Cornelia Arnolda Johanna “Corrie” ten Boom (15 April 1892[1] – 15 April 1983) was a Dutch watchmaker and later a Christian writer and public speaker, who worked with her father, Casper ten Boom, her sister Betsie ten Boom and other family members to help many Jewish people escape from the Nazis during the Holocaust in World War II by hiding them in her home. They were caught, and she was arrested and sent to the Ravensbrück concentration camp. Her most famous book, The Hiding Place, is a biography that recounts the story of her family’s efforts and how she found and shared hope in God while she was imprisoned at the concentration camp.
Corrie Ten Boom Quotes
1. “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
2. “Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow. It empties today of its strength.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
3. “If you look at the world, you’ll be distressed. If you look within, you’ll be depressed. If you look at God you’ll be at rest.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
4. “Faith sees the invisible, believes the unbelievable, and receives the impossible.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
5. “Is prayer your steering wheel or your spare tire?”
— Corrie Ten Boom
6. “When a train goes through a tunnel and it gets dark, you don’t throw away the ticket and jump off. You sit still and trust the engineer.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
7. “Worrying is carrying tomorrow’s load with today’s strength- carrying two days at once. It is moving into tomorrow ahead of time. Worrying doesn’t empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
8. “You can never learn that Christ is all you need until Christ is all you have.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
9. “Forgiveness is the key that unlocks the door of resentment and the handcuffs of hatred. It is a power that breaks the chains of bitterness and the shackles of selfishness.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
10. “There is no pit so deep, that God’s love is not deeper still.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
11. “God buries our sins in the depths of the sea and then puts up a sign that reads, “No fishing.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
12. “Forgiveness is setting the prisoner free, only to find out that the prisoner was me.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
13. “Let God’s promises shine on your problems.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
14. “The safest place to be is in the center of God’s will.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
15. “If the devil cannot make us bad, he will make us busy.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
16. “Hold loosely to the things of this life, so that if God requires them of you, it will be easy to let them go.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
17. “In order to realize the worth of the anchor we need to feel the stress of the storm.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
18. “I have learned to hold all things loosely, so God will not have to pry them out of my hands.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
19. “We must mirror God’s love in the midst of a world full of hatred. We are the mirrors of God’s love, so we may show Jesus by our lives.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
20. “Don’t pray when you feel like it. Have an appointment with the Lord and keep it.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
21. “Worry is a cycle of inefficient thoughts whirling around a center of fear.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
22. “God has plans, not problems for our lives. The life of a Christian is an education for a higher service. God is training you for something.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
23. “It is not my ability, but my response to God’s ability, that counts.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
24. “Faith is like radar that sees through the fog – the reality of things at a distance that the human eye cannot see.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
25. “Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength. it does not enable us to escape evil. It makes us unfit to face evil when it comes. it is the interest you pay on trouble before it comes.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
26. “You never so touch the ocean of God’s love as when you forgive and love your enemies.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
27. “Does being born into a Christian family make one a Christian? No! God has no grandchildren.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
28. “There is no panic in Heaven! God has no problems, only plans.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
29. “If all things are possible with God, then all things are possible to him who believes in Him.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
30. “Worry is an old man with bended head, carrying a load of feathers which he thinks are lead.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
31. “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
32. “The measure of a life, after all, is not its duration, but its donation.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
33. “Trying to do the Lord’s work in your own strength is the most confusing, exhausting, and tedious of all work. But when you are filled with the Holy Spirit, then the ministry of Jesus just flows out of you.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
34. “In God’s faithfulness lies eternal security.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
35. “Love is the strongest force in the world.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
36. “There are no ‘ifs’ in God’s Kingdom. His timing is perfect. His will is our hiding place. Lord Jesus, keep me in Your will! Don’t let me go mad by poking about outside it.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
37. “What wings are to a bird, and sails to a ship, so is prayer to the soul.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
38. “Hold everything in your hands lightly, otherwise it hurts when God pries your fingers open.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
39. “A person is either a missionary or a mission field.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
40. “Four marks of true repentance are acknowledgment of wrong, willingness to confess it, willingness to abandon it, and willingness to make restitution.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
41. “No pit is so deep that He is not deeper still; with Jesus even in our darkest moments, the best remains, and the very best is yet to be.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
42. “As a camel kneels before his master to have him remove his burden at the end of the day, so kneel each night and let the Master take your burden.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
43. “Don’t bother to give God instructions; just report for duty.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
44. “Any concern too small to be turned into a prayer is too small to be made into a burden.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
45. “The best learning I had came from teaching.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
46. “If God sends us on strong paths, we are provided strong shoes.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
47. “There are no ‘if’s’ in God’s world. And no places that are safer than other places. The center of His will is our only safety – let us pray that we may always know it!”
— Corrie Ten Boom
48. “Jesus did not promise to change the circumstances around us. He promised great peace and pure joy to those who would learn to believe that God actually controls all things.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
49. “Forgiveness is an act of the will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
50. “If Jesus were born one thousand times in Bethlehem and not in me, then I would still be lost.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
51. “You see, a potter can only mold the clay when it lies completely in his hand. It requires complete surrender.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
52. “When a Christian shuns fellowship with other Christians, the devil smiles, When he stops studying the Bible, the devil laughs. When he stops praying, the devils shouts for joy.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
53. “The school of life offers some difficult courses, but it is in the difficult class that one learns the most.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
54. “A man is powerful on his knees.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
55. “Jesus loves sinners. He only loves sinners. He has never turned anyone away who came to Him for forgiveness, and He died on the cross for sinners, not for respectable people.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
56. “Faith is like radar that sees through the fog.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
57. “You know, eternal life does not start when we go to heaven. It starts the moment you reach out to Jesus. He never turns His back on anyone. And He is waiting for you…”
— Corrie Ten Boom
58. “God, make me willing to be made willing.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
59. “The first step on the way to victory is to recognize the enemy.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
60. “Only Heaven will reveal the top part of God’s tapestry.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
61. “Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
62. “In darkness God’s truth shines most clear.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
63. “I have experienced His presence in the deepest hell that man can create. I have really tested the promises of the Bible, and believe me, you can count on them.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
64. “When I try, I fail. When I trust, He succeeds.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
65. “Expect resistance but pray for miracles!”
— Corrie Ten Boom
66. “You can’t love God without loving the Jewish people.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
67. “Today I know that such memories are the key not to the past, but to the future. 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
68. “The human spirit fails, except when the Holy Spirit fills.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
69. “When you want to work for God start a committee. When you want to work with God start a prayer group.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
70. “He uses our problems for His miracles. This was my first lesson in learning to trust Him completely…”
— Corrie Ten Boom
71. “Thank you, Lord, that You are the Conqueror and that You want to make us more than conquerors.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
72. “The devil smiles when we are up to our ears in work, but he trembles when we pray.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
73. “The amount of God’s love is unlimited, but we only receive as much as we use.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
74. “Children need the wisdom of their elders; the aging need the encouragement of a child’s exuberance.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
75. “Only to those who have been in prison does freedom have such great meaning.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
76. “A religion that is small enough for our understanding would not be big enough for our needs.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
77. “Don’t hold onto anything so tightly that Jesus can’t take it from you.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
78. “We can’t solve problems for others. We can introduce them to the Lord.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
79. “Child, you have to learn to see things in the right proportions. Learn to see great things great and small things small.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
80. “In the center of a hurricane there is absolute peace and quiet. There is no safer place than in the center of the will of God.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
81. “Discernment is God’s call to intercession, never to faultfinding.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
82. “Be united with other Christians. A wall with loose bricks is not good. The bricks must be cemented together.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
83. “We never know how God will answer our prayers, but we can expect that He will get us involved in His plan for the answer. If we are true intercessors, we must be ready to take part in God’s work on behalf of the people for whom we pray.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
84. “When you are covered by His wings, it can get pretty dark.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
85. “Perhaps only when human effort had done its best and failed, would God’s power alone be free to work.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
86. “Forgiveness is not an emotion; it is an act of the will.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
87. “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
88. “What a sad mistake we sometimes make when we think that God only cares about Christians.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
89. “If God has called you, do not spend time looking over your shoulder to see who is following you.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
90. “No matter how deep our darkness, he is deeper still.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
91. “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
92. “There is an ocean of God’s love available-there is plenty for everyone. May God grant you never to doubt that victorious whatever the circumstances.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
93. “The Lord never makes a mistake. One day, when we are in heaven, I’m sure we shall see the answers to the whys.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
94. “We are not a postwar generation, but a pre-peace generation. Jesus is coming.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
95. “In this dark world, the Lord Jesus gave us the task of passing on His love.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
96. “Love is larger than the walls which shut it in.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
97. “I would much rather be the trusting child of a rich Father, than a beggar at the door of worldly men.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
98. “Your love in me is stronger than the hatred.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
99. “The life of a Christian is an education for higher service.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
100. “Jesus Christ is able to untangle all the snarls in your soul, to banish all your complexes, and to transform even your fixed habit patterns, no matter how deeply they are etched in your subconscious.”
— Corrie Ten Boom
