Quotes about Meaning

Just as this scale predicted the future health and happiness of the children in this study, so does knowing and telling our own stories of harm predict our future health and happiness in recovering from that trauma. When we know our stories and make sense of what has happened, we get connected to the larger story of our lives and its meaning. We become more resilient, we are able to handle stress, and we heal.

Paul argues for holy anger when he repeats the advice of Psalm 4:4: "In your anger do not sin" (Ephesians 4:26).

A good test of the appropriateness of a joke is whether the humor controls us or we control it.

The type of religion which rejoices in the pious sound of traditional phrases, regardless of their meanings, or shrinks from "controversial" matters, will never stand amid the shocks of life. In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.

It is not enough to know that Jesus is alive; it is not enough to know that a wonderful Person lived in the first century of the Christian era and that Person still lives, somewhere and somehow, today. Jesus lives, and that is well; but what good is it to us?

According to that fundamental principle, language is truthful, not when the meaning attached to the words by the speaker, but when the meaning intended to be produced in the mind of the particular person addressed, is in accordance with the facts.

the best use of one's life is to spend it for something that will outlast it. Life's value is not its duration but its donation—not how long we live but how fully and how well.1

Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?

Pray that your loneliness may spur you into finding something to live for, great enough to die for.

We need to step back and look at the more fundamental question: What was the author originally saying? We cannot simply read our own understandings into the meaning of a word or statement someone else wrote or said. And when we look at some often bizarre-sounding parts of the Bible, we have to try to discover who the original audience was and view the text through their lens, not ours. If we don't, the possibilities for confusion are endless.

But to mean it when I say that I want my life to count for His glory is to drive a stake through the heart of self - a painful and determined dying to me that must be a part of every day I live.

He wants you to understand that there are no wasted moments. For His glory He uses everything that's happened, everything that's happening, and everything that will happen - past, present, and future.