I did everything religion told me to do for a long time only to end up frustrated, beat down and jaded. I couldn't keep up. No matter how hard I tried, it was never enough. So I decided to quit. And I did.
The only time my prayers are never answered is on the golf course.
The trouble with many men is that they have got just enough religion to make them miserable. If there is not joy in religion, you have got a leak in your religion.
Introspection can easily become the tool of Satan, who is called the accuser. One of his chief weapons is discouragement. He knows that if he can make us discouraged and dispirited we will not fight the battle for holiness.
Every Christian who strives for holiness of life experiences dryness of soul. It is to most people a heart-rending experience. It is a paradox, for the soul becomes confused when it realizes the harder it strives the further away Jesus seems to be.
A rabbi should not despair if people do not do as much as they should. Every parent has that with children. God is merciful.
What most of all hinders heavenly consolation is that you are too slow in turning yourself to prayer.
The devil's one object is so to depress God's people that he can go to the man of the world and say: There are God's people. Do you want to be like that?
Just having conversations with God, begging God to make the pain go away, and then the pain wouldn't go away. So I'm like 'Who the hell am I talking to? God is not responding.'
It is a common temptation of Satan to make us give up the reading of the Word and prayer when our enjoyment is gone; as if it were of no use to read the Scriptures when we do not enjoy them, and as if it were no use to pray when we have no spirit of prayer.
