“Much of the world believes little or nothing. People are broad but shallow. Agnosticism, anxiety, emptiness, and meaninglessness have gripped much of the world—and even the church . . . By contrast, our Pilgrim forebears stand as shining examples of men who were narrow but deep, certain of what they believed, unswerving in their loyalty,  and passionately dedicated to the God they trusted, and for whom they would willingly have died.”

“Create time for yourself... There are 24 hours in a day... Outline the number to spend on your dreams every day!”

“[God the Spirit] will never lead you contrary to the Word of God. I hear people saying, “The Lord led me to do this . . .” I am always a little suspicious unless what the Lord has said is in keeping with His Word.”

“In speaking of this desire for our own far off country, which we find in ourselves even now, I feel a certain shyness. I am almost committing an indecency. I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you—the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence; the secret also which pierces with such sweetness that when, in very intimate conversation, the mention of it becomes imminent, we grow awkward and affect to laugh at ourselves; the secret we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both. We cannot tell it because it is a desire for something that has never actually appeared in our experience. We cannot hide it because our experience is constantly suggesting it, and we betray ourselves like lovers at the mention of a name. Our commonest expedient is to call it beauty and behave as if that had settled the matter. Wordsworth’s expedient was to identify it with certain moments in his own past. But all this is a cheat. If Wordsworth had gone back to those moments in the past, he would not have found the thing itself, but only the reminder of it; what he remembered would turn out to be itself a remembering. The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshipers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.”

“Remember, it is not necessary for others to fail in order that you may succeed. The richest persons are those who give most in service to others.”

“I got to believe that the people who can really be trusted are those who have kept their promises, not under the influence of pleasing people, but under the influence of doing what they have devoted their lives to be doing!”

“One must divide one's time between politics and equations. But our equations are much more important to me, because politics is for the present, while our equations are for eternity.”

“Destiny will always make someone angry, but better that person be angry with you than for you to be angry with you. I guarantee you will end up an angry person the day you awaken spiritually and realize that you’ve adhered to everyone’s priorities except your own.”

“If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning.”

“Never argue with an artist.”

“But by the end of two years, most have either changed careers or moved to suburban schools - a consequence of low pay, a lack of support from the educational bureaucracy, and a pervasive feeling of isolation.”

“Christ never told his disciples that they would get an Academy Award for their performances, but He did tell them to expect to have troubles.”

“The greatest tragedy to ever happen to a nation is not the incidences of war or terrorism. It's when more bookshops close down and more drinking bars are opened to replace them!”

“My mother told me that when she knew I was traveling, she would pray that the Lord would be with me. I would finish a meeting in California and then travel straight through until I got home. She would just stay awake worrying, waiting for the telephone to ring, announcing bad news. I told her that she was wasting her time, that she might as well not pray if she was going to keep on worrying. She would pray that God would protect me, and then she would stay awake worrying. That’s the way many people act when they pray. But worry can hinder you from receiving answers to prayers. Worry can stop God from being able to move on your behalf. Thank God, prayer means more than that. John 16:24 says, “. . . ask, and ye SHALL RECEIVE, that your joy may be full.” When you pray in faith, according to God’s Word, you are full of joy and rejoicing even before the answer materializes because you know God heard you. You have His Word for it.”

“Honesty means exactly what it says. We are honest and trustworthy in all our dealings. People can trust our word, because we refuse to lie or shade the truth.”