Hannah Anderson > Quotes

“Discernment,” C.H. Spurgeon once famously quipped, “is knowing the difference between right and almost right.” Tweaking that ever so slightly, discernment is knowing the difference between what is good and what is better. And sometimes, seeking what is better means learning to trust God while you wait for Him to supply it.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“Humility teaches us that God is actively redeeming the world. And because He is, we can experience the relief of confessing our brokenness—whether it is intentional sin, our natural limitations, or simply the weight of living under the curse. Humility teaches us to find rest in confession. Rest from the need to hide, the need to be perfect. We rest by saying, both to God and others, “I am not enough. I need help.” And ultimately, the humility that leads us to confess our brokenness, both within and without, also frees us to grieve it and throw ourselves on the mercy of God. And this, more than anything, leads to rest. When humility expresses itself in godly sorrow, we can finally break down; we can finally let it all out; we can finally have that “good” cry. Good, both because it is a weeping, breath-sucking catharsis, but also because it is legitimate. Good, because it honestly faces the brokenness of the world while resting in something—Someone—greater. Good, because it leads to surrender. To cry like Jesus as He looks over Jerusalem. To cry like Jesus as He stands at Lazarus’s tomb. To cry like Jesus as He endures the cross and entrusts Himself to the Father.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“The One who made us is the One who guides who we become.”
― Hannah Anderson, Made for More: An Invitation to Live in God's Image

“What we choose to speak about and how we speak about it are part of the message we send to each other and the larger culture we create.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“When we encounter someone who holds a viewpoint we don’t agree with, we can begin to view their whole existence through the lens of our disagreement with them. Instead of getting to know them and engaging their ideas, we assume that we already know them because we know where they stand on a certain political or religious question. And the degree to which we disagree with them on this question becomes the degree to which we will disrespect and disregard their humanity. They become our cultural enemy with whom we can’t imagine having anything in common. We can’t imagine that they, like us, are people who love their families, walk their dogs, work hard at their jobs, enjoy a good book, and might just be working toward the common good (even if we disagree about what “good” looks like). By separating ourselves into categories of “us” and “them,” we can justify mocking them, misrepresenting their views, and (in extreme cases) condoning violence against them. But “when we engage in dehumanizing rhetoric or promote dehumanizing images,” writes sociologist Brené Brown, “we diminish our own humanity in the process.”6”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“We act out of love for God; and our obedience actually causes us to love more because it brings us into harmony with His nature and our own.”
― Hannah Anderson, Made For More: An Invitation to Live in God's Image

“Discernment gives you the ability to both appreciate the subtle beauty of a Renoir and spot a fake.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“If, however, we spend our days talking about good, worthy, glorious things, there is the strong likelihood that our lives will be filled with good, worthy, glorious things.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“Your life has intrinsic value, not simply because of who you are as an individual, but because of who He is as your God.”
― Hannah Anderson, Made for More: An Invitation to Live in God's Image

“When Jesus calls us to take His yoke, when He invites us to find rest through submission, He is not satisfying some warped need for power or His own sense of pride. He is calling us to safety. The safety that comes from belonging to Him. The safety that comes from being tamed.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“If we are to seek whatever is honorable, it must include seeking the honor that is inherent in God's image bearers. We must recognize their intrinsic dignity and hold it in high esteem. There is no wiggle room on this. No matter how different a person may be from us, no matter what political, social, or moral views they may hold, no matter how strongly and vehemently we disagree with them, no matter their crimes, we must not dishonor the image of God in them. To joke about their death or destruction, to celebrate their pain and loss, to openly mock and belittle their struggles is to blaspheme the God in whose image they are created.

This is no easy thing---especially when someone is not living honorably themselves, when they are not living in a way that is consistent with their identity as an image bearer. Somehow their hatred, pride, and deceit are able to draw hatred, pride, and deceit from us. That's why in his first epistle, Peter makes a point to call slaves to honor unkind masters, wives to honor unbelieving husbands, and all to honor the emperor---an emperor who at that very moment was seeking their lives. In calling us to honor those who have, in all human logic, forfeited the right to honor, we testify to a greater reality: whether or not a person is living within the dignity of their identity as an image bearer does not change the fact that God has bestowed dignity on them.

In honoring them, we honor God.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“One of the most compelling things about this majestic God, this God who existed before the worlds began, is that He understands our weakness. As David sang in the Judean hillsides, “He knows our frame and remembers that we are dust.” So much so, that even back in the emptiness of the cosmos, He knew that we would never be able to truly seek Him for ourselves. He knew that in our confusion, we would stumble about in the darkness, unable to find Him and unable to understand ourselves. He knew this, and so in those moments before He laid the foundations of the earth, He planned a way that He would find us.”
― Hannah Anderson, Made for More: An Invitation to Live in God's Image

“Pride tells us that all we have to do is organize well enough, plan effectively enough, and work hard enough and we can achieve our dreams. Humility teaches us that it was never up to us in the first place.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“If we speak lightly about serious things, and seriously about inconsequential things—we will be unable to discern what is good because our entire moral ballast will shift.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“What if we could see the world as God sees it—in all its brokenness and beauty—and in seeing, be able to do more than endure this life?”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“Humility reminds us of our limits; humility teaches us that we are physical beings existing in a broken world. Not only are we limited and imperfect ourselves, but our bodies and our sense of our bodies have been shaped by the false messages around us. Simply learning to “love your body” will not free you from shame because, at times, your body will feel very unlovable. What will free you from shame is humility; what will free you from shame is accepting that you are not and were never meant to be divine.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“The glory of God is a human being fully alive; and to be alive consists in beholding God.”—Irenaeus”
― Hannah Anderson, Made For More: An Invitation to Live in God's Image

“We are not called to embody Jesus ourselves; He has already been incarnated and is still even now! No, we are not called to be Jesus; we are called to fall at His feet and worship Him. We are called to affirm that "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth." [John 1:14] And it is through this worship, through recognizing His rightful place, that we are finally humbled.

When we are consumed with God's glory, we forget to worry about our own. When our eyes are fixed on Him as the source of all goodness and truth and beauty, we accept that we are not. When we are enamored by His worth and majesty, we can stop being so enamored with ourselves. And fascinatingly, when we seek God's glory, we'll be able to appreciate it in the people around us. Instead of seeing them as threats to our own glory, we will see them as beautiful reflections of His.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“Instead of comparing what you have with other people (either more or less), humility teaches you to compare what you have now with what you had when you entered this world. You entered this world with nothing. You didn’t even have clothing on. Your very existence is a gift and everything that you have or have ever had is a gift as well.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“If you are not experiencing His rest, if you are weighed down, put out, and resentful, you must ask yourself whether you’re actually pulling under His yoke. If you’re feeling burdened and heavy laden, you must question whether you’re as humbly submitted to Him as you believe yourself to be. You may have thrown off the yoke of religious form, you may be working for the greater good, but it’s entirely possible that you are still plowing under your own direction and strength. Instead of embracing Jesus as your Messiah, it’s entirely possible that you’ve become your own messiah. It’s entirely possible that you’ve begun to live beyond your means in a most literal sense.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“As much as we want other people’s sins exposed, we must be willing to have ours exposed too. We must be willing to admit when we’ve misjudged, misunderstood, and misapplied. We must not be afraid of good, honest, uncomfortable questions because ultimately good, honest, uncomfortable questions will lead us to a richer, deeper understanding of truth and ourselves. And this is how truth leads to goodness. Truth will not leave us alone. It will not allow us to be less than God intends us to be. It will press and pull and stretch us. It will force us out of the shadows, out from behind closed doors into the freedom and light of day.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“Instead, we must forgo emotional manipulation and tell the truth about God’s character. The truth is that God is kind and long-suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish,17 and it is precisely His kindness that makes us run to Him. The truth is that God has waited so long for us, despite our rejection of Him, that we can’t help but love Him. And suddenly it is the love of Christ constraining us, not guilt or fear or pressure. Suddenly the Holy Spirit is doing His own work of testifying to the glory of Christ. Suddenly the gospel is changing a person.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“Through His humanity, we learn what ours is supposed to be. Through His deity, He enables us to be what we are supposed to be.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“As long as we refuse to accept that our pride is the source of our unrest, we will continue to wither on the vine. "Humility, that low, sweet root / From which all heavenly virtues shoot." —Thomas Moore”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“While the Scripture encourages us to give up our liberties for the good of each other, the goal is not conformity. We sacrifice for each other because we are in relationship with each other, not in order to stay in relationship with each other. This nuance is essential because it helps us discern the difference between healthy and unhealthy communities. Because as much as healthy communities can lead us to wisdom and goodness, unhealthy communities can actually hinder our developing discernment. Another point that Jacobs makes in How to Think is how often we conform to community expectations and toe the party line, not because we are convinced it’s right or good, but because speaking out against it would jeopardize our membership in the group. Sometimes this may mean accepting bad treatment for ourselves, as in abusive relationships, or enabling the abuse of others, all in order to stay in the group. Jacobs says that we can tell the difference between an unhealthy community and a healthy one by its attitude toward discernment. An unhealthy community “discourages, mocks, and ruthlessly excludes those who ask uncomfortable questions. … The genuine community is open to thinking and questioning, so long as those thoughts and questions come from people of goodwill.”9 In fact, the dissenting voice is so important to finding goodness that God has equipped certain people with a particular gift for discernment.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“A crown of thorns. Do not underestimate the significance of this crown of thorns. This was not simply a way to inflict pain, to press barbs into His profoundly human flesh. This was an attempt to humiliate Him and mock His power. What better way to diminish the King of the universe than to crown Him with the very curse that hangs over His creation? What better way to triumph over Him than for evil to adorn His head? What could be more humiliating than to have our brokenness rest on Him? But”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“Emotional humility—understanding that God is greater than our heart—solves both these extremes. Humility reminds us that the lack of confidence does not determine whether God has gifted us and called us. Humility also reminds us that the presence of confidence does not mean that God has gifted us and called us. Just because we believe in ourselves doesn’t mean we should.16 Ultimately, by silencing the cacophony of emotion, humility frees you to hear God’s call and leads you to a place of both rest and flourishing.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“But this is also why Jesus calls us to come to HIm. By coming to Jesus, we remember who we are and who we are not. By coming to Him, we come face to face with God and with ourselves. "It is only in our encounter with a personal God," writes philosopher Dietrich von Hildebrand, "that we become fully aware of our condition as creatures, and fling from us the last particle of self-glory.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“And when our bodies remind us that we are not, when they wrinkle and sag and weaken, we are ashamed of them. We do not hate our bodies for what they are; we hate them for what they are not. We hate them for not being godlike. We hate them for being imperfect. We hate them for being limited. And like the man and woman in the garden, instead of rejecting the pride that tells us we could be like God, we reject our bodies that tell us we cannot.”
― Hannah Anderson, Humble Roots: How Humility Grounds and Nourishes Your Soul

“But what happens when a community can’t receive dissenting opinions? At the very least, it won’t benefit from those with the gift of discernment, and because of the pressure to conform, those with the gift might be tempted to remain silent about the danger they see. But in the silence, the community risks coming under the control of false, manipulative leaders while those who do have insight from God are ignored. Correspondingly, those with the gift of discernment might become so frustrated that they are tempted to use it to judge and divide the Body, rather than heal it.”
― Hannah Anderson, All That's Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment