Samuel Godfrey George Quotations - From His Letters

The compulsion to hate is as strong as, if not stronger than the compulsion to love. Every one of us would be ready to hate as long as one has something to hate. Yet the impulse to hate is reined in by obedience to Christ who commanded us to love our enemies, and to love our fellow men. But this obedience is impossible to achieve by human strength alone, and is a work of the Holy Spirit who resides in the believer. 

Christians, by virtue of being Christians, or by virtue of being baptised and confirmed, do not automatically put on a garb of righteousness. Merely reading the Word of God, or listening to a charismatic preacher does not transform a person into a practising Christian. People who follow the teachings of Christ are those who are in love with Christ to the extent that they do not value anything else. They are also people who understand the deep truth in the teaching of Christ and appreciate the importance of following it.  

You can live with Christ, and still betray Him. Judas has proved that already. You can fraternise with Christ, and still be found wanting in faith and grace. The apostles have proved that. What made the same disappointing apostles the pillars of the Christian Faith is the transforming work of the Spirit of Christ. It is not by might, nor by power but by His Spirit. And His Spirit does not transform everyone who claims to be Christian, simply because most claims are not true.
 
That most Christians are judgemental, intolerant and hateful should not come as a surprise. They are either ignorant of the teachings of Christ, or are unmoved by them, as the Spirit is not at work in them. Therefore the greatest challenge for a practising Christian is to persevere in faith, despite the little inspiration that can be derived from fellow Christians. Ultimately he or she lives to please Christ, at the cost of everything else.

We are both lovers of Christ. We may not be Christians. A Christian is not necessarily a lover of Christ. There are Christians who do not know the Christ. And there are Christians whom Christ does not know.


We know and love Christ. And Christ loves us. We know this because the thought of Christ brings us joy. And if Christ loves us, He surely understands us. Though we fall short of His glory, He justifies us in the sight of God. 

The purpose of Christ is to reveal God's love to Man. His desire is not to condemn but to bless. His intent is not to abandon the lost child, but to seek and return him to his Father.
 
You know your Lord. He lives in you. His beauty shines through you. Your thoughts, your words and your love testify to this. May the Light that shines in both of us dispel the darkness that surrounds us.


The divine and the human in us make each of us two rather than one. You have understood the implications of this. The tension that you see between the divine and the human is a result of conflict and not harmony. The misery of life is due to the suppression of the divine element by the human. One continues in the conflict in the hope that the divine will ultimately overcome the human. The hope is really a promise made by God through Christ.

The Lord has striven much within me. His beautiful strife has produced much beauty. Thank you for understanding. You have been given the eyes to see what cannot be plainly seen. There is much I haven't said. My words conceal and reveal. Not all will be revealed. In the mystery of the divine lies the beauty.


I offer you this irony: you may not believe in the historical Christ, but you have spoken for Him. I have not met the historical Christ, nor have I seen Him in His divine glory, but I have heard His voice in yours. I have felt His love in your love for me. His encouragement delivered in your voice has kept me going. What makes us different does not matter. We are linked. And He has linked us.
 
I believe in a childhood dream. I believe that the Fire that I saw raging across the black sky is the Lord God Himself. I believe that the words of English that spontaneously issued from my Tamil lips, pledging servitude to the Lord (at a time when I barely spoke English and hardly grasped the concept of service), are the signs of a future servitude to Christ that involved this foreign language. I believe that the mad desire for the sight of Christ, which I felt soon afterward, heralded the moment when His Spirit came to reside in me. And I believe that He has remained with me ever since, even when I denigrated and denounced Him with the strongest expletives in both Tamil and English. And I believe that He still remains, even if I choose to cuckold Him continually in the arms of His enemy. The Lord will have His bride, even if she has been exceedingly violated.
 
The Lord is Spirit, and He resides in many who believe in Him. He is One despite His three manifestations. And He was once a man. This I believe without question. When I envision Christ I envision Him as the man.

Now whatever you believe, you would accept that you are drawn to me, and I believe that the historical and divine Christ is in me. Therefore you are drawn to Him, and not to me. What I have said and done, I have not said and done any of it.