Karen Kingsbury
You don't have love without sacrifice; you can't have sacrifice without love.
I can spend 10 to 15 minutes with someone, and they can tell me what they're going through. I may never have gone through that, but I get it on a really deep level.
I came to Christ in my early 20s.
I'm receiving 300 to 500 letters every week from people telling me that God used my stories to save their marriage or to introduce them to Christ or to heal a relationship that had been broken.
You need to get down among the people who are the dirtiest and dustiest, and the depravity, and you need to see Christ's light shining there.
My characters are not plastic.
You're gifted to do something.
You need to have time to really hear God.
As I watched bookstores close, I began to wonder how that felt for the owners. Owning a bookstore was their dream and now they're struggling and seeing those dreams fall apart.
The general market wants what I do.
Reader loyalty will stay because I'm not changing.
There were times when I was so sick of talking about the Bible.
I always knew I wanted to be a writer.
I developed a deep sadness for celebrities, a pity that they often are caught in a plastic world that runs too hard and too fast, and that many times that world means destroyed relationships with everyone they know and love.
I write about true-life type things.
I write about the trials and triumphs of contemporary life - and often the readers see themselves between the lines of the story.
Secular writers can tell a story about the physical, the emotional, and the intellectual parts of a character. But no matter how well they tell the story, they miss a facet that is innately part of all of us - the spiritual.
Life is too short to be anything but real with the cast of characters God has placed in the story of your life. Love well, laugh often, and find your life in Christ. Don't hide away or be a follower. Be the wonderful unique person God made you to be, and know that your purpose will always be best when defined by your faith in himCollection: Love
Love happens when people forgive.Collection: People
It's not how we fall that defines us as Christians. It's how we get up again.Collection: Christian
Friends don't get jealous of each other or begrudge the other for finding success. They celebrate every victory together.Collection: Jealous
God stays awake all the time. In case we need to talk to Him about something.Collection: Needs
People were never meant to be idols. We aren't supposed to be worshipped. Only God deserves that kind of praise.Collection: Idols
The next time that boy pursues you, he better do it like a dying man looking for water in a desert. When it's the right guy, you'll know, because he'll cherish you.Collection: Boys
God grows fragrant flowers of hope in the ashes of loss.Collection: Flower
Life is too short for half-hearted connections and meaningless run-throughs.Collection: Running
I tell of hearts and souls and dances... Butterflies and second chances; Desperate ones and dreamers bound, Seeking life from barren ground, Who suffer on in earthly fate The bitter pain of agony hate, Might but they stop and here forgive Would break the bonds to breathe and live And find that God in goodness brings A chance for change, the hope of wings To rest in Him, and self to die And so become a butterfly.Collection: Pain
This last year... I learned something about family. Like it's not about blood alone. It's being connected... it's growing up together and loving each other. It's believing in the same God and knowing you'd do anything for the person across from you at dinner.Collection: Growing Up
Christmas is a time to mark our progress through this earthly journey. Because of Christmas, this we know: Christ was born for us. He is love, and the plans he has for us always surpass our own.Collection: Inspirational
Love well, laugh often and live well for Christ.Collection: Laughing
The truth was this: Love is a decision.Collection: Love Is
Readers need to see themselves between the lines of the story.Collection: Stories
The more bad choices you make, the less bad your choices seem.Collection: Choices
Never be passive. Victories happen when you take charge of a game. You can't win by playing not to lose".Collection: Winning
As long as he was breathing, God's greatest task for him was not yet finished. His highest purpose in life was still unfulfilled. ... God still had plans for him.Collection: Breathing
Goodbyes are on of the hardest things about life. One way or another people were always leaving... Always moving on.Collection: Goodbye
Forgiveness makes you feel better. As soon as you forgive, you're free.Collection: Forgiveness
Christmas is ... a time to mark our progress through this earthly journey. Every December we can look back and marvel at the designs of God and realize how very little we are in control of the events that shaped the past year. Then, with hearts full, look to the celebration of that silent, holy night, and all its certainty. Because of Christmas, this we know: Christ was born for us. He is love, and the plans he has for us always surpass those of our own.Collection: Christmas
But the Beast was a good person...the Prince looked on the outside the way the Beast was on the inside. Sometimes people couldn't see the inside of the person unless they like the outside of a person. Because they hadn't learned to hear the music yet.Collection: People
You can't base your decisions on anyone's opinion but yours and God's.Collection: Decision
God, please now my future see, make it clear where I should be. Open windows, close the doors, not my will, my God, but Yours.Collection: Doors
It's never too late with truth. It stands outside time.Collection: Too Late
New steps. That's what it amounted to. The two of them were learning the steps that would bring them together, a dance that would take them into forever. A dance that could be nothing less than God's plan for their lives.Collection: Two
The death of a friendship was usually slow and insidious, like the wearing away of a hillside after years of too much rain. A handful of misunderstandings, a season of miscommunication, the passing of time, and where once stood two women with a dozen years of memories and tears and conversation and laughter—where once stood two women closer than sisters—now stood two strangers.Collection: Laughter
They'd had fun, for sure. They laughed and enjoyed being together. But if she was painfully honest with herself, something was missing. Something in the way Tim looked at her. She remembered her mom's word. "I saw the way he looked at you...he adores you." Maybe that was it. Tim looked at her on a surface level. He smiled and seemed happy to see her. But When Cody looked at her, there were no layers left, nothing her didn't reveal, nothing he couldn't see. He didn't really look at her so much as he looked into her. To the deepest, most real places in her heart and soul.Collection: Mom
We must remember how to love, remember what's important, and remember God's truth as it applies to our relationships.Collection: Important
Perfect love drives out fearCollection: Bible
The eagle had two natural enemies: storms and serpents. He embraced the storm, waiting on the rock for the right thermal current and then using that to carry him higher. While other birds were taking cover, the eagle was soaring. An eagle would never fight against the storms of life.Collection: Fighting
My parents used to say faith wasn't something you could pretend about. It wasn't real unless it looked like faith and acted like faith.Collection: Real
A verse came to mind, one that has comforted Kari before. It was the shortest verse in the Bible: Jesus wept. If he cried over Jerusalem, if he cried over the death of Lazarus, surely he was crying now over the death of her dreams, the death of her marriage.Collection: Dream