Belief/Believe

​"Belief is a wise wager. Granted that faith cannot be proved, what harm will come to you if you gamble on its truth and it proves false? If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation, that He exists."—Blaise Pascal

“. . . an unexamined belief system is not worth holding.”—Jan David Hettinga in Follow Me

“A man’s real belief is that which he lives by.”—George McDonald

            “Belief is a twofold transaction—a deliberate destroying of all roads back again, and a complete surrender to our Lord Himself.”--Oswald Chambers in Thy Great Redemption 

            “Our Lord’s word believe does not refer to an intellectual act, but to a moral act; with our Lord to believe means to commit.”--Oswald Chambers in Approved Unto God 114

“I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, I believe in order that I may understand.”--Saint Anselm

“To believe in Jesus means much more than the experience of salvation in any form, it entails a mental and moral commitment to our Lord Jesus Christ’s view of God and humankind, of sin and the devil, and of the Scriptures.”--Oswald Chambers in Approved Unto God 104

“It seems to me that either you believe it all, or else you don’t believe at all.”—Martin Burnham

“There are three sources of belief: reason, custom and inspiration.  The mind must be open to proofs, must be confirmed by custom, and offer itself in humbleness to inspirations which alone can produce a true and saving effect.”—Blaise Pascal in Pensees
         
“Furthermore, Scripture does clearly and consistently teach the primacy of right belief as the foundation of right behavior.  In other words, righteous living is properly seen as a fruit of authentic faith, and never the other way around.”—John MacArthur in The Truth War

“The components of a belief, then, are three: first, it is something of which we are aware.  Second, it satisfies the irritation caused by doubt.  And finally, it involves the establishment in our nature of a rule of action or a habit.”—Norman Geisler in Christian Apologetics

“You can’t persuade a man to believe in God.  Belief in God is not an act of the intellect; it is a moral creation produced by the interaction of God’s Spirit and my spirit in willing obedience.”—Oswald Chambers in Conformed to His Image  36
           
“People say, “You must believe certain things before you can be a Christian.”  It is impossible.  A person’s beliefs are the effect of being a Christian, not the cause of it.”—Oswald Chambers in He Shall Glorify Me 28
           
“Belief is the abandonment of all claim to merit.  That is why it is so difficult to believe.”—Oswald Chambers in Disciples Indeed 251
           
“Distortions of belief come because principles are put in the place of Jesus Christ.”—Oswald Chambers in Disciples Indeed 314
           
“Belief in God must be tried before it is of value to God or to a child of His.”—Oswald Chamber in The Place of Help 81
           
“According to the New Testament, belief arises from intellectual conviction and goes through moral self-surrender to identification with the Lord Jesus Christ.”—Oswald Chambers in Approved Unto God 110
           
“In the Bible, theological and practical stand for the same thing.  The greatest demand God makes of us is to believe that He is righteous when everything that happens goes against that faith.”—Oswald Chambers in God’s Workmanship 60

“Today we have substituted creedal belief for personal belief, and that is why so many are devoted to causes and so few devoted to Jesus Christ.”—Oswald Chamber in My Utmost for His Highest

Belief in Jesus is a miracle productid only by the efficacy of Redemption, not by impressiveness of speech, not by wooing and winning, but by the sheer unaided power of God. The creative power of the Redemption comes through the preaching of the Gospel, but never because of the personality of the preacher.—Oswald Chambers in My Utmost for His Highest

“Belief is not an intellectual act; belief is a moral act whereby I deliberately commit myself.”—Oswald Chambers in My Utmost for His Highest

 “When people say that can’t believe, don’t argue with them on what they don’t believe, but ask them what they do believe, and proceed from that point; disbelief as often arises from temperament as from sin.”—Oswald Chambers in Disciples Indeed 253

To believe in a person is quite different from believing that a series of statements about the person are true . . . Believing that and believing in are very different.  The first leads to an emphasis on correct belief, on believing the right things.  The second leads to a transformed life.—Marcus Borg in Jesus: Uncovering the Life, Teachings, and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary

“Learn to believe in God, to take hold of God, to let God take possession of thy life, and it will be easy to take hold of the promise.”—Andrew Murray in With Christ in the School of Prayer

So believing God is just looking to God and what He is, allowing Him to reveal His presence, giving Him time and yielding the whole being to take in the full impression of what He is as God, the soul opened up to receive and rejoice in the overshadowing of His love.—Andrew Murray in With Christ in the School of Prayer

Fact: Seven out of ten self-identified, born-again Christians don’t believe in moral absolutes.  Only 10% base their moral decision-making on Biblical principles . . . Only 30% of this same group correlates spiritual maturity with “having a relationship with Jesus.” . . . 40% of all Christians do not believe they have a personal responsibility to share their faith with another.—R. James Shupp in One Blinding Vision

“Everything you say and everything you do has to prove what you believe.”—Simon Sinek in Start With Why

“Believe you can and you’re halfway there.”—Theodore Roosevelt

“We are building it on belief; for it is what men believe that makes them invincible.”—General George C. Marshall

“Believers are not bold because we think we’re somebody. We’re bold because we know Somebody.  His Name is Jesus.”—The Kenneth Copeland Word of Faith Study Bible

“You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life or death to you.”—C.S. Lewis

“Beliefs are the rails upon which our lives run.”—J.P. Moreland in Love Your God With All Your Mind
           
​“It’s not what you believe that counts; it’s what you believe enough to do.”—Gary Gulbranson quoted by Richard Stearns in The Hole In Our Gospel

 “You can only find out what you actually believe (rather than what you think you believe) by watching how you act.”—Jordan B. Peterson in 12 Rules For Life: An Antidote To Chaos, p. 103

“What a man believes moves and rules his whole being, enters into Him, and becomes part of is very life.”—Andrew Murray in The Two Covenants


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