Cleansed Quotes

Even though our society is increasingly pluralistic, we must ensure an equal playing field rather than a religiously cleansed arena where people of faith are no longer welcome. ~ Jay Sekulow

He who wishes to put on the yellow dress without having cleansed himself from sin, who disregards temperance and truth, is unworthy of the yellow dress. ~ Anonymous

All Gaza's temples are torn down and burned and the city is cleansed of every belief but the Christian faith. The most stubborn opponents, faute de mieux, are tied up, marched away to the provincial capital, severely tortured, and all killed mala morte, 'a great number.' ~ Ramsay MacMullen

And immediately his leprosy was cleansed" (Mat 8:3). To one who had lain in the grave four days He cried, "Lazarus, come forth," and the dead came forth. The stormy wind and the angry waves were hushed at a single word from Him. A legion of demons could not resist His authoritative command. ~ Arthur W. Pink

When you have a child, you start to dream of how this kid will grow up and make you proud. The only thing you can predict with 100% certainty is that the reality will diverge somehow from that dream. Some of our children will disappoint us by not being the scholars we hoped they would be. Some children will disappoint us by not being the athletes we hoped they would be. Some will disappoint us by coming out and telling us they are gay and they won't give us grandchildren ... the real question is not, what book can I read, what technique can I use to raise a perfect child? The real question is how will you handle that gap between the child you dreamt of having and the real child growing up in your home ... What I have learned is that any religion, if you do it wrong, will leave people feeling condemned and dismissed and unworthy and any religion, if you do it right, will leave people feeling cleansed and firmed. (118) Rabbi Harold Kushner ~ Carol Lynn Pearson

You are divine," he whispered. That's exactly how I felt. Otherworldly and ethereal, above the clouds, beyond the possibility of pain or sadness. I felt cleansed and completely new. ~ Catou Martine

During his four-day vision quest, the Indian built a sweat lodge of willow and hides, fasted, cleansed himself with sage and cedar, and endured the heat of the fire until his spirit was released to soar over a field of snakes. His ordeal ended when a vision of his mother appeared and told him to go back home because he had forgotten his pipe. ~ Wade Davis

For a moment, I lived in the center of the sun, warmed and cleansed, and the smell and sight of sickness fell away; the bitterness lifted from my heart. I ~ Diana Gabaldon

Still the dream persists, suppressed but always there, that somehow by some miraculous effort of the heart what was done could be undone. What form would such atonement take that would turn back time and bring the dead to life? None. None possible, not in the real world. And yet in my imaginings I can clearly see this cleansed new creature steaming up out of myself like a proselyte rising drenched from the baptismal river amid glad cries. ~ John Banville

When he has cleansed away the most mysterious sights (of his imagination), he can become without a flaw. ~ Lao-Tzu

Cleansed, chlorinated to the point of chemical peel, sore muscles relieved, I felt almost human again. Tiptoe to my room, up a darkened hall, past closed doors, I wondered if I'd ever feel completely human again. ~ Ellen Hopkins

When your heart is cleansed of everything you
think you are, you'll see yourself as an old beloved soul. It's not possible to see yourself without a mirror so gaze at the beloved; let his face become your mirror. ~ Rumi

Stood in firelight, sweltering. Bloodstain on chest like map of violent new continent. Felt cleansed. Felt dark planet turn under my feet and knew what cats know that makes them scream like babies in night.

Looked at sky through smoke heavy with human fat and God was not there. The cold, suffocating dark goes on forever and we are alone. Live our lives, lacking anything better to do. Devise reason later. Born from oblivion; bear children, hell-bound as ourselves, go into oblivion. There is nothing else.

Existence is random. Has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it for too long. No meaning save what we choose to impose. This rudderless world is not shaped by vague metaphysical forces. It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that butchers them or destiny that feeds them to the dogs. It's us. Only us. Streets stank of fire. The void breathed hard on my heart, turning its illusions to ice, shattering them. Was reborn then, free to scrawl own design on this morally blank world.

Was Rorschach.

Does that answer your Questions, Doctor? ~ Alan Moore

The experiences of your past life which are stored within come up to the surface to be rejected. By rejecting all these by and by the inside will have to be cleansed. ~ Sri Aurobindo

Christ desires nothing so much as to redeem His heritage from the dominion of Satan. But before we are delivered from Satan's power without, we must be delivered {175} from his power within. The Lord permits trials in order that we may be cleansed from earthliness, from selfishness, from harsh, unchristlike traits of character. He suffers the deep waters of affliction to go over our souls in order that we may know Him and Jesus Christ whom He has sent, in order that we may have deep heart longings to be cleansed from defilement, and may come forth from the trial purer, holier, happier. Often we enter the furnace of trial with our souls darkened with selfishness; but if patient under the crucial test, we shall come forth reflecting the divine character. When His purpose in the affliction is accomplished, "He shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday." Ps. 37:6. ~ Ellen G. White

Because I am still weak in love and imperfect in virtue, I need to be strengthened and comforted by Thee; therefore visit Thou me often and instruct me with Thy holy ways of discipline. Deliver me from evil passions, and cleanse my heart from all inordinate affections, that, being healed and altogether cleansed within, I may be made ready to love, strong to suffer, steadfast to endure. ~ Thomas A Kempis

Impurities are constantly and imperceptibly passing from the body, through the pores, and if the surface of the skin is not kept in a healthy condition, the system is burdened with impure matter ... and if the garments worn are not frequently cleansed ... the pores of the skin absorb again the waste matter thrown off. The impurities of the body ... are taken back into the blood, and forced upon the internal organs. ~ Ellen G. White

When a man makes utensils out of a metal which has been thoroughly cleansed of dross, the utensils will be excellent. You monks, who wish to follow the Way, make your own hearts clean from the dirt of evil passion, and your conduct will be unimpeachable. ~ Gautama Buddha

Each sacrifice was a process of change. Your tears changed your perception and they cleansed your soul. Those were survival tears. As you were changing, slowly but surely you were forming a connection as you began to think and analyze - this isn't your life. This isn't you. ~ Charlena E. Jackson

Revival, as contrasted with a Holy Ghost atmosphere is a clean- cut breakthrough of the Spirit, a sweep of Holy Ghost power, bending the hearts of hardened sinners as the wheat before the wind, breaking up the fountains of the great deep, sweeping the whole range of the emotions, as the master hand moves across the harp strings, from the tears and cries of the penitent to the holy laughter and triumphant joy of the cleansed. ~ Norman Grubb

Parallel to the training of the body a struggle against the poisoning of the soul must begin. Our whole public life today is like a hothouse for sexual ideas and simulations. Just look at the bill of fare served up in our movies, vaudeville and theaters, and you will hardly be able to deny that this is not the right kind of food, particularly for the youth. Theater, art, literature, cinema, press, posters, and window displays must be cleansed of all manifestations of our rotting world and placed in the service of a moral, political and cultural idea. ~ Adolf Hitler

The Eiani cleansed, refreshed, and rejuvenated me. In order to heal, it first had to burn away the dead, consume the decay, then force new life where death had once resided ~ Julia J. Gibbs

At the entrance of the Führerbunker, a dandelion pushed through the crack between cobblestones. The cadet did not notice that he stepped on it as they entered the bunker.

A dark cloud of smoke rose from a burning ministry. Zeller fantasized that the filth that surrounded him was cleansed. He saw himself, a portly and tailored leader in a white uniform with gold epaulets, buttons, and stripes.

He imagined himself in an immaculate, white city in Antarctica. ~ Paul Majkut

We will never be cleansed until we confess we are dirty. And we will never be able to wash the feet of those who have hurt us until we allow Jesus, the one we have hurt, to wash ours. ~ Max Lucado

All drama is about lies. All drama is about something that's hidden. A drama starts because a situation becomes imbalanced by a lie. The lie may be something we tell each other or something we think about ourselves, but the lie imbalances a situation. If you're cheating on your wife the repression of that puts things out of balance; or if you're someone you think you're not, and you think you should be further ahead in your job, that neurotic vision takes over your life and you're plagued by it until you're cleansed. At the end of a play the lie is revealed. The better the play the more surprising and inevitable the lie is. Aristotle told us this ~ David Mamet

The God of this world has chosen to provide light to all mankind through His Son, who was crucified and died so that we could be cleansed and made free ~ Todd Coburn

Life itself turned our planet blue and green, as tiny photosynthetic bacteria cleansed the oceans of air and sea, and filled them with oxygen. Powered by this new and potent source of energy, life erupted. Flowers bloom and beckon, intricate corals hide darting gold fish, vast monsters lurk in black depths, trees reach for the sky, animals buzz and lumber and see. And in the midst of it all, we are moved by the untold mysteries of this creation, we cosmic assemblies of molecules that feel and think and marvel and wonder at how we came to be here. ~ Nick Lane

Every tear I cried restored my soul, refreshed my spirit, cleansed my thoughts, and washed the residue so I could clearly see the path that was in front of me. ~ Charlena E. Jackson

REPENT:FOR THE KINGDOM OF GOD
IS AT HAND

The whole message of John the Baptist and Jesus Christ are: Repent: For the Kingdom of God is at hand.

But this message has been terrible misunderstood by the priests and the Christians.

It is almost the same kind of people that crucified Jesus, which founded Christianity.

The symbol for Christianity has also become the cross on which Jesus was crucified, which is a bit morbid.

When you do not repent, your eyes will be filled with this world: the world of possession, the world of greed, the world of anger and hate, the world of ego and the world of hatred.

Your eyes has to be completely cleansed before you can see the Kingdom of God.

Repentance will open the door to God, to the divine.

What does it mean to repent? Repentance does not mean to ask to be forgiven for making a mistake. This will not change you, it will not transform
you.

What John the Baptist and Jesus Christ mean by repentance is something totally different. They mean to look to the very roots of your being, of your existence. It is not about asking to repent for a specific act, it is about changing the whole quality of your being.

It is about returning to your original being. Jesus says that the Kingdom of God is within you. The Kingdom of God is to return to your deepest core of being, which transforms you.

It is to stand naked before God. ~ Swami Dhyan Giten

The window of the soul cleansed perfectly and made completely transparent by the divine light ~ John Of The Cross

Egyptian papyri mention temple attendants who cleansed patients and implemented regimes of diet and exercise. ~ Steve Parker

When the doors of perception are cleansed, men will see things as they truly are, infinite. ~ William Blake

He could no longer remember his real name. He felt empty and cleansed, in that place that was not a place. He was without form, and void. He was nothing. ~ Neil Gaiman

Are you i the one who is to come, or shall we j look for another?" 4. And Jesus answered them, "Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5 k the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers [1] are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and l the poor have good news preached to them. 6And blessed is the one who m is not offended by me. ~ Anonymous

[Today's left] would have left us with Slobodan Milosevic in power, Bosnia ethnically cleansed, Kosovo part of Greater Serbia, Afghanistan under the Taliban, and Iraq the property of a psychopathic crime family. Now, I'm sorry to say, I've no patience with that leftist mentality anymore. ~ Christopher Hitchens

The problem play is a melodrama cleansed of invention. ~ David Mamet

We must be careful to avoid spiritual elitism. Everything we are and anything we possess as believers in Christ is a gift of grace. Pure hearts before God must be cleansed from any hint of spiritual pride. ~ Beth Moore

How many a poor immortal soul have I met well-nigh crushed and smothered under its load, creeping down the road of life, pushing before it a barn seventy-five feet by forty, its Augean stables never cleansed, and one hundred acres of land, tillage, mowing, pasture, and wood-lot. The portionless, who struggle with no such unnecessary inherited encumbrances, find it labor enough to subdue and cultivate a few cubic feet of flesh. ~ Henry David Thoreau

The Kikuyu, when left to themselves, do not bury their dead, but leave them above ground for the hyenas and vultures to deal with. The custom had always appealed to me, I thought that it would be pleasant thing to be laid out to the sun and the stars, and to be so promptly, neatly, and openly picked and cleansed; to be made one with Nature and become a common component of a landscape. ~ Karen Blixen

This is how God sees you when you turn to Him. When you accept the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus, you are cleansed, purified. You become His beautiful princess. Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. ~ MaryLu Tyndall

In just 20 years terrorism, communications, the jet plane and the increase of wealth and knowledge have forced, to varying degrees, world leaders into a haunted and secret peerage whose links with the people they guide are meticulously cleansed and staged. ~ Hugh Sidey

The language of the mob was only the language of public opinion cleansed of hypocrisy and restraint. ~ Hannah Arendt

And in Kandahar he was taught about survival, about fighting and killing and hunting, and he learned much else without being taught, such as looking out for himself and watching his tongue and not saying the wrong thing, the thing that might get him killed. About the dignity of the lost, about losing, and how it cleansed the soul to accept defeat, and about letting go, avoiding the trap of holding on too tightly to what you wanted, and about abandonment in general, and in particular fatherlesness, the lessness of fathers, the lessness of the fatherless, and the best defenses of those who are less against those who are more: inwardness, forethought, cunning, humility and good peripheral vision. The many lessons of lessness. The lessening from which growing could begin. ~ Salman Rushdie

In order to be united with him, the will must consequently be emptied of and detached from all disordered appetite and satisfaction with respect to every particular thing in which it can rejoice, whether earthly or heavenly, temporal or spiritual, so that purged and cleansed of all inordinate satisfactions, joys, and appetites it might be wholly occupied in loving God with its affections. ~ San Juan De La Cruz

The very purpose of designing the Temple of Jerusalem as a series of ever more restrictive ingressions was to maintain the priestly monopoly over who can and cannot come into the presence of God and to what degree. The sick, the lame, the leper, the "demon-possessed," menstruating women, those with bodily discharges, those who had recently given birth - none of these were permitted to enter the Temple and take part in the rituals unless first purified according to the priestly code. With every leper cleansed, every paralytic healed, every demon cast out, Jesus was not only challenging that priestly code, he was invalidating the very purpose of the priesthood. ~ Reza Aslan

Low moisture hair care regimens are the most common source of breakage in black hair care. Hair that is not treated regularly with moisturizing deep-conditioning treatments, and hair that is cleansed less than once weekly with moisturizing products is a prime candidate for moisture deficiency breakage. Regimens that feature regular heat styling and daily products such as greases, pomades, alcohol-based hair gels and holding sprays also tend to fall into this breakage category. Occasionally, the overuse of protein-based products such as "hair repair" and reconstructor treatments is to blame for low moisture hair breakage. This condition is often referred to as "protein overload" in ~ Audrey Davis-Sivasothy

Certain realities in life are only seen through eyes that are cleansed through our tears. Let us learn how to weep ~ Pope Francis

As for me, I would rather be a worm in a wild apple than a son of man. But we are what we are, and we might remember not to hate any person, for all are vicious; And not to be astonished at any evil, all are deserved; And not to fear death; it is the only way to be cleansed. ~ Robinson Jeffers

When death comes, we take off our clothes and gather everything we left behind: what is dark, broken, touched with shame. When Death demands we give an accounting, naked we present our lives in bundles. See how much these weigh, we tell him, refusing to deny what we have lived. Everything that is touched by light loves the light. We the stubborn-as-grass, we who reel at the taste of sap and want our spirits cleansed, will not betray the weeds, snake, or crippled mare. Never leave behind what the light shone on. ~ Linda Gregg

It's only when we understand that in Jesus we are cleansed, washed, and renewed that we see our sin fall by the wayside. ~ Jefferson Bethke

I will buy you back with My blood because I love you. I will free you from the chains of sin. I will settle the conflict within and give peace to your soul. But you must come to Me with a repentant heart. You must be willing to be redeemed. You must exchange your sin-blackened heart for a new heart that is cleansed by My blood. ~ Billy Graham

Man today lives in a coffin of flesh. Hearing and seeing nothing. The Land and Law are perverted. The Good Book says I will gather you to Jerusalem to the furnace of my wrath. It says thou art the land that is not cleansed. I concur. We need a great fire that will sweep from ocean to ocean and I offer my oath that I will soak myself in kerosene if promised the fire would be allowed to burn. ~ Philipp Meyer

My greatest witness is not that I have some kind of biblical theological knowledge concerning
Christ, but that He came to me at my lowest point, and forgave me, and cleansed and changed me
inwardly, transforming me into a new creation! Do you, dear friend, have such a relationship with
Christ? Has He truly become your rescuer? ~ Billy Witt

They stayed for rapt moments in the crystal sphere of this soul, as if in a realm of invisible radiation, listening to unearthly music, and then returned to their daily lives with hearts cleansed and strengthened, as if descending from a high mountain peak. ~ Hermann Hesse

God's answer to your guilty conscience is the death of his Son. Your answer to a guilty conscience is usually something you do, like confessing harder, praying more, reading your Bible, paying more than your tithe in the offering and so on. These actions are what the writer to the Hebrews calls "dead works," the very things your conscience needs to be cleansed from and the very things that eventually get you wrapped up in the black shadow of your own guilt. ~ John White

Wipe those tears, as they have cleansed your soul. ~ Sharlene Leong

The desert is also a place where we can face our own demons and shadows and be cleansed of them. ~ Christine Valters Paintner

In the critics' vocabulary, the work 'precursor' is indispensable, but it should be cleansed of all connotations of polemics or rivalry. ~ Jorge Luis Borges

He who is completely sanctified, or cleansed from all sin, and dies in this state, is fit for glory. ~ Adam Clarke

If the counsel of the peaceniks had been followed, Kuwait would today be the nineteenth province of Iraq. Bosnia would be a trampled and cleansed province of Greater Serbia, Kosovo would have been emptied of most of its inhabitants, and the Taliban would still be in power in Afghanistan. Yet nothing seems to disturb the contented air of moral superiority of those that intone the "peace movement". ~ Christopher Hitchens

An individualist town councillor will walk along the municipal pavement, lit by municipal gas and cleansed by municipal brooms with municipal water and - seeing by the municipal clock in the municipal market, that he is too early to meet his children coming from the municipal school, hard by the country lunatic asylum and the municipal hospital, will use the national telegraph system to tell them not to walk through the municipal park, but to come by the municipal tramway to meet him in the municipal reading-room, by the municipal museum, art-gallery, and library, where he intends ... to prepare his next speech in the municipal town hall in favor of the nationalization of canals and in increase of Government control of the railway system. "Socialism, Sir," he will say, "don't waste the time of a practical man by your fantastic absurdities. Self-help, Sir, individual self-help, that's what has made our city what it is. ~ Sidney Webb

Real filth is the one inside. The rest simply washes off. There is only one type of dirt that cannot be cleansed with pure waters, and that is the stain of hatred and bigotry contaminating the soul. You can purify your body through abstinence and fasting, but only love will purify your heart. ~ Elif Shafak

Thus the conscience, though it may lead the unsaved man aright in some areas, cannot save him, since it is defiled, seared, and evil. But in regeneration it is cleansed and used by the Lord to guide the believer in his political, vocational, spiritual, and social relations. ~ Charles C. Ryrie

Thousands of sheep, cattle, and donkeys were also cleansed through water as spoils of war and divided among the peoples. So too the thousands of shekels of items of silver, gold, bronze, and iron were purified through fire and also apportioned out to the tribes. On the final day of purification, Joshua and Caleb were getting ready to return to camp. They were in Joshua's tent eating a small meal of goat and bread. Joshua took a sip of wine from his goatskin flask. Caleb watched him closely. He had been watching Joshua closely these seven days. Joshua looked refreshed. And he looked different. Like he was a changed man from the one whose pursuit of rigid excessive holiness rose to a crescendo of self-righteous vengeance and hate. He had come to the end of himself and was crushed by his own unrighteousness. ~ Brian Godawa

The grief and tears didn't wash me away. They gave me my life back! They cleansed me, baptized me, hydrated the earth at my feet. ~ Anne Lamott

Baptism is rich in meaning. It suggests cleansing. When you are a disciple, you understand that you are cleansed by Christ. You understand that Christ died in your place on the cross, paying for your sins, fully forgiving you for all your wrongs. You are cleansed from guilt, and you are becoming a cleaner, healthier, more whole person. ~ Brian D. McLaren

5For this very reason make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, 6and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, 7and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. 8For if these things are yours and abound, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9For whoever lacks these things is blind and shortsighted and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. ~ Anonymous

Once they leave to see to their other duties, I go to stand before the fire, feeling once again as if I have been completely upended and remade anew, when in truth, I have barely caught my breath from the first time my life shattered before my eyes.

But this- this is different. This is no shattering, but rather some great knitting together of the broken pieces into a stronger whole.

I feel cleansed, not only of sin- but of artifice. I am stripped down to nothing but my raw self. As uncomfortable as it makes me feel, there is freedom in it as well, for there is no place left for others' expectations and desires of me to hide. ~ Robin LaFevers

That morning he feels fresh-scrubbed and cleansed, as if he is being given yet another opportunity to live his life correctly. ~ Hanya Yanagihara

Who is to blame? The filth peddler, of course, but even more than this vulgar entertainer, the filth consumer, the public. So long as men are corrupt and revel in sewer filth, entertainers will sell them what they want. Laws may be passed, arrests may be made, lawyers may argue, courts may sentence and jails may harbor men of corrupt minds, but pornography and allied insults to decency will never cease until men have cleansed their minds and cease to require and pay for such vile stuff. When the customer is sick and tired of being drowned in filth by the comedians, he will not pay for that filth and its source will dry up. ~ Spencer W. Kimball

It was here the land spoke to him most, in a region that lay high in the north of what was now Kazakhstan, though to the nomads with whom he was to spend the next three summers, all of Central Asia was one land, divided not into states but into mountain and steppe, desert and oasis. The steppe nomads made him feel he was looking back in time--his time. It was the strangest sensation, the first day he was invited to break bread with them. It was as though a mountain inside him were melting, leaving him naked and cleansed, entirely in his own skin, the skin he used to inhabit in the valley of his youth...before he had to don a thousand skins. In the steppe, he was undisguised, unwary, unwanting. ~ Uzma Aslam Khan

Catherine [of Siena] compares justice combined with mercy with a precious pearl. Justice without mercy would be dark, cruel, more like injustice than justice. But mercy without justice would be like salve on a sore which should be cleansed with the red-hot iron; if the salve is applied before the wound is cleansed it only makes it smart, and does not heal it ~ Sigrid Undset

And thus the rushing waves of the sea touched her lovely feet and cleansed it's sins. ~ Rajesh Omprakash

The humble sinner will sometimes be interpreted as one of the filthiest in the eyes of man yet immersed in the eyes of God, and this is due to the volition of honesty regarding his own corruption. ~ Criss Jami

In human life, you will find players of religion until the knowledge and proficiency in religion will be cleansed from all superstitions, and will be purified and perfected by the enlightenment of real science. ~ Mustafa Kemal Ataturk

If someone is leaving you behind, and you are becoming jealous and embittered, keep praying that he may have success in the very matter where he is awakening your envy; and whether he is helped or not, one thing is sure, that your own soul will be cleansed and ennobled. ~ William Law

Sometimes you're taken into troubled waters not to drown but to be cleansed ~ Karen Salmansohn

Quietly contemplate the Lamb as the light of heaven. Light in Scripture is the emblem of joy. The joy of the saints in heaven is comprised in this: Jesus chose us, loved us, bought us, cleansed us, robed us, kept us, glorified us: we are here entirely through the Lord Jesus. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

HE TEN LEPERS: Handling ingratitude with disapproval-
And Jesus Answer, were there not 10 cleansed but where are 9? ~ Ikechukwu Joseph

To course across more kindly waters now my talent's little vessel lifts her sails, leaving behind herself a sea so cruel; and what I sing will be that second kingdom, in which the human soul is cleansed of sin, becoming worthy of ascent to Heaven. ~ Dante Alighieri

Every religion contains portions of the law. In fact, some unbelievers, by their knowledge of the law, have advanced so far that they realize that their souls need to be cleansed, that their thoughts and desires need to be purified. But only in the Christian religion will you find the Gospel. Other religions do not contain even a speck of it. ~ C.F.W. Walther

From what cause the rite of baptism first proceeded is not expressed formally in the scripture, but it may be probably thought to be an imitation of the law of Moses concerning leprosy, wherein the leprous man was commanded to be kept out of the camp of Israel for a certain time, after which time being judged by the priest to be clean, he was admitted into the camp after a solemn washing. And this may therefore be a type of the washing in baptism, wherein such men as are cleansed of the leprosy of Sin by Faith, are received into the church with the solemnity of baptism. ~ Thomas Hobbes

Oh, we want a new breed of men before India can be cleansed of her disease. ~ Sarojini Naidu

Understanding that we are forgiven and cleansed, and knowing who we are in Christ sets us free from the need to impress others. As long as we know who we are, we don't have to be overly concerned about what others think of us. Once we know who we are and accept ourselves, we no longer have anything to prove. When we have nothing to prove we can relax and be at ease in every situation. ~ Joyce Meyer

Each of the five tribes claims to have been the victorious attacker. Each recalls the slaughter with relish. Each believes it was ordained by their own god as righteous vengeance, because of the unholy practices carried on in the city. Evil must be cleansed with blood, they say. On that day the blood ran like water, so afterwards it must have been very clean. ~ Margaret Atwood

We must not be content to be cleansed from sin; we must be filled with the Spirit. ~ John Fletcher

Just as gold tarnished in depth (cf. Jms. 5:3) cannot be properly purified and restored to its proper brightness unless it is cast in the fire and thoroughly hammered with mallets, so when the soul has been tarnished with the rust of sin and become thoroughly useless it cannot be cleansed and recover its original beauty unless it meets many trials and enter into the furnace of tribulations. ~ Symeon The New Theologian

Confession is like really, really healthy vomit. It may smell and get all over the front of your shirt, but you feel better - you feel cleansed - when you're done. ~ Rob Bell

Bodies are cleansed by water; the mind is purified by truth. ~ Horace Mann

There it is . . . Our God declares the end in the beginning. In Christ, God loved us before we loved him, caught us before we fell, forgave us before we asked, clothed us in righteousness before we realized we were naked, and cleansed us before we were aware of our filth. God called those who were enemies, aliens, and strangers his very own children and friends. And wrote the story of our life before we drew our first breath. ~ Lisa Bevere

When you become vulnerable, any ideal or perfect image of yourself falls away. (...)

Many people are addicted to perfection, and in their pursuit of the ideal, they have no patience with vulnerability. (...)

Every poet would like to write the ideal poem. Though they never achieve this, sometimes it glimmers through their best work. Ironically, the very beyondness of the idea is often the touch of presence that renders the work luminous. The beauty of the ideal awakens a passion and urgency that brings out the best in the person and calls forth the dream of excellence.

The beauty of the true ideal is its hospitality towards woundedness, weakness, failure and fall-back. Yet so many people are infected with the virus of perfection. They cannot rest; they allow themselves no ease until they come close to the cleansed domain of perfection. This false notion of perfection does damage and puts their lives under great strain. It is a wonderful day in a life when one is finally able to stand before the long, deep mirror of one's own reflection and view oneself with appreciation, acceptance, and forgiveness. On that day one breaks through the falsity of images and expectations which have blinded one's spirit. One can only learn to see who one is when one learns to view oneself with the most intimate and forgiving compassion. ~ John O'Donohue

Though good and bad men suffer alike, we must not suppose that there is no difference between the men themselves, because there is no difference in what they both suffer. For even in the likeness of the sufferings, there remains an unlikeness in the sufferers; and though exposed to the same anguish, virtue and vice are not the same thing. For as the same fire causes gold to glow brightly, and chaff to smoke; and under the same flail the straw is beaten small, while the grain is cleansed; and as the lees are not mixed with the oil, though squeezed out of the vat by the same pressure, so the same violence of affliction proves, purges, clarifies the good, but damns, ruins, exterminates the wicked. ~ Augustine Of Hippo

Psalm 73:1: "Truly God is good to Israel, to such as are pure in heart." Here the psalmist is speaking prophetically, distinguishing Israel as people whose hearts have been cleansed - which is possible only through the blood of Christ. ~ David Wilkerson

When the mind is tired, or the soul is disquieted, let us go to the woods and fill our lungs with the rain-washed and the sun-cleansed air, and our hearts with the beauty of tree, flower, crystal, and gem." The ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

He began to stand, and saw Lyon stiffen, poised to do whatever he needed to do. He, like Lyon, could throw himself on a pyre, too. Because fire cleansed. She'd won, and he'd lost.

It had stopped mattering. Her happiness was indistinguishable from his own. No matter what became of him, he wanted her to know he loved her.

"You'd best get out of here, Redmond. Your secret is safe with me."

Lyon's eyes flared in wary surprise. He froze. And his smile, when it came, was slow, and crooked, and he looked very like Lavay when Lavay was being insufferably knowing.

"Ah. You do love her more than life. Splendid. And that, my dear Lord Flint, is what I came here today to discover."

Whatever he felt was between him and Violet. "Go before I change my mind, Redmond. ~ Julie Anne Long

Soap?"
"School of America in Paris" he explains. "SOAP".
Nice. My father sent me here to be cleansed. ~ Stephanie Perkins

She'd poked my arm. "How was the bathroom?"
I poked her back. "An adventure to check off my bucket list. I sailed the golden seas and cleansed myself in the Greek sinks. I'm quite proud."
A line marred her forehead. "You keep getting a little bit weirder the longer school goes on, you know?"
I shrugged. "It's like crack cocaine."
"Wha - never mind ~ Tijan

Rained gently last night, just enough to wash the town clean, and then today a clean crisp fat spring day, the air redolent, the kind of green minty succulent air you'd bottle if you could and snort greedily on bleak, wet January evenings when the streetlights hzzzt on at four in the afternoon and all existence seems hopeless and sad. ~ Brian Doyle

She thought she had been saved by his love for her, and in part she had been. It had cleansed her, never casting blame. But that had been only the beginning. It was loving him in return that had brought her up out of the darkness. ~ Francine Rivers

If you're neurotic and you think, I'm not where I deserve to be or my mother didn't love me, or blah, blah, blah, that lie, that neurotic vision, takes over your life and you're plagued by it 'til it's cleansed. In a play, at the end of the play, the lie is revealed. [T]he better the play is, the more surprising and inevitable the lie is, as Aristotle told us. Plays are about lies. ~ David Mamet