Quotes About Congregation

#1. Many old music hall fans were present at the funeral today of Fred 'Chuckles' Jenkins, Britain's oldest and unfunniest comedian. In tribute, the vicar read out one of Fred's jokes, and the congregation had two minutes silence.

Ronnie Barker

#2. Music is a gut thing. You're working in a medium which is more in touch with the primal than the modern. A gig is a ritual. There's a congregation.

Siobhan Fahey

#3. In mid-career, I was at one and the same time the rabbi of a major congregation, writing books, and teaching at Columbia. I didn't spend enough time with my children. Now, when I get an all-important call, I sometimes say that I'm having lunch with my granddaughter. And I do not apologize

Arthur Hertzberg

#4. They will be like shadows, they will be like wraiths, gray members of a congregation of nightmare; hark! his long wavering howl ... an aria of fear made audible.
The wolfsong is the sound of the rending you will suffer, in itself a murdering.

Angela Carter

#5. There's a lot of terminology, like "washes whiter than snow," and these things which when they're said in a uniracial congregation, they just go fine. But when they're said in a mixed congregation, some people will get offended and wonder, "Why are you saying that? What are you saying?"

Michael Emerson

#6. If God's words determine reality, then of all the things a pastor does, speaking the words of God to the congregation is the most important.

Carl R. Trueman

#7. I give money for church organs in the hope the organ music will distract the congregation's attention from the rest of the service.

Andrew Carnegie

#8. Modern church music is so constructed that the congregation cannot hear one distinct word.

Desiderius Erasmus

#9. The earlier practice of the Church had been more or less to employ in worship under the presidency of the pastor or pastors, the gifts of the congregation.

Robert Rainy

#10. I think there's definitely a potential there for a congregation to survive without the Crystal Cathedral. The congregation is the people. It's not the building.

Robert A. Schuller

#11. Yourselves above the congregation of the LORD? NUM16.4 And when Moses heard it, he fell upon his face: NUM16.5 And he

Anonymous

#12. My heart went out, seeking the God of my people. In thousands of homes those white candles burned tonight. I joined an invisible congregation.

Jessie Sampter

#13. It has been well and truly said that in the exoteric church the ceremony is performed by one person for the benefit of the congregation; but in the Lodge the ceremony is performed by the congregation for the benefit of one person.

Dion Fortune

#14. In the context of Quaker worship, it is perfectly appropriate for any person in the congregation to speak a timely word from the Lord.

Richard Foster

#15. To see with one's own eyes, to feel and judge without succumbing to the suggestive power of the fashion of the day, to be able to express what one has seen and felt in a snappy sentence or even in a cunningly wrought word - is that not glorious? Is it not a proper subject for congregation?

Albert Einstein

#16. I know that God our Father is in this work in great congregations ... and in the smallest branch and the smallest congregation.

Loren C. Dunn

#17. When the congregation becomes the norm by which sermons are measured, a minister has put a mortgage on his soul.

Ralph W. Sockman

#18. The next morning, the earth was strewn with debris from the windstorm the night before. An audience of trees looked down on severed limbs cast about the ground, their hunched and beaten postures reminding me of a congregation of amputees gathered in the wake of a war.

John Burley

#19. If it came to saving the life of one priest or sacrificing the life of an entire congregation, the church would save the life of the priest. Which is backwards, of course.

Rob Walton

#20. Any musical person who has never heard a Negro congregation under the spell of religious fervor sing these old songs has missed one of the most thrilling emotions which the human heart may experience.

James Weldon Johnson

#21. Finney preached and sometimes the whole congregation would get up and leave! that's good preaching.

Leonard Ravenhill

#22. George Washington participated as a vestryman in his local congregation, but that didn't really imply any particular kind of religious belief. This was necessary in order to participate in the society.

Matthew Stewart

#23. Because marriage is meant to reflect the great sacrificial and sanctifying love Christ has for his church, it makes sense to connect your married life to a local Christian congregation.

Matt Chandler

#24. A joyful congregation is an attractive congregation.

T. B. Joshua

#25. A pastor who does not pray daily for his congregation is not a pastor.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

#26. Focus on the mind and the soul. Read. Study. Enrol in a course of lectures. Pray. Become a member of a religious congregation. Study the Bible or other ancient works of wisdom.

Jonathan Sacks

#27. A good church is a Bible-centered church. Nothing is as important as this
not a large congregation, a witty pastor, or tangible experiences of the Holy Spirit.

Alistair Begg

#28. Or perhaps you notice a congregation of ladybugs on a rose stalk. Don't invoke the old nursery saying and ask them to fly away home. Their house is not on fire. Your roses are, with aphids, which the ladybugs are feeding on - and you can bless yourself that they have come to your rescue.

Eleanor Perenyi

#29. I tell my congregation at times, "You don't have to feel conviction for every sermon. Some of you are actually obedient and faithful in this area." Not perfectly, of course, but truly and sincerely.

Kevin DeYoung

#30. Ay, rail at gaming - 'tis a rich topic, and affords noble declamation. Go, preach against it in the city - you'll find a congregation in every tavern.

Edward Moore

#31. To think because you have been "saved" that you are now sane is insanity. God doesn't fix the mind. He only gives you opportunities to have moments of clarity. It is your job to climb the mountain and see above the clouds for yourself, not to believe the congregation's interpretation of the view.

Shannon L. Alder

#32. I think it's of huge importance to us as worship leaders ... to ask ourselves these two questions: What were the words we put into our congregation's mouths, minds, and memories? And how well did our congregation sing? Our role is simply to be an accompaniment to them as they sing.

Keith Getty

#33. When the rest of the congregation rose at the entrance of the choir he kept his seat. He argued that rising to one's feet at such a time tended to make the choir-boys conceited.

Isa Bowman

#34. We drove past a small church, and the congregation had abandoned the building to stand outside in a circle with their heads bowed, maybe hoping their prayers would get a better signal on the lawn.

Heaven has notoriously bad reception.

Atom Yang

#35. You probably can't get much closer to God than serving a congregation 24/7. At the same time, there's a different kind of closeness in this present life I have in which I have much more freedom to come and go and to engage some of the silence and stillness and solitude that I was missing before.

Barbara Brown Taylor

#36. Donald Coggan's wisdom: "When true preaching takes place, the main actor is not the preacher, nor the congregation, but the Holy Spirit."15

Calvin Miller

#37. I don't think we should discriminate against an organization or congregation because they're religious, if they're doing good work. But government can't subsidize proselytizing or worship or religious activity. It can't.

Jim Wallis

#38. The test of a preacher is that his congregation goes away saying, not "What a lovely sermon!" but "I will do something."

Saint Francis De Sales

#39. Christ [is] the very essence of all delights and pleasures, the very soul and substance of them. As all the rivers are gathered into the ocean, which is congregation or meeting-place of all waters in the world: so Christ is that ocean in which all true delights and pleasures meet ...

John Flavel

#40. God, Benny, don't blow your nose like that in the church. You'd lift half the congregation out of their seats," Patsy warned.

Maeve Binchy

#41. HOMILETICS, n. The science of adapting sermons to the spiritual needs, capacities and conditions of the congregation.

Ambrose Bierce

#42. The cultivation of consumer spirituality is the antithesis of a sacrificial, "deny yourself" congregation.

Eugene H. Peterson

#43. The umpire had comical news. The congregation had been theoretically spotted from the air by a theoretical enemy. They were all theoretically dead now. The theoretical corpses laughed and ate a hearty noontime meal.

Kurt Vonnegut

#44. I was astonished to learn in one of these best-selling books (on church life) that the size of my church parking lot had far more to do with how things fared in my congregation than my choice of texts in preaching. I was being lied to and I knew it.

Eugene H. Peterson

#45. The only way to understand the Psalms is on your knees, the whole congregation praying the words of the Psalms with all its strength.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

#46. Handel's "He Shall Feed His Flock Like a Shepherd," a popular anthem with elaborate part singing that the congregation performed faultlessly. As hundreds of tenor voices soared across the

Ken Follett

#47. Christmas Day 800, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne "Holy Roman Emperor" in the Basilica of St. Peter. The congregation acclaimed him as "Augustus," and Leo prostrated himself at Charlemagne's feet.

Karen Armstrong

#48. I coach church planters to look at the ethnic diversity of schools and neighborhoods they are near. This will be an indicator how ethnically diverse their congregation can become.

Derwin L. Gray

#49. The attention of the congregation is a major part of the attention that the pastor gives to his or her utterance. It's very exceptional. I don't know anyone who doesn't enjoy a good sermon. People who are completely nonreligious know a good sermon when they hear one.

Marilynne Robinson

#50. I am humbled and deeply honored to have been asked to serve the congregants of Shearith Israel, a congregation with an incomparable history, where some of America's most distinguished rabbis have pastored and preached.

Meir Soloveichik

#51. Slurping these spirits is soul preparation, a warped communion, myself serving as god, priest, and congregation.

Mary Karr

#52. Don't allow the Internet to become your congregation. YouTube is a horrible place to go to church.

Albert Mohler

#53. Do you think that I am an old man? I could prove to this congregation that I am young; for I could find more girls who would choose me for a husband than can carry any of the young men.

Brigham Young

#54. The spiritual life of any congregation and its growth in grace will never exceed the high-water mark set by its pulpit.

Steven J. Lawson

#55. Of all the doctors I have known, psychoanalysts, a congregation of lay priests with bible, rites, and the faithful, constitute the most sinister, the most ridiculous, the most unwholesome of the species.

Antonio Lobo Antunes

#56. Could K. represent the congregation all by himself? What if he had been a stranger merely visiting the church? That was more or less his position.

Franz Kafka

#57. A king who dies on the cross must be the king of a rather strange kingdom. Only those who understand the profound paradox of the cross can also understand the whole meaning of Jesus' assertion: my kingdom is not of this world. 2 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Lectures to the Congregation in Barcelona

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

#58. I cannot fail to call the congregation to worship God, to listen to his Word, to offer themselves to God.

Eugene H. Peterson

#59. Every congregation is a congregation of sinners. As if that weren't bad enough, they all have sinners for pastors.

Eugene H. Peterson

#60. When I was just writing books and giving lectures, if people disagreed, they just didn't buy your book or attend your lectures. But, if you're leading a congregation, people feel they have the right to tell you what you should or shouldn't talk about. And that hasn't always been easy for me.

Marianne Williamson

#61. Prosperity Gospel". At his United Church Science of Living Institute in New York he would tell his congregation "close your eyes and see green. Money up to your armpits, a roomful of money and there you are, just tossing around in it like a swimming pool.

Reverend Ike

#62. Her family half carried Terri Weedon back down the royal blue carpet, and the congregation averted its eyes.

J.K. Rowling

#63. I think a pastor used to be viewed as the one-stop ministry shop. The pastor served on every committee, volunteered at every event, and made all the hospital visits. I think that is changing and I think that is healthy. Both for the pastor and the congregation.

Mark Batterson

#64. Money follows mission, not the reverse. This is a shorthand way of saying that the stronger the congregation's relational characteristics, the easier it is to raise money. The stronger the congregation's mission, visitation, groupings, leadership, and decision making, the stronger the giving.

Kennon Callahan

#65. But I think it's up to a local congregation to determine whether or not a marriage should be blessed of God. And it shouldn't be up to the government.

Tony Campolo

#66. There are congressmen in our congregation, judges, federal reserve governors. And there are also people who are homeless and some who are mentally ill. To be able to talk to each of those people is something that I've had to learn how to do over the years.

James Green Somerville

#67. The church grew, and I gained a reputation for preaching, and people came, and it was a wonderful community. But we had a building that seated 82 people, and with a congregation then approaching 400 we were up to four services on Sunday, and everyone was tired.

Barbara Brown Taylor

#68. If you are a Church Of One, do you trust your congregation? When you want to be inspired by an icon representing something bigger than yourself, don't you ever get tired of just looking into the mirror?

Frank Schaeffer

#69. Nothing can be more sublime this side of heaven than the singing of this noble Psalm by a vast congregation. It is all ablaze with grateful adoration.

Charles Spurgeon

#70. If what you know no longer matters, the ministry cannot help but be another "helping profession" whose task is to attract people to church because of the appealing personality of the minister and the friendliness of the congregation.

Stanley Hauerwas

#71. When I was growing up there, North Gulfport was referred to as 'Little Vietnam' because of the perception of crime and depravity within its borders - as if its denizens were simply a congregation of the downtrodden.

Natasha Trethewey

#72. You can see the goldenrod, that most tenacious and pernicious and beauteous of all New England flora, bowing away from the wind like a great and silent congregation.

Stephen King

#73. I feel a part of the congregation. I've never had to do special music. The kids sing in the choir. It's just normal. We're treated like everybody else.

Amy Grant

#74. I see this in the way that sermons are preached. How would you give a Black Nationalist speech or campaign for the Republicans when you're an integrated congregation? It doesn't happen.

Michael Emerson

#75. Why the jailer does not leave open his prison doors,
why the judge does not dismiss his case,
why the preacher does not dismisshis congregation! It is because they do not obey the hint God gives them, nor accept the pardon which he freely offers to all.

Henry David Thoreau

#76. I am a pastor, and I teach and preach the Bible to my congregation every week. But the Bible is not a manufacturer's handbook. Neither is it a science textbook nor a guidebook for public policy.

Adam Hamilton

#77. Washington is a great international city and in the congregation we have people who are rich and poor, black and white, and from every part of the world.

James Green Somerville

#78. 25. My praise shall be of thee in the great congregation:

Anonymous

#79. If a pastor's activity in the church is merely a once-a-week attempt to tow the congregation's cargo ship a little closer to eternity, the whole thing comes to nothing. A human life, unlike a cargo ship, cannot lie in the same place until the next Sunday.

Soren Kierkegaard

#80. He was one of those men who, even in the years of peace, would have advised his congregation that while God may well be honored by the inflexibility of the pious, he might also be honored by the flexibility of the sensible.

Thomas Keneally

#81. If it is true that rock stars weather into institutions, then Dylan has started now to resemble the Church of England: the dwindling popularity of his product cannot diminish the intensity of the arguments among his congregation.

Robert Sandall

#82. The more a congregation considers its people customers, the more likely it is to develop a broader range of ministries to relate to varying needs, interests and priorities.

Stan Toler

#83. We must understand that the local church isn't a country club or a casual self-help group. It is God's holy temple, a congregation of redeemed saints and priests who are consecrated to God. It is God's lighthouse in a dark world. It is the pillar and support of the truth.

Alexander Strauch

#84. I've traveled all over the country for years speaking in churches, teaching the Ten Commandments. It's amazing if 2 percent of any congregation knows the Ten Commandments.

Randall Terry

#85. As I've taught our congregation, within the Christian faith the question of homosexuality is not a question of biblical authority, but biblical interpretation.

Adam Hamilton

#86. Whoever buys into the vision God has for the congregation develops an affinity for all that is going on.

Phil Pringle

#87. It was John Flavel who said to his congregation in England, some three hundred years ago, "Some providences of God, like Hebrew letters, are best understood backwards.

Steve Farrar

#88. To appear at church every Sunday; to look down upon, and let himself be looked at for an hour by the congregation, is the best means of becoming popular which can be recommended to a young sovereign.

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

#89. There was a time when ministers spoke forthrightly and named things. We don't name anything anymore. Finney had a sermon on How to Preach so as to Convert Nobody. He said 'Preach on sin but never mention any of the sins of your congregation - that will do it.'

Vance Havner

#90. The man that wandereth out of the way of understanding shall remain" (I.E., even while living) "in the congregation of the dead.

Herman Melville

#91. Then of course there are bigger things that matter, like who do I see up there in the congregation? Do I see myself up there? Well, I don't.

Michael Emerson

#92. Yet perhaps the pale-faced congregation was almost as fearful a sight to the minister as his black veil to them.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

#93. Robert Murray M'Cheyne, Scottish pastor and writer from the mid-1800s, said, "The greatest need of my congregation is my own personal holiness."1

Daron Brown

#94. Second, God sometimes calls us to a congregation when we don't yet have what it needs. Sometimes we can't help a people until after we've been with them for a while, and being with them is the means God uses to teach us what he wants us to offer them. For

Zack Eswine

#95. Whenever pastors assume people in their congregation know certain things, they miss opportunities to teach. If a pastor makes assumptions year after year, then a whole generation has never heard [that truth] for the first time. If we assume too much, we communicate too little.

Andy Stanley

#96. I've been working for years in my local congregation to undermine the idea that the conservative-liberal divide is reliable shorthand for "faithful to God" vs. "unfaithful to God.

Ken Wilson

#97. You've already said this is your dream job. And forgive me if I'm wrong, but I promised before God, Reverend Walsh, and a congregation of our nearest and dearest to 'cherish you, uphold your hopes and dreams, and keep you safe at my side.'

E.L. James

#98. Effective churches manage their resources - budgets, schedules, personnel - to accomplish the work of God in their communities without making efficiency the ruling principle of the congregation.

Thomas White

#99. The joining of the whole congregation in prayer has something exceedingly solemn and affecting in it.

Karl Philipp Moritz

#100. For I cherish the greatest respect towards everybody's religious obligations, never mind how comical, and could not find it in my heart to undervalue even a congregation of ants worshipping a toad-stool ...

Herman Melville