Oswald Chambers famous quotes
Last updated: Jul 22, 2024
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We look upon prayer simply as a means of getting things for ourselves, but the biblical purpose of prayer is that we may get to know God Himself.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Faith is not intelligent understanding, faith is deliberate commitment to a Person where I see no way.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Every time we pray our horizon is altered, our attitude to things is altered, not sometimes but every time, and the amazing thing is that we don't pray more.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Get into the habit of dealing with God about everything. Unless in the first waking moment of the day you learn to fling the door wide back and let God in, you will work on a wrong level all day; but swing the door wide open and pray to your Father in secret, and every public thing will be stamped with the presence of God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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As long as we are flippant and stupid and shallow and think that we know ourselves, we shall never give ourselves over to Jesus Christ; but when once we become conscious that we are infinitely more than we can fathom, and infinitely greater in possibility either for good or bad than we can know, we shall be only too glad to hand ourselves over to Him.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Am I prepared to let God grip me by His power and do a work in me that is worthy of Himself? Sanctification is not my idea of what I want God to do for me; sanctification is God's idea of what He wants to do for me, and He has to get me into the attitude of mind and spirit where at any cost I will let Him sanctify me wholly.
-- Oswald Chambers -
We have the idea that God is going to do some exceptional thing- that He is preparing and equipping us for some extraordinary work in the future. But as we grow in His grace we find that God is glorifying Himself here and now, at this very moment. If we have God’s assurance behind us, the most amazing strength becomes ours, and we learn to sing, glorifying Him even in the ordinary days and ways of life.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Patience has the meaning of testing-a thing drawn out and tested, drawn out to the last strand in a strain without breaking, and ending in sheer joy. The strain on a violin string when stretched to the uttermost gives it its strength; and the stronger the strain, the finer is the sound of our life for God, and He never strains more than we are able to bear.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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We impoverish God in our minds when we say there must be answers to our prayers on the material plane; the biggest answers to our prayers are in the realm of the unseen.
-- Oswald Chambers -
God does not further our spiritual life in spite of our circumstances, but in and by our circumstances.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Spend plenty of time with God; let other things go, but don't neglect Him. We are not here to do work for God, we are here to be workers with Him, those through whom He can do His work.
-- Oswald Chambers -
We are not responsible for the circumstances we are in, but we are responsible for the way we allow those circumstances to affect us; we can either allow them to get on top of us or we can allow them to transform us into what God wants us to be.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Depression tends to turn us away from the everyday things of God’s creation. But whenever God steps in, His inspiration is to do the most natural, simple things- things we would never have imagined God was in, but as we do them we find Him there.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Eternal life is not a gift from God; eternal life is the gift of God. The energy and the power which was so very evident in Jesus will be exhibited in us by an act of the absolute sovereign grace of God, once we have made that complete and effective decision about sin. We have to keep letting go, and slowly, but surely, the great full life of God will invade us, penetrating every part.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Faith for my deliverance is not faith in God. Faith means, whether I am visibly delivered or not, I will stick to my belief that God is love.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Get to the end of yourself where you can do nothing, but where He does everything.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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The greatest test of Christianity is the wear and tear of daily life; it is like the shining of silver: the more it is rubbed the brighter it grows.
-- Oswald Chambers -
To say that 'prayer changes things' is not as close to the truth as saying, 'prayer changes me and then I change things.' God has established things so that prayer, on the basis of redemption, changes the way a person looks at things.
-- Oswald Chambers -
No matter what changes God has performed in you, never rely on them. Build only on a Person, the Lord Jesus Christ, and on the Spirit He gives.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Beware of harking back to what you once were when God wants you to be something you have never been.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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The great thing about faith in God is that it keeps a man undisturbed in the midst of disturbance.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Holiness, not happiness, is the chief end of man.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The vision that God gives is not some unattainable castle in the sky, but a vision of what God wants you to be down here.
-- Oswald Chambers -
We must build our faith not on fading lights but on the Light that never fails.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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We are in danger of being stern where God is tender, and of being tender where God is stern.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The remarkable thing about God is that when you fear God, you fear nothing else, whereas if you do not fear God, you fear everything else.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Keep your life in its constant contact with God that his surprising power may break out on the right hand and on the left. Â Always be in a state of expectancy, and see that you leave room for God to come in as he likes.
-- Oswald Chambers -
God brings you to places, among people, and into certain conditions to accomplish a definite purpose through the intercession of the Spirit in you. Your part in intercessory prayer is not to agonize over how to intercede, but to use the everyday circumstances and people God puts around you by His providence to bring them before His throne, and to allow the Spirit in you the opportunity to intercede for them. In this way God is going to touch the whole world with His saints.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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God never forces a person's will into surrender, and He never begs. He patiently waits until that person willingly yields to Him. True surrender is a matter of being 'united together [with Jesus] in the likeness of His death' (Romans 6:5) until nothing ever appeals to you that did not appeal to Him. And after you surrender--then what? Your entire life should be characterized by an eagerness to maintain unbroken fellowship and oneness with God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Prayer is the exercise of drawing on the grace of God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
In times of prosperity we are apt to forget God; we imagine it does not matter whether we recognise Him or not. As long as we are comfortably clothed and fed and looked after, our civilisation becomes an elaborate means of ignoring God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
God gives us the vision, then he takes us down to the valley to batter us into the shape of the vision, and it is in the valley that so many of us faint and give way. Every vision will be made real if we will have patience.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Get into the habit of saying, ''Speak, Lord,'' and life will become a romance.
-- Oswald Chambers -
We always know when Jesus is at work because He produces in the commonplace something that is inspiring.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Our Lord’s making of a disciple is supernatural. He does not build on any natural capacity of ours at all. God does not ask us to do the things that are naturally easy for us- He only asks us to do the things that we are perfectly fit to do through His grace, and that is where the cross we must bear will always come.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The call of God is to preach the gospel--namely, the reality of redemption in our Lord Jesus Christ. The one passion of Paul's life was to proclaim the gospel of God. He welcomed heartbreak, disillusionment , and tribulation for only one reason--these things kept him unmovable in his devotion to the gospel of God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Solitude with God repairs the damage done by the fret and noise and clamour of the world.
-- Oswald Chambers -
All heaven is interested in the cross of Christ, all hell terribly afraid of it, while men are the only beings who more or less ignore its meaning.
-- Oswald Chambers -
If you want to be of use to God, maintain the proper relationship with Jesus Christ by staying focused on Him & He will make use of you every minute you live- yet you will be unaware, on the conscious level of your life, that you are being used of Him.
-- Oswald Chambers -
God can do nothing for me until I recognize the limits of what is humanly possible, allowing Him to do the impossible.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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To terrorize a man into believing in God is never the work of God, but the work of human expediency. If we want to convince a congregation of a certain thing, we may use terror to frighten them into it; but never say that is God's way, it is our way. To call that God's method is a travesty to the character of God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Obedience to the call of Christ nearly always costs everything to two people- the one who is called, and the one who loves that one.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The Bible does not thrill; the Bible nourishes. Give time to the reading of the Bible and the recreating effect is as real as that of fresh air physically.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The main characteristic which is the proof of the indwelling Spirit is an amazing tenderness in personal dealing, and a blazing truthfulness with regard to God's Word.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Conscience is the internal perception of God's Moral Law.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Spiritual character is only made by standing loyal to God's character, no matter what distress the trial of faith brings. The distress and agony the prophets experienced was the agony of believing God when everything that was happening contradicted what they proclaimed Him to be; there was nothing to prove that God was just and true, but everything to prove the opposite.
-- Oswald Chambers -
I have no right to say I believe in God unless I order my life as under His all-seeing Eye.
-- Oswald Chambers -
It is not what a man does that is of final importance, but what he is in what he does. The atmosphere produced by a man, much more than his activities, has the lasting influence.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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It is misleading to imagine that we are developed in spite of our circumstances, for we are developed because of them. It is mastery in circumstances that is needed, not mastery over them.
-- Oswald Chambers -
If we are in Christ the whole basis of our goings is God, not conceptions of God, not ideas of God, but God Himself. We do not need any more ideas about God, the world is full of ideas about God, they are all worthless, because the ideas of God in anyone’s head are of no more use than our own ideas. What we need is a real God, not more ideas about Him.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The Christian Church should not be a secret society of specialists, but a public manifestation of believers in Jesus.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Doubt is not always a sign that a man is wrong; it may be a sign that he is thinking.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Prayer is the evidence that I am spiritually concentrated on God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
We think of prayer as a preparation for work, or a calm after having done work, whereas prayer is the essential work.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Sin is not wrong doing, it is wrong BEING, deliberate and emphatic independence of God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The proof that our relationship is right with God is that we do our best whether we feel inspired or not.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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One of the most amazing revelations of God comes to us when we learn that it is in the everyday things of life that we realize the magnificent deity of Jesus Christ.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Quit praying about yourself and spend your life for the sake of others as the bondservant of Jesus. That is the true meaning of being broken bread and poured-out wine in real life.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The moment we recognize our complete weakness and our dependence upon Him will be the very moment that the Spirit of God will exhibit His power.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Am I as spontaneously kind to God as I used to be, or am I only expecting God to be kind to me? Am I full of the little things that cheer His heart over me, or am I whimpering because things are going hardly with me? There is no joy in the soul that has forgotten what God prizes.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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It is in the middle that human choices are made; the beginning and the end remain with God. The decrees of God are birth and death, and in between those limits man makes his own distress or joy.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Happiness is not a sign that we are right with God; happiness is a sign of satisfaction, that is all, and the majority of us can be satisfied on too low a level.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Have you been asking God what He is going to do? He will never tell you. God does not tell you what He is going to do; He reveals to you Who He is.
-- Oswald Chambers -
You will never cease to be the most amazed person on earth at what God has done for you on the inside.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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We have to pray with our eyes on God, not on the difficulties.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Not often, but every once in a while, God brings us to a major turning point--a great crossroads in our life. From that point we either go more and more toward a slow, lazy, and useless Christian life, or we become more and more on fire, giving our utmost for His highest--our best for His glory.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Spiritual lust--'I must have it at once'--causes me to demand an answer from God, instead of seeking God himself who gives the answer. Is today 'the third day' and He has still not done what I expected? Whenever we insist that God should give us an answer to prayer we are off track. The purpose of prayer is that we get a hold of God, not of the answer.
-- Oswald Chambers -
If we believe in Jesus, it is not what we gain but what He pours through us that really counts. God’s purpose is not simply to make us beautiful, plump grapes, but to make us grapes so that He may squeeze the sweetness out of us.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Jesus Christ reveals, not an embarrassed God, not a confused God, not a God who stands apart from the problems, but One who stands in the thick of the whole thing with man.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The Sermon on the Mount is not a set of principles to be obeyed apart from identification with Jesus Christ. The Sermon on the Mount is a statement of the life we will live when the Holy Spirit is getting his way with us.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Never take your obedience as the reason God blesses you; obedience is the outcome of being rightly related to God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Never water down the Word of God, but preach it in its undiluted sternness. There must be unflinching faithfulness to the Word of God, but when you come to personal dealings with others, remember who you are- you are not some special being created in heaven, but a sinner saved by grace.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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We are only what we are in the dark; all the rest is reputation.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Spiritual maturity is not reached by the passing of the years, but by obedience to the will of God. Some people mature into an understanding of God’s will more quickly than others because they obey more readily; they more readily sacrifice the life of nature to the will of God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Leave the Irreparable Past in His hands, and step out into the Irresistible Future with Him.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The dearest friend on earth is a mere shadow compared to Jesus Christ.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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The real test of a saint is not one's willingness to preach the gospel, but one's willingness to do something like washing the disciples' feet - that is, being willing to do those things that seem unimportant in human estimation but count as everything to God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The battle is lost or won in the secret places of the will before God, never first in the external world.
-- Oswald Chambers -
We pray when there's nothing else we can do, but God wants us to pray before we do anything at all.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Are you learning to say things after listening to God, or are you saying things and trying to make God's word fit in?
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Seeing is never believing: we interpret what we see in the light of what we believe. Faith is confidence in God before you see God emerging, therefore the nature of faith is that it must be tried.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Perseverance is more than endurance." It is endurance combined with absolute assurance and certainty that what we are looking for is going to happen. Perseverance means more than just hanging on, which may only be exposing our fear of letting go and falling. Perseverance is our supreme effort of refusing to believe that our hero is going to be conquered.
-- Oswald Chambers -
All our fret and worry is caused by calculating without God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Keep your soul fit to manifest the life of the Son of God. Never live on memories; let the word of God be always living and active in you.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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If a crisis has come to you on any front, surrender your will to Jesus absolutely and irrevocably.
-- Oswald Chambers -
If God sees that my spiritual life will be furthered by giving the things for which I ask, then He will give them, but that is not the end of prayer. The end of prayer is that I come to know God Himself.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Whenever the insistence is on the point that God answers prayer, we are off the track. The meaning of prayer is that we get hold of God, not of the answer.
-- Oswald Chambers -
Am I learning how to use my Bible? The way to become complete for the Master’s service is to be well soaked in the Bible; some of us only exploit certain passages. Our Lord wants to give us continuous instruction out of His word; continuous instruction turns hearers into disciples.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Measure your growth in grace by your sensitiveness to sin.
-- Oswald Chambers -
When I see Jesus Christ I simply want to be what He wants me to be.
-- Oswald Chambers -
We should always choose our books as God chooses our friends, just a bit beyond us, so that we have to do our level best to keep up with them.
-- Oswald Chambers -
If a man cannot prove his religion in the valley, it is not worth anything.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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One of the greatest snares is the number of good things we might do. Jesus Christ never did the good things He might have done, He did everything He ought to do because He had His eye fixed on His Father's will and He sacrificed Himself for His Father.
-- Oswald Chambers -
When we lose sight of God we become hard and dogmatic. We hurl our own petitions at God's throne and dictate to Him as to what we wish Him to do. We do not worship God, nor do we seek to form the mind of Christ. If we are hard towards God, we will become hard towards other people.
-- Oswald Chambers -
God never fits His word to suit me; He fits me to suit His word.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The whole meaning of prayer is that we may know God.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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Grace is the overflowing favor of God, and you can always count on it being available to draw upon as needed.
-- Oswald Chambers -
God's purpose is not to perfect me to make me a trophy in His showcase; He is getting me to the place where He can use me. Let Him do what He wants.
-- Oswald Chambers -
The passion of Christianity comes from deliberately signing away my own rights and becoming a bondservant of Jesus Christ. Until I do that, I will not begin to be a saint.
-- Oswald Chambers -
If you have ever prayed in the dawn you will ask yourself why you were so foolish as not to do it always: it is difficult to get into communion with God in the midst of the hurly-burly of the day.
-- Oswald Chambers -
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