John Piper Quotes

I think people do things all the time in the name of love that they shouldn't be doing - such is the nature of us.

Digression is my passion. I love telling the main stories, but in some ways, what I love most is using those narratives as a way of stringing together the interesting stories that people have kind of forgotten, and that are kind of surprising. The problem is, how do you pare stories away so that the book doesn't become a distracting jumble of material, and readers lose focus? In my experience, there's really only one way to do that. I pack it all in with the rough draft, then count on myself and my trusted readers to tell me what's good and what's not good.

You've got to bring the emotion, and you have to understand that you can't touch other people if you're not touched. You can't move other people if you're not moved. So if you're just giving some frickin talk you've memorized over and over again, you're going to have a flat affect. If you've just got a bunch of visuals on the screen that are leading your talk, hang up your shoes and get the hell out of there.

You hear stories about me beating my brains out practising, but the truth is, I was enjoying myself. I couldn't wait to get up in the morning, so I could hit balls. When I'm hitting the ball where I want, hard and crisply, it's a joy that very few people experience.

God uses people who fail - Cause there aren't any other kind around.

From time immemorial, people have talked about peace without achieving it. Do we simply lack enough experience? Though we talk peace, we wage war. Sometimes we even wage war in the name of peace. . . . War may be too much a part of history to be eliminated—ever.

It now lately sometimes seemed a black miracle to me that people could actually care deeply about a subject or pursuit, and could go on caring this way for years on end. Could dedicate their entire lives to it. It seemed admirable and at the same time pathetic. We are all dying to give our lives away to something, maybe.

If I did not speak with people who call me names, I could not engage in politics.

There are too many ideas and things and people. Too many directions to go. I was starting to believe the reason it matters to care passionately about something, is that it whittles the world down to a more manageable size.

He had found the thing which the modern people call Impressionism, which is another name for that final scepticism which can find no floor to the universe.

I have a lot left inside. I believe my art will last 500 years, 1,000 years and forever. For me, art is everything. I will strive to create works of art until I die, in the hope that my work will continue to touch the hearts of people even after I have died.

I think what's so interesting for people is that I don't take it so seriously and yet I am still immersed in the [fashion] industry.

I live art, I respect people, and I've found what I want to do in life - I've found what makes me happy.

People I work with are open to leadership that has a vision, but this vision has to be communicated clearly and persuasively, and always, always with passion.

I remember a lot of people, but when I meet people and I'm stoned, I'm not as good with names.

People tend to call me names that I can't repeat on basic cable. I will give you a hint. They rhyme with itch, hunt, & bore.

You cannot motivate the best people with money. Money is just a way to keep score. The best people in any field are motivated by passion.

People like to warn you that by the time you reach the middle of your life, passion will begin to feel like a meal eaten long ago, which you remember with great tenderness.

Do what you love and try not to look at what other people occupy themselves with. Most people seem restless and bounce around too much to focus or even pay attention enough to themselves to figure out exactly what they really do love, as opposed to what the people that surround them are doing.

Everyone who works with love and with intelligence finds in the very sincerity of his love for nature and art a kind of armor against the opinions of other people.

Pursuing your passions makes you more interesting, and interesting people are enchanting.

Jesus doesn't say, "The religion founded in my name is the way, the truth, and the life, [and] what people say about me is the way." "Our way of worship, the Christian structure, is not the way," [he would say,] "I am. I am. If you want to know what life is all about, what it's supposed to be, where it's supposed to go, where it's supposed to derive its strength from, don't look at anything people say about me. Don't look at the faith that's been created. Look at my life, which is a life ultimately of sacrificial love."

...the majority of people cannot endure the bareness and futility of their lives unless they have some ardent dedication, or some passionate pursuit in which they can lose themselves.