Mike Yaconelli

I just want to be remembered as a person who loved God, who served others more than he served himself, who was trying to grow in maturity and stability.

— Mike Yaconelli love

Im unfinished. Im unfixed. And the reality is thats where God meets me is in the mess of my life, in the unfixedness, in the brokenness. I thought he did the opposite, he got rid of all that stuff. But if you read the Bible, if you look at it at all, constantly he was showing up in peoples lives at the worst possible time of their life.

— Mike Yaconelli life

There have been times where Ive said, Jesus, I dont believe in you anymore, get out of here. I dont know. I dont even trust you. And its like, okay. And hes still hanging on.

— Mike Yaconelli time

Pretending is the grease of non-relationships. Pretending is how you and I get through the day without ever having to know each other. When I walk in the room, you say to me, How are you? Well, you dont want to know. And, frankly, I dont want to tell you. So I just say, Fine, and you go, Fine. And off we go.

— Mike Yaconelli relationships

I can remember the night I became a Christian. And man, this weight came off of me and all that kind of stuff. What I didnt realize was, that was just the beginning - of a huge journey.

— Mike Yaconelli christian

— Mike Yaconelli life

I just want to be remembered as a person who loved God, who served others more than he served himself, who was trying to grow in maturity and stability.

— Mike Yaconelli love

— Mike Yaconelli relationships

There have been times where Ive said, Jesus, I dont believe in you anymore, get out of here. I dont know. I dont even trust you. And its like, okay. And hes still hanging on.

— Mike Yaconelli time

I think that when you follow Christ, one of the things that happens when you start listening to His voice is that you really are alone.

— Mike Yaconelli art

I can remember the night I became a Christian. And man, this weight came off of me and all that kind of stuff. What I didnt realize was, that was just the beginning - of a huge journey.

— Mike Yaconelli christian

Rest is a decision we make. Rest is choosing to do nothing when we have too much to do, slowing down when we feel pressure to go faster, stopping instead of starting. Rest is listening to our weariness and responding to our tiredness, not to what is making us tired. Rest is what happens when we say one simple word: “No!

— Mike Yaconelli art

The power of the Church is not a parade of flawless people, but of a flawless Christ who embraces our flaws. The Church is not made up of whole people, rather of the broken people who find wholeness in a Christ who was broken for us.

— Mike Yaconelli people

The grace of God is dangerous. Its lavish, excessive, outrageous, and scandalous. Gods grace is ridiculously inclusive. Apparently God doesnt care who He loves. He is not very careful about the people He calls His friends or the people He calls His church.

— Mike Yaconelli love

Spirituality isnt about being finished and perfect; spirituality is about trusting God in our unfinishedness.

— Mike Yaconelli god

Christianity is not about learning how to live within the lines; Christianity is about the joy of coloring. The grace of God is preposterous enough to accept as beautiful a coloring that anyone else would reject as ugly. The grace of God sees beyond the scribbling to the heart of the scribbler - a scribbler who is similar to two thieves who hung on crosses on either side of Jesus. One of the two asked Jesus to please accept his scribbled and sloppy life into the kingdom of God and He did. Preposterous. And very good news for the rest of us scribblers.

— Mike Yaconelli life

Nothing makes people in the church more angry than grace. Its ironic: we stumble into a party we werent invited to and find the uninvited standing at the door making sure no other uninviteds get in.

— Mike Yaconelli art

Spirituality is a mixed-up, topsy-turvy, helter-skelter godliness that turns our lives into an upside-down toboggan ride of unexpected turns, surprise bumps and bone shattering crashes ... a life ruined by a Jesus who loves us right into his arms.

— Mike Yaconelli love

What landed Jesus on the cross was the preposterous idea that common, ordinary, broken, screwed-up people could be godly.

— Mike Yaconelli god

Nothing in the church makes people in the church more angry than grace. Its ironic: we stumble into a party we werent invited to and find the uninvited standing at the door making sure no other uninviteds get in. Then a strange phenomenon occurs: as soon as we are included in the party because of Jesus irresponsible love, we decide to make grace more responsible by becoming self-appointed Kingdom Monitors, guarding the kingdom of God, keeping the riffraff out (which, as I understand it, are who the kingdom of God is supposed to include).

— Mike Yaconelli love

Until we start thinking in terms of revolution instead of compromise the Church will continue to pat itself on the back with token steps of renewal.

— Mike Yaconelli art

There are a whole lot of people who are so freakin busy—theyve so cluttered up their lives—theyre at their wits end. And if theyd only just stop for a minute, they could hear the God of the universe whisper to them, “I love you.

— Mike Yaconelli love

Speed damages our souls because living fast consumes every ounce of our energy. Speed has a deafening roar that drowns our the whispering voices of our souls and leaves Jesus as a diminishing speck in the rearview mirror.

— Mike Yaconelli soul

Spirituality is not about being fixed; it is about Gods being present in the mess of our unfixedness. (Messy Spirituality)

— Mike Yaconelli god

Spiritual growth is more than procedure, it’s a wild search for God in the midst of the tangled jungle of our souls, a search for which involves a volatile mix of messy reality, wild freedom, frustrating stuckness, increasing slowness and a healthy dose of gratitude

— Mike Yaconelli god

I want a lifetime of holy moments. Every day I want to be in dangerous proximity to Jesus. I long for a life that explodes with meaning and is filled with adventure, wonder, risk, and danger. I long for a faith that is gloriously treacherous. I want to be with Jesus, not knowing whether to cry or laugh.

— Mike Yaconelli life

Religious people love to hide behind religion. They love the rules of religion more than they love Jesus. With practice, Condemners let rules become more important than the spiritual life.

— Mike Yaconelli love

Accepting the reality of our broken, flawed lives is the beginning of spirituality not because the spiritual life will remove our flaws but because we let go of seeking perfection and, instead, seek God, the one who is present in the tangledness of our lives.

— Mike Yaconelli life

The Church is the place where the incompetent, the unfinished, and even the unhealthy are welcome. I believe Jesus agrees.

— Mike Yaconelli jesus

Voices surround us, always telling us to move faster. It may be our boss, our pastor, our parents, our wives, our husbands, our politicians, or, sadly, even ourselves. So we comply. We increase the speed. We live life in the fast lane because we have no slow lanes anymore. Every lane is fast, and the only comfort our culture can offer is more lanes and increased speed limits. The result? Too many of us are running as fast as we can, and an alarming number of us are running much faster than we can sustain.

— Mike Yaconelli life

Sin does not always drive us to drink; more often it drives us to exhaustion. Tiredness is equally as debilitating as drunkenness. Burnout is slang for an inner tiredness, a fatigue of our souls. Jesus came to forgive us all of our sins, including the sin of busyness. The problem with growth in the modern church is not the slowness of growth but the rushing of growth.

— Mike Yaconelli soul

Think about how many of us have wondered why we dont fit, why our faith doesnt stabilize us, why we seem so out of sync with most of the world. Genuine faith is the isolating force in our lives that creates tension wherever we go. To put it another way, faith is the unbalancing force in our lives that is the fruit of Gods disturbing presence.

— Mike Yaconelli god

Jesus cares more about desire than about competence

— Mike Yaconelli jesus

Speed is not neutral. Fast living used to mean a life of debauchery; now it just means fast, but the consequences are even more serious. Speeding through life endangers our relationships and our souls.

— Mike Yaconelli life

Children live in a world of dreams and imagination, a world of aliveness… There is a voice of wonder and amazement inside all of us; but we grow to realize we can no longer hear it, and we live in silence. It isn’t that God stopped speaking; it is that our lives became louder.

— Mike Yaconelli god

Spiritual growth thrives in the midst of our problems, not in their absence. Spiritual growth occurs in the trenches of life, not in the classroom.

— Mike Yaconelli life

For God so loved the world, that whosoever believes in him will, from that point on, be considered weired by the rest of the world, which means the church should be more like a zoo than a tomb of identical mummies.

— Mike Yaconelli love

Just because we believe the gospel is a life-and-death matter doesnt mean we have to act as if were dead.

— Mike Yaconelli life

Play is an expression of Gods presence in the world; one clear sign of Gods absence in society is the absence of playfulness and laughter.

— Mike Yaconelli god

Our world is... longing to see people whose God is big and holy and frightening and gentle and tender... and ours; a God whose love frightens us into His strong and powerful arms where He longs to whisper those terrifying words, I love you.

— Mike Yaconelli love

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