Martin Luther Quotes

The two chief things are faith and love. Faith receives the good; love gives the good. Faith offers us God as our own; love gives us to our neighbor as his own.

Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.

Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all.

Whoever does not accept my teaching may not be saved - for it is God's teaching and not mine.

To turn one's eyes away from Jesus means to turn them to the Law.

Brief let me be. The fewer words the better prayer.

The words 'I will forgive you, but I'll never forget what you've done' never explain the real nature of forgiveness.

Nothing is so much needed as a secure family life for a people seeking to rise out of poverty and backwardness.

Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter - but beautiful - struggle for a new world.

Our goal is to create a beloved community," said Dr. King, "and this will require a qualitative change in our souls as well as a quantitative change in our lives.

The secret of contentment is the realization that life is a gift, not a right. Next to faith this is the highest art - to be content with the calling in which God has placed you.

In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law . . That would lead to anarchy.

Let him who wants a true church cling to the Word by which everything is upheld.

God is not a God of sadness, death, etc., but the devil is. Christ is a God of joy, and so the Scriptures often say that we should rejoice ... A Christian should and must be a cheerful person.

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy.

So when Jesus says "Love your enemies," he is setting forth a profound and ultimately inescapable admonition.

Put thou thy trust in God; In duty's path go on; Fix on His word thy steadfast eye; So shall thy work be done.

I am so busy now that if I did not spend three hours each day in prayer, I could not get through the day.

If men only believe enough in Christ they can commit adultery and murder a thousand times a day without periling their salvation.

It is Love that will save our world and our civilization.

We must shift the arms race into a 'peace race'.

Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity.

There is no wisdom save in truth.

Should anyone knock at my heart and say, 'Who lives here?' I should reply, 'Not Martin Luther, but the Lord Jesus Christ.'

Without images we can neither think nor understand anything.

All laws and philosophy merely tell us what should be done, but they do not provide the strength to do it.

Prayer is a very precious medicine, one that certainly helps and never fails, if you will only use it.

In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action.

Lukewarm acceptance is more bewildering than outright rejection.

I would rather be a man of conviction than a man of conformity

I became convinced that noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good.

Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God, your functional savior.

All who call on God in true faith, earnestly from the heart, will certainly be heard, and will receive what they have asked and desired.

We must use time creatively.

Whatever your life's work is, do it well. A man should do his job so well that the living, the dead, and the unborn could do it no better.

The soul can do without everything except the word of God, without which none at all of its wants are provided for.

Next to the Word of God, music deserves the highest praise.

Bewilderment is the true comprehension. Not to know where you are going is the true knowledge.

Wealth is the smallest thing on earth, the least gift that God has bestowed on mankind.

What is it to serve God and to do His will? Nothing else than to show mercy to our neighbor. For it is our own neighbor who needs our service; God in heaven needs it not.

Sin is essentially a departure from God.

Holy Christendom has, in my judgment, no better teacher after the apostles than St. Augustine.

I refuse to accept the view . . . that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality.

what the situation will be like in the world before the Lord returns, namely, Christ will be despised, and the preachers of the Gospel will be regarded as fools.

The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest. That's all.

Take away the Mass, destroy the Church.

America must begin the struggle for democracy at home. The advocacy of free elections in Europe by American officials is hypocrisy when free elections are not held in great sections of America.

Racial segregation must be seen for what it is, and that is an evil system, a new form of slavery covered up with certain niceties of complexity.

I would not give one moment of heaven for all the joy and riches of the world, even if it lasted for thousands and thousands of years.

We need not invite the Devil to our table; he is too ready to come without being asked. The air all about us is filled with demons.