Sourced

• We do not find happiness by being assertive. We don't find happiness by running over people because we see what we want and they are in the way of that happiness so we either abandon them or we smash them. The Scriptures don't teach us to be assertive. The Scriptures teach us—and this is remarkable—the Scriptures teach us to be submissive. This is not a popular idea.
  • Seminar at LeSEA Broadcasting Studios in South Bend, Indiana (February 1993)

• You guys are all into that born again thing, which is great. We do need to be born again, since Jesus said that to a guy named Nicodemus. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, I can tell you that you just have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy too…[And he paused in the awkward silence.] But I guess that’s why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest.
  • The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical by Shane Claiborne

In Concert

• Never forget what Jesus did for you. Never take lightly what it cost Him. And never assume that if it cost Him His very life, that it won't also cost you yours.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• So go out and live real good and I promise you'll get beat up real bad. But, in a little while after you're dead, you'll be rotted away anyway. It's not gonna matter if you have a few scars. It will matter if you didn't live.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• It's so funny being a Christian musician. It always scares me when people think so highly of Christian music, Contemporary Christian music especially. Because I kinda go, I know a lot of us, and we don't know jack about anything. Not that I don't want you to buy our records and come to our concerts. I sure do. But you should come for entertainment. If you really want spiritual nourishment, you should go to church...you should read the Scriptures.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• I had a prof one time... He said, "Class, you will forget almost everything I will teach you in here, so please remember this: that God spoke to Balaam through his ass, and He has been speaking through asses ever since. So, if God should choose to speak through you, you need not think too highly of yourself. And, if on meeting someone, right away you recognize what they are, listen to them anyway."
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• I’m all the time being asked by people, ‘How do ya feel closer to God.’ And I kinda always want to say ‘I don’t know.’ When I read the lives of most of the great saints they didn’t necessarily feel very close to God. When I read the Psalms I get the feeling like David and the other Psalmists felt quite far away from God for most of the time. Closeness to God is not about feelings, closeness to God is about obedience… I don’t know how you feel close to God. And no one I know that seems to be close to God knows anything about those feelings either. I know if we obey occasionally the feeling follows, not always, but occasionally. I know that if we disobey we don’t have a shot at it.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• That’s one of the things I love about being single, everybody always goes ‘Oh, you’re single what a tragedy.’ And I go ‘Well, yeah, from about ten to two each evening it is a tragedy but that times a tragedy for most married people as well.’ One of the great advantages of being single is you can still pick up hitch hikers, if you are married you don’t want to get, you know, slit or anything, cause you have a family to support. If you single and you die it doesn’t really matter so you are free to do what you really want to do. I love that!
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• It starts off so beautifully and then at the end of that Psalm, the last verse of that Psalm is “How very blessed is the man who dashes the little one’s heads against the rocks.” This is not the sort of scripture you read at a pro-life meeting. But it’s in there none the less. Which is the thing about the Bible that’s why it always cracks me up when people say ‘Well in Dududududududududududududu it says’ you kinda go ‘Wow it says a lot of things in there.’ Proof texting is a very dangerous thing. I think if we were given the scriptures it was not so that we could prove that we were right about everything. If we were given the scriptures it was to humble us into realizing that God is right and the rest of us are just guessing. Which is what makes them so much fun to read, especially if you are not a fundamentalist.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• And this is what I have come to think: That if I want to identify fully with Jesus Christ, whom I claim to be my Savior and Lord the best way that I can do that is to identify with the poor. This I know will go against the teachings of all the popular evangelical preachers. But they’re just wrong. They’re not bad, they’re just wrong. Christianity is not about building an absolutely secure little niche in the world where you can live with your perfect little wife and your perfect little children in your beautiful little house where you have no gays or minority groups anywhere near you. Christianity is about learning to love like Jesus loved and Jesus loved the poor and Jesus loved the broken.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• Bear in mind, children, that they listen to you because you are kids—not because you are right. That's how our Father listens to us ... We never understand what we're praying, and God, in His mercy, does not answer our prayers according to our understanding, but according to His wisdom.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• Yes, it's embarrassing to be born again, but imagine how embarrassing it must have been to be born the first time. At least this time you get to wear clothes!
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• We are not saved because we're good. We're good because we're saved.
  • Lufkin, Texas (July 19, 1997)
• It's just that for so many people that I know, Christianity's this matter of ... it has everything to do with morals. Christianity is a religion about morals. And they will even talk about Jesus. And they will say kids need to know about Jesus so they won't smoke, drink, or chew, or go with girls that do, and all that kind of thing. And I kinda go, "That's not why people need to know about Jesus. The only reason—the only possible excuse for talking about Jesus is because we need a Savior."
  • The Lord's Prayer, Here in America CD (February 1994)

Unsourced

• If you've ever known the love of God, you know it's nothing but reckless and it's nothing but raging. Sometimes it hurts to be loved, and if it doesn't hurt it's probably not love, may be infatuation. I think a lot of American people are infatuated with God, but we don't really love Him, and they don't really let Him love them. Being loved by God is one of the most painful things in the world, it's also the only thing that can bring us salvation and it's like everything else that is really wonderful, there's a little bit of pain in it, little bit of hurt.

• I am a Christian, not because someone explained the nuts and bolts of Christianity to me, but because there were people willing to be nuts and bolts.

• If you want a religion that makes sense, go somewhere else. But if you want a religion that makes life, choose Christianity.

• Telling you to never give up on Jesus is like telling thirsty people to never give up on water. Christ In Youth Conference, 1991, Bolivar, Missouri

• Cause You go to church your all "Holy, Holy, Holy" for two or three hours then you go home and sin. For two or three hours your doing pretty good. Maybe the problem that you don't go to church maybe its that you go home. -Anderson 1995 Concert