Vance Havner Quotes

Receiving, reading, researching, remembering, and reflecting on the Word of God are all useless if we fail to put what we learn into practice.

Most Christians are educated way beyond the level of their obedience already! We don’t need to know more, we need to do more.

We recognize a tree by its fruit, and we ought to be able to recognize a Christian by his action. The fruit of faith should be evident in our lives, for being a Christian is more than making sound professions of faith. It should reveal itself in practical and visible ways. Indeed it is better to keep quiet about our beliefs, and live them out, than to talk eloquently about what we believe, but fail to live by it.

If any man should ask me what is the first, second, and third part of being a Christian, I must answer 'Action!'

It is only all too easy to understand the requirements contained in God's Word ('Give all your goods to the poor.' 'If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the left.' 'If anyone takes your coat, let him have your cloak also. Rejoice always.' 'Count it sheer joy when you meet various temptations' etc.). The most ignorant, poor creature cannot honestly deny being able to understand God's requirements. But it is tough on the flesh to will to understand it and to then act accordingly. It is not a question of interpretation, but action.

I believe it's easy to serve God if we learn to hear from Him before we struggle to do things for Him that He never asked us to do.

study to practice in life that which the Lord commands, and then be you assured that you shall never hear nor read the same without fruit.

They who secure eternal life are doers of the word as well as hearers.

It appears that too many Christians want to enjoy the thrill of feeling right but are not willing to endure the inconvenience of being right.

Christian practice is that evidence which confirms every other indication of true godliness.

God wants to see human beings, not ghosts who shun the world. . . . Our marriage must be a 'yes' to God's earth. It must strengthen our resolve to do and accomplish something on earth. I fear that Christians who venture to stand on earth on only one leg will stand in heaven on only one leg too.

If we live the faith in our daily life, then our work too becomes a chance to spread the joy of being a Christian.

A Christian is a walking sermon. They preach far more than a minister does, for they preach all week long.

Christianity is a religion which concerns us as we are here and now, creatures of body and soul. We do not "follow the footsteps of his most holy life" by the exercise of a trained religious imagination, but by treading the firm, rough earth, up hill and down dale.

Prayer is the supreme instance of the hidden character of the Christian life.

Too many Christians live their Christian lives inside their heads; it never gets out through hands and feet and lips.

All that a Christian does, even in eating and sleeping, is prayer, when it is done in simplicity, according to the order of God, without either adding to or diminishing from it by his own choice.

Obedience is the only reality. It is faith visible, faith acting, and faith manifest. It is the test of real discipleship among the Lord's people.

Study the Bible to know about God. Obey the Bible to really know God.

You may as soon find a living man who does not breathe, as a living Christian who does not pray.

A ton of prayer will never produce what an ounce of obedience will.

I have for many years made it a practice to read through the Bible once every year.

The true ground of most men's prejudice against the Christian doctrine is because they have no mind to obey it.

Any religion has to have a practice. When you let it go so far from practice that it just becomes a matter of talk something bad happens.

We may sing, 'Crown Him Lord of all,' and rejoice in the tones of the loud-sounding organ and the deep melody of harmonious voices, but still we have done nothing until we have left the world and set our faces toward the city of God in hard practical reality. When faith becomes obedience then it is true faith indeed.