John Shelby Spong Quotes

Falling in love with God is the most important thing a person can do.

Allowing myself to love God completely has obviously shed light on my self-love because he loves me more than I could ever love myself.

The inspiration came suddenly again to surrender to the Mother. It was quite unexpected: And so somehow I made a surrender to the Mother. Then I had an experience of overwhelming love. Waves of love sort of flowed into me.

Jesus represents the possibilities of a new dimension of existence that transcends all the boundaries that restrict us from opening ourselves to God and allowing this source of love to flow through us.

From the early Seventies to the mid-Eighties, I approached Rome at a snail's pace. Having concluded that God existed, I could not seriously entertain the thought of not trying to be in contact with Him.

When the faith is strong enough, it is sufficient just to be. It's a journey towards simplicity, towards quietness, towards a kind of joy that is not in time. It's a journey that has taken us from primary identification with our body and our psyche, on to an identification with God, and ultimately beyond identification.

To love another person is to see the face of God.

I have no companion but Love, no beginning, no end, no dawn. The Soul calls from within me: 'You, ignorant of the way of Love, set Me free.'

You will never cease to be the most amazed person on earth at what God has done for you on the inside.

Maharaj-ji, in my first darshan, my first meeting with him, showed me his powers. At that point I was impressed with the power. But subsequently, I realized that it was really his love that pulled me in. His love is unconditional love.

I have gone through a period of seeking to understand what or how strong or what are the connections I have to God.

If you love God, you can't hate anything or anyone. If the love one offers is met with hate, it doesn't die, rather it manifests in the form of compassion. That is universal love. It is not just a sentiment. It cannot be manifested merely by a shift in mental disposition. It can only come from inner cleaning, an inner awakening.

Let the inner god that is in each one of us speak. The temple is your body, and the priest is your heart: it is from here that every awareness must begin.

Rajneeshism is creating a Noah's Ark of consciousness, remaining centered exactly in the middle of the cyclone. You can only escape within, and that's what I teach. I do not teach worship of God or any other ritual but only a scientific way of coming to your innermost core.

I never thought much about God, certainly never wondered whether God was thinking about me, until I fell in love with a Zen Buddhist priest.

There is no greater power in heaven or on earth than pure, unconditional love.

In love lies the seed of our growth. The more we love, the closer we are to the spiritual experience.

I used to think JESUS motivated us with ultimatums, but now I know He pursues us in LOVE.

Our purpose is to grow up and become love

The complementary movement towards divine love is growth in humility which is the acceptence of the reality about ourselves, our own weakness and limitations.

And it is in this darkness, when there is nothing left in us that can please or comfort our own minds, when we seem to be useless and worthy of all contempt, when we seem to have failed, when we seem to be destroyed and devoured, it is then that the deep and secret selfishness that is too close to us for us to identify is stripped away from our souls. It is in this darkness that we find liberty. It is in this abandonment that we are made strong. This is the night which empties us and makes us pure.

The way to heaven is within. Shake the wings of love-when love's wings have become strong, there is no need to trouble about a ladder.

The hardest times to choose love are the very times when you can most grow spiritually. In fact, they are the only times you can grow spiritually!

You cease to move into yourself, away from others. You give up your antagonism. You begin to move toward others in love. God moved toward you in gracious, outgoing love, and you move toward others in that same outgoing love.

The soul can split the sky in two and let the face of God shine through.