Peter Kreeft Quotes

Before prayer changes others, it first changes us.

The first purpose of prayer is to know God.

He (God) loves what I shall be.

Some people think prayer is telling God what to do. I don't think that's the case.

Do not despair, thinking that you cannot change yourself after so many years. Simply enter into the presence of Jesus as you are and ask him to give you a fearless heart where he can be with you. You cannot make yourself different. Jesus came to give you a new heart, a new spirit, a new mind, and a new body. Let him transform you by his love and so enable you to receive his affection in your whole being.

Prayer is not so much about convincing God to do what we want God to do as it is about convincing ourselves to do what God wants us to do.

We need prayer to understand God's love for us. If we really mean to pray and want to pray we must be ready to do it now. These are only the first steps towards prayer but if we never make the first step with determination, we will not reach the last one: the presence of God

Growth is a detox process, as our weakest, darkest places are sucked up to the surface in order to be released...often, it is not a change in partners but rather a change in perception that delivers us to the love we seek.

Prayer is not about changing God, but being willing to let God change us.

Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men! Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Prayer is not conquering God's reluctance, but taking hold of God's willingness.

Not a day has gone by that I have not communicated with my Father in Heaven through prayer. It is a relationship I cherish-one I would literally be lost without. If you do not now have such a relationship with your Father in Heaven, I urge you to work toward that goal. As you do so, you will be entitled to His inspiration and guidance in your life.

Prayer does change things, all kinds of things. But the most important thing it changes is us. As we engage in this communion with God more deeply and come to know the One with whom we are speaking more intimately, that growing knowledge of God reveals to us all the more brilliantly who we are and our need to change in conformity to Him. Prayer changes us profoundly.

Faith transforms the whole person precisely to the extent that he or she becomes open to love.

Hate, like prayer, changes the person involved in the activity, not the person the activity is aimed at.

Instead of praying: 'Dear God, bring me someone fabulous,' try: 'Dear God, make me into someone fabulous.'

Prayer is not designed to inform God, but to give man a sight of his misery; to humble man's heart, to excite his desire, to inflame his faith, to animate his hope, to raise his soul from earth to heaven.

Spiritual progress is the changing of the point of view.

Love is not easy. All great religions postulate love as one of the greatest accomplishments. If it were that easy, or as easy as most people think, certainly, the great religious leaders would have been rather naive.

God does not exist to answer our prayers, but by our prayers we come to discern the mind of God.

Why pray? Evidently, God likes to be asked. God certainly does not need our wisdom or our knowledge, nor even the information contained in our prayers ("your Father knows what you need before you ask him"). But by inviting us into the partnership of creation, God also invites us into relationship. God is love, said the apostle John. God does not merely have love or feel love. God is love and cannot not love. As such, God yearns for relationship with the creatures made in his image.

He who has made great moral progress ceases to pray

If you want to awaken all of humanity, then awaken all of yourself, if you want to eliminate the suffering in the world, then eliminate all that is negative in yourself. Truly, the greatest gift you have to give is that of your own self-transformation.

Many people need a new rewiring of their heart and mind.

The circumstances we ask God to CHANGE are often the circumstances God is using to CHANGE US.

I want to change my circumstances. God wants to change me.