.
Billy GrahamRead
Don't ever hesitate to take to [God] whatever is on your heart. He already knows it anyway, but He doesn't want you to bear its pain or celebrate its joy alone.
Billy GrahamRead
God will not force himself upon us against our will. If we want his love, we need to believe in him. We need to make a definite, positive act of commitment and surrender to the love of God. No one can do it for us.
Billy GrahamRead
Success in God's eyes is faithfulness to His calling.
Billy GrahamRead
Heaven doesn't make this life less important; it makes it more important.
Billy GrahamRead
Similar quotes
We will only advance in our evangelistic work as fast and as far as we advance on our knees. Prayer opens the channel between a soul and God; prayerlessness closes it. Prayer releases the grip of Satan's power; prayerlessness increases it. That is why prayer is so exhausting and so vital. If we believed it, the prayer meeting would be as full as the church.
Alan RedpathRead
The rewards of life and devotion to God are love and inner rapture, and the capacity to receive the light of God.
RumiRead
The prayer of listening makes things simple but it also makes us vulnerable, and that is frightening. Listening makes us open to Christ, the Word of God, spoken in all things: in the material world, the Scriptures, the Church, and sacraments and, sometimes most threateningly, in our fellow human beings. To listen at prayer is to take the chance of hearing the voice of Christ in the poor, the weak, those whom we love and those whom we do not love.
Benedict GroeschelRead
O my God, what must a soul be like when it is in this state! It longs to be all one tongue with which to praise the Lord. It utters a thousand pious follies, in a continuous endeavor to please Him who thus possesses it.
Teresa Of AvilaRead
Prayer is surrender--surr ender to the will of God and cooperation with that will. If I throw out a boathook from the boat and catch hold of the shore and pull, do I pull the shore to me, or do I pull myself to the shore? Prayer is not pulling God to my will, but the aligning of my will to the will of God.
E. Stanley JonesRead
For prayer is nothing else than being on terms of friendship with God.
Teresa Of AvilaRead