Christian Maturity Quotes

That word maturity seems to hold the key to the concept of spirituality, for Christian maturity is the growth which the Holy Spirit produces over a period of time in the believer. ~ Charles C. Ryrie

While this may simply be another way of saying that spirituality is Christian maturity, it tries to delineate more openly the factors of Spirit-control over a period of time. ~ Charles C. Ryrie

Those who look down on other Christians because they lack a particular gift or experience, or those who despise a particular gift and look down on Christians who have it, are not demonstrating spiritual maturity. ~ Craig S. Keener

There is a certain kind of maturity that can be attained only through the discipline of suffering. ~ D. A. Carson

God will be 'all in all' (I Cor. 15:28) when we are no longer what we are now, a multiplicity of impulses and emotions, with little or nothing of God in us, but are fully like God , with room for God and God alone. This is the 'maturity' (cf. Col. 1:28) towards which we speed. ~ Gregory Of Nazianzus

None of us can come to the highest maturity without enduring the summer heat of trials. ~ Charles Spurgeon

The result of these many voices and general lack of agreement on what really are the biblical means to Christian maturity seems to be breeding two kinds of believers. There are some who are not quite sure that they are even on the right track of normal Christian living; there are others who are quite certain that they have arrived at the station. Or, to change the metaphor, there seem to be so many master chefs around that some are so confused by looking only at the various menus that they are starving to death, while others are sampling everything that is offered with resultant indigestion, and a few have sworn allegiance to one and are convinced that all the others are frauds. ~ Charles C. Ryrie

It's a gift to joyfully recognize and accept our own smallness and ordinariness. Then you are free with nothing to live up to, nothing to prove, and nothing to protect. Such freedom is my best description of Christian maturity, because once you know that your "I" is great and one with God, you can ironically be quite content with a small and ordinary "I." No grandstanding is necessary. Any question of your own importance or dignity has already been resolved once and for all and forever. ~ Richard Rohr

When what has been created in time according to the temporal order has reached maturity, it ceases from natural growth. But when what has been brought about by the knowledge of God through the practice of the virtues has reached maturity, it starts to grow anew. For the end of one stage constitutes the starting point of the next. ~ Maximus The Confessor

Voices calling Christians to forget about doctrinal differences and just love Jesus do not represent Christian maturity. This is like that humorous bit of wisdom, if you want to succeed every time, just lower the standards ~ John Crotts

A Spiritual Discipline is an intentionally directed action which places us in a position to receive from God the power to do what we cannot accomplish on our own ...
The deep waters of God's life are already flowing. We simply learn the strokes that will enable us more and more to be at home in them ...
The human body is our power-pack of mind-body-spirit
we discipline it in order to practice cooperation with God. (Life with God, p. 135-137) ~ Richard Foster

The path of light is the path of love. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Sorrows, because they are lingering guests, I will entertain but moderately, knowing that the more they are made of the longer they will continue: and for pleasures, because they stay not, and do but call to drink at my door, I will use them as passengers with slight respect. He is his own best friend that makes the least of both of them. ~ Joseph Hall

Without fear I can acknowledge that the authentic Christian tension is not between life and death, but between life and life. ~ Brennan Manning

Don't creationists ever wonder about the fact that the paleontologists found ape-like skulls with the 'human leg and foot bones,' rather than the other way around, i.e., human skulls with 'ape leg and foot bones?' ... Come on, creationists, think about it! Did God hide the human skulls, only leaving behind leg and foot bones belonging to human midgets with misshapen feet, and mix such bones only with the skulls of ape-like creatures with larger cranial capacities than living apes? What a 'kidder' the creationists' God must be. ~ Edward Babinski

Even the staunchest atheist growing up in Western society cannot avoid having absorbed the basic tenets of Christian morality. Our societies are steeped in it: everything we have accomplished over the centuries, even science, developed either hand in hand with or in opposition to religion, but never separately. It is impossible to know what morality would look like without religion. It would require a visit to a human culture that is not now and never was religious. That such cultures do not exist should give us pause. ~ Frans De Waal

Search for the good ways. And walk in right path. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Let us simplify our lives a little, let us make the changes necessary to focus on the simple, humble path of Christian
discipleship. ~ Dieter F. Uchtdorf

I don't have all the answers. More than that, I don't even know half the questions. But I can rest in the fact that God has both. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

What do you see in a guy like Christian Prescott? he asked me that night when he dropped me off from prom. And what he was really saying then, what would have come through loud and clear if I hadn't been so blind was, why don't you see me? ~ Cynthia Hand

We see a hearse; we think sorrow. We see a grave; we think despair. We hear of a death; we think of a loss. Not so in heaven. When heaven sees a breathless body, it sees the vacated cocoon & the liberated butterfly. ~ Max Lucado

Ask God to fill your mouth with the words you need to say today. No issue is so small that it doesn't require God's wisdom. ~ Joyce Meyer

In literature classes, you don't learn about genes; in physics classes you don't learn about human evolution. So you get a fragmented view of the world. That makes it hard to find meaning in education. ~ David Christian

Worship is not part of the Christian life, it is the Christian life ~ Gerald Vann

All over Harlem, Negro boys and girls are growing into stunted maturity, trying desperately to find a place to stand; and the wonder is not that so many are ruined but that so many survive. ~ James A. Baldwin

It must be reiterated that no reasoning founded on the principies of philosophical ethics or of the Christian creed can reject as fundamentally unjust an economic system that succeeds in improving the material conditions of ali people, and assign the epithet "just" to a system that tends to spread poverty and starvation. The evaluation of any economic system must be made by careful analysis of its effects upon the welfare of people, not by an appeal to an arbitrary concept of justice which neglects to take these effects into full account. ~ Ludwig Von Mises

Especially in urban areas, nobody cares so much [about castes], because you are forced to live in the same buildings. There is so, so little space. You can't be thinking about whether you are living in a street that has only Brahmins, or in a building that has been touched only by Muslims or Christians. You just live there, because that's the only place that you can find. So such distinctions just crumble away. There are people who maintain them, at all costs. But for the most part, it doesn't matter. ~ Anita Rau Badami

Nevertheless, they boarded The Purdue Victory and sailed out of Boston harbor, provided for against all inclemencies but these they were leaving behind, and those disasters of such scope and fortuitous originality which Christian courts of law and insurance companies, humbly arguing ad hominem, define as acts of God. ~ William Gaddis

The act of extending forgiveness and asking for forgiveness must come from our heart. ~ Sara Dormon

If fear appears at your door you have two options, either you choose to let it in or you choose to grab onto the Lord and the promise of His presence no matter what. ~ Yilda B. Rivera

Catholic missionaries labored earnestly to convert indians. They fervently believed that God expected them to save the Indians' souls by convincing them to abandon their old sinful beliefs and to embrace the one true Christian faith. But after baptizing tens of thousands of Indians, the missionaries learned that many Indians continued to worship their own gods. Most priests came to believe that the Indians were lesser beings inherently incapable of fully understanding Christianity. ~ James L. Roark

There is a spiritual law of choosing, believing, abiding, and holding steady in our walk with God, which is essential to the working of the Holy Spirit either in our sanctification or healing. ~ Lettie Cowman

When the world asks if there is any hope, we can say absolutely! No one is exempt from tragedy or disappointment- God himself was not exempt. Jesus offered no immunity, no way out of the unfairness, but rather a way through it to the other side. ~ Philip Yancey

It reminds us that we are not called to be parrots, unquestioningly repeating whatever we learn from a favorite teacher. Instead, we are to exercise wisdom and discernment, continually asking questions, weighing answers, seeking understanding, and grounding our beliefs within the context of God's Word and the wisdom of Christian tradition. ~ Ann Spangler

Above all the grace and the gifts that Christ gives to his beloved is that of overcoming self. ~ Francis Of Assisi

We also need people like social workers, volunteers, the Christian Industrial League, drug treatment programs to make sure you are getting them a job. That's what you have to do. Otherwise, we just keep stepping around these things. ~ Richard M. Daley

This idea is a great idea, and a Christian idea could not have found fuller expression. Repentance can go no further than the astonishing heroic deed that you have contemplated, if only ... ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Prayer is heart to heart talk with the Creator. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Watch against lip religion. Above all abide in Christ and he will abide in you. ~ Robert Murray M'Cheyne

No one can claim to be called Christian who gives money for the building of warships and arsenals. ~ Belva Lockwood

Adam's role in Christianity is so important that many Christians - and almost all of America's one hundred million evangelicals - believe their faith collapses like a teetering Jenga tower if Adam is removed from the foundation. Christian scholars noting the implausibility of the human race appearing suddenly ten thousand years ago are not greeted with cheers. They are more often met with inquisitions and in too many instances they lose their jobs. ~ Karl W. Giberson

In the New Testament, God's steadfast love and faithfulness are seen, not in an act of deliverance from foreign enemies, but in sending the Son and raising Him from the dead to enact a global rescue mission (Romans 8:3.) Jesus is God's supreme, grand, climactic act of faithfulness. Not only that, but "faithful" also describes Jesus. Paul writes, "We know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but in faith in Jesus Christ" (Galations 2:16...). A better reading is "faithfulness of Jesus Christ" -- which is found in footnotes of many Bibles -- and the two readings couldn't be more different... Paul isn't saying, "You are not justified by your efforts but by your faith." The contrast he's making isn't between two options we have; the contrast is between your efforts and Jesus' faithfulness to you, shown in His obedient death on a Roman cross. Paul is interested in telling readers what Jesus did, Jesus' faithfulness, not what we do. God's grand act of faithfulness is giving His son for our sake. God is all in. Jesus' grand act of faithfulness is going through with it for our sake. Jesus is all in. Now it's our move, which really is the point of all this. Like God the Father and God the Son, we are also called to be faithful. On one level, we are faithful to God when we trust God, but faith (pistis) doesn't stop there. It extends, as we've seen, in faithfulness toward each other, in humility and self-sacrificial love. And here is the real kick in the pants: When we ~ Peter Enns

Curriculum companies provide more work than is needed. I never finished the complete curriculum when I taught in a classroom or at home. If your race is with your curriculum, learn to pick and choose what to use, and please do not attempt to cover it all or your race will be ongoing and you will be exhausted. Even races require pit stops to refuel. ~ Tamara L. Chilver

We did not determine our fate into the world. What we know is we are here in the world. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

I never really had a teenage experience. I went from childhood to maturity, and in some ways, it short-circuited me emotionally. ~ Robbie Robertson

Sometimes when people work for God, they get the idea that He should make their life all smooth and easy because they're doing His work ... It ain't so. Jesus said life is gonna be hard. Period. He said if you're gonna follow Him, then you're gonna carry a cross, just like He did. this world of ours is under a curse, honey. We need to expect things to be bad. But even if we lose everything, we still have Jesus. ~ Lynn Austin

Scientists are in the strange position of being confronted daily by the indisputable fact of their own consciousness, yet with no way of explaining it. ~ Christian De Quincey

Families who lovingly accept the difficult trial of a child with special needs are greatly to be admired. They render the Church and society an invaluable witness of faithfulness to the gift of life. In these situations, the family can discover, together with the Christian community, new approaches, new ways of acting, a different way of understanding and identifying with others, by welcoming and caring for the mystery of the frailty of human life. People with disabilities are a gift for the family and an opportunity to grow in love, mutual aid and unity ... If the family, in the light of the faith, accepts the presence of persons with special needs, they will be able to recognize and ensure the quality and value of every human life, with its proper needs, rights and opportunities. ~ Pope Francis

I believe no one can read the history of our country without realizing that the Good Book and the spirit of the Savior have from the beginning been our guiding geniuses. ~ Earl Warren

For virtue is a light and buoyant thing, and all who live in her way fly like clouds as Isaiah says, and as doves with their young ones; but sin is a heavy affair, as another of the prophets says, sitting upon a talent of lead. ~ Gregory Of Nyssa