The Hardest Peace Quotes

“It takes courage, humiliating courage, to step aside from your own sovereignty and imagined control and begin looking for the gift that comes unmerited. Yes, I’m talking about grace. Grace by my definition is the gift that comes unearned. In a world of unbelievably able bodies, where new diets are fashioned every day to keep my brand of story away, it is hard to realize you may be living in the middle of the best story ever told. That the story of breast cancer could possibly be a good story? A great story even? It would be easier to shake my fist at the test results and scream that this isn’t the right story, but to receive—humbly receive—the story no one would ever want, and know there is goodness in the midst of its horror, is not something I could ever do in my own strength. I simply cannot. That receiving comes from the One who received His own suffering for a much greater purpose than my own.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“My hope is not in the absence of suffering and comfort returned. My hope is in the presence of the One who promises never to leave or forsake, the One who declares nothing “will be able to separate us from the love of God” (Rom. 8:39). Nothing.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Trusting God when the miracle does not come, when the urgent prayer gets no answer, when there is only darkness—this is the kind of faith God values perhaps most of all. This is the kind of faith that can be developed and displayed only in the midst of difficult circumstances. This is the kind of faith that cannot be shaken because it is the result of having been shaken. Nancy Guthrie, Holding on to Hope”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“That though the hard might come and our hearts be broken, that brokenness isn’t bad. The tears are evidence of our love for one another. They did not stop that day, and they will not stop in the days to come. But tears are a gift, not something to withhold or bottle up—they are the essence of the best of life.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“But we are not the Author of our story. We are the characters.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“When I let go of having it perfect, I learned the joy of sharing life with the imperfect.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Grace is the sweet moment you never expect but turns up to get you through a day, an appointment, a reality you never, ever dreamed for yourself.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“But because I believe God’s plans for me are better than what I could plan for myself, rather than run away from the path he has set before me, I want to run toward it. I don’t want to try to change God’s mind—his thoughts are perfect. I want to think his thoughts. I don’t want to change God’s timing—his timing is perfect. I want the grace to accept his timing. I don’t want to change God’s plan—his plan is perfect. I want to embrace his plan and see how he is glorified through it. I want to submit. Nancy Guthrie, Holding on to Hope Receiving what is before me and fighting to walk in the path that is”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Sometimes the hardest peace to find is the peace in saying good-bye and leaving the work of justice and reconciliation to Jesus.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“I want to move past my own unkindness with love, and know the reckless love of Jesus, and extend that love—that unconditional, always-believing-the-best, full-of-forgiveness-and-grace love.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Jesus didn’t have to extend His love. He didn’t have to think of me when He went up on that cross. He didn’t have to rewrite my story from one of beauty to one of brokenness and create a whole new brand of beauty. He simply didn’t have to do it, but He did. He bought me. He bought me that day He died, and He showed His power when He overcame death and rose from the grave. He overcame my death in that moment. He overcame my fear of death in that unbelievable, beautiful moment, and the fruit of that death, that resurrection, and that stunning grace is peace. It is the hardest peace, because it is brutal. Horribly brutal and ugly, and we want to look away, but it is the greatest, greatest story that ever was. And it was, and it is.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Jason recently said in a sermon, “We want suffering to be like pregnancy—we have a season, and it’s over, and there is a tidy moral to the story.” I’ve come to sense that isn’t what faith is at all. What if there is never an end? What if the story never improves and the tests continue to break our hearts? Is God still good?”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“My season of weakness has taught me the joy of receiving, the strength of brokenness, and the importance of looking for God in each moment. Before cancer, I would have said”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“hard is often the vehicle Jesus uses to meet us, point us to that peace, and teach us grace.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Cancer is a gift. There, I said it. I can say that cancer and suffering give the beautiful gift of perspective. It is the gift you never wanted, the gift wrapped in confusion and brokenness and heartbreak. It’s the gift that strips all your other ideas of living from you completely. The beautiful, ugly raising to the surface of the importance of each and every moment.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“When you come to the end of yourself, that’s when something else can begin.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Affliction is a bruising of a blessing; but it is a blessing from the hand of God.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“tomorrow we get to wake up and be faithful. Whatever each step brings, and whatever hard comes, people will always disappoint us. But tomorrow, tomorrow we get to be faithful in that moment.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“In the absence of comforts and friends, is Jesus enough?”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Interestingly enough, the most-asked question in the whole Bible—from Genesis to Revelation—is “How long, O Lord, how long?” And the most repeated command from God is “Do not fear” or “Do not be afraid.” The people of God consistently cry out for relief, and the God of love bids us trust him. Scotty Smith, Objects of His Affection”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“To be alive is to be broken. And to be broken is to stand in need of grace. Honesty keeps us in touch with our neediness and the truth that we are saved sinners. There is a beautiful transparency to honest disciples who never wear a false face and do not pretend to be anything but who they are. Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“But because I believe God’s plans for me are better than what I could plan for myself, rather than run away from the path he has set before me, I want to run toward it. I don’t want to try to change God’s mind—his thoughts are perfect. I want to think his thoughts. I don’t want to change God’s timing—his timing is perfect. I want the grace to accept his timing. I don’t want to change God’s plan—his plan is perfect. I want to embrace his plan and see how he is glorified through it. I want to submit. Nancy Guthrie, Holding on to Hope”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“The “keep quiet and look good” living is always easier than heart-baring, mistake-admitting, choosing-humility life offered in Jesus.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“In the absence of grace, there is only right and wrong, black and white, and the endless unknowable gray of performance.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Anger makes us all stupid.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“I have met many who have taken that diagnosis and slipped deeply into anger. I understand. It’s an easy place to go. But I cannot go there. I have taken a path of seeking grace. It sounds trite putting those words on paper. Perhaps it is. But if God has called me to this hard story, His promise is one of sufficient grace. Sufficient for me, sufficient for my guy, sufficient for my littles.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“It took me years to find contentment in the mundane momentum of loving in motherhood.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“The grace of Jesus allows us to look honestly at our lives, not lock our stories into a place of shame. When I open wide my hands to the truth of my life and allow grace and forgiveness to seep into the pain of my story, I can lift my face, walk in grace and forgiveness, and not dwell on the bitter moments that hurt so desperately.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“Brokenness is not to be feared, but humbly received.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

“It would be easier to shake my fist at the test results and scream that this isn’t the right story, but to receive—humbly receive—the story no one would ever want, and know there is goodness in the midst of its horror, is not something I could ever do in my own strength. I simply cannot. That receiving comes from the One who received His own suffering for a much greater purpose than my own.”
― Kara Tippetts, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard