Quotes

Money and Possessions

• "It's never too early to teach your children about the tool of money. Teach them how to work for it and they learn pride and self-respect. Teach them how to save it and they learn security and self-worth. Teach them how to be generous with it and they learn love."- Judith Jamison (1943- ), African-American dancer and choreographer

• "The currency of this world will be worthless at our death or at Christ's return, both of which are imminent."- Randy C. Alcorn, ministry leader and author

• "The real measure of your wealth is how much you'd be worth if you lost all your money."- Anonymous

• "If a person gets his attitude toward money straight, it will help straighten out almost every other area in his life."- Billy Graham (1918-), American evangelist

• "Give me five minutes with a person's checkbook, and I will tell you where their heart is."- Billy Graham (1918-), American evangelist

• "Remember this-you can't serve God and Money, but you can serve God with money."- Selwyn Hughes, English pastor and author

• "The world asks, ‘What does a man own?' Christ asks, ‘How does he use it?' "- Andrew Murray (1828-1917), South African evangelist and writer

• “We should travel light and live simply. Our enemy is not possessions but excess.” — John R.W. Stott (1921-), English pastor and evangelist

• “I have watched hundreds of Christians in my time become financially blessed then develop an acquisitive streak that in turn makes their souls as metallic as the coins they seek.” — Selwyn Hughes, English pastor and author

God's Ownership and Man's Stewardship

• "Everything we have is really loaned to us; we can't take anything with us when we depart. If we have no use for a thing, we should pass it on to someone else who can use it-now."- Norma S. Scholl

• "A lot of people are willing to give God the credit, but not too many are willing to give Him the cash." - Anonymous

• "I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all. But whatever I have placed in God's hands, that I still possess."- Martin Luther (1483-1546), German reformer and theologian

• "One of the greatest missing teachings in the American church today is the reminder to men and women that nothing we have belongs to us."- Gordon MacDonald, American pastor and teacher

• "Stewardship is the act of organizing your life so that God can spend you."- Lynn A. Miller, author

• "I believe with all of my heart that God's people possess God's provision to accomplish and fulfill God's purposes in the world."- Joel Vestal, founder of ServLife International

Prosperity and Poverty

• "Thousands upon thousands are yearly brought into a state of real poverty by their great anxiety not to be thought poor."- William Corbett (1680-1748), English composer

• "There's no need to be the richest man in the cemetery. You can't do any business from there."- Colonel Sanders (1890-1980), Kentucky Fried Chicken founder

• "The fellow that has no money is poor. The fellow that has nothing but money is poorer still."- Billy Sunday (1862-1935), American revivalist

• "He who is not contented with what he has, will not be contented with what he doesn't have."- Socrates (469-399 B.C.), Greek philosopher  “A man there was, and they called him mad; the more he gave, the more he had.” — John Bunyan (1628-88), English Puritan writer and preacher

•   “I shovel [money] out, and God shovels it back ... but God has a bigger shovel!” — R.G. LeTourneau (1888-1969), American inventor 

• “We are rich only through what we give: and poor only through what we refuse and keep.” — Anne Swetchine (1782-1857), Russian-French writer 

Generosity

• "What is the chief end of giving? To glorify God and enjoy him forever."- Dennis Bakke, businessman

• "When it comes to giving until it hurts, most people have a very low threshold of pain."- Anonymous

• "Real charity doesn't care if it's tax deductible or not."- Anonymous

• "The Dead Sea is the dead sea because it continually receives and never gives."- Anonymous

• "Charity begins at home and generally dies from lack of outdoor exercise."- Anonymous

• "Do not give, as many rich men do, like a hen that lays her eggs ... and then cackles."- Henry Ward Beecher (1813-87), American abolitionist and clergyman

• "Examples are few of men ruined by giving."- Christian Bovée

• "It is possible to give without loving, but it is impossible to love without giving."- Richard Braunstein, author

• "It is more difficult to give money away intelligently than it is to earn it in the first place."- Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), American industrialist and philanthropist

• "We make a living by what we get; we make a life by what we give."- Winston Churchill (1874-1965), British wartime prime minister and statesman

• "No person was ever honored for what he received. Honor has been the reward for what he gave."- Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933), 30th U.S. president

• "No one has ever become poor by giving."- Anne Frank (1929-45), Jewish Dutch diarist during Nazi occupation

• "No one is so generous as he who has nothing to give."- French Proverb

• "Dearest lord, teach me to be generous; teach me to serve you as you deserve; to give and not to count the cost."- Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556), Jesuit founder

• "The only investment I ever made which has paid consistently increasing dividends is the money I have given to the Lord."- James L. Kraft (1874-1953), Kraft-Phoenix Cheese Corp. chairman

• "Nothing that you have not given away will ever be really yours."- Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951), American novelist and playwright

• "To give without any reward, or any notice, has a special quality of its own."- Anne Morrow Lindbergh (1906-2001), American aviatrix and writer

• "A bone to the dog is not charity. Charity is the bone shared with the dog, when you are just as hungry as the dog."- Jack London (1876-1916), American novelist

• "Give what you have. To someone it may be better than you dare to think."- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-82), American writer and poet

• "Generosity during life is a very different thing from generosity in the hour of death; one proceeds from genuine liberality and benevolence, the other from pride or fear."- Horace Mann (1796-1859), American educator and politician

• "The measure of a life is not its duration, but its donation."- Peter Marshall (1902-49), former U.S. Senate chaplain

• "I am convinced that the devil has caused the subject of giving to stir up resistance and resentment among God's people because he knows there are few ways of spiritual enrichment like the exercise of faithful stewardship."- Stephen Olford, preacher and author

• "Jesus commended the widow not for giving away so much, but for keeping so little."- Ed Owens, Chicago fund manager

• "Our culture values the size of the gift, but God values the size of what we keep."- Ed Owens, Chicago fund manager

• "He that gives all, though but little, gives much; because God looks not to the quantity of the gift, but to the quality of the givers."- Francis Quarles (1592-1644), author

• "Think of giving not as a duty but as a privilege."- John D. Rockefeller, Jr. (1874-1960), American industrialist and philanthropist

• "Generosity is to materialism what kryptonite is to Superman."- Lloyd Shadrach, pastor and author

• "Never measure your generosity by what you give, but rather by what you have left."- Bishop Fulton J. Sheen (1895-1979), Roman Catholic bishop, orator, radio-broadcaster and author

• "If there be any truer measure of a man than by what he does, it must be by what he gives."- Robert South (1634-1716), English clergyman

• "Giving is true loving."- Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-92), English Baptist preacher

• "Defer not charities till death. He that does so is rather liberal of another man's substance than his own."- L.M. Stretch (fl. 1800), English regionalist writer

• "We can all be stimulated to greater generosity by the known generosity of others."- John R.W. Stott (1921-), English pastor and evangelist

• "It's not how much we give but how much love we put into giving."- Mother Teresa (1910-97), Roman Catholic missionary to India

• "Giving is more than a responsibility-it is a privilege; more than an act of obedience-it is evidence of our faith."- William Arthur Ward (1921-94), American educator

• "If I cannot give bountifully, yet will I give freely."- Arthur Warwick

• "[When I die] if I leave behind me ten pounds ... you and all mankind [may] bear witness against me, that I have lived and died a thief and a robber."- John Wesley (1703-91), English evangelist and founder of Methodism

• "Earn as much as you can. Save as much as you can. Invest as much as you can. Give as much as you can."- John Wesley (1703-91), English evangelist and founder of Methodism

• “A gift is acceptable according to what the giver has, not according to what he has not.” — John R.W. Stott (1921-), English pastor and evangelist 

• “We can all be stimulated to greater generosity by the known generosity of others.” — John R.W. Stott (1921-), English pastor and evangelist

• “He, who gives what he would as readily throw away, gives without generosity; for the essence of generosity is in self-sacrifice.” — Jeremy Taylor (1613-67), English bishop and writer

• “The best investment with the least risk and the greatest dividend is giving.” — Sir John Templeton (1912-), investor and philanthropist

• “It’s not how much we give but how much love we put into giving.” — Mother Teresa (1910-97), Roman Catholic missionary to India

Funding the Great Commission

• "Americans are especially vulnerable to an appeal that says, ‘Give us your dollars, but not your sons and daughters.' If we do that, missionary vision will die within a generation, and the dollars will also eventually stop."- Roger Hedlund, author

• "I will place no value on anything I have or possess except in relation to the Kingdom of Christ. If anything I have will advance that Kingdom, it shall be given or kept whichever will best promote the glory of Him to whom I owe all my hopes, both for time and eternity."- David Livingstone (1813-73), Scottish missionary and explorer of Africa

• "God's work done in God's way will never lack God's supply."- J. Hudson Taylor (1832-1905), English missionary to China

• "I believe with all of my heart that God's people possess God's provision to accomplish and fulfill God's purposes in the world."- Joel Vestal, founder of ServLife International

Eternal Reward

• "If we believe heaven to be our country, it is better for us to transmit our wealth thither, than to retain it here, where we may lose it by a sudden removal."- John Calvin (1509-64), French theologian and reformer

• "I judge all things only by the price they shall gain in eternity."- John Wesley (1703-91), English evangelist and founder of Methodism