Top 328 Quotes & Sayings by Francis Chan - Page 5

He has more of a right to ask us why so many people are starving [than we do to ask Him]. As much as we want God to explain himself to us, His creation, we are in no place to demand that He give an account to us.

Do you want to see God more than you desire security?

I love staring out toward the ocean and away from anything manmade.

God is the only true Giver, and He needs nothing from us. But still He wants us. He gave us life so that we might seek and know Him.

A person who is obsessed is characterized by committed, settled, passionate love for God, above and before every other thing and every other being.

God is compassionate and just, loving and holy, wrathful and forgiving. WE can't sideline His more difficult attributes to make room for the palatable ones.

The point of your life is to point to Him...it is His movie, His world, His gift.

Jesus evidently hates it when we tear into our brothers or sisters with demeaning words, words that fail to honor the people around us as the beautiful image-bearing creatures that they are.

Both worry and stress reek of arrogance.

I could fill my whole time doing interviews, speaking to crowds, and there's this natural human tendency because of our culture to think that the more people I talk to, the bigger the impact I'll have, and yet Jesus didn't spend His time just speaking to the masses. He spent the bulk of his time with a small group of people.

Some people say I would love to take a selfie with Moses. Do you understand the gap between Moses and God?

If you want to see the big stuff that God has, you've got to take some risk and trust only in the Gospel.

Which is more messed up- that we have so much compared to everyone else, or that we don't think we're rich? That on any given day, we might flippantly call ourselves 'broke' or 'poor?' We are neither of those things. We are rich. Filthy rich.

You and I are not allowed to tell Him how much He can hate it (sin).

Why is it that we believe God's promises of blessing but not his promises of punishment?

I want to live so that I am truly submitted to the Spirit's leading on a daily basis. Christ said its better for us that the Spirit came and I want to live like that is true. I don't want to keep crawling when I have the ability to fly.

We are loaded down with too many good things, more than we could ever need, while others are desperate for a small loaf. The good things we cling to are more than money; we hoard our resources, our gifts, our time, our families, out friends....how ludicrous it is to hold on to the abundance God has given us and merely repeat the words 'thank you'.

People who are obsessed with Jesus live lives that connect them with the poor in some way or another. Obsessed people believe that Jesus talked about money and the poor so often because it was really important to Him.

If one person “wastes” away his day by spending hours connecting with God, and the other person believes he is too busy or has better things to do than worship the Creator and Sustainer, who is the crazy one?

Stress says that the things we are involved in are important enough to merit our impatience, our lack of grace toward others, or our tight grip of control.

Lukewarm people give money to charity and to the church....as long as it doesn't impinge on their standard of living. If they have a little extra and it is easy and safe to give, they do so. After all, God loves a cheerful giver, right?

The enemy just hates our prayers.

...there is still a need for those of us nestled deep within the Christian bubble to look beyond the status quo and critically assess the degree to which we are really living biblically.

There will be people who will teach for the sake of greed or for the sake of ego. So watch their lives. Do they look and act like Jesus?

Following Jesus is not about diligently keeping a set of rules or conjuring up the moral fortitude to lead good lives. It's about loving God and enjoying Him

Non-churchgoer s tend to see Christians as takers rather than givers. When Christians sacrifice and give wildly to the poor, that is truly a light that glimmers. The Bible teaches that the church is to be that light, that sign of hope, in an increasingly dark and hopeless world.

Your problems are not just your problems. Ultimately, they belong to the church body that God has placed you in.

Oswald Chambers writes, ‘Never make a principle out of your experience; let God be as original with other people as He is with you.’ To that I would add, ‘Be careful not to turn others’ lives into the mold for your own.’ Allow God to be as creative with you as He is with each of us.

God has given you this good stuff so that you can show the world a person who enjoys blessings, but who is still totally obsessed with God.

All my life I've heard people say, 'God loves you.' It's probably the most insane statement you could make to say that the eternal Creator of this universe is in love with me. There is a response that ought to take place in believers, a crazy reaction to that love. Do you really understand what God has done for you? If so, why is response so lukewarm?

It struck me that many Christians flash around their 'no trans fat' label, trying to convince everyone they are healthy and good. Yet they have no substantive or healthful elements to their faith. It's like the Laodiceans, who thought they had everything until Christ told them they were poor and wretched.

We have to learn how to control our minds. We have to learn self-control.

Allow God to be as creative with you as He is with each of us.

Truth is, I think, if God just gave us our daily bread, many of us would be angry. 'That's all you're going to give me? You're just going to give me enough to sustain me for today? What about tomorrow or next year or 10, 20, 30 years from now? I want to know that I'm set up.' And yet Jesus says just pray for your daily provisions.

We have control over our prayer life, our relationship with Jesus.

It's a pretty crazy task to try to describe God "quickly." Everything starts with a healthy fear of Him.

When you read the New Testament, you see the Holy Spirit was supposed to change everything so that this gathering of people who call themselves Christians had this supernatural element about them.

I love being in the ocean. I love the unpredictability of it- size of wave, animals you see, etc.

The concept of downsizing so that others might upgrade is biblical, beautiful...and nearly unheard of. We either close the gap or don't take the words of the Bible literally.

I was raised Christian after age 5, but I didn't really understand it until high school. A friend of mine invited me to his youth group. There I heard the gospel, understood it, and accepted it.

...if God is truly the greatest good on this earth, would He be loving us if He didn't draw us toward what is best for us (even if that happens to be Himself)?

Show true religion, cause words don't relieve

I confess to you guys, I confess to the church, I know I have backed away from certain things because of my arrogance. I thought I could attract more people to Jesus by hiding certain things about him.

We live in a relativistic culture, where people are more con- cerned with being liked than being truthful. In A Sweet and Bitter Providence, John Piper does an outstanding job of bibli- cally defending key truths that the church often ignores. He gives us an example of how to take a bold and educated stand on issues of race, purity, and God's sovereignty.

Christ can come back at any time so the one thing you want to have in your life is a focused prayer time.

...I don't think my church's teachings were incorrect, just incomplete.

There's no sense in improving your marriage until you are secure with God.

But hey, if that’s too much to ask, tell them to just become Christians—you know, the people who get to go to heaven without having to commit to anything

When loving Him becomes obligation, one of the many things we have to do, we end up focusing even more on ourselves.

Being in war together may be what keeps us from being at war with each other. Rather than neglecting the battle to work on your marriage, maybe the best thing for your marriage is to enter the battlefield together.

We are so used to multi-tasking. 2014 was probably the most productive year of my life...But I noticed during the last couple of months when I would get alone with God it was hard to do one thing at a time.

A person who is obsessed with Jesus knows that the best thing he can do is be faithful to his Savior in every aspect of his life, continually saying "Thank You!" to God. An obsessed person knows there can never be intimacy if he is always trying to pay God back or work hard enough to be worthy. He revels in his role as a child and friend of God.

I want to help people understand how to study the Scriptures with other people, to give them an overview of Scripture and assume that by understanding the Scriptures better, the Holy Spirit will bring to mind the right stories, the right teachings.

You have access to the Tent Of Meeting.

When we love God because we feel we should love Him, instead of genuinely loving out of our true selves, we have forgotten who God really is.

God is so clear in spelling out His attributes in scripture in order that others would know what He is really like.

People who are obsessed with Jesus do not consider service a burden. Obsessed people take joy in loving God by loving His people (Mt 13:44)(Jn 15:8).

...we'll first address our inaccurate view of God and, consequently of ourselves.

A person who is obsessed with Jesus knows that the sin of pride is always a battle. Obsessed people know that you can never be "humble enough," and so they seek to make themselves less known and Christ more known (Mt 5:16).

I don't want to keep crawling when i have the ability to fly.