Amazing Faith: the Authorized Biography of Bill Bright, Founder of Campus Crusade for Christ

Amazing Faith: the Authorized Biography of Bill Bright, Founder of Campus Crusade for Christ by Michael Richardson
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A great book on the life of Bill Bright. The books takes you from Bill's birth through his great ministry of Campus Crusade. I trust you will be challenged by the quotes below from the book:

If we could but show the world that being committed to Christ is no tame, humdrum, sheltered monotony, but the most thrilling, exciting adventure the human spirit could ever know, those who have been standing outside the church and looking askance at Christ would come crowding in to pay allegiance, and we might well expect the greatest revival since Pentecost.   ~Dr. James Stewart

When you step down from the podium, will people say, “What a great preacher he is,” or, “What a great Lord he serves?”   ~quote Bill Bright heard at Princeton and took to heart

In one class at Fuller, Bill [Bright] took an exegetical tour of Romans 6 that so impressed him, he never forgot its four points: know, reckon, yield, obey.  Know your position in Christ as dead to sin, risen in power. Reckon or account yourself dead to the old sin nature; behave by faith as if it were dead and don’t respond to it. Yield your body as an instrument of righteousness. Obey God’s commands by faith.   ~Michael Richardson

There is no magic in small plans. When I consider my ministry, I think of the world. Anything less than that would not be worthy of Christ, nor of His will for my life.   ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

The greatness of a man’s power is the measure of his surrender. It is not a question of who you are or what you are, but whether God controls you.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

Are you proving that the Christian life is a joyful, happy thing? Do you look glad that you are a Christian? Make the Christian life contagious.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

Enthusiasm starts a hard job; determination works at it; only love continues until it is finished.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

Serving God with our little is the way to make it more.    ~Dr. Henrietta Mears


Kindness has converted more sinners than zeal, eloquence, or learning.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

You teach a little by what you say. You teach most by what you are.   ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

An efficient leader may, through his knowledge of his job and the magnetism of his personality, greatly increase the efficiency of others.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

All that I see teaches me to thank the Creator for all I cannot see.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

You must decide what you want to build and then precede with the plans.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears


What you are is God’s gift to you. What you can become is your gift to Him.  ~Dr. Henrietta Mears

I see now that evil is endemic in man and that the Christian doctrine of original sin expresses a deep and essential insight into human nature. Reject it and you fall victim, as so many of us whose minds developed in an atmosphere of left-wing politics and rationalist philosophy have fallen victims, to shallow optimism in regard to human nature.  ~former atheist-philosopher Cyril E. M. Joad

Christianity seemed to offer … consolation, strengthening, and assistance, while the rationalist philosophy which I had hitherto done my best to maintain, came to seem intolerably trivial and superficial ….    ~former atheist-philosopher Cyril E. M. Joad

Who can this Man be who, though He never wrote a single word Himself to be read by succeeding generations, yet has by His spoken words and unparalleled deeds, created a greater literature, led to more profound thinking about and brought more light upon life’s greatest problems, than any other person who has ever walked among men? Indeed, the very words under which thousands of books about Jesus are classified are not used of any other historical person of any century, no matter how great they may have been – such as Incarnation, Virgin Birth, Sinlessness, Deity, Resurrection, Ascension, Second Advent, Prince of Peace, and Head of the Church.  ~Wilbur M. Smith

What sort of man is this, who over and over again, gave numerous details about His death, months before it occurred, and added to each such utterance that on the third day after His decease He would rise again from the dead – and DID RISE, as even the city of Jerusalem soon came to believe? No other founder of a great world religion (or a small one) ever made such statements, or ever came forth from the dead.    ~Wilbur M. Smith

The life Jesus led, the miracles He performed, the words He spoke, His death on the cross, His resurrection, His ascent to heaven, all point to the fact that He was not mere man, but more than man …. It is important to consider that Jesus Christ claimed to be God. He claimed to be the author of a new way of life ….

Either Jesus of Nazareth was who He claimed to be, the Son of God, the Savior of mankind, or He was the greatest impostor the world has ever known. If His claims were false more good has resulted from a lie than has ever been accomplished by the truth …. Historically, we know that whenever His message has gone, new life, new hope, and new purpose for living have resulted ….

Does it not make sense that this person (whom most people, knowing the facts, consider the greatest teacher, the greatest example, the greatest leader the world has ever known) would be, as He Himself claimed to be, and the Bible tells us that He is, the one person who could bridge the chasm between a holy God and sinful man?     ~Bill Bright

God looks first for availability in His servants, then provides them with the necessary ability for accomplishing His purpose.   ~Michael Richardson

Inspiration without perspiration leads to frustration and ultimately to stagnation.   ~Bill Bright

Acceptance of circumstances, Bill would explain years later, is the role of a slave. Whatever needs the Master permits in the life of the slave are the Master’s responsibility to meet. It is not for the slave to rush out and fix the situation for the Master or, even worse, to rise up and rebel. The slave is to present the need to the Master and rest in the Master’s handling of it. This requires total trust in the Master’s honor, justice, and goodness. The slave awaits the Master’s move and the Master’s provision. ~Michael Richardson

Bill was awed by the story of Kim’s survival of a communist attack on his home village in Korea. On a rainy spring day, communist guerrillas invaded the village in Korea, intent upon killing everyone in their path. Kim’s wife and father were murdered, and Kim himself was beaten and left for dead. In the cool rain of the night he revived and fled to safety in the mountains with his young daughter. They were the sole survivors.

As a man of God, Kim had learned from Scripture that he was to love his enemies and pray for those who persecuted him. What was to be his attitude concerning those who had killed his beloved wife and honored father? The Spirit of God impressed upon him that he was to seek out the communist chief who led the guerrilla attack, tell him that he loved and forgave him, and tell him of God’s love in Christ and his need for the Savior.

This he did, and God honored his obedience. The communist chief knelt in prayer with Kim and committed his life to Christ. Within a short time a number of other communists were converted to Christ as well, and Kim helped them build a church for themselves and other communists converts before he came to America to further his education.  ~Michael Richardson

He feared man so little because he feared God so much.  ~Inscription on the burial monument for Lord Lawrence


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