Quakers Quotes about Hope and Despair

“Faith and hope are not about believing everything will be alright. They call us to our purpose: to love one another. They call us to constantly cultivate love in quiet ways through it all…. In turn, faith and hope promise us that no matter what happens, unexpected tangible support will arrive, joy and love will comfort us, and infallible guidance will lead us every step of the way.”

“I was under great temptations sometimes, and my inward sufferings were heavy; but I could find none to open my condition to but the Lord alone, unto whom I cried night and day. And I went back into Nottinghamshire, and there the Lord shewed me that the natures of those things which were hurtful without, were within in the hearts and minds of wicked men…  And I cried to the Lord, saying, ‘Why should I be thus, seeing I was never addicted to commit those evils?’ And the Lord answered that it was needful I should have a sense of all conditions, how else should I speak to all conditions; and in this I saw the infinite love of God. I saw also that there was an ocean of darkness and death, but an infinite ocean of light and love, which flowed over the ocean of darkness. And in that

“If we set our hearts on goodness as a personal goal, it means that we have to ignore or suppress all the other parts of ourselves that do not fit into our ideal of goodness. That was what George Fox had already done and he was actually shocked when, on the first part of his inward journey, he came upon the dark and unacceptable parts of himself. Like Simone Weil, the twentieth century mystic, he found that he knew from the inside a potential for all possible crimes. His fantasies were guided by no one but himself, but he quickly made the acquaintance of the things inside him that could be bestial, murderous and depraved.”

“Our strength or help is only in God; but then it is near us, it is in us – a force superior to all possible opposition – a force that never was, nor can be foiled. We are free to stand in this unconquerable ability, and defeat the powers of darkness; or to turn from it, and be foiled and overcome. When we stand, we know it is God alone upholds us.”

“What is your first instinct – your first act – when you walk into a dark room? Mine is to find a light switch… to turn on a light! I want to know where I am, to see where I’m going. I want to be able to find my way.  In the creation story, the first thing God did was to flip on a light switch.  God spoke, and light came. The earth was formless, dark and empty, and God spoke light into being. ‘God called the light Day and the darkness God called Night.'”

“In this century we have been newly filled by the conscious knowledge of our own darkness – that we carry this darkness within us. We no longer need to project our darkness outward into demons or scapegoats – or, if we do, we know we are evoking disaster. It is by encounter with our own darkness that we recognise the light. It is the light itself which shows us the darkness – and both are summoned within us.”

“During a recent meeting for worship at Orange Grove I was led to share a message about depression. It has become clear to me that some highly gifted people, including some Friends, have suffered from this affliction…. When Fox spoke of an ‘ocean of darkness,’ he was using a metaphor that vividly describes what many people experience during depression – a feeling of drowning in an unending sea of despair. But Fox also experienced an ‘ocean of light’ – a sense of being buoyed up in a sea of divine love so intense it overcomes this feeling of isolation and hopelessness.”

He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.

“In this humanistic age we suppose man is the initiator and God is the responder. But the living Christ within us is the initiator and we are the responders. God the Lover, the accuser, the revealer of light and darkness presses within us. ‘Behold, I stand at the door and knock.’ And all our apparent initiative is already a response, a testimonial to His secret presence and working within us. The basic response of the soul to the Light is internal adoration and joy, thanksgiving and worship, self-surrender and listening.”

“It is very difficult not to be fearful. And I think there’s a reason that every spiritual tradition, and certainly the holy Bible itself, admonishes us not to be afraid again and again; it’s that fear is a great obstacle. It gets in our way. But we can’t will ourselves to be fearless. And so I think it’s good to be able to name the terror, to say, ‘What is terrifying you right now?'”

“Join me in holding hope for restoration. Join me in prayers and intentions for peace. Join me in offering our service toward justice and a world of mutual reciprocity.”

There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole. There is a balm in Gilead to heal our broken souls.

“It is in my heart to praise thee, O my God; let me never forget thee, what thou hast been to me in the night by thy presence, in the day of trial when I was beset in darkness, when I was cast out as a wandering bird, and when I was assaulted with strong temptations, then thy presence in secret did preserve me, and in a low estate I felt thee near me.”

“[At my first sit-in] we sat there for two days waiting for something to eat. And it was the most challenging two days of my life. People came up and spat at us in the face. They put lit cigarettes down our backs, our shirts. People would punch us in the stomach so hard that we would fall on the floor, and then they would kick us.”

“Night and day are a continuum. Our planet is constantly turning day into night, and back again to day, with some of the loveliest times being dawn and evening, when it is not sharply either day or night. Our planet is seasonal. Winter gives way to spring, to summer, to autumn, and back to winter. Our lives, too, are seasonal and cyclical.”

Man was made for Joy & Woe; And when this we rightly know Thro’ the World we safely go. Joy & Woe are woven fine, A Clothing for the Soul divine; Under every grief & pine Runs a joy with silken twine.

“Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain. And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy.”

The plow has savaged this sweet field / Misshapen clods of earth kicked up / Rocks and twisted roots exposed to view / Last year’s growth demolished by the blade.

“One day Winnie the Pooh went to visit his friend Rabbit. Rabbit, always the consummate host, offered Pooh some honey which Pooh gladly accepted. Pooh, true to form, ate rather too much honey and as he was leaving got stuck in Rabbit’s door.  Pooh was stuck half in and half out. He couldn’t go back in and he couldn’t get out. He was stuck so tight he couldn’t even sigh. (That’s what grief feels like for many people.)”

“‘The children’s meeting’ of 1663 is famous among Friends. In 1906, some Friends made a book about it, [a fictionalized account] told in the words of fourteen-year-old Judith, who was there in 1663. At the end of that first week, on Saturday, with their parents still in jail, Judith’s friend Maria came to visit and asked: ‘Who will gather the meeting tomorrow?'”

“With the change of leadership here in the US, many people are scared. They are facing threats to their security, their health, and their freedom and looking toward an uncertain future. They find themselves in “an ocean of darkness,” as George Fox wrote, though he also wrote that “an infinite ocean of light,” of God’s love, flowed over the ocean of darkness. Our faith does not tell us we will not face challenges, but that we can trust in the guidance of Spirit to show us how to love one another in ways that make a difference.”