John Bytheway Quotes

The honour of Jesus Christ is at stake in your bodily life. Are you remaining loyal to the Son of God in the things which beset His life in you? Do you continue to go with Jesus? The way lies through Gethsemane, through the city gate, outside the camp; the way lies alone, and the way lies until there is no trace of a footstep left, only the voice, 'Follow Me.'

If we are not willing to wake up in the morning and die to ourselves, perhaps we should ask ourselves whether or not we are really following Jesus.

Our virtues are dearer to us the more we have had to suffer for them. It is the same with our children. All profound affection admits a sacrifice.

Imagine that you had discovered gold or oil on a certain property, and no one else knew about it. Can you see yourself being sad and feeling deprived for having to gather all your resources and sacrifice them in order to buy that property? Hardly. Now you know what it is like to deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Jesus.

When life is rosy, we may slide by with knowing about Jesus, with imitating him and quoting him and speaking of him. But only in suffering will we know Jesus.

No healthy Christian ever chooses suffering; he chooses God's will, as Jesus did, whether it means suffering or not.

Following Jesus means taking up one's own cross to accompany him on his path, an uncomfortable path that is not one of success or earthly glory, but which leads to true freedom, the freedom from selfishness and sin.

The Lord has not redeemed you so you might enjoy pleasures and luxuries or so that you might abandon yourself to ease and indolence, but rather so you should be prepared to endure all sorts of evils.

The way of the Cross is not easy, yet it is the tuneful, the rhythmic, the beautiful, the lovely way.

The more you forget yourself, the more Jesus will think of you.

Suffering! We owe to it all that is good in us, all that gives value to life; we owe to it pity, we owe to it courage, we owe to it all the virtues.

Bear the Cross cheerfully and it will bear you.

As Christians, we worship a victimized Lord. We should expect to suffer and should have particular compassion on those who hurt emotionally and physically. But we do not resemble the Suffering Servant when we take pains to show off our suffering.

When we love like Jesus does, lives change for the better.

The stroke has given me another way to serve people. It lets me feel more deeply the pain of others; to help them know by example that ultimately, whatever happens, no harm can come. 'Death is perfectly safe,' I like to say.

When you close your eyes to tragedy, you close your eyes to greatness.

It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience.

Every merciful act to the needy, the suffering, is as though done to Jesus.

We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread.

Jesus asks me to go to him when I am overburdened. He did not promise to take away those burdens, for I must carry mine as he carried his.

You find that the things you let go of while following Jesus were the things that were going to destroy you in the end.

My role models are people who can do things; I say to myself, "I wish I could do that." Like women who endure hardships and turn their luck around and bring up children on their own and start a business. Or a social worker who leaves his country, his comfort, his friends, and goes far away to help people he doesn't know. I want to evolve into that, ultimately. I want to be that person who could sacrifice everything for others.

I think," he said, "I think, if you want thousands, you have to fight for one.

Our position in Christ Jesus is enhanced each time we help someone in trouble.

Being a Christian means renouncing ourselves, taking up the cross and carrying it with Jesus. There is no other way.