Victory Motivational Quotes

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You are not a victim. No matter what you have been through, you're still here. You may have been challenged, hurt, betrayed, beaten, and discouraged, but nothing has defeated you. You are still here! You have been delayed but not denied. You are not a victim, you are a victor. You have a history of victory.
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
If you walked away from a toxic, negative, abusive, one-sided, dead-end low vibrational relationship or friendship — you won.
Lalah Delia
I am not a victim. No matter what I have been through, I'm still here. I have a history of victory.
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
Compassion crowns the soul with its truest victory.
Aberjhani (The River of Winged Dreams)
War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth a war, is much worse. When a people are used as mere human instruments for firing cannon or thrusting bayonets, in the service and for the selfish purposes of a master, such war degrades a people. A war to protect other human beings against tyrannical injustice; a war to give victory to their own ideas of right and good, and which is their own war, carried on for an honest purpose by their free choice, — is often the means of their regeneration. A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for, nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety, is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. As long as justice and injustice have not terminated their ever-renewing fight for ascendancy in the affairs of mankind, human beings must be willing, when need is, to do battle for the one against the other.
John Stuart Mill (Principles of Political Economy (Great Minds Series))
Shout out to everyone transcending a mindset, mentality, desire, belief, emotion, habit, behavior or vibration, that no longer serves them.
Lalah Delia
Advice to my younger self: 1 Start where you are with what you have 2 Try not to hurt other people 3 Take more chances 4 If you fail, keep trying
Germany Kent
The only walls that exist are those you have placed in your mind. And whatever obstacles you conceive, exist only because you have forgotten what you have already achieved.
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
Just because you feel lost doesn't mean that you are. Sometimes you just have to relax, breathe deep, and trust the path you're on.
Lalah Delia
You were born a winner, a warrior, one who defied the odds by surviving the most gruesome battle of them all - the race to the egg. And now that you are a giant, why do you even doubt victory against smaller numbers and wider margins? The only walls that exist are those you have placed in your mind. And whatever obstacles you conceive, exist only because you have forgotten what you have already achieved.
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
Don’t ever stop believing in your own personal transformation. It is still happening even on the days you may not realize it or feel like it.
Lalah Delia
Without being push to the wall, we will have remained in our comfortable zone. But this circumstance challenges us to find the courage to move on.
Lailah Gifty Akita (On Eagles Wings:Rise)
I honor you for every time this year you: got back up vibrated higher shined your light and loved and elevated beyond —the call of duty.
Lalah Delia
Each day offers you an opportunity to overcome obstacles and fears in your life. Those victories, however small they appear, are significant and don’t need to be measured against or compared with those of someone else. They stand on their own as important measures of your own personal capabilities.
Steve Pemberton (The Lighthouse Effect: How Ordinary People Can Have an Extraordinary Impact in the World)
Preparation doesn't assures victory, it assures confidence.
Amit Kalantri (Wealth of Words)
It will be better to spent our energy on reality; the tangible facts, not thoughts of the past.
Durgesh Satpathy (Equating the Equations of Insanity: A Journey from Grief to Victory)
Do not come into agreement with fear. Activate your faith, live in victory, speak over your life and expect great things to come your way.
Germany Kent
I can’t help you, I can only guide you, and you are the one who can help yourself.
Durgesh Satpathy (Equating the Equations of Insanity: A Journey from Grief to Victory)
Being in home is like magic moments, in a magic world, among maicians
Durgesh Satpathy (Equating the Equations of Insanity: A Journey from Grief to Victory)
The road to success is paved with doubters and haters.
Matshona Dhliwayo
The victory over our inner self is a daily struggle. Be strong and do not give up.
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
A warrior doesn’t worry. He or she evaluates the situation, investigates the source, calculates the risks and benefits, formulates a plan then puts it into action.
Shannon L. Alder
First gain the victory and then make the best use of it you can.
Horatio Nelson
You were born to dream. You were born to strive. You were born to conquer. You were born to rise.
Matshona Dhliwayo
You don't fight the battles you know you will win, its the ones that everyone says you will lose.
Chris Burkmenn
Emotional pain, physical damage, financial weakness are the reasons to stop for a while and not forever.
Amit Kalantri
Nothing is permanent in my mysterious world, even my moments of belief - Jenifer
Durgesh Satpathy (Equating the Equations of Insanity: A Journey from Grief to Victory)
Dear past, I survived you. Dear present, I’m ready for you. Dear future, I’m coming for you.
Matshona Dhliwayo
You were never created to live depressed, defeated, guilty, condemned, ashamed or unworthy. We were created to be victorious.
Joel Osteen
It's not life situations but our thoughts are the pilots of grief.
Durgesh Satpathy (Equating the Equations of Insanity: A Journey from Grief to Victory)
If you adjust first time, compromise second time, failure is what you will get third time.
Amit Kalantri
am blessed. I am prosperous. I am successful.” “I am victorious. I am talented. I am creative.” “I am wise. I am healthy. I am in shape.” “I am energetic. I am happy. I am positive.” “I am passionate. I am strong. I am confident.” “I am secure. I am beautiful. I am attractive.” “I am valuable. I am free. I am redeemed.” “I am forgiven. I am anointed. I am accepted.” “I am approved. I am prepared. I am qualified.” “I am motivated. I am focused. I am disciplined.” “I am determined. I am patient. I am kind.” “I am generous. I am excellent. I am equipped.” “I am empowered. I am well able.” “I am a child of the Most High God.
Joel Osteen (The Power of I Am: Two Words That Will Change Your Life Today)
You can perhaps, in a number of circumstances, tell yourself that you can't have more than you have until you do better than you're doing, but by all means steer clear of its reverse, the creed of defeat, in saying that you can't do better than you're doing until you can have more than you have.
Criss Jami (Healology)
You may encounter many disappointments. Be strong. Tell yourself, “I am good enough, I will try again.
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
The smell of the sweat is not sweet, but the fruit of the sweat is very sweet.
Amit Kalantri (Wealth of Words)
Critics are loud, but success is louder.
Matshona Dhliwayo
When all help is stopped, when your loved ones started doubting your competence, when failure seems almost confirmed, but no matter what, if you make one more attempt, that final step will fetch you the victory.
Amit Kalantri
Authentic inspiration endows individuals with mental or spiritual energy which they are then able to transform into positive action. It can make all the difference between a man, woman, or child allowing despair to permanently paralyze any dreams they may have for their lives, or, exercising sufficient strength of will to make those dreams a reality.
Aberjhani (Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry)
If you're looking for an excuse to quit you will find it, but if you are looking for the reason to continue you must fight for it.
Chris Burkmenn
A step towards what you fear is a mile towards mastering it.
Matshona Dhliwayo
The strong overcome their opponents, the mighty crush them, the shrewd outwit them, the cowardly hide from them, but the enlightened transcend them.
Matshona Dhliwayo
Champions realise that defeat - and learning from it even more than from winning - is part of the path to mastery.
Rasheed Ogunlaru
Sometimes we have to reach rock bottom before we're willing to rise up and overcome our trials.
Dana Arcuri (Reinventing You: Simple Steps to Transform Your Body, Mind, & Spirit)
Your deepest scars tell the world of your greatest triumphs.
Matshona Dhliwayo
Of course we'll win. And even if we were to lose, we'd win at losing.
Criss Jami (Killosophy)
There is much more joy in being a survivor than been a quitter.
Omoakhuana Anthonia
Adaptability and innovation are the root of victory. Chaos and fear are the birth of defeat.
Alpha Four
The more difficult the VICTORY, The Greater the Happiness in WINING
Pelé
Scars are your greatest medals in life.
Matshona Dhliwayo
The magic to attain victory is simple…..Just believe.
Omoakhuana Anthonia
Never despair if you have to start at the bottom; not even the sun rises from the top.
Matshona Dhliwayo
It is in vain to try and stop a star from rising, even with a ladder.
Matshona Dhliwayo
If you were able to fall a hundred times as a child and rise, you are able to fall a thousand times as a grown up and soar.
Matshona Dhliwayo
Losing teaches you how to win; winning teaches you how not to lose.
Matshona Dhliwayo
When excellence becomes a habit, success becomes a lifestyle.
Matshona Dhliwayo
Whatever begun with planning, ends in a victory.
Amit Kalantri
Most of us respond with panic when we get what we want. The moment of victory is often the moment of greatest peril. We let success get to our head and start acting in over-confident ways. This is the beginning of self-destruction
Mohadesa Najumi
Dear Fathers of the Fatherless Children, The Chief Guardian is filled with amazing, unbelievable strength, perseverance, and wisdom. She is powerful, she is the disciplinarian, she is a survivor, she is victorious – and most importantly, she is a mother.
Charlena E. Jackson (Dear fathers of the fatherless children)
Not after one month, not after one week, not after one day, not after one hour, not even after one minute, only after one second is the best time for a defeated person to stand up and fight for his future victory!
Mehmet Murat ildan
Peace is possible for dead bodies, living bodies can not expect peace on the way to the victory.
Amit Kalantri
If records refuse to be broken, shatter them.
Matshona Dhliwayo
It takes heart to battle great challenges, great faith to be victorious over them.
Wayne Chirisa
Stumbling towards greatness is better than sprinting towards mediocrity.
Matshona Dhliwayo
Taking a leap of faith is better than taking a leap of doubt.
Matshona Dhliwayo
It is not the size of a person in the fight, but the size of the fight in a person is what determines victory.
Ifeanyi Enoch Onuoha
If you water your dreams with excellence, success will grow.
Matshona Dhliwayo
You'll never know how close you are to victory if you give up.
Jay Samit (Disrupt You!: Master Personal Transformation, Seize Opportunity, and Thrive in the Era of Endless Innovation)
The sweetest victory is that won when everyone counted you out because they believe you can not make it.
N.K. David
I will not play it safe! I want to experience the length, depth, and breadth of life. I'm not just here for the victories... I'm here for the scars.
Steve Maraboli
‪You collide with destiny caught up in the mystery of walking the halls of a mind that's only inclined to recognize & expect victory.‬
Curtis Tyrone Jones
When you’re free from the shackles of solitude you never get the sense any mountain is too high to scale, or any horizon is too far to conquer.
Saim .A. Cheeda
Victorious you are and victorious you will be, as long as in your psyche you can see yourself as victorious.
Abhijit Naskar (Saint of The Sapiens)
My left foot is the wisdom from yesterday, my right foot is the vision of tomorrow and my mind is focused on the work of today and this is how I stand a winner.
Amit Kalantri
I don't consider those competitions fair where judges get to decide the winner, because selected judges quite often are not worthy or qualified enough to make the right decision.
Amit Kalantri
Set your goals high, and don’t stop till you get there.
Bo Jackson
Victory is a thing of the will.
Marshal Foch
If an eagle is teaching you to fly, ignore the advice of turkeys.
Matshona Dhliwayo
Mastery requires endurance. Mastery, a word we don’t use often, is not the equivalent of what we might consider its cognate—perfectionism—an inhuman aim motivated by a concern with how others view us. Mastery is also not the same as success—an event-based victory based on a peak point, a punctuated moment in time. Mastery is not merely a commitment to a goal, but to a curved-line, constant pursuit.
Sarah Lewis (The Rise: Creativity, the Gift of Failure, and the Search for Mastery)
I've never considered the possibility of defeat. I've never planned for it. That's the job for those people who plan for such things. My job is to only plan for success...victory; it has my complete focus.
Spuds Crawford
Barrayar is bred in my bones. I cannot shake it, no matter how far I travel. This struggle, God knows, has no honor in it. But exile, for no other motive than ease—that would be to give up all hope of honor. The last defeat, with no seed of future victory in it.
Lois McMaster Bujold (Shards of Honour (Vorkosigan Saga, #1))
Praying always means praying through things and not giving up. It means being ever-watchful and persevering in prayer in order to see breakthrough. God wants us to be persistent in our praying. Don’t forget to spend some quiet time praying to your Heavenly Father today.
Stormie Omartian (Prayer Warrior: The Power of Praying Your Way to Victory)
Sacrifices will make you a martyr, victories will make you a hero.
Amit Kalantri
Breaking down a closed door is quicker than waiting for someone to answer it.
Matshona Dhliwayo
MY FIVE DOS FOR GETTING BACK INTO THE GAME: 1. Do expect defeat. It’s a given when the stakes are high and the competition is working ferociously to beat you. If you’re surprised when it happens, you’re dreaming; dreamers don’t last long. 2. Do force yourself to stop looking backward and dwelling on the professional “train wreck” you have just been in. It’s mental quicksand. 3. Do allow yourself appropriate recovery—grieving—time. You’ve been knocked senseless; give yourself a little time to recuperate. A keyword here is “little.” Don’t let it drag on. 4. Do tell yourself, “I am going to stand and fight again,” with the knowledge that often when things are at their worst you’re closer than you can imagine to success. Our Super Bowl victory arrived less than sixteen months after my “train wreck” in Miami. 5. Do begin planning for your next serious encounter. The smallest steps—plans—move you forward on the road to recovery. Focus on the fix. MY FIVE DON’TS: 1. Don’t ask, “Why me?” 2. Don’t expect sympathy. 3. Don’t bellyache. 4. Don’t keep accepting condolences. 5. Don’t blame others.
Bill Walsh (The Score Takes Care of Itself: My Philosophy of Leadership)
If you give up every time you don't achieve the immediate gain you want, you're just guaranteeing that the worst is going to happen... You can't expect an easy victory after one protest march.
Noam Chomsky (Imperial Ambitions: Conversations on the Post-9/11 World)
Best of all, of course, religion solves the problem of death, which no living individuals can solve, no matter how they would support us. Religion, then, gives the possibility of heroic victory in freedom and solves the problem of human dignity at it highest level. The two ontological motives of the human condition are both met: the need to surrender oneself in full to the the rest of nature, to become a part of it by laying down one's whole existence to some higher meaning; and the need to expand oneself as an individual heroic personality. Finally, religion alone gives hope, because it holds open the dimension of the unknown and the unknowable, the fantastic mystery of creation that the human mind cannot even begin to approach, the possibility of a multidimensionality of spheres of existence, of heavens and possible embodiments that make a mockery of earthly logic-and in doing so, it relieves the absurdity of earthly life, all the impossible limitations and frustrations of living matter. In religious terms, to "see God" is to die, because the creature is too small and finite to be able to bear the higher meanings of creation. Religion takes one's very creatureliness, one's insignificance, and makes it a condition of hope. Full transcendence of the human condition means limitless possibility unimaginable to us.
Ernest Becker (The Denial of Death)
As I developed as a CEO, I found two key techniques to be useful in minimizing politics. 1. Hire people with the right kind of ambition. The cases that I described above might involve people who are ambitious but not necessarily inherently political. All cases are not like this. The surest way to turn your company into the political equivalent of the U.S. Senate is to hire people with the wrong kind of ambition. As defined by Andy Grove, the right kind of ambition is ambition for the company’s success with the executive’s own success only coming as a by-product of the company’s victory. The wrong kind of ambition is ambition for the executive’s personal success regardless of the company’s outcome. 2. Build strict processes for potentially political issues and do not deviate. Certain activities attract political behavior. These activities include:   Performance evaluation and compensation   Organizational design and territory   Promotions Let’s examine each case and how you might build and execute a process that insulates the company from bad behavior and politically motivated outcomes.
Ben Horowitz (The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers)
That is the thing you notice about second-mountain people. There’s been a motivational shift. Their desires have been transformed. If you wanted to generalize a bit, you could say there are six layers of desire: Material pleasure. Having nice food, a nice car, a nice house. Ego pleasure. Becoming well-known or rich and successful. Winning victories and recognition. Intellectual pleasure. Learning about things. Understanding the world around us. Generativity. The pleasure we get in giving back to others and serving our communities. Fulfilled love. Receiving and giving love. The rapturous union of souls. Transcendence. The feeling we get when living in accordance with some ideal.
David Brooks (The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life)
The people who explain politics for a living – the politicians themselves, their advisers, the media who cover them – love to reach conclusions like this one. Elections are decided by charismatic personalities, strategic maneuvers, the power of rhetoric, the zeitgeist of the political moment. The explainers cloak themselves in loose-fitting theories because they offer a narrative comfort, unlike the more honest acknowledgment that elections hinge on the motivations of millions of individual human beings and their messy, illogical, and often unknowable psychologies.
Sasha Issenberg (The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns)
It made the kids at camp much more enthusiastic and cooperative when they had ego goals to fulfill, I'm sure, but ultimately that kind of motivation is destructive. Any effort that has self-glorification as its final endpoint is bound to end in disaster. Now we're paying the price. When you try to climb a mountain to prove how big you are, you almost never make it. And even if you do it's a hollow victory. In order to sustain victory you have to prove yourself again and again in some other way, and again and again and again, driven forever to fill a false image, haunted by the fear that the image is not true and someone will find out. That's never the way.
Robert M. Pirsig
It's not the critic who counts. Not the man who points out where the strong man stumbled or where the doer of great deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena. Whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood. Who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again. And who, while daring greatly, spends himself in a worthy cause so that his place may not be among those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat. Theodore Roosevelt quoted by Edelman
Marian Wright Edelman (the measure of our success: a letter to my children and yours)
The Christian up to his eyes in trouble can take comfort from the knowledge that in God’s kindly plan it all has a positive purpose, to further his sanctification. In this world, royal children have to undergo extra training and discipline which other children escape, in order to fit them for their high destiny. It is the same with the children of the King of kings. The clue to understanding all his dealings with them is to remember that throughout their lives he is training them for what awaits them, and chiseling them into the image of Christ. Sometimes the chiseling process is painful and the discipline irksome, but then the Scripture reminds us: “The Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son. Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons . . . No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it” (Heb 12:6-7,11). Only the person who has grasped this can make sense of Romans 8:28, “All things work together for good to them that love God” (KJV); equally, only he can maintain his assurance of sonship against satanic assault as things go wrong. But he who has mastered the truth of adoption both retains assurance and receives blessing in the day of trouble: this is one aspect of faith’s victory over the world. Meanwhile, however, the point stands that the Christian’s primary motive for holy living is not negative, the hope (vain!) that hereby he may avoid chastening, but positive, the impulse to show his love and gratitude to his adopting God by identifying himself with the Father’s will for him.
J.I. Packer (Knowing God)
Most of the crimes which disturb the internal peace of society are produced by the restraints which the necessary, but unequal, laws of property have imposed on the appetites of mankind, by confining to a few the possession of those objects that are coveted by many. Of all our passions and appetites, the love of power is of the most imperious and unsociable nature, since the pride of one man requires the submission of the multitude. In the tumult of civil discord, the laws of society lose their force, and their place is seldom supplied by those of humanity. The ardor of contention, the pride of victory, the despair of success, the memory of past injuries, and the fear of future dangers, all contribute to inflame the mind, and to silence the voice of pity. From such motives almost every page of history has been stained with civil blood....
Edward Gibbon (The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Volume I)
Coach wastes no time delivering one of his brief, post-game speeches. As usual, it sounds like he’s talking in point form. “We lost. It feels shitty. Don’t let it get to you. Just means we work harder during practice and bring it harder for the next game.” He nods at everyone, then stalks out the door. I’d think he was pissed at us, if not for the fact that his victory speeches more or less go the same way—“We won. It feels great. Don’t let it go to your head. We work just as hard during practice and we win more games.” If any of our freshman players are expecting Coach to deliver epic motivational speeches a la Kurt Russell in Miracle, they’re in for a grave disappointment.
Elle Kennedy (The Score (Off-Campus, #3))
When black people are given a chance to tell their history. They only speak of their weakness, weak moments and defeat. When they are given a chance on Media. They only do stories, series, movies, or write articles about their bad qualities , bad people in the community. They make sure they humiliate them, but whites never do that. Whites tell of their heroes, They tell of great moments, victories and they will never tell of their losses, weakness, bad characters, criminals activities. That is why people don't respect black people or Africa even thou is a great strong continent. It is because they don't know what our heroes have done. This is information is even hidden to our children and generation to come.
D.J. Kyos
It was a long struggle against invisible foes, or to put it more accurately, against invisible foes that might not have been there at all, but it was a victorious struggle, in the course of which they understood that the victory would only be unconditional if they annihilated or, if he might put it in such old fashioned terms, said Korin, exiled, exiled anything that might have stood against them, or rather, fully absorbed it into the repulsive vulgarity of the world they now ruled, ruled if not exactly commanded, and thereby besmirched whatever was good and transcendent, not by saying a haughty 'no' to good and transcendent things, no, for they understood that the important thing was to say 'yes' from the meanest of motives, to give them their outright support, to display them, to nurture them; it was this that dawned on them and showed them what to do, that their best option was not to crush their enemies, to mock them or wipe them off the face of the earth, but, on the contrary, to embrace them, to take responsibility for them and so to empty them of their content, and in this way to establish a world in which it was precisely these things that would be the most liable to spread the infection so that the only power that had any chance of resisting them, by whose radiant light it might still have been possible to see the degree to which they had taken over people's lives... how could he make himself clearer at this point, Korin hesitated...
László Krasznahorkai (War & War)
Don’t you find it striking? The personality is constantly dying and it feels like continuity. Meanwhile, we panic about death, which we cannot ever experience. Yet it is this illogical fear that motivates our lives. We gore each other and mutilate ourselves for victory and fame, as if these might swindle mortality and extend us somehow. Then, as death bears down, we agonize over how little we have achieved. I will scarcely be recorded anywhere. Except, of course, in your eccentric newspaper. I won’t question why you’ve chosen me--thank God someone has! It extends the lease on my illusions.
Tom Rachman (The Imperfectionists)
Most churches do not grow beyond the spiritual health of their leadership. Many churches have a pastor who is trying to lead people to a Savior he has yet to personally encounter. If spiritual gifting is no proof of authentic faith, then certainly a job title isn't either. You must have a clear sense of calling before you enter ministry. Being a called man is a lonely job, and many times you feel like God has abandoned you in your ministry. Ministry is more than hard. Ministry is impossible. And unless we have a fire inside our bones compelling us, we simply will not survive. Pastoral ministry is a calling, not a career. It is not a job you pursue. If you don’t think demons are real, try planting a church! You won’t get very far in advancing God’s kingdom without feeling resistance from the enemy. If I fail to spend two hours in prayer each morning, the devil gets the victory through the day. Once a month I get away for the day, once a quarter I try to get out for two days, and once a year I try to get away for a week. The purpose of these times is rest, relaxation, and solitude with God. A pastor must always be fearless before his critics and fearful before his God. Let us tremble at the thought of neglecting the sheep. Remember that when Christ judges us, he will judge us with a special degree of strictness. The only way you will endure in ministry is if you determine to do so through the prevailing power of the Holy Spirit. The unsexy reality of the pastorate is that it involves hard work—the heavy-lifting, curse-ridden, unyielding employment of your whole person for the sake of the church. Pastoral ministry requires dogged, unyielding determination, and determination can only come from one source—God himself. Passive staff members must be motivated. Erring elders and deacons must be confronted. Divisive church members must be rebuked. Nobody enjoys doing such things (if you do, you should be not be a pastor!), but they are necessary in order to have a healthy church over the long haul. If you allow passivity, laziness, and sin to fester, you will soon despise the church you pastor. From the beginning of sacred Scripture (Gen. 2:17) to the end (Rev. 21:8), the penalty for sin is death. Therefore, if we sin, we should die. But it is Jesus, the sinless one, who dies in our place for our sins. The good news of the gospel is that Jesus died to take to himself the penalty of our sin. The Bible is not Christ-centered because it is generally about Jesus. It is Christ-centered because the Bible’s primary purpose, from beginning to end, is to point us toward the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus for the salvation and sanctification of sinners. Christ-centered preaching goes much further than merely providing suggestions for how to live; it points us to the very source of life and wisdom and explains how and why we have access to him. Felt needs are set into the context of the gospel, so that the Christian message is not reduced to making us feel better about ourselves. If you do not know how sinful you are, you feel no need of salvation. Sin-exposing preaching helps people come face-to-face with their sin and their great need for a Savior. We can worship in heaven, and we can talk to God in heaven, and we can read our Bibles in heaven, but we can’t share the gospel with our lost friends in heaven. “Would your city weep if your church did not exist?” It was crystal-clear for me. Somehow, through fear or insecurity, I had let my dreams for our church shrink. I had stopped thinking about the limitless things God could do and had been distracted by my own limitations. I prayed right there that God would forgive me of my small-mindedness. I asked God to forgive my lack of faith that God could use a man like me to bring the message of the gospel through our missionary church to our lost city. I begged God to renew my heart and mind with a vision for our city that was more like Christ's.
Darrin Patrick (Church Planter: The Man, The Message, The Mission)
As for having reached the top, with only one way to go from there, Lee had a point, no? I mean, if you cannot repeat a once-in-a-lifetime miracle—if you can never again reach the top—then why bother creating at all? Well, I can actually speak about this predicament from personal experience, because I myself was once “at the top”—with a book that sat on the bestseller list for more than three years. I can’t tell you how many people said to me during those years, “How are you ever going to top that?” They’d speak of my great good fortune as though it were a curse, not a blessing, and would speculate about how terrified I must feel at the prospect of not being able to reach such phenomenal heights again. But such thinking assumes there is a “top”—and that reaching that top (and staying there) is the only motive one has to create. Such thinking assumes that the mysteries of inspiration operate on the same scale that we do—on a limited human scale of success and failure, of winning and losing, of comparison and competition, of commerce and reputation, of units sold and influence wielded. Such thinking assumes that you must be constantly victorious—not only against your peers, but also against an earlier version of your own poor self. Most dangerously of all, such thinking assumes that if you cannot win, then you must not continue to play. But what does any of that have to do with vocation? What does any of that have to do with the pursuit of love? What does any of that have to do with the strange communion between the human and the magical? What does any of that have to do with faith? What does any of that have to do with the quiet glory of merely making things, and then sharing those things with an open heart and no expectations?
Elizabeth Gilbert (Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear)
Finally, we arrive at the question of the so-called nonpolitical man. Hitler not only established his power from the very beginning with masses of people who were until then essentially nonpolitical; he also accomplished his last step to victory in March of 1933 in a "legal" manner, by mobilizing no less than five million nonvoters, that is to say, nonpolitical people. The Left parties had made every effort to win over the indifferent masses, without posing the question as to what it means "to be indifferent or nonpolitical." If an industrialist and large estate owner champions a rightist party, this is easily understood in terms of his immediate economic interests. In his case a leftist orientation would be at variance with his social situation and would, for that reason, point to irrational motives. If an industrial worker has a leftist orientation, this too is by all mean rationally consistent—it derives from his economic and social position in industry. If, however, a worker, an employee, or an official has a rightist orientation, this must be ascribed to a lack of political clarity, i.e., he is ignorant of his social position. The more a man who belongs to the broad working masses is nonpolitical, the more susceptible he is to the ideology of political reaction. To be nonpolitical is not, as one might suppose, evidence of a passive psychic condition, but of a highly active attitude, a defense against the awareness of social responsibility. The analysis of this defense against consciousness of one's social responsibility yields clear insights into a number of dark questions concerning the behavior of the broad nonpolitical strata. In the case of the average intellectual "who wants nothing to do with politics," it can easily be shown that immediate economic interests and fears related to his social position, which is dependent upon public opinion, lie at the basis of his noninvolvement. These fears cause him to make the most grotesque sacrifices with respect to his knowledge and convictions. Those people who are engaged in the production process in one way or another and are nonetheless socially irresponsible can be divided into two major groups. In the case of the one group the concept of politics is unconsciously associated with the idea of violence and physical danger, i.e., with an intense fear, which prevents them from facing life realistically. In the case of the other group, which undoubtedly constitutes the majority, social irresponsibility is based on personal conflicts and anxieties, of which the sexual anxiety is the predominant one. […] Until now the revolutionary movement has misunderstood this situation. It attempted to awaken the "nonpolitical" man by making him conscious solely of his unfulfilled economic interests. Experience teaches that the majority of these "nonpolitical" people can hardly be made to listen to anything about their socio-economic situation, whereas they are very accessible to the mystical claptrap of a National Socialist, despite the fact that the latter makes very little mention of economic interests. [This] is explained by the fact that severe sexual conflicts (in the broadest sense of the word), whether conscious or unconscious, inhibit rational thinking and the development of social responsibility. They make a person afraid and force him into a shell. If, now, such a self-encapsulated person meets a propagandist who works with faith and mysticism, meets, in other words, a fascist who works with sexual, libidinous methods, he turns his complete attention to him. This is not because the fascist program makes a greater impression on him than the liberal program, but because in his devotion to the führer and the führer's ideology, he experiences a momentary release from his unrelenting inner tension. Unconsciously, he is able to give his conflicts a different form and in this way to "solve" them.
Wilhelm Reich (The Mass Psychology of Fascism)