Carolyn Weber > Quotes

“Ahhh, teaching literature. A noble calling! For we are all stories.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“Dr. Deveaux stopped and looked at me hard. He leaned in and whispered, 'The rest is all bullshit, Miss Drake. It's as simple as that. Your purpose here in life is to discern the real thing from the bullshit, and then to choose the non-bullshit. Think of the opportunity that God has given you to study as the means by which to attain your own personal bullshit detector. Sometimes that will be particularly difficult, because those who proclaim to know the truth, well intentioned or not, are spewing the most bullshit. But you will know when you have been properly ravished. And then you'll see, how the entire world is eyeball deep in it and that we choose it, and that we choose it every day. But the good news is that, although we struggle with it, there is a way out. Yes, there is a very worthy antidote and option to all the bullshit.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“He quickened his stride: 'The truth is in the paradox, Miss Drake. Anything not done in submission to God, anything not done to the glory of God, is doomed to failure, frailty, and futility. This is the unholy trinity we humans fear most. And we should, for we entertain it all the time at the pain and expense of not knowing the real one.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“There is nothing more powerful, more radical, more transformational than love. No other substance or force. And do not be deceived, for it is all of these things, and then far more than that. It can't be circumscribed by our desires or dictated by the whim of our moods. Not the Great Love of the Universe, as I like to call it. Not the Love that set everything in motion, keeps it in motion, which moves through all things and yet bulldozes nothing, not even our will. Try it. Just try it and you'll see. If you love that Great Love first, because It loved you first, and then love yourself as you have been loved, and love others from that love...WOW! BAM! Life without that kind of faith-that's death. Therein lies the great metaphor...Life without faith IS death. For life, as it was intended to be, is love. Start loving and you'll really start living. There is no other force in the universe comparable to that.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“...just who is your master? For we all have one. No individual, by the very state of existence, can avoid life as a form of servitude; it only remains for us to decide, deny, or remain oblivious to, whom or what we serve.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“What if everything operates by love?' I said to her, 'I mean, what if this God presence . . . is God moving through us and through everything we do? If so, why do we resist it? What if everything horrible that happens, from drive-by shootings to illness, is because we have broken this chain of love, and we don't know how to put everything right again?”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“To that point I had not realized that in doing something I love, and at which at times I may even excel, I felt something I could only define as akin to an electric volt deep in my core. From where did this power come? Was it the presence--extension or workings or shadow--of something else in me? Or was it something else encouraging me to love through what I love?”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“It all comes down to Jesus Christ, and what you CHOOSE to believe about Him. Jesus claims He is the Son of God. Jesus claims He died for you and rose from the dead. He claims that the only way to cancel out your sin and spend eternity in heaven is to be believe that He is who He said He was. These are the claims on the table. Bold claims. its will make you wince, won't it?
Personally, I think the boldness of the claims makes the choosing a lot easier. Most people who have never actually read the menu probably assume they can order a la carte at the Jesus table or customize their own recipe of faith. But you can't say yes to the historical figure and a few parables but pass on miracles, the resurrection, and the Son-of-God thing. That is not the offering. Christ is a fixed meal. It is all or nothing with His claims. Everyone is invited, but only you can decide if you actually want to eat at His table. For those who do believe in Christ, it means getting real, being hones about your sin, and living your life as if you really mean it.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“Dr. Inchbald tried his best to comply. 'I've come to the conclusion that God is sovereign, even over science, and that I cannot pretend to fully know His ways. They really are mysterious, as the saying goes. And they are not of the mind of men, no matter how hard we try to wrap our minds about these ways. I can marvel at the intricacies of the human body, which really are pretty miraculous to behold. In fact, I don't know how one can go to medical school and not be in greater awe of a Creator than ever before.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“No individual, by the very state of existence, can avoid life as a form of servitude; it only remains for us to decide, deny, or remain oblivious to, whom or what we serve.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“Jesus wanted freedom for women too,” Regina continued, “but His notion of liberation is very different from our limited one. His teachings are for the most part genderless; they apply to everyone. What is important is that my identity doesn’t lie primarily in being a professor, or being a wife, or even in being a mother. Those things will always fall short. Entire careers get swept away at a moment’s notice at the presentation of a pink slip, a vote of the elders, an accusation of a student, a cut in the budget. Marriages face infidelities, for instance, and end up like car wrecks from which people can recover but are never again the same. Children grow up and move far away and forget to write or call—as they should.” She smiled wistfully. “The point is, if you have your identity in any of these things, it’s surefire disappointment. Anything man-made—or woman-made, for that matter—will and does fail you. Having my identity in Christ first and foremost gives me the courage—yes, the courage—to live my life boldly, purposefully, in everything I do, no matter what that is.” I”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“Dr. Deveaux stopped and looked at me hard. He leaned in and whispered, “The rest is all bullshit, Miss Drake. It’s as simple as that. Your purpose here in life is to discern the real thing from the bullshit, and then to choose the non-bullshit. Think of the opportunity that God has given you to study as the means by which to attain your own personal bullshit detector. Sometimes that will be particularly difficult, because those who proclaim to know the truth, well intentioned or not, are spewing the most bullshit. But you will know when you have been properly ravished. And then you’ll see, then you’ll see, how the entire world is eyeball deep in it and that we choose it, and that we choose it every day. But the good news is that, although we struggle with it, there is a way out. Yes, there is a very worthy antidote and option to all the bullshit.” I”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“That is the bizarre thing about the good news: who knows how you will really hear it one day, but once you have heard it, I mean really HEARD it, you can never UNHEAR it. Once you have read it, or spoken it, or thought it, even if it irritates you, even if you hate hearing it or cannot find it feasible, or try to dismiss it, you cannot UNREAD it, or UNSPEAK it, or UNTHINK it.
It is like a great big elephant in a tiny room. Its obvious presence begins to squeeze out everything else, including your own little measly self. Some accept it easily, some accept it quickly, and some are struck with the mystical reality of it right away. These people have no trouble bringing the unseen into the realm of the seen. But others of us fight the elephant; we push back on it, we try to ignore it, get it to leave the room, or attempt to leave the room ourselves. But it does not help. The trunk keeps curling around the doorknob. The hook is there. It may snooze or loom or rise and recede, but regardless of the time passed or the vanity endured, the idea keeps coming back, like a cosmic boomerang you just cannot throw away. I did not realize this was part of the grace of it all-such relentless truthfulness.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“Looking at the parable of the poor widow who gave her last coins to the offering, I considered what it is to give God everything, to truly give him significant pieces of yourself until you have given him your all. To give so much that all that is left is to be with him. I think of how the world measures the depth of our giving by what we hand over, but Jesus measures it by what we hold on to.”
― Carolyn Weber, Holy Is the Day: Living in the Gift of the Present

“Yes...I love how the Irish are so comfortable with paradox that they revel in it. In fact, if you took it away from them, I suspect they would start gasping like fish out of water. No wonder their land's name, now removed from its Gaelic notions of abundance in 'eire,' evokes anger, or 'ire,' and yet also the rich, cooling green of a sea-colored jewel. A 'terrible beauty' indeed. They understand oppression and repression and explosion, but they remain a culture of faith-faith that creaks and groans and pulls, but is alive and never dull. And which urges them to art, to poetry, to song-these, too, are forms of action. Of passion. Of conviction. Yes, of love.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“I found that those friends of mine who welcomed the unseen into the realm of their seen offered immediate understanding. Some are Christians, some are not. Most are artists of some kind or other; artistry can extend to a way of being, of living lovingly in this world. Many seem to have almost a spiritual affinity for the unmarked trail, armed only with True North. ["Leap With Faith" Blogpost By Carolyn Weber — July 27, 2011]”
― Carolyn Weber

“Trauma cracks us open (or for some of us, cuts us open) so the Holy Spirit can get in. So we can “right” ourselves.”
― Carolyn Weber, Holy Is the Day: Living in the Gift of the Present

“Conversion, EVERYTHING, including yourself, gets turned around. Transformed.'
'What happens if you turn FROM one, but can't fully turn TO the other?' I cried. 'Tell me, Michael, is there a word for being eternally, pathetically, insurmountably 'stuck'?' I paused, searching for the right words, the words that would convey exactly how my soul ached but could not quite leap. They were evading me...Is there a word for wanting to forget this God and Jesus and the whole mess? For wanting to forget it ALL?' I pinned him with my eyes.
'Despair,' he reminded me, draining his glass.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“I'm like an addict when it comes to books. Compelled to read, understand, savor, wrangle with, be moved by, learn to live from these silent companions who speak so loudly.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford: A Memoir by Carolyn Weber

“Humility, or the ending point of being lost, can become the starting point of righteousness.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“Yet, it doesn't make us superfluous or unimportant, the fact that God doesn't need us,' I rushed on. 'Actually, quite the opposite. It's because He loves us in spite of not needing us that makes His love so, well, awesome.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“[My father] was handsome and tanned and smelled wonderful, like a mix of the ocean and fresh-cut grass, except when he smoked his pipe, which also smelled wonderful, as how I thought wisdom must smell, when it curls about your head.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“And there you are. In the ring. With The Terror. it’s just tiny, feeble you, another student or two smarter than you, and your professor, far smarter than you. Oh sure, your professor civilly serves tea or sherry depending on the time of day, but The Terror remains.
Gradually, however, The Terror morphs into The Excitement as you being to lose yourself in the luxurious tendrils of a stimulating argument. Time always flies, the hour (or two or three) leaving you exhausted, happy, perturbed, and yet strangely satisfied by the end…. As a result, pursuing one’s degree at Oxford becomes for most not a matter of prerequisite for a job, or to please one’s parents, or to make minimum income bracket. Rather, the opportunity to study here seals an experience marked by intense personal growth resulting from a genuine desire to learn. A heady, hearty experience that changes you forever because it cracks you open ultimately to the humility of learning, which is where all of this wanted to take you in the first place.” 56”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“...I have always felt as thought we are all made for deep relationship. I don't mean this in a prudish, judgmental way, but in the sense that whenever we do give up easily on people, or have one-night stands, or divorce, especially on a whim, it's no wonder we feel empty inside, even if we don't want to admit it. We seem 'wired' for so much more.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“I began to worry that perhaps I was getting in over my head here. It was occurring to me that believing in the Bible was an all-or-nothing affair. Either you believe it is the revealed Word of God, or you don’t. It is like being a little bit pregnant. Impossible. Either you are in or you are out. Having eliminated lunatic, given the unavoidable seriousness warranted of my attention, was it now liar or Lord?”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“...I read the Bible steadily...Even the long, monotonous lists. Even the really weird stuff, most of it so unbelievable as to only be true. I have to say I found it the most compelling piece of creative non-fiction I had ever read. If I sat around for thousands of years, I could never come up with what it proposes, let alone with how intricately Genesis unfolds toward Revelation.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“But just as suddenly the darkness receded, the pool of light seemed to take me in, as I thought how anything we do—any job, act, gesture—becomes meaningful if done with a heart for God. Was this the great diurnal paradox looming up again—nothing matters and everything does?”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“But really,' Rachel insisted, 'so unfair. Just as Christians automatically cannot be folks who give serious thought to what they are doing. As though millions of people for hundreds of years across hundreds of cultures have simply had it wrong. Chesterton was right when he claimed that 'the Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“If you do what you love, you will never work a day in your life,”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford

“We can lean into the human fear, acknowledge it, and move through it to the larger vision, or we can remain crumpled by it, crumble to it.”
― Carolyn Weber, Surprised by Oxford