“God doesn’t owe you an explanation or reason for everything he asks you to do. Understanding can wait, but obedience can’t. Instant obedience will teach you more about God than a lifetime of Bible discussions. In fact, you will never understand some commands until you obey them first. Obedience unlocks understanding.”

“Because tragedy happened to you, it gives you a greater sense of oneness with others who experience tragedy. Because we have been comforted through the Word of God, we in turn may be able to comfort others.”

“If we recognize our talents and use them appropriately, and choose a field that uses those talents, we will rise to the top of our field.”

“One picture is worth a thousand words”

“Can you see me? Can you hear me? Does anything I say mean anything to you?”

“Grief is a good thing. It's the way we get through the transitions of life.”

“I never try to defend religion. Religion has spawned wars. Many so-called religious people have been characterized by prejudice, pride, and bickering . . . I would call you to a simple faith in Jesus, who said, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

“To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should be conducted, so as to be most useful, I should answer, ‘by restraining it to true facts & sound principles only.’ Yet I fear such a paper would find few subscribers. It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression of the press could not more compleatly deprive the nation of its benefits, than is done by its abandoned prostitution to falsehood. Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knolege with the lies of the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live & die in the belief, that they have known something of what has been passing in the world in their time; whereas the accounts they have read in newspapers are just as true a history of any other period of the world as of the present, except that the real names of the day are affixed to their fables. General facts may indeed be collected from them, such as that Europe is now at war, that Bonaparte has been a successful warrior, that he has subjected a great portion of Europe to his will, &c., &c.; but no details can be relied on. I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great facts, and the details are all false.” —Letter to John Norvell, 14 June 1807 [Works 10:417--18]” 

“Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves.”

“One of life’s mysteries is why two children growing up in the same home sometimes take radically different paths—one following Christ, the other rebellious and scornful. Yet it happens.”

“Even when things are coming against me and things aren’t working out the way I’d like, I still want to display the character of Jesus Christ.”

“Ingratitude to God does not rely only on our refusal to give the verbal thanksgiving due to Him, but also recides in our inability to appreciate his gifts and potentials in us by leaving them untapped.”

“A man of few words will rarely be thoughtless in his speech; he will measure every word.”

“(Back during the Gold Rush you could go into a stream of water and pan out a little gold dust. But if you really wanted to make a strike and get down where the real gold was, you had to dig for it. In the same way you can skim along on the top of scriptures—but if you really want to find out what the Bible says, you’ll have to dig down into the Word of God.)”

“I believe in trusting. Trust begets trust. Suspicion is foetid and only stinks. He who trusts has never yet lost in the world.”