Emily

“they cut that heart into two halves, wishing to know whether what they had been told was true. Inside, on the two halves of the heart that had been cut open, they found an inscription in gold letters: Jesus Christ.”
― Ignatius Brianchaninov, On the Prayer of Jesus: The Classic Guide to the Practice of Unceasing Prayer Found in The Way of a Pilgrim

“The rescue of drowning men is, then, a duty worth dying for, but not worth living for.”
― C.S. Lewis, How to Be a Christian: Reflections and Essays

“He shocked or excited them with irreverent comments on authority; so he caricatured rival religious teachers ‘straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel’. He produced outrageous inversions of normality – ‘Leave the dead to bury their own dead,’ Jesus said to a man who wanted to postpone becoming his disciple in order to see to his father’s funeral.40 This saying is clearly authentic, since Gospel writers felt bound to preserve it even though it outrages every pious norm of the ancient world and a universal human instinct; moreover, Christianity has stonily ignored the command throughout its subsequent history. Jesus puzzled people with references which apparently needed spelling out in private even to his closest followers.41 He had power: around him, as with many charismatic leaders over the centuries, there gathered stories of exceptional healings, miracles of providing food and drink, even raising apparent corpses from the dead.”
― Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years

“(John 14:13). Truly, truly, I tell you, if you ask anything of the Father in My name, He will give it you. Till now you have asked nothing in My name; ask and you will receive, that your joy may be full (John 16:23).”
― Ignatius Brianchaninov, On the Prayer of Jesus: The Classic Guide to the Practice of Unceasing Prayer Found in The Way of a Pilgrim