“Good is not always God's will, but God's will is always good.”

—  Watchman Nee

Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Good is not always God's will, but God's will is always good." by Watchman Nee?
Watchman Nee photo
Watchman Nee 10
Chinese church leader 1903–1972

Related quotes

Oswald Chambers photo
Graham Greene photo

“God save us always," I said, "from the innocent and the good.”

Pt. I, ch. 1, pg 15
Source: The Quiet American (1955)

Joel Osteen photo

“God wants you to have a good life, a life filled with love, joy, peace, and fulfillment. That doesn’t mean it will always be easy, but it does mean that it will always be good.”

Joel Osteen (1963) American televangelist and author

Source: Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential

Sallustius photo

“It is impious to suppose that the divine is affected for good or ill by human things. The Gods are always good and always do good and never harm, being always in the same state and like themselves. The truth simply is that, when we are good, we are joined to the Gods by our likeness to live according to virtue we cling to the Gods, and when we become evil we make the Gods our enemies — not because they are angered against us, but because our sins prevent the light of the Gods from shining upon us, and put us in communion with spirits of punishment.”

Sallustius Roman philosopher and writer

XIV. In what sense, though the Gods never change, they are said to be made angry and appeased.
On the Gods and the Cosmos
Context: If any one thinks the doctrine of the unchangeableness of the Gods is reasonable and true, and then wonders how it is that they rejoice in the good and reject the bad, are angry with sinners and become propitious when appeased, the answer is as follows: God does not rejoice — for that which rejoices also grieves; nor is he angered — for to be angered is a passion; nor is he appeased by gifts — if he were, he would be conquered by pleasure.
It is impious to suppose that the divine is affected for good or ill by human things. The Gods are always good and always do good and never harm, being always in the same state and like themselves. The truth simply is that, when we are good, we are joined to the Gods by our likeness to live according to virtue we cling to the Gods, and when we become evil we make the Gods our enemies — not because they are angered against us, but because our sins prevent the light of the Gods from shining upon us, and put us in communion with spirits of punishment. And if by prayers and sacrifices we find forgiveness of sins, we do not appease or change the Gods, but by what we do and by our turning toward the divine we heal our own badness and so enjoy again the goodness of the Gods. To say that God turns away from the evil is like saying that the sun hides himself from the blind.

Aristotle photo

“If, then, God is always in that good state in which we sometimes are, this compels our wonder; and if in a better this compels it yet more. And God is in a better state. And life also belongs to God; for the actuality of thought is life, and God is that actuality; and God's self-dependent actuality is life most good and eternal.”

Book XII, 1072b.24
Metaphysics
Original: (el) εἰ οὖν οὕτως εὖ ἔχει, ὡς ἡμεῖς ποτέ, ὁ θεὸς ἀεί, θαυμαστόν: εἰ δὲ μᾶλλον, ἔτι θαυμασιώτερον. ἔχει δὲ ὧδε. καὶ ζωὴ δέ γε ὑπάρχει: ἡ γὰρ νοῦ ἐνέργεια ζωή, ἐκεῖνος δὲ ἡ ἐνέργεια: ἐνέργεια δὲ ἡ καθ᾽ αὑτὴν ἐκείνου ζωὴ ἀρίστη καὶ ἀΐδιος.
Source: https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0051%3Abook%3D12%3Asection%3D1072b

Alexander Maclaren photo

“If our faith in God is not the veriest sham, it demands, and will produce, the abandonment sometimes, the subordination always, of external helps and material good.”

Alexander Maclaren (1826–1910) British minister

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 240.

Archibald Macleish photo

“If God is God, he is not good. If God is good, he is not God.”

Archibald Macleish (1892–1982) American poet and Librarian of Congress

Dialogue from MacLeish's play J.B. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J.B._(play), an adaptation of the Bible's Book of Job, also quoted in The God Problem: How a Godless Cosmos Creates (2012) by Howard Bloom

L. Lin Wood photo
John Keats photo

“I can scarcely bid you good-bye, even in a letter. I always made an awkward bow. God bless you!”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

Letter to Charles Armitage Brown (November 30, 1820)
Letters (1817–1820)

Related topics