Marshall

“We tell ourselves, “Strong Christians pray a lot. If I were a stronger Christian, I’d pray more.” Strong Christians do pray more, but they pray more because they realize how weak they are. They don’t try to hide it from themselves. Weakness is the channel that allows them to access grace.”
― Paul E. Miller, A Praying Life: Connecting With God In A Distracting World

“simply—I believe that the Bible alone is the answer to all our questions, and that we need only to ask repeatedly and a little humbly, in order to receive this answer. One cannot simply read the Bible, like other books. One must be prepared really to enquire of it. Only thus will it reveal itself. Only if we expect from it the ultimate answer, shall we receive it. That is because in the Bible God speaks to us. And one cannot simply think about God in one’s own strength, one has to enquire of him. Only if we seek him, will he answer us. Of course it is also possible to read the Bible like any other book, that is to say from the point of view of textual criticism, etc.; there is nothing to be said against that. Only that that is not the method which will reveal to us the heart of the Bible, but only the surface, just as we do not grasp the words of someone we love by taking them to bits, but by simply receiving them, so that for days they go on lingering in our minds, simply because they are the words of a person we love; and just as these words reveal more and more of the person who said them as we go on, like Mary, “pondering them in our heart,” so it will be with the words of the Bible.”
― Eric Metaxas, Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy

“If you board the wrong train it is no use running along the corridor in the opposite direction. —DIETRICH BONHOEFFER”
― Eric Metaxas, Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy

“On earth, however, God doesn’t prescribe a happy life. Look at some of the Psalms. They are written by people of great faith, yet they run the emotional gamut. One even ends with “darkness is my closest friend” (Ps. 88:18). When your emotions feel muted or always low, when you are unable to experience the highs and lows you once did, the important question is not “How can I figure out what I have done wrong?” but it is, “Where do I turn—or, to whom do I turn—when I am depressed?”
― Edward T. Welch, Depression: Looking Up from the Stubborn Darkness