Criss Jami Quotes

Man is the only god of confusion. In a political sense the liberal man is like one shouting over the voice of God thus making it difficult to hear God; the conservative man is like one standing in the way of God, making it difficult to see God.

~ Criss Jami

Those who stand for different causes during different generations often experience the same oppositions and the same difficulties as those of the previous and the next generations. That is the basis of history repeating itself.

~ Criss Jami

Christ died not so that you could freely go on sinning, and therefore, continue dying; He died rather so that you could freely grow in obedience, and therefore, start living.

~ Criss Jami

I am not convinced within myself that to its core and as a whole, humanity has, as some like to assume, progressed a great deal over the millennia. Human technology? Of course. Human beings? Hardly.

~ Criss Jami

There is this common notion that young conservatives are the few, that most people had liberal worldviews when they were young. If this is true, then it is with great irony that a number of old liberals must never had progressed into conservatives as they grew older.

~ Criss Jami

Perhaps not everything happens for a reason. That is, until you make it so; because for everything there is a season, which can, in fact, become beautiful.

~ Criss Jami

To understand even remotely the holy omnipotence of God is to understand at least from mostly to wholly the magnificence of Christ.

~ Criss Jami

If beauty is relative, then any and everything when compared to the beauty of God is absolutely hideous.

~ Criss Jami

Together, we form a necessary paradox; not a senseless contradiction.

~ Criss Jami

For the believer, humility is honesty about one's greatest flaws to a degree in which he is fearless about truly appearing less righteous than another.

~ Criss Jami

The aim is to love God because the pure heart loves loving God and because the true mind knows He deserves it. Unlike the accusations and beliefs of the critics and skeptics, it is neither an obligation of duty; nor a fear of damnation; nor a wish for power; nor a desire to appear more righteous than others; nor because God needs it; but because through all love, truth, reason, faith, honesty, and joy in and beyond oneself and the universe, He is worthy.

~ Criss Jami

All individuals have moral deficiencies, and when introducing these to reality one not only strengthens himself but also the confidence of others in the human exigency for Christ due to a reflection throughout the body of Christ.

~ Criss Jami

Christ commands his people to love their enemies, because if not, that would rule out pretty much the entire world.

~ Criss Jami

A spirit ushered by false teachings is like a body nourished by sweets. The adult, as opposed to the child, will come to understand reasons one cannot live a healthy existence on nothing but candy; so likewise, the Christian must come to understand that one cannot know and love the will of God under false doctrine.

~ Criss Jami

Growing up I sometimes imagined that for Christ's return perhaps He would appear as 'Black Jesus' to white people and 'White Jesus' to black people just to screw with the racists.

~ Criss Jami

We are not as some people like to assume nowadays 'just being real' by embracing passively the sinful, fallen versions of ourselves. Quite the opposite really: our true selves were, from the beginning, intended to resemble the example which was then set by Christ Jesus; hence God wants to restore us to how we would have been had original sin never once befell.

~ Criss Jami

Some of the simplest of truths are also some of the most difficult of truths, but such is Christianity: 'If it's not about Christ, it's not about life.

~ Criss Jami

Initially, the God of the Old Testament might seem overwhelming and domineering to you, or tyrannical, or perhaps even evil, which is good. It is the first telling that God is indeed God, by sheer definition, and not some ear-tickling fairy by which one in his depravity is guaranteed to find another form of stale romanticism or love at first sight. For such a first impression as the latter would be problematic to the essence of Christianity. Therefore the Christians are right in saying that the nature of imperfect men cannot ultimately co-exist with the nature of a perfect God; and that the hope of each man is now desperately found in God's sending of Christ.

~ Criss Jami

Every exceptional bias against Christianity I find to be evidence for its validity.

~ Criss Jami

Without Christ a people may always have the freedom to do, but never the power to complete.

~ Criss Jami

Emotion is always multiplied in the art of a person who doesn't really show much emotion. It once expanded deep within his hidden soul, and following the downplay his audience is blown away.

~ Criss Jami

Like most arts, the link between the mind and the pen can chain you like an enslaved workaholic. Even on an intended vacation you suddenly have this killer urge to record whatever the vacation may teach.

~ Criss Jami

If I were to believe in God enough to call him a murderer, then I might also believe enough that he, as a spirit, exists beyond death; and therefore only he could do it righteously. For the physical being kills a man and hatefully sends him away, whereas God, the spiritual being, kills a man and lovingly draws him nigh.

~ Criss Jami

...There are also those who inadvertently grant power to another man's words by continuously trying to spite him. If a man gets to the point where he can simply say, 'The sky is blue,' and people indignantly rush up trying to refute him saying, 'No, the sky is light blue,' then, whether they realize it or not, he has become an authority figure even to such adversaries.

~ Criss Jami

A sign of power in a man is not only when people follow what he suggests, but also when people make a conscious effort to do the exact opposite of what he suggests.

~ Criss Jami

All great leaders find a sense of balance through their levels of reception. For instance, those who support a leader may soften him, those who ignore him may challenge him, and those who oppose him may stroke his ego.

~ Criss Jami

Everyone has their own ways of expression. I believe we all have a lot to say, but finding ways to say it is more than half the battle.

~ Criss Jami

I'm often painted as the bad guy, and the artistic part of me wants to hand out the brush.

~ Criss Jami

It starts off like climbing a tree or solving a puzzle - poetry, if nothing else, is just fun to write. But deeper into each and every piece, you no longer hesitate to call it work. It's passion. A poet's sense of lyrical accomplishment is then his food and water, his means of survival.

~ Criss Jami

From recovery to rags and rags to recovery symbolizes art - a perfect compilation of human imperfections.

~ Criss Jami

I'm never proud of my old work. I always feel as though my skills have since improved.

~ Criss Jami

I'm a peasantI'm the muzhikA pest you're destined to play the musicAnd yes it's pleasant to say it's beauty I'mIndebted to rest respecting it truly

~ Criss Jami

It is by continuing to put out good work that the artist best shows his gratitude.

~ Criss Jami

In the heart of appeasement there's the fear of rejection, and in acts of fear there are mirrors of oppression.

~ Criss Jami

The extent of creativity to which I admire in an individual is his ability to be richly creative while still, in a way, telling the truth. It is the fool who creates only his own lies, and the bore who simply repeats what he is told.

~ Criss Jami

Time and time again does the pride of man influence his very own fall. While denying it, one gradually starts to believe that he is the authority, or that he possesses great moral dominion over others, yet it is spiritually unwarranted. By that point he loses steam; in result, he falsely begins trying to prove that unwarranted dominion by seizing the role of a condemner.

~ Criss Jami

God is our final say in who and what's negative and who and what's positive in our lives. It is best not to have this so over-simplified as the illusioned superstitionists have it; an infinite being's tests may not always be so flowery, and the things we may see as positive are in many cases simply desires of our sinful nature. We are to protect our spirit without falling into the narcissistic mistake of trying to protect our selfish emotions, which the latter, in turn, is more than unlikely to bring peace and happiness. But rather guilt and emptiness. When one walks around constantly, in his mind, attempting to separate positive versus negative people, he is already controlled by something even worse than those he calls the 'negative people', and that is before he spots it soon enough to avoid it as he hypocritically tries to avoid them.

~ Criss Jami

Everybody knows basically what is right and what is wrong. Everybody knows better than to hate others. In fact, most people teach against it, and yet we still see it on the daily. But why do you think that is? It is because the problem was never really humans not loving humans enough; the problem was humans not loving righteousness enough. We must empty our own love for the world so that it can be replaced by the love of Christ; only then will we begin to love people as Christ loves people, as He always intended.

~ Criss Jami

The sacrifices we make to stay healthy, to look good, the tasty foods we skip, the guilt trips, the exercising - all these things require great discipline, care, and even a paradoxical, self-denying self-love of sorts in order to be properly executed. However it is regretful that so many of us today are not as passionate about our spiritual holiness as we are about our physical health. They are indeed both important - we should worship in every aspect of our lives - and one even, in a sense, entails the other. Although, this disproportion in said priorities is still very much expected: we humans have always taken a liking to trendiness and the temporal side of things, doing what is judged vainly in the eyes of man before that which is judged vitally and eternally in the eyes of God (i.e. cleaning the outside of one's cup while leaving a filthy inside). But in a way, it all goes to show that the man who fully hates discipline hates himself fully; for within the spirit is where The Holy One judges true wellness or malady.

~ Criss Jami

There are those who feel that the world is ultimately moving closer to Truth and to prosperity as the times evolve; then there are those who feel that it is ultimately moving farther away from Truth and into self-destruction. From this, and if it were really that simplistic, one might get the impression that life gravitates slightly into two types of people whom which are diametrically opposed in spirit.

~ Criss Jami