Top 191 Quotes & Sayings by Watchman Nee

The Christian faith begins not with a big DO but with a big DONE.

Man's thought is always of the punishment that will come to him if he sins. But God's thought is always of the glory man will miss if he sins. God's purpose for redemption is glory, glory, glory.

The breaking of the alabaster box and the anointing of the Lord filled the house with the odor, with the sweetest odor. Everyone could smell it. Whenever you meet someone who has really suffered; been limited, gone through things for the Lord, willing to be imprisoned by the Lord, just being satisfied with Him and nothing else, immediately you scent the fragrance. There is a savor of the Lord. Something has been crushed, something has been broken, and there is a resulting odor of sweetness.

It is important to receive God's arrangement in the circumstances. This arrangement is the discipline of the Holy Spirit. To escape God's arrangement just one time is to lose an opportunity to have our capacity enlarged. A believer can never be the same after passing through suffering.

The right attitude is this: that I have my own will, yet I will the will of God.

To bear the cross means that you refrain from doing what you have the power to do. You are qualified to fulfill your desire, yet you refrain from doing so. A person like this is the strongest person. The strongest person is not the one who is able to do something, but the one who is able not to do what he has the power to do.

Because the Lord Jesus died on the Cross, I have received forgiveness of sins; because the Lord Jesus rose from the dead, I have received new life; because the Lord Jesus has been exalted to the right hand of the Father, I have received the outpoured Spirit. All is because of Him; nothing is because of me.

There is nothing more tragic than to come to the end of life and know we have been on the wrong course.

Lord, I am willing to break my heart in order that I may satisfy Thy heart!

We may be weak, but looking at our weakness will never make us strong.

Our prayers lay the track down which Gods power can come. Like a mighty locomotive, his power is irresistible, but it cannot reach us without rails.

The 'flesh' is too bad to be cleansed; it must be crucified.

Our bread is not only the Word of God, our meat is not only to do His will, our bread is also...the difficulties that are in our way.

Revelation is the first step to holiness, and consecration is the second. A day must come in our lives, as definite as the day of our conversion, when we give up all right to ourselves and submit to the absolute Lordship of Jesus Christ.

The Law requires much, but offers no help in the carrying out of its requirements. The Lord Jesus requires just as much, yea even more (Matt. 5:21-48), but what he requires from us he himself carries out in us. The law makes demands and leaves us helpless to fulfill them; Christ makes demands, but he himself fulfills in us the very demands he makes.

We should not open our mouths too hastily upon approaching God. On the contrary, we first must ask God to show us what and how to pray before we make our request known to Him. Have we not consumed a great deal of time in the past asking for what we wanted? Why not now ask for what God wants?

Prayer is the acid test of the inner man's strength. A strong spirit is capable of praying much and praying with all perseverance until the answer comes. A weak one grows weary and fainthearted in the maintenance of praying.

To remove warfare from a spiritual life is to render it unspiritual. Life in the spirit is a suffering way, filled with watching and laboring, burdened by weariness and trial, punctuated by heartbreak and conflict. It is a life utterly outpoured for the kingdom of God and lived in complete disregard for one's personal happiness.

With complete consecration comes perfect peace.

A Christian life is an unending engagement on the battlefield.

I need forgiveness for my sins, but I need also deliverance from the power of sin... I appreciate the blessed fact of God's forgiveness, but I want something more than that: I want deliverance. I need forgiveness for what I have done, but I need also deliverance from what I am.

Separation to God, separation from the world, is the first principle of Christian living.

It does not matter what your personal deficiency, or whether it be a hundred and one different things, God has always one sufficient answer, His Son Jesus Christ, and he is the answer to every need.

Negligence in prayer withers the inner man. Nothing can be a substitute for it, not even Christian work. Many are so preoccupied with work that they allow little time for prayer. Hence they cannot cast out demons. Prayer enables us first inwardly to overcome the enemy and then outwardly to deal with him.

Repentance means a change of mind. Formerly, I thought sin as a pleasant thing, but now I have changed my mind about it. Formerly, I thought the world an attractive place, but now I know better. Formerly I regarded it miserable business to be a Christian, but now I think differently. Once I thought certain things delightful, now I think them vile. Once I thought other things utterly worthless, now I think them most precious. That is a change of mind, and that is repentance.

I do not consecrate myself to be a missionary or a preacher. I consecrate myself to God to do His will where I am, be it in school, office, or kitchen, or wherever He may, in His wisdom, send me.

To keep our hand on the plow while wiping away our tears -- THAT is Christianity!

The Spirit is both a builder and a dweller. He cannot dwell where he has not built; He builds to dwell and dwells in only what he has built.

The system of fathers of the world church, the clergy system of the state church, and the pastoral system of the independent churches are all the same in nature. They are all Nicolaitans. In the Bible there are only brothers. There is the gift of a pastor, but no system of pastors. The pastoral system is man's tradition. If the children of God are not willing to return to the position of that in the beginning, no matter what they do, it will not be right.

An affection which is not inspired by the Lord will soon be transformed into lust. Samson is not alone in the history of man in failing in this regard. Delilah is still cutting the hair of man today!

Not until we take the place of a servant can He take His place as Lord.

Our old history ends with the Cross; our new history begins with the resurrection.

Numerous Christians do not know how to glorify God in their eating and drinking. They do not eat and drink simply to keep their body fit for the Lord's use but indulge to satisfy their personal desires. We should understand that the body is for the Lord and not for ourselves; hence we should refrain from using it for our pleasure. Food ought not hinder our fellowship with God since it is to be taken purely to preserve the body in health.

Often Satan injects pride into the believer's spirit, evoking in him an attitude of self-importance and of self-conceit. He causes him to esteem himself a very outstanding person, one who is indispensable in God's work. Such a spirit constitutes one of the major reasons for the fall of believers.

We must not pay attention just to reading and studying; rather, we should ask if we are open before the Lord. If we do not have an unveiled face, the glory of the Lord will not shine on us. If our heart is not open to God, God cannot give us any light.

Our rest lies in looking to the Lord, not to ourselves.

The life of faith is not only totally different from, but also diametrically opposite to, a life of feeling.

Spiritual advancement is measured by faithful obedience.

Christians ought to eliminate their folly. They ought to adopt God's view of the absolute impossibility for their natural walk to please Him. They must dare to allow the Holy Spirit to point out to them every corruption of the soul life. They must exercise faith in believing God's estimation of their natural life and must wait patiently for the Holy Spirit to reveal in them what the Bible says of them. Only in this manner will they be led in the way of deliverance.

The Lord has shown me that I can do anything, but that He has said, apart from Me ye can do nothing. So it comes to this, that everything I have done, and can still do apart from Him is nothing!

God has supplied all my needs and has not failed me once.

How true it is that without the guidance of the Holy Spirit intellect not only is undependable but also extremely dangerous, because it often confuses the issue of right and wrong.

Whatever the mind sets itself on is what the man walks after.

Good is not always God's will, but God's will is always good.

If you would test the character of anything, you only need to enquire whether that thing leads you to God or away from God.

God is not seeking a display of my Christ-likeness , but a manifestation of His Christ.

The Christian experience, from start to finish, is a journey of faith.

Frequently the enemy entices Christians to harbor an unforgiving spirit - a very common symptom indeed among God's children. Such bitterness and fault-finding and enmity inflict a severe blow upon spiritual life.

We must have a spirit of power towards the enemy, a spirit of love towards men, and a spirit of self-control towards ourselves.

Why do so many Christians pray such tiny prayers when their God is so big?

Actually, only God can satisfy a Christian's heart; man cannot.

The Blood deals with what we have done, whereas the Cross deals with what we are. The Blood disposes of our sins, while the Cross strikes at the root of our capacity for sin.

May we always be possessed by the consciousness that we are not our own.

We think of the Christian life as a ‘changed life’ but it is not that. What God offers us is an ‘exchanged life,’ a ‘substituted life,’ and Christ is our Substitute within.

Take this as the secret of Christ's life in you: His Spirit dwells in your innermost spirit. Meditate on it, believe in it, and remember it until this glorious truth produces within you a holy fear and wonderment that the Holy Spirit indeed abides in you.

Outside of Christ, I am only a sinner, but in Christ, I am saved. Outside of Christ, I am empty; in Christ, I am full. Outside of Christ, I am weak; in Christ, I am strong. Outside of Christ, I cannot; in Christ, I am more than able. Outside of Christ, I have been defeated; in Christ, I am already victorious. How meaningful are the words, "in Christ."

Not by gain our life is measured, But by what we've lost 'Tis scored; 'Tis not how much wine is drunken But how much has been outpoured. For the strength of love never standeth In the sacrifice we bear; He who has the greatest suffering Ever has the most to share.

Nowadays Christians appear to treat prayer as a means to accomplish their aims and ideas. If they possessed just a little deeper understanding, they would recognize that prayer is but man uttering to God what is God's will.

God will answer all our questions in one way and one way only. Namely, by showing us more of his Son.

If Christ lives in us, we will rejoice in everything, and we will thank and praise the Lord. We will say, 'Hallelujah! Praise the Lord' forever.