Devin Best > Devin's Quotes

“And so seated next to my father in the train compartment, I suddenly asked, "Father, what is sexsin?"
He turned to look at me, as he always did when answering a question, but to my surprise he said nothing. At last he stood up, lifted his traveling case off the floor and set it on the floor.
Will you carry it off the train, Corrie?" he said.
I stood up and tugged at it. It was crammed with the watches and spare parts he had purchased that morning.
It's too heavy," I said.
Yes," he said, "and it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It's the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger, you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“This is what the past is for! Every experience God gives us, every person He puts in our lives is the perfect preparation for the future that only He can see.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“Do you know what hurts so very much? It's love. Love is the strongest force in the world, and when it is blocked that means pain. There are two things we can do when this happens. We can kill that love so that it stops hurting. But then of course part of us dies, too. Or we can ask God to open up another route for that love to travel.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“In darkness God's truth shines most clear.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Even as the angry vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him....Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me your forgiveness....And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world's healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives along with the command, the love itself.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“If God has shown us bad times ahead, it's enough for me that He knows about them. That's why He sometimes shows us things, you know - to tell us that this too is in His hands.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“God's viewpoint is sometimes different from ours - so different that we could not even guess at it unless He had given us a Book which tells us such things....In the Bible I learn that God values us not for our strenght or our brains but simply because He has made us.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“Father sat down on the edge of the narrow bed. "Corrie," he began gently, "when you and I go to Amsterdam-when do I give you your ticket?"
I sniffed a few times, considering this.
"Why, just before we get on the train."
"Exactly. And our wise Father in heaven knows when we're going to need things, too. Don't run out ahead of Him, Corrie. When the time comes that some of us will have to die, you will look into your heart and find the strength you need-just in time.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Mama's love had always been the kind that acted itself out with soup pot and sewing basket. But now that these things were taken away, the love seemed as whole as before. She sat in her chair at the window and loved us. She loved the people she saw in the street-- and beyond: her love took in the city, the land of Holland, the world. And so I learned that love is larger than the walls which shut it in. ”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“And for all these people alike, the key to healing turned out to be the same. Each had a hurt he had to forgive.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“How often it is a small, almost unconscious event that makes a turning point.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“...suddenly I was afraid of what Father would say. Afraid he would say, "There'll be someone else soon," and that forever afterward this untruth would lie between us. For in some deep part of me I knew already that there would not--soon or ever--be anyone else.

The sweet cigar-smell came into the room with Father. And of course he did not say the false, idle words.

"Corrie," he began instead, "do you know what hurts so very much? It's love. Love is the strongest force in the world, and when it is blocked that means pain.

"There are two things we can do when this happens. We can kill the love so that it stops hurting. But then of course part of us dies, too. Or, Corrie, we can ask God to open up another route for that love to travel.

"God loves Karel--even more than you do--and if you ask Him, He will give you His love for this man, a love nothing can prevent, nothing destroy. Whenever we cannot love in the old, human way, Corrie, God can give us his perfect way."

I did not know, as I listened to Father's footsteps winding back down the stairs, that he had given me more than the key to this hard moment. I did not know that he had put into my hands the secret that would open far darker rooms than this--places where there was not, on a human level, anything to love at all.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“All through the short afternoon they kept coming, the people who counted themselves Father's friends. Young and old, poor and rich, scholarly gentlemen and illiterate servant girls—only to Father did it seem that they were all alike. That was Father's secret: not that he overlooked the differences in people; that he didn't know they were there.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“When He tells us to love our enemies He gives, along with the command, the love itself.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Oh, this was the great ploy of Satan in that kingdom of his: to display such blatant evil one could almost believe one's own secret sin didn't matter.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“At last we heard Father's footsteps winding up the stairs. It was the best moment in every day, when he came up to tuck us in. We never fell asleep until he had arranged the balnkets in his special way and laid his hand for a moment on each head. Then we tried not to move even a toe.

But that night as he stepped through the door I burst into tears. "I need you!" I sobbed. "You can't die! You can't!"

Father sat down on the edge of the narrow bed. "Corrie," he began gently, "when you and I go to Amsterdam, when do I give you your ticket?" I sniffed a few times, considering this. "Why, just before we get on the train."

"Exactly. And our wise Father in Heaven knows when we're going to need things too. Don't run out ahead of Him, Corrie. When the time comes that some of us will have to die, you will look into your heart and find the strength you need--just in time.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“If the Gospels were truly the pattern of God’s activity, then defeat was only the beginning.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Corrie, if people can be taught to hate, they can be taught to love! We must find the way, you and I, no matter how long it takes.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger, you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.

And I was satisfied. More than satisfied--wonderfully at peace. There were answers to mmy hard questions--for now, I was content to leave them in my father's keeping.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“And so I discovered that it is not on our own forgiveness any more than on our own goodness that the world's healing hinges, but on His. When he tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself.”
― Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“The real sin lay in thinking that any power to help and transform came from me. Of course it was not my wholeness, but Christ’s that made the difference.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“The blacker the night around us grew, the brighter and truer and more beautiful burned the word of God.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“Thou art my hiding place and my shield: I hope in thy word. . . . Hold thou me up, and I shall be safe.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“I know that the experiences of our lives, when we let God use them, become the mysterious and perfect preparation for the work. He will give us to do.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Every experience God gives us, every person He puts in our lives is the perfect preparation for a future that only He can see.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“We must tell people what we have learned here. We must tell them that there is no pit so deep that He is not deeper still. They will listen to us, Corrie, because we have been here.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Happiness isn’t something that depends on our surroundings, Corrie. It’s something we make inside ourselves.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place

“Life in Ravensbruck took place on two separate levels, mutually impossible. One, the observable, external life, grew every day more horrible. The other, the life we lived with God, grew daily better, truth upon truth, glory upon glory.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Thank you," Betsie went on serenely, "for the fleas and for-"

The fleas! This was too much. "Betsie, there's no way even God can make me grateful for a flea."

"Give thanks in all circumstances," she quoted. "It doesn't say, 'in pleasant circumstances.' Fleas are part of this place where God has put us."

And so we stood between piers of bunks and gave thanks for fleas. But this time I was sure Betsie was wrong.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

“Perhaps only when human effort had done its best and failed, would God’s power alone be free to work.”
― Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place