As a pastor, I've spent 30 years talking to people and heard every kind of story imaginable.

When a plan or strategy fails, people are tempted to assume it was the wrong vision. Plans and strategies can always be changed and improved. But vision doesn't change. Visions are simply refined with time.

People pray in one direction but they walk in a different direction, and direction always determines where we end up.

Guys that preach verse-by-verse through books of the Bible - that is just cheating. It's cheating because that would be easy, first of all. That isn't how you grow people. No one in the Scripture modeled that.

People are not on a truth quest; they are on a happiness quest. They will continue to attend your church - even if they don't share your beliefs - as long as they find the content engaging and helpful.

Communicators need to figure out how well do they engage people, and they should not talk one word longer than people are engaged.

You cannot communicate complicated information to large groups of people. As you increase the number of people, you have to decrease the complexity of the information.

There are some rich people who, no matter how much God sends their way, never seem to put their hope in their riches.

Rich people have the potential to reach a point where they see money as the source of their safety and security.

80% of your problems are not PEOPLE problems ... they are SYSTEM problems, because systems create the behaviors of people.

Success is an intoxicant, and intoxicated people seldom have a firm grasp on reality.

Leadership is not always about getting things done 'right.' Leadership is about getting things done through other people.

The love of Christ comes from simple people who love simple people. Never be fooled by the spiritual leader who knows a lot but doesn't love a lot.

People without clear vision are easily distracted, have a tendency to drift from one idea to another and often make foolish decisions that rob them of their dreams.

I can't make people fall in love with Jesus, but I can arrange dates.

You can't influence people you refuse to associate with.

It's ok for people to feel bad about the wrong things they've done.

Greed is supported by an endless cast of what-ifs. Greedy people can never have enough to satisfy the need they feel in light of every conceivable eventuality.

People are far more interested in what works than what's true.

It's OK to offend people with the Gospel, but, good grief- let's don't offend them with something else.

When people are convinced you want something FOR them rather than something FROM them, they are less likely to be offended when you challenge them.

On day one, the Church wasn't for church people because there weren't any church people.

Jesus did not predict a place. Jesus predicted a people.

Many years from now, what would you like people to line up and thank you for?

People do not plan to mess up their lives. They just don't plan not to.

If we want to reach the people that no one else is reaching, we've got to do things that no one else is doing.

Nothing has stolen more dreams, dashed more hopes, broken up more families, and messed up more people psychologically than our propensity to disregard God's commands regarding sexual purity.

I want people to help me reanchor the church to undeniable, mind-boggling, culture-shifting demonstration of compassion and generosity. Because, generosity was the hallmark of the early church.

What percentage should you give? I tell people to start with 10 percent because the Bible writers have a lot to say about the tithe, which means, "tenth." For some people, that's extremely uncomfortable. But so is a colonoscopy, and those save countless lives.

Grace is not reserved for good people; grace underscores the goodness of God.

The starting block for people who are going to stay in love is mutual submission.

You have no idea the numbers of people that God may want to influence through you

Leaders who refuse to listen, will eventually be surrounded by people who have nothing helpful to say

The Word of God well understood and religiously obeyed is the shortest route to spiritual perfection. And we must not select a few favorite passages to the exclusion of others. Nothing less than a whole Bible can make a whole Christian.

I say that a Christian congregation can survive and often appear to prosper in the community by the exercise of human talent and without any touch from the Holy Spirit! All that religious activity and the dear people will not know anything better until the great and terrible day when our self-employed talents are burned with fire and only that which was wrought by the Holy Ghost will stand forever!

Failure to get a right viewpoint in the beginning of our Christian lives may result in weakness and sterility for the rest of our days!

Nothing bothers the devil more than a Christian delighting in God’s presence.

The weakness of so many modern Christians is that they feel to much at home in the world. In their effort to achieve restful 'adjustment' to unregenerate society they have lost their pilgrim character and become an essential part of the very moral order against which they are sent to protest.

We Christians must look sharp that our Christianity does not simply refine our sins without removing them.

Spiritual Christians look upon the world not as a playground but as a battleground.

There is a strain of loneliness infecting many Christians, which only the presence of God can cure.

To me, it has always been difficult to understand those evangelical Christians who insist upon living in the crisis as if no crisis existed. They say they serve the Lord, but they divide their days so as to leave plenty of time to play and loaf and enjoy the pleasures of the world as well. They are at ease while the world burns....

No matter what the circumstances, we Christians should keep our heads. God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, of love and of a sound mind. It is a dismal thing to see a son of heaven cringe in terror before the sons of earth.

The complacency of Christians is the scandal of Christianity.

A Christian expects to go to Heaven on the virtue of another.

At the heart of the Christian message is God Himself waiting for His redeemed children to push in to conscious awareness of His Presence.

The Christian gospel is a message of freedom through grace and we must stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. But what shall we do with our freedom? The Apostle Paul grieved that some of the believers of his day took advantage of their freedom and indulged the flesh in the name of Christian liberty. They threw off discipline, scorned obedience and made gods of their own bellies.

Christians should be the boldest people in the world-not cocky and sure of ourselves, but sure of Him.

Walking in humility isn't focusing on what we are NOT; rather, it's declaring what God is.

Listen to no man who has not listened to God.