In This Mountain Quotes

“Give me faith, Lord, to know Your Presence as surely as I know the beating of my own heart. I've felt so far from You....”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“There’ll be times when you wonder how you can possibly thank Him for something that turns your life upside down; certainly there will be such times for me. Let us, then, at times like these, give thanks on faith alone… obedient, trusting, hoping, believing.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Fear knocked, faith answered. No one was there.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“He was praying the Psalms, as he'd done in times past, with the enemies of King David translated into his own enemies of fear and remorse and self-loathing, which, in their legions, had become as armies of darkness.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“When we receive the bread and blood, we, also, are touching God...I know you recognize that wonderous fact, dear brother, but sometimes it's good to be reminded.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Though we don’t do it often enough, it’s easy to have a grateful heart for food and shelter, love and hope, health and peace. But what about the hard stuff, the stuff that darkens your world and wounds you to the quick? Just what is this everything business? “It’s the hook. It’s the key. Everything is the word on which this whole powerful command stands and has its being.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“St. Francis de Sales had spoken ably to that: “Do not look forward to what may happen tomorrow; the same everlasting Father who cares for you today will take care of you tomorrow and every day. Either He will shield you from suffering, or He will give you unfailing strength to bear it.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“At times God puts us through the discipline of darkness to teach us to heed Him. Song birds are taught to sing in the dark, and we are put into the shadow of God’s hand until we learn to hear Him…. Watch where God puts you into darkness, and when you are there keep your mouth shut. Are you in the dark just now in your circumstances, or in your life with God? Then remain quiet…. When you are in the dark, listen, and God will give you a very precious message for someone else when you get into the light.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Niebuhr spoke to that,” said Father Tim. “Indeed. He said, ‘Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“we keep our eyes on Christians, we can be disappointed in a major way. The important thing is to keep our eyes on Christ….”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Our obedience will say, ‘Father, I don’t know why You’re causing, or allowing, this hard thing to happen, but I’m going to give thanks in it because You ask me to. I’m going to trust You to have a purpose for it that I can’t know and may never know. Bottom line, You’re God—and that’s good enough for me.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Lord,” he said, “speak to me, please. I can’t go on like this. Speak to me in a way I can understand clearly. I’ve read Your word, I’ve sought Your counsel, I’ve whined, I’ve groveled, I’ve despaired, I’ve pled—and I’ve waited. And through it all, Lord, You’ve been so strangely silent.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Do not look forward to what may happen tomorrow; the same everlasting Father who cares for you today will take care of you tomorrow and every day. Either He will shield you from suffering, or He will give you unfailing strength to bear it.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Then remain quiet…. When you are in the dark, listen, and God will give you a very precious message for someone else when you get into the light.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Draw nigh unto my soul, and redeem it: deliver me because of mine enemies. Thou hast known my reproach, and my shame, and my dishonour: mine adversaries are all before thee. Pour out thine indignation upon them, and let thy wrathful anger take hold of them…”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Save me, O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul. I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing: I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me. I am weary of my crying: my throat is dried: mine eyes fail while I wait for my God…. O God, thou knowest my foolishness; and my sins are not hid from thee…. My prayer is unto thee, O Lord, in an acceptable time: O God, in the multitude of thy mercy hear me…. Hear me, O Lord; for thy lovingkindness is good: turn unto me according to the multitude of thy tender mercies. And hide not thy face from thy servant; for I am in trouble: hear me speedily.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Hope thought the imagery deft enough and”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Thank you God for loving me, and for sending your son to die for my sins. I sincerely repent of my sins and receive Jesus Christ as my personal Savior. Now as your child, I turn my entire life over to you. Amen.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Then, at the final hour, when hope was dim and my heart bruised with the sense of failure, God blessed me with a completely different message. A sermon expressly for this service, this day, this people… The trouble is, he gave me only four words… Last night, alone in my study, God gave me four words that Saint Paul wrote in his first letter to the church at Thessalonica. Four words that can help us enter into obedience, trust, and closer communion with God himself, made known through Jesus Christ. Here are the four words. I pray that you will inscribe them on your heart… ‘In everything, give thanks.’… In EVERYTHING, give thanks. That’s all. That’s this morning’s message. If you believe as I do, that scripture is the inspired word of God, then we see this not as a random thought or oddly clever idea of his servant Paul, but as a loving command issued through the great apostle. Generally, Christians understand that giving thanks is good and right, though we don’t do it often enough. It’s easy to have a grateful heart when we have food and shelter, love and hope, health and peace. But what about the hard stuff? The stuff that darkens your world and wounds you to the quick? Just what is this ‘everything’ business? It’s the hook, it’s the key. ‘Everything’ is the word on which this whole powerful command stands, and has its being. Please don’t misunderstand, the word ‘thanks’ is crucial. But a deeper spiritual truth, I believe, lies in giving thanks in everything. In loss of all kinds, in illness, in depression, in grief, in failure, and of course, in health and peace, success and happiness. In everything. There will be times when you wonder how you can possibly thank him for something that turns your life upside down. Certainly, there will be such times for me. Let us then, at times like these, give thanks on faith alone, obedient, trusting, hoping, believing… Remember our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who suffered agonies we can’t begin to imagine, fulfilling God’s will that you and I might have everlasting life. Some of us have been in trying circumstances these last months, unsettling, unremitting, even, we sometimes think, unbearable. ‘Dear God,’ we pray, ‘stop this. Fix that. Bless us, and step on it.’ I admit to you that although I often thank God for my blessings, even the smallest, I haven’t thanked him for my afflictions. I know the fifth chapter of First Thessalonians pretty well, yet it just hadn’t occurred to me to actually take Him up on this notion. I’ve been too busy begging him to lead me out of the valley and onto the mountain top. After all, I have work to do, I have things to accomplish… I started thanking Him last night, this morning at two o’clock, to be precise, for something that grieves me deeply, and I’m committed to continue thanking him in this hard thing, no matter how desperate it might become. And I’m going to begin looking for the good in it, whether God caused it or permitted it. We can rest assured there is great good in it. Why have I decided to take these four words as a personal commission? Here’s the entire eighteenth verse: ‘In everything, give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you’. His will concerning you. His will concerning me. This thing which I’ve taken as a commission intrigues me. I want to see where it goes, where it leads. I pray you’ll be called to do the same. And please tell me where it leads you. Let me hear what happens when you respond to what I believe is a powerful and challenging, though deceptively simple, command of God. Let’s look once more at the four words God is saying to us by looking at what our obedience to them will say to God. Our obedience will say, ‘Father, I don’t know why you’re causing or allowing this hard thing to happen, but I’m going to give thanks in it because you ask me to. I’m going to trust you to have a purpose for it that I can’t know, and may never know. Bottom line, you’re God, and that’s good enough for me.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“He remembered Mrs. Sadie’s story of falling into the abandoned well, of her terror as she cried out unheard in the dark summer night, and unable to move. She said she’d known for the first time the deep meaning of the prayers she had learned by rote. ‘It was the darkness,’ Mrs. Sadie had told him. ‘That was the worst.’ The tears were hot on his face. His own life seemed overwhelmed by darkness these last weeks. There had been the bright and shining possibility, then had come the crushing darkness. Something flickered in his memory. ‘Songbirds,’ he whispered. ‘Songbirds. Yes. Are taught to sing in the dark.’ That was a line from Oswald Chambers from the book he’d kept by his bedside for many years… He thumbed through the worn and familiar pages. There, page 45, the reading for February 14th. ‘At times, God puts us through the discipline of darkness to teach us to heed him. Songbirds are taught to sing in the dark, and we are put into the shadow of God’s hand until we learn to hear him. Watch where God puts you into darkness, and when you are there, keep your mouth shut. Are you in the dark just now in your circumstances, or in your life with God? Then remain quiet. When you are in the dark, listen, and God will give you a very precious message for someone else when you get into the light.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“I know the fifth chapter”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“I’ve found that if we keep our eyes on Christians, we can be disappointed in a major way. The important thing is to keep our eyes on Christ….”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Something you’d written in a margin,” said George, “I can’t remember where…‘The significant, life-forming times are the dull, in-between times.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“He knew only that he must get on with his life, which lately seemed to have passed him by.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“If he was going to find what he was seeking, he’d have to look, it was that simple. “Show me, Lord,” he prayed aloud. “Lead me there and open my heart to Your wisdom….”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Still achieving, still pursuing, learn to labor and to wait.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“Remember our good verse from Jeremiah, ‘I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“The height of the mountaintop is measured by the drab drudgery of the valley.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain

“I try to wait for Him to make the darkness light, then grow afraid and try to create the light on my own.”
― Jan Karon, In This Mountain