282 Quotes by Eugene H. Peterson

Unlike mere action, prayer is not subject to immediate evaluation or verification. If we are addicted to “results” we will quickly lose interest in prayer.

I think pastors are the worst listeners. We’re so used to speaking, teaching, giving answers. We must learn to be quiet, quit being so verbal, learn to pay attention to what’s going on, and listen.

There’s nobody who doesn’t have problems with the church, because there’s sin in the church. But there’s no other place to be a Christian except the church.

The contrast between world and church in this regard is stark: American culture is doing its dead level best with its celebrities, consumerism, and violence to keep us in a perpetually arrested state of adolescence. Yet all the while the church is quietly and without false advertising immersing us in the conditions of becoming mature to the measure of the full stature of Christ.

It’s the set of the sail, and not the gale that determines the way they go.

That’s the whole spiritual life. It’s learning how to die. And as you learn how to die, you start losing all your illusions, and you start being capable now of true intimacy and love.

People learn to shop for churches; there is no loyalty to the church. They’re consumers being attracted to one product or another. I think it’s sacrilege, to tell you the truth, it really is.

We live most days and most of the hours of those days in a world permeated with the making and purchasing of idols.

The Spirit works through community. Somebody will have a stupid, screwy idea. That’s okay. The point of having creeds and confessions and traditions is to keep us in touch with the obvious errors.