43 Discipleship Quotes For Inspiration

In a world where spiritual growth and personal development are more important than ever, finding the right words to inspire and guide us can make all the difference. Whether you are new to the journey of discipleship or have been walking the path for years, a powerful quote can serve as a beacon of hope, a reminder of purpose, and a source of strength. In this collection, we've carefully curated the top 43 discipleship quotes designed to uplift and motivate you. Dive in and let these timeless words of wisdom illuminate your path to deeper faith and commitment.

1. “When a person is evoked for who she is, not who she is not, the most often result will be the inner healing of her heart through the touch of affirmation.Jesus said you are to love one another as I have loved you, a love that will possibly lead to the bloody, anguish gift of yourself, a love that forgives seven times seven, that keeps no record of wrong. This is the criterion, sole norm, the standard of discipleship in the New Israel of God.” - Brennan Manning

2. “When in situations of stress, we wonder if there is any more in us to give, we can be comforted to know that God, who knows our capabilities perfectly, placed us here to succeed. No one was foreordained to fail or to be wicked. When we have been weighed and found wanting, let us remember that we were measured before and were found equal to our tasks; and therefore, let us continue but with a more determined discipleship." (Ensign, Feb. 1979, 73.)” - Neal Maxwell

3. “The "show business," which is so incorporated into our view of Christian work today, has caused us to drift far from Our Lord's conception of discipleship. It is instilled in us to think that we have to do exceptional things for God; we have not. We have to be exceptional in ordinary things, to be holy in mean streets, among mean people, surrounded by sordid sinners. That is not learned in five minutes.” - Oswald Chambersd Chambers

4. “The trouble with deep belief is that it costs something And there is something inside me, some selfish beast of a subtle thing that doesn't like the truth at all because it carries responsibility, and if I actually believe these things I have to do something about them. It is so, so cumbersome to believe anything. And it isn't cool.” - Donald Miller

5. “Jesus of Nazareth always comes asking disciples to follow him--not merely "accept him," not merely "believe in him," not merely "worship him," but to follow him: one either follows Christ, or one does not. There is no compartmentalization of the faith, no realm, no sphere, no business, no politic in which the lordship of Christ will be excluded. We either make him Lord of all lords, or we deny him as Lord of any.” - Lee Camp

6. “For those who feel their lives are a grave disappointment to God, it requires enormous trust and reckless, raging confidence to accept that the love of Jesus Christ knows no shadow of alteration or change. When Jesus said, "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy burdened," He assumed we would grow weary, discouraged, and disheartened along the way. These words are a touching testimony to the genuine humanness of Jesus. He had no romantic notion of the cost of discipleship. He knew that following Him was as unsentimental as duty, as demanding as love.” - Brennan Manning

7. “We are not meant to die merely in order to be dead. God could not want that for the creatures to whom He has given the breath of life. We die in order to live.” - Elisabeth Elliot

8. “We advise disciples not to follow anyone. Let them follow themselves. Each one should follow his resplendent and luminous inner Being.” - Samael Aun Weor

9. “Jesus calls us to his rest, and meekness is His method. The meek man cares not at all who is greater than he, for he has long ago decided that the esteem of the world is not worth the effort.” - A. W. Tozer

10. “God in His sovereign goodness often uses the painful and at times debilitating injury of a spear thrower to make us readier for His service. ... One thing you discover about spear throwers is that though it’s not necessary for them to be good, it’s essential for them to appear good.” - Erwin W. Lutzer

11. “Do they desire to join me in thanksgiving when they hear how, by your gift, I have come close to you, and do they pray for me when they hear how I am held back by my own weight? ...A brotherly mind will love in me what you teach to be lovable, and will regret in me what you teach to be regrettable. This is a mark of a Christian brother's mind, not an outsider's--not that of 'the sons of aliens whose mouth speaks vanity, and their right hand is a right hand of iniquity' (Ps. 143:7 f.). A brotherly person rejoices on my account when he approves me, but when he disapproves, he is loving me. To such people I will reveal myself. They will take heart from my good traits, and sigh with sadness at my bad ones. My good points are instilled by you and are your gifts. My bad points are my faults and your judgements on them. Let them take heart from the one and regret the other. Let both praise and tears ascend in your sight from brotherly hearts, your censers. ...But you Lord...Make perfect my imperfections” - St. Augustine of Hippo

12. “Beginning to sense his call to preach boldly in dangerous situations even though he was young and slight, the author agreed to go only if God would give him a particular sense of His presence. The next morning, the author says it was as if God took out his human eyes and replaced them with God's own because he saw other people so much more vividly.” - K.P. Yohannan

13. “The only humility that is really ours is not that which we try to show before God in prayer, but that which we carry with us, and carry out, in our ordinary conduct; the insignficances of daily life are the importances and the tests of eternity, because they prove what really is the spirit that possesses us.” - Andrew Murray

14. “We need to shed our unearthly and nonsocial and idealistic and romantic and uber-spiritual visions of kingdom and get back to what Jesus meant. By kingdom, Jesus means: God's Dream Society on earth, spreading out from the land of Israel to encompass the whole world.” - Scot McKnight

15. “Most people in America, when they are exposed to the Christian faith, are not being transformed. They take one step into the door, and the journey ends. They are not being allowed, encouraged, or equipped to love or to think like Christ. Yet in many ways a focus on spiritual formation fits what a new generation is really seeking. Transformation is a process, a journey, not a one-time decision.” - David Kinnaman

16. “The choice we face is not, as many imagine, between heaven and hell. Rather, the choice is between heaven and this world. Even a fool would exchange hell for heaven; but only the wise will exchange this world for heaven.” - Dave Hunt

17. “‎Those who aren't following Jesus aren't his followers. It's that simple. Followers follow, and those who don't follow aren't followers. To follow Jesus means to follow Jesus into a society where justice rules, where love shapes everything. To follow Jesus means to take up his dream and work for it.” - Scot McKnight

18. “Why do so many today want to wander off to South Africa or Kenya or India or Russia or Honduras or Costa Rica or Peru to help with justice issues but not spend the same effort in their own neighborhood or community or state? Why do young suburbanites, say in Chicago, want to go to Kentucky or Tennessee to help people but not want to spend that same time to go to the inner city in their own area to help with justice issues? I asked this question to a mature student in my office one day, and he thought he had a partial explanation: 'Because my generation is searching for experiences, and the more exotic and extreme the better. Going down the street to help at a food shelter is good and it is just and some of us are doing that, but it's not an experience. We want experiences.” - Scot McKnight

19. “Jesus did not command us to "develop" leaders. He commanded us to make "disciples". The world "develops" leaders, the Church "disciples" them. The two are not the same.” - John Paul warren

20. “Fortunately, God made all varieties of people with a wide variety of interests and abilities. He has called people of every race and color who have been hurt by life in every manner imaginable. Even the scars of past abuse and injury can be the means of bringing healing to another. What wonderful opportunities to make disciples!” - Swindoll Charles R.

21. “It takes a while for revelry to turn to reverence, and much repetition of truth to eventual turn young zeal into habitual channels for good.” - Elisabeth Elliot

22. “Let not him who accepts light in an instant despise him who gropes months in shadows.” - Elisabeth Elliot

23. “Failure means nothing now, only that it taught me life.” - Elisabeth Elliot

24. “Individually the disciple and friend of Jesus who has learned to work shoulder to shoulder with his or her Lord stands in this world as a point of contact between heaven and earth, a kind of Jacob’s ladder by which the angels of God may ascend from and descend into human life. Thus the disciple stands as an envoy or a receiver by which the kingdom of God is conveyed into every quarter of human affairs.” - Dallas Willard

25. “The cross where Jesus died became also the cross where His apostle died. The loss, the rejection, the shame, belong both to Christ and to all who in very truth are His. the cross that saves them also slays them, and anything short of this is a pseudo-faith and not true faith at all.” - A.W. Tozer

26. “Waiting is an art that our impatient age has forgotten. It wants to break open the ripe fruit when it has hardly finished planting the shoot. But all too often the greedy eyes are only deceived; the fruit that seemed so precious is still green on the inside, and disrespected hands ungratefully toss aside what has so disappointed them.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

27. “I always have the feeling we are merely fearfully trying to save room for God; I would rather speak of God at the center than at the limits, in strength rather than weakness, and thus in human life and goodness rather than in death and guilt.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

28. “Spiritual maturity is not reached by the passing of the years, but by obedience to the will of God. Some people mature into an understanding of God’s will more quickly than others because they obey more readily; they more readily sacrifice the life of nature to the will of God.” - Oswald Chambers

29. “God is not preparing you for anything; obedience is its own end in the purpose of God; be faithful to Him.” - Oswald Chambers

30. “Discipling our children is not about teaching them to behave in a way that won’t embarrass us. We’re working toward something much more important than that. We’re actually raising our children with a view toward leading them to trust and to follow Christ.” - Voddie T. Baucham Jr.

31. “Because I am not yet living up to what Jesus expects me to be in those red letters in the Bible, I always define myself as somebody who is saved by God's grace and is on his way to becoming a Christian. (...) Being saved is trusting in what Christ did for us, but being Christian is dependent on the way we respond to what he did for us.” - Tony Campolo

32. “What makes authentic disciples is not visions, ecstasies, biblical mastery of chapter and verse, or spectacular success in the ministry, but a capacity for faithfulness. Buffeted by the fickle winds of failure, battered by their own unruly emotions, and bruised by rejection and ridicule, authentic disciples may have stumbled and frequently fallen, endured lapses and relapses, gotten handcuffed to the fleshpots and wandered into a far county. Yet, they kept coming back to Jesus.” - Brennan Manning

33. “...there is still a need for those of us nestled deep within the Christian bubble to look beyond the status quo and critically assess the degree to which we are really living biblically.” - Francis Chan

34. “(Bonhoeffer's) change was not an ungainly, embarrassing leap from which he would have to retreat slightly when he gained more maturity and perspective. It was by all accounts a deepening consistent with what had gone before.” - Eric Metaxas

35. “The figure of the crucified invalidates all thought which takes success for its standard.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

36. “We listened, as all boys in their better moods will listen (ay, and men too for the matter of that), to a man whom we felt to be, with all his heart and soul and strength, striving against whatever was mean and unmanly and unrighteous in our little world. It was not the cold, clear voice of one giving advice and warning from serene heights to those who were struggling and sinning below, but the warm, living voice of one who was fighting for us and by our sides, and calling on us to help him and ourselves and one another.” - Thomas Hughes

37. “Any religious person who says he does not really need human friends because God is his Friend is calling God a liar because He's the One Who says we also need human friends.” - Mark Driscoll

38. “You can either be god of certain areas of your life, or let Me be God of your whole life.” - The Skit Guys

39. “My life is too short, and God’s work is too great for me to think of making a home for myself in this world.” - George Eliot

40. “The main characteristic which is the proof of the indwelling Spirit is an amazing tenderness in personal dealing, and a blazing truthfulness with regard to God’s Word.” - Oswald Chambers

41. “It never cost a disciple anything to follow Jesus; to talk about cost when you are in love with anyone is an insult.” - Oswald Chambers

42. “If we are cut loose from the anchor of God's Word, we will not be free. We will be slaves of personal passions and popular trends.” - John Piper

43. “I do not politicize Christianity nor my discipleship as Jesus did not politicize either His divinity nor his humanity.” - R. Alan Woods