The manner in which an author chooses to quote others can be intriguing. Why did he choose this particular quote? Did he agree with the quote or was he using it to make a comparison? Why quote this person instead of someone else? The answers to all of these questions, and many others, can be fascinating.

The quotes below come from Wayne Cordeiro’s book Leading on Empty: Refilling Your Tank and Renewing Your Passion. Cordeiro pastors the largest church in Hawaii. That might seem like the perfect place to relax and enjoy ministry, but after thirty years at the helm he was burned out and ready to quit. In Leading on Empty he shares what he learned on the path back to a focused, balanced, joyous life.

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I know God will not give me anything I can’t handle. I just wish He didn’t trust me so much.
~ Mother Teresa

I am told that God loves me—and yet the reality of darkness and coldness and emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul.
~ Mother Teresa

Succeeding in business and failing at home is a cop-out. For no success in the workplace will ever make up for failure at home.
~ Howard Hendricks

To do great work a man must be very idle as well as very industrious.
~ Samuel Butler

It is the space between the notes that makes the music.
~ Noah Benshea

Quietude, which some men cannot abide because it reveals their inward poverty, is as a palace of cedar to the wise, for along its hallowed courts the King in His beauty deigns to walk.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Wisdom is the right use of knowledge. To know is not to be wise. Many men know a great deal, and are all the greater fools for it. There is no fool so great a fool as a knowing fool. But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Nobody ever outgrows Scripture; the Book widens and deepens with our years.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

The ministry is a matter which wears the brain and strains the heart, and drains out the life of a man if he attends to it as he should.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrows, but only empties today of its strength.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

As sure as God puts His children in the furnace He will be in the furnace with them.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Fiery trials make golden Christians.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

I wonder how much more effective our churches would be if we made the pastor’s spiritual health—not the pastor’s efficiency—our number one priority.
~ Philip Yancey

I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.
~ Michael Jordan

The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.
~ John Powell

Prosperity is a great teacher; adversity a greater.
~ William Hazlitt

When a man is pushed, tormented, defeated, he has a chance to learn something.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Loneliness is the poverty of self; solitude is the richness of self.
~ May Sarton

Worry is a cycle of inefficient thoughts whirling around a center of fear.
~ Corrie Ten Boom

When you’re finished changing, you’re finished.
~ Benjamin Franklin

Write you injuries in dust, your benefits in marble.
~ Benjamin Franklin

Energy and persistence conquer all things.
~ Benjamin Franklin

How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them.
~ Benjamin Franklin

The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason.
~ Benjamin Franklin

Those things that hurt, instruct.
~ Benjamin Franklin

Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.
~ William James

We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Kites rise highest against the wind—not with it.
~ Winston Churchill

We shall draw from the heart of suffering itself the means of inspiration and survival.
~ Winston Churchill

Never, never, never give up! And never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense.
~ Winston Churchill

Continuous effort—not strength or intelligence—is the key to unlocking our potential.
~ Winston Churchill

There is no doubt that it is around the family and the home that all the greatest virtues, the most dominating virtues of human society, are created, strengthened, and maintained.
~ Winston Churchill

The pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.
~ Winston Churchill

We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking, only to learn that it is God who is shaking them.
~ Charles C. West

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired, and success achieved.
~ Helen Keller

I thank God for my handicaps, for through them, I have found myself, my work, and my God.
~ Helen Keller

To overcome difficulties is to experience the full delight of existence.
~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Good timber does not grow with ease; the stronger the wind, the stronger the trees.
~ j. Willard Marriott

What is the difference between an obstacle and an opportunity? Our attitude toward it. Every opportunity has a difficulty, and every difficulty has an opportunity.
~ J. Sidlow Baxter

Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: You don’t give up.
~ Anne Lamott

The greater the difficulty, the more glory in surmounting it. Skillful pilots gain their reputation from storms and tempests.
~ Epicurus

The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it.
~ Moliere

The grand essentials of happiness are: something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.
~ Allan K. Chalmers

Through humor, you can soften some of the worst blows that life delivers. And once you find laughter, no matter how painful your situation might be, you can survive it.
~ Bill Cosby

It is important to become aware that at every moment of our life we have an opportunity to choose joy . . . . It is in the choice that our true freedom lies, and that freedom is, in the final analysis, the freedom to love.
~ Henri Nouwen

The happiest people I know are the ones who have learned how to hold everything loosely and have given the worrisome, stress-filled, fearful details of their lives into God’s keeping.
~ Charles Swindoll

God gave burdens, also shoulder.
~ Yiddish saying

I seem forsaken and alone, I hear the lion roar; and every door is shut but one, and that is Mercy’s door.
~ William Cowper

Sorrow comes to all . . . . Perfect relief is not possible, except with time. You cannot now realize that you will ever feel better and yet you are sure to be happy again.
~ Abraham Lincoln

I am the most miserable man living . . . . Whether I shall ever be better, I cannot tell. I awfully forebode I shall not.
~ Abraham Lincoln, in a letter to John T. Stuart, January 23, 1841

The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love, and to be greater than our suffering.
~ Ben Okri

It is in the quiet crucible of your personal, private sufferings that your noblest dreams are born and God’s greatest gifts are given in compensation for what you have been through.
~ Wintley Phipps

Adrenaline arousal can be compared to revving up a car engine, then leaving it to idle at high speed.
~ Archibald D. Hart, in The Hidden Link Between Adrenaline and Stress

Be aware of wonder. Live a balanced life—learn some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.
~ Robert Fulghum

God will one day hold us accountable for all the things He created for us to enjoy, but we refused to do so.
~ rabbinic saying

I find that doing the will of God leaves me no time for disputing about His plans.
~ George MacDonald

Every tomorrow has two handles. We can take hold of it with the handle of anxiety or the handle of faith.
~ Henry Ward Beecher

Whatever the struggle, continue the climb. It may be only one step to the summit.
~ Diane Westlake

Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
~ Thomas Edison

Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seem to be no hope at all.
~ Dale Carnegie

There is no failure except in no longer trying.
~ Elbert Hubbard

To be right with God has often meant to be in trouble with men.
~ A. W. Tozer

When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.
~ Alexander Graham Bell.

You are now at a crossroads. This is your opportunity to make the most important decision you will ever make. Forget your past. Where are you now?… Who have you decided to become? Make this decision consciously. Make it carefully. Make it powerfully.
~ Anthony Robbins

“I learned that good judgment comes from experience and that experience grows out of mistakes.”
– Omar Bradley, general

“Trouble is only opportunity in work clothes.”
– Henry Kaiser, industrialist

“Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks.”
– Phillips Brooks, clergyman

“Courage is rarely reckless or foolish. Courage usually involves a highly realistic estimate of the odds that must be faced.”
– Margaret Truman, author

“You can’t do it unless you can imagine it.”
– George Lucas, director

“You are not beaten until you admit it.”
– George Patton, general

“Wisdom is knowing what to do; virtue is doing it.”
– David Jordan, scientist

“Dreams never hurt anybody if he keeps working right behind the dream to make as much of it become real as he can.”
– Frank Woolworth, Entrepreneur

“Knowledge has to be improved, challenged and increased constantly, or it vanishes.”
– Peter Drucker, management expert

“Problems should be solved on the spot, as soon as they arise. No frontline employee should have to wait for a supervisor’s permission.”
– Jan Carlzon, airline executive

“Instead of comparing our lot with that of those who are more fortunate than we are, we should compare it with the lot of the great majority of our fellow men. It then appears that we are among the privileged.”
– Helen Keller, lecturer

“All men who deliberate on controversial matters should do it free of hate, friendship, anger and pity.”
– Sallust, historian

“We can learn from past failures and mistakes, but we shouldn’t get stuck there. We can keep future goals in mind, but we shouldn’t get stuck there, either. The only way to reach our potential is to focus on what we must do now – this moment, this day – to perform effectively and win.”
– Joe Torre

“The successful man is the one who had the chance and took it.”
– Roger Babson, executive

“Small opportunities are often the beginning of great enterprises.”
– Demosthenes, statesman

“The virtue you would like to have, assume it is already yours, appropriate it, enter into the part and live the character just as the great actor is absorbed in… the part he plays.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson, poet

“Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.”
– Mother Teresa, charity worker

“All achievements, all earned riches, have their beginning in an idea.”
– Napolean Hill, author

“Our minds can shape the way a thing will be because we act according to our expectations.”
– Federico Fellini, director

“A man may fulfill the object of his existence by asking a question he cannot answer and attempting a task he cannot achieve.”
– Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., physician

“No matter what it is, pick yourself up and go on to the next project.”
– Shelley Duvall, actress

“Deal first with whatever is causing you the greatest emotional distress. Often this will break the logjam in your work and free you up mentally to complete (the) other tasks.”
– Brian Tracy, motivational coach

“Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.”
– John Wooden, basketball coach

“If you want to conquer fear, don’t sit at home and think about it. Go out and get busy. ”
– Dale Carnegie, motivational expert

“I am willing to put myself through anything; temporary pain or discomfort means nothing to me as long as I can see that the experience will take me to a new level.”
– Diana Nyad, swimmer

“Don’t ever be afraid to admit you were wrong. It’s like saying you’re wiser today than you were yesterday.”
– Robert Newell, humorist

“Character is built daily by the way one thinks and acts – thought by thought, action by action.”
– Helen Douglas, legislator

“I don’t think that once you get to one level, you can relax. You’ve got to keep pushing. ”
– Larry Bird, basketball player

“Life is the sum of all your choices.”
– Albert Camus, Author

“All men who have achieved great things have been great dreamers.”
– Orison Swett Marden, writer

“You can easily judge the character of others by how they treat those who can do nothing for them or to them.”
– Malcolm Forbes, publisher

“The real winners in life are the people who look at every situation with an expectation that they can make it work or make it better.”
– Barbara Pletcher, author

“If life was so easy that you could just go buy success, there would be a lot more successful companies in the world. Successful enterprises are built from the ground up.”
– Lou Gerstner, IBM CEO

“If you want to get the best out of a person you must look for the best that is in him.”
– Bernard Haldane

“Deliberation is the work of many men. Action, of one alone.”
– Charles de Gaulle, statesman

“Character is the ability to carry out a good resolution long after the excitement of the moment has passed.”
– Cavett Robert

“The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”
– Samuel Johnson, Lexicographer

“There is no such thing as a minor lapse of integrity.”
– Tom Peters, Author

“No great performance ever came from holding back.”
– Don Greene, performance coach

“It is dangerous to go into eternity with possibilities that oneself has prevented from becoming realities. A possibility is a hint from God. One must follow it. ”
– Soren Kierkegaard, Philosopher

“It’s not what you do once in a while; it’s what you do day in and day out that makes the difference.”
– Jenny Craig, diet guru

“A strong imagination begetteth opportunity.”
– Michel de Montaigne, writer

“I love the man who can smile in trouble, gather strength from distress and grow brave by reflection.”
– Thomas Paine, Statesman

“I have never known a really successful man who deep in his heart did not understand the grind, the discipline it takes to win.”
– Vince Lombardi, American Football Coach

“What will your children remember? Moments spent listening, talking, playing and sharing together may be the most important times of all.”
– Gloria Gaither

“The important thing is to learn a lesson every time you lose.”
– John McEnroe, tennis champion

“Life without risk is not worth living.”
– Chuck Lindbergh, aviator

“Managing is getting paid for home runs someone else hits.”
– Casey Stengel, baseball manager

“The starting point of all achievement is desire. Keep this constantly in mind. Weak desires bring weak results, just as a small fire makes a small amount of heat.”
– Napoleon Hill, author

“You have set yourself a difficult task, but you will succeed if you persevere.”
– Helen Adams Keller, American Author and Lecturer

“Lost time is never found again.”
– Benjamin Franklin, inventor

“Until you make peace with who you are you will never be content with what you have.”
– Doris Mortman

“Experience is valuable only if it’s imbued with meaning from which one can draw salient conclusions. Otherwise, experience becomes imprisoning.”
– Barry McCaffrey, general

“Rowing harder doesn’t help if the boat is headed in the wrong direction.”
– Kenichi Ohmae, business coach

“Every man, however wise, needs the advice of some sagacious friend in the affairs of life.”
– Plautus, Playwright

“Each man (is) the architect of his own fortune.”
– Appius Caecus, builder

“For every disadvantage there is a corresponding advantage.”
– Clement Stone, executive

“We either make ourselves miserable or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same.”
– Carlos Castaneda, author

“Before you begin a thing, remind yourself that difficulties and delays quite impossible to foresee are ahead… You can only see one thing clearly, and that is your goal. Form a mental vision of that and cling to it through thick and thin.”
– Kathleen Norris, Writer

“Create a definite plan for carrying out your desire, and begin at once, whether you’re ready or not, to put it into action.”
– Napoleon Hill, motivational expert

“I’ve come to believe that each of us has a personal calling that’s as unique as a fingerprint–and that the best way to succeed is to discover what you love and then find a way to offer it to others in the form of service, working hard, and also allowing ”
– Oprah Winfrey, Talk Show Host

“Leaders get out front and stay there by raising the standards by which they judge themselves – and by which they are willing to be judged.”
– Frederick Smith, Federal Express founder

“Success is waking up in the morning and bounding out of bed because there’s something out there that you love to do, that you believe in, that you’re good at – something that’s bigger than you are, and you can hardly wait to get at it again.”
– Whit Hobbs

“Before a person can achieve the kind of life he wants, he must think, act, walk, talk and conduct himself in all of his affairs as would the person he wishes to become.”
– Zig Ziglar, Author

“Be like a postage stamp. Stick to one thing until you get there.”
– Josh Billings, humorist

“In real estate, it’s location, location, location. In business, it’s differentiate, differentiate, differentiate.”
– Robert Goizueta, executive

“To be prepared is half the victory.”
– Miguel de Cervantes

“Stay committed to your decisions, but stay flexible in your approach. It’s the end you’re after.”
– Anthony Robbins, Motivational Speaker

“The more informative your advertising, the more persuasive it will be.”
– David Ogilvy, Advertising Executive

“The person who pays an ounce of principle for a pound of popularity gets badly cheated.”
– Ronald Reagan, 40th U.S. president

“If you don’t fail now and again, it’s a sign you’re playing it safe.”
– Woody Allen, Director

“Setting a goal is not the main thing. It is deciding how you will go about achieving it and staying with that plan.”
– Tom Landry, football coach

“Giving up is the ultimate tragedy.”
– Robert Donovan, writer

“Keep your sense of humor. There’s enough stress in the rest of your life to let bad shots ruin a game you’re supposed to enjoy.”
– Amy Alcott, golfer

“If you want to leave your footprints on the sands of time, be sure you’re wearing work shoes.”
– Author Unknown

“Begin challenging your own assumptions. Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won’t come in.”
– Alan Alda, Actor

“It is the studying that you do after your school days that really counts. Otherwise, you know only that which everyone else knows.”
– Henry Doherty

“If your actions create a legacy that inspires others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, then you are an excellent leader.”
– Dolly Parton, Singer

“In times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times like these.”
– Paul Harvey, broadcaster

“Not only strike when the iron is hot, but make it hot by striking.”
– Oliver Cromwell, military leader

“Never say no when a client asks for something, even if it is the moon. You can always try, and anyhow there is plenty of time afterward to explain that it was not possible.”
– Cesar Ritz, hotelier

“The entrepreneur is… the most important player in the building of the global economy. So much so that big companies are reconstituting themselves as networks of entrepreneurs.”
– John Naisbitt, writer

“It’s the little things that make the big things possible. Only close attention to the fine details of any operation makes the operation first class.”
– J. Willard Marriott Sr., hotel executive

“It is good that thou shouldest take hold of this; yea, also from this withdraw not thine hand: for he that feareth God shall come forth of them all” (Ecclesiastes 7:18).

“Don’t be fanatically religious and don’t be irreverently blatant. Remember that the two extremes have to be held in the right balance.” Oswald Chambers

“A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up” (Ecclesiastes 3:3).

“Every possibility I have of producing a fine character in time, I can use to produce the opposite; I have that liberty from the Creator. God will not prevent my disobeying Him; if He did, my obedience would not be worth anything.” (Oswald Chambers)

“Then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith be it done unto you” (Matthew 9:29).

“Jesus never tells us what to see, but when His touch is upon our eyes, we know that we see what He is seeing, He restores this pristine innocence of sight. ‘Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.’” (Oswald Chambers)

“The very God of peace sanctify you wholly…” (1 Thessalonians 5:23).

“God never develops one part of our being at the expense of the other; spirit, soul and body are kept in harmony. Remember, our spirit does not go further than we bring our body.” (Oswald Chambers)

“A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one’s birth” (Ecclesiastes 7:1).

“Solomon is speaking of character, not of reputation. Reputation is what other people think of you; ‘character is what you are in the dark,’ where no one sees but yourself…Solomon says that the man who has attained a sagacious character during life is like a most refreshing, soothing, healing ointment.” (Oswald Chambers)

“Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock” (Matthew 7:24).

“We speak of building castles in the air; that is where a castle should be—whoever heard of a castle underground! The problem is how to get the foundation under your castle in the air so that it can stand upon the earth.” (Oswald Chambers)

“Except a grain of wheat fall into the earth and die, it abideth by itself alone; but if it die, it beareth much fruit” (John 12:24).

“Death is God’s delightful way of giving us life.” Chambers

“And the Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends…” (Job 42:10).

“If you are in the position of Job and have shipped some trouble on board that makes you taken up with yourself, remember that when Job prayed for his friends, God emancipated him.”  (Oswald Chambers)