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Henri Nouwen Quotes - Page 3

All Quotes Abundance Age Art Being Human Boundaries Brokenness Challenges Children Choices Christ Church Community Compassion Darkness Desire Discipline Effort Evil Expectations Feelings Focus Friendship Giving Glory Grace Gratitude Grief Grieving Growth Hatred Healing Heart Home Hospitality Humanity Hurt Identity Inspirational Intimacy Jesus Journey Joy Kissing Letting Go Life Listening Loneliness Love Lying Memories Opportunity Pain Past Poverty Prayer Property Quality Reading Reality Rejection Running Safety Silence Solitude Son Sorrow Soul Struggle Suffering Teaching Temptation Tragedy Transformation Unity Vocation Waiting War Weakness Writing

Jesus' whole life and mission involve accepting powerlessness and revealing in this powerlessness the limitlessness of God's love. Here we see what compassion means. It is not a bending toward the underprivileged from a

Jesus' whole life and mission involve accepting powerlessness and revealing in this powerlessness the limitlessness of God's love. Here we see what compassion means. It is not a bending toward the underprivileged from a privileged position; it is not a reaching out from on high to those who are less fortunate below; it is not a gesture of sympathy or pity for those who fail to make it in the upward pull. On the contrary, compassion means going directly to those people and places where suffering is most acute and building a home there.

Jesus, Mean, Home

I know that I have to move from speaking about Jesus to letting him speak within me, from thinking about Jesus to letting him think within me, from acting for and with Jesus to letting him act through me. I know the only way for me to see the world is to see it through his eyes.

Jesus, Moving, Eye

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2011). “Finding Our Sacred Center: A Journey to Inner Peace”, p.8, Twenty-Third Publications

A friend is more than a therapist or confessor, even though a friend can sometimes heal us and offer us God's forgiveness. A friend is that other person with whom we can share our solitude, our silence, and our prayer. A friend is that other person with whom we can look at a tree and say, "Isn't that beautiful," or sit on the beach and silently watch the sun disappear under the horizon. With a friend we don't have to say or do something special. With a friend we can be still and know that God is there with both of us.

Beautiful, Beach, Prayer

Each day holds a surprise. But only if we expect it can we see, hear, or feel it when it comes to us. Let's not be afraid to receive each day's surprise, whether it comes to us as sorrow or as joy It will open a new place in our hearts, a place where we can welcome new friends and celebrate more fully our shared humanity.

Heart, Joy, Humanity

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2009). “Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith”, p.1, Harper Collins

If I were to let my life be taken over by what is urgent, I might very well never get around to what is essential.

Taken, Essentials, Might

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2009). “Letters to Marc About Jesus: Living a Spiritual Life in a Material World”, p.3, Harper Collins

However, community is first of all a quality of the heart. It grows from the spiritual knowledge that we are alive not for ourselves but for one another. Community is the fruit of our capacity to make the interests of others more important than our own. The question, therefore, is not 'How can we make community?' but, 'How can we develop and nurture giving hearts?'

Spiritual, Heart, Giving

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2009). “Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith”, p.23, Harper Collins

Your heart is greater than your wounds.

Heart, Greater, Wounds

Let us not underestimate how hard it is to be compassionate. Compassion is hard because it requires the inner disposition to go with others to place where they are weak, vulnerable, lonely, and broken. But this is not our spontaneous response to suffering. What we desire most is to do away with suffering by fleeing from it or finding a quick cure for it.

Lonely, Compassion, Broken

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2016). “The Spiritual Life: Eight Essential Titles by Henri Nouwen”, p.20, HarperCollins

The farther the outward journey takes you, the deeper the inward journey must be.

Journey, Inward, Deeper

Henri Nouwen (2010). “The Inner Voice of Love: A Journey Through Anguish to Freedom”, p.94, Image

When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives means the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving much advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a gentle and tender hand.

Love, Friendship, Pain

"Kindness Can Open Hearts and Unexpected Opportunities" by Kare Anderson, www.huffingtonpost.com. September 17, 2015.

The truth, even though I cannot feel it right now, is that I am the chosen child of God, precious in God's eyes, called the Beloved from all eternity and held safe in an everlasting embrace... We must dare to opt consciously for our chosenness and not allow our emotions, feelings, or passions to seduce us into self-rejection.

Children, Passion, Eye

When we are crushed like grapes, we cannot think of the wine we will become.

Wine, Thinking, Grapes

Hospitality means primarily the creation of free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy. Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place. It is not to bring men and women over to our side, but to offer freedom not disturbed by dividing lines.

Mean, Men, Space

Henri Nouwen (2013). “Reaching Out”, p.71, Image

Hope means to keep living amid desperation and to keep humming in the darkness.

Mean, Darkness, Desperation

The church is not an institution forcing us to follow rules but a community inviting us to still our hunger and thirst at its table.

Community, Church, Hunger And Thirst

The greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity or power, but self-rejection.

Self, Rejection, Meaningful Life

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2017). “You are the Beloved: Daily Meditations for Spiritual Living”, p.10, Hachette UK

Prayer is not what is done by us, but rather what is done by the Holy Spirit in us.

Prayer, Done, Spirit

To forgive another from the heart is an act of liberation. We set that person free from the negative bonds that exist between us. As long as we do not forgive we pull them with us, or worse, as a heavy load. The great temptation is to cling in anger to our enemies & then define ourselves as being offended & wounded by them. Forgiveness, therefore, liberates not only the other but also ourselves. It is the way to the freedom of the children of God.

Children, Heart, Long

Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place.

Space, People, Hospitality

Henri Nouwen (2013). “Reaching Out”, p.71, Image

Our life is...a time in which sadness and joy kiss each other at every moment.

Sadness, Kissing, Joy

Jesus.. says, 'Let go of your complaints, forgive those who loved you poorly, step over your feelings of being rejected, and have the courage to trust that you won't fall into an abyss of nothingness but into the safe embrace of a God whose love will heal all your wounds.

Letting Go, Jesus, Fall

Solitude is the furnace of transformation. Without solitude we remain victims of our society and continue to be entangled in the illusions of the false self.

Self, Solitude, Our Society

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2016). “The Spiritual Life: Eight Essential Titles by Henri Nouwen”, p.18, HarperCollins

Our humanity comes to its fullest bloom in giving. We become beautiful people when we give whatever we can give: a smile, a handshake, a kiss, an embrace, a word of love, a present, a part of our life...all of our life.

Beautiful, Kissing, People

One of the tragedies of our life is that we keep forgetting who we are

Tragedy, Who We Are, Life Is

Your life is not going to be easy, and it should not be easy. It ought to be hard. It ought to be radical; it ought to be restless; it ought to lead you to places you'd rather not go.

Encouragement, Life Is, Easy

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