Kara Tippetts Quotes

hard is often the vehicle Jesus uses to meet us, point us to that peace, and teach us grace.

But we are not the Author of our story. We are the characters.

To be alive is to be broken. And to be broken is to stand in need of grace. Honesty keeps us in touch with our neediness and the truth that we are saved sinners. There is a beautiful transparency to honest disciples who never wear a false face and do not pretend to be anything but who they are. Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel

It takes courage, humiliating courage, to step aside from your own sovereignty and imagined control and begin looking for the gift that comes unmerited. Yes, I'm talking about grace. Grace by my definition is the gift that comes unearned. In a world of unbelievably able bodies, where new diets are fashioned every day to keep my brand of story away, it is hard to realize you may be living in the middle of the best story ever told. That the story of breast cancer could possibly be a good story? A great story even? It would be easier to shake my fist at the test results and scream that this isn't the right story, but to receive - humbly receive - the story no one would ever want, and know there is goodness in the midst of its horror, is not something I could ever do in my own strength. I simply cannot. That receiving comes from the One who received His own suffering for a much greater purpose than my own.

When I let go of having it perfect, I learned the joy of sharing life with the imperfect.

Jesus didn't have to extend His love. He didn't have to think of me when He went up on that cross. He didn't have to rewrite my story from one of beauty to one of brokenness and create a whole new brand of beauty. He simply didn't have to do it, but He did. He bought me. He bought me that day He died, and He showed His power when He overcame death and rose from the grave. He overcame my death in that moment. He overcame my fear of death in that unbelievable, beautiful moment, and the fruit of that death, that resurrection, and that stunning grace is peace. It is the hardest peace, because it is brutal. Horribly brutal and ugly, and we want to look away, but it is the greatest, greatest story that ever was. And it was, and it is.

I felt my weakness; I knew my smallness. Being raised under anger, the voice of a child is lost.

The "keep quiet and look good" living is always easier than heart-baring, mistake-admitting, choosing-humility life offered in Jesus.

Anger makes us all stupid.

I longed to not withhold love when it was inconvenient to give it. Those faces [of her children] helped motivate me to want to know Jesus well, and to live near Him and listen to His Spirit as I walked in faith with my family.

But because I believe God's plans for me are better than what I could plan for myself, rather than run away from the path he has set before me, I want to run toward it. I don't want to try to change God's mind - his thoughts are perfect. I want to think his thoughts. I don't want to change God's timing - his timing is perfect. I want the grace to accept his timing. I don't want to change God's plan - his plan is perfect. I want to embrace his plan and see how he is glorified through it. I want to submit. Nancy Guthrie, Holding on to Hope Receiving what is before me and fighting to walk in the path that is

Sometimes the hardest peace to find is the peace in saying good-bye and leaving the work of justice and reconciliation to Jesus.

In the absence of grace, there is only right and wrong, black and white, and the endless unknowable gray of performance.

Showing up for another says, "I see you. Your pain is known, and though I cannot make it better, I'm here and that's what matters.

Grace is the sweet moment you never expect but turns up to get you through a day, an appointment, a reality you never, ever dreamed for yourself.

Affliction is a bruising of a blessing; but it is a blessing from the hand of God.

Cancer is a gift. There, I said it. I can say that cancer and suffering give the beautiful gift of perspective. It is the gift you never wanted, the gift wrapped in confusion and brokenness and heartbreak. It's the gift that strips all your other ideas of living from you completely. The beautiful, ugly raising to the surface of the importance of each and every moment.