Looking Up To Heaven Quotes & Sayings

Nowadays almost all man's improvements, so called, as the building of houses, and the cutting down of the forest and of all large trees, simply deform the landscape, and make it more tame and cheap ... and some worldly miser with a surveyor looking after his bounds, while heaven had taken place around him, and he did not see the angles going to and fro, but was looking for an old post-hole in the midst of paradise. I looked again, and saw him standing in the middle of a boggy, stygian, fen, surrounded by devils, and he had found his bounds without a doubt, three little stones, where a stake had been driven, and looking nearer, I saw that the prince of Darkness was his surveyor. — Henry David Thoreau

The masses are always wrong - Wisdom is doing everything the crowd does not do. All you do is reverse the totality of their learning and you have the heaven they're looking for. — Charles Bukowski

There's a lady who's sure
All that glitters is gold.
And she's buying a stairway to heaven.
And when she gets there she knows
If the stores are closed.
With a word she can get what she came for.
There's a sign on the wall
But she wants to be sure.
Cause you know sometimes words have
Two meanings.
In a tree by the brook there's a songbird
Who sings sometimes.
All of our thoughts are misgiven.
There's a feeling I get when I look
To the West.
And my spirit is crying for leaving.
In my thoughts I have seen rings of smoke
Through the trees.
And the voices of those who stand looking. — Led Zeppelin

What's this flesh? A little cruded milk
Fantastical puff-paste. Our bodies are weaker than those
Paper prisons boys use to keep flies in; more contemptible,
Since our is to preserve earth-worms. Didst thou ever seen
A lark in a cage? Such is the soul in the body: this world
Is like her little turf of grass, and the heaven o'er our heads
Like her looking-glass, only gives us a miserable knowledge
Of the small compass of our prison. — John Webster

Space and heaven are looking at you with billions of eyes just to appreciate the beauty of life. — Debasish Mridha

He was looking forward to his visit not only for the pleasure of the shrewd dealing which far transcended mere gross profit, but with the sheer happiness of being out of bed and moving once more at free will, even though a little weakly, in the sun and air which men drank and moved in and talked and dealt with one another - a pleasure no small part of which lay in the fact that he had not started yet and was absolutely nothing under heaven to make him start until he wanted to. He did not still feel weak, he was merely luxuriating in that supremely gutful lassitude of convalescence in which time, hurry, doing, did not exist, the accumulating seconds and minutes and hours to which in its well state the body's slave both waking and sleeping, now reversed and time now the lip-server and mendicant to the body's pleasure instead of the body thrall to time's headlong course. — William Faulkner

I think it rather pathetic that so many people are looking forward to heaven to prove that their doctrinal position was correct. — Chuck Smith

God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and let your sins be strong (sin boldly), but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world. We will commit sins while we are here, for this life is not a place where justice resides. We, however, ... are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth where justice will reign. — Martin Luther

When the boy sits up, ... , holds his holy votive tablet up with both hands as if to heaven, up at the level of his head like a priest raising the bread, cause this place is full of people who have eyes and choose to see nothing, who all talk into their hands as they peripatate and carry these votives, some the size of a hand, some the size of a face or a whole head, dedicated to saints perhaps or holy folk, and they look or talk to or pray to these tablets or icons all the while by holding them next to their heads or stroking them with fingers and staring only at them, signifying they must be heavy in their despair to be so consistently looking away from their world and so devoted to their icons. — Ali Smith

The only Angels in Los Angeles are in Heaven, and they're looking down on the Dodgers. — Tommy Lasorda

When the eyes of the soul looking out meet the eyes of God looking in, heaven has begun right here on earth. — Aiden Wilson Tozer

A little girl and her father were walking along in the evening. She was fascinated by the stars, and kept looking up at them, but made no comment until her father asked what she was thinking. She replied, If the bottom side of heaven is so beautiful, how wonderful the other side must be — Francis Gay

The man who spends all his time looking up to heaven is not always the best; in fact, he is usually the worst. — Jose Bergamin

In thinking about miracles, I believe that our frame of reference has been too dramatic. We have been looking for the burning bush, the parting of the sea, the bellowing voice from heaven. Instead we should be looking at the ordinary day-to-day events in our lives for evidence of the miraculous, maintaining at the same time a scientific orientation. — M. Scott Peck

When we lift our inward eyes to gaze upon God we are sure to meet friendly eyes gazing back at us, for it is written that the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout all the earth. The sweet language of experience is "Thou God seest me." When the eyes of the soul looking out meet the eyes of God looking in, heaven has begun right here on this earth. — A.W. Tozer

Now that it's over, I just wanna hold her
I'd give up all the world to see
That little piece of heaven looking back at me.
Now that it's over, I just wanna hold her.
I've gotta live with the choices I've made
And I can't live with myself today. — Skillet

How did Heaven come into all of this? Heaven was life, not death. Heaven was a woman holding your head in the crook of her arm and looking down at you. Heaven was a warm hand on your cheek and the smell of soup with garlic on the fire. — Christopher Buehlman

It was Gideon who finally broke the silence, which gave me a certain satisfaction. "What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?" The way he asked, he sounded almost embarrassed.
"What?"
"It's what my mother always used to when I was little. If I was looking straight ahead and saying nothing, like you right at this moment."
"You have a mother?" Only when I'd said it did I realize what a silly question it was! Oh, for heaven's sake!
Gideon raised one eyebrow. "What did you expect?" he asked, amused. "You thought I was an android put together by Uncle Falk and Mr. George?"
"Well, it's not such an outlandish idea. Do you have photos of yourself as a baby?" Trying to imagine a baby Gideon with a round, soft plump-cheeked face and a bald head made me grin. — Kerstin Gier

I wanted to tell Ren the truth. I wanted to say that he was the best friend I'd ever had. That I was sorry about the way I had treated him. I wanted to tell him ... that I loved him. But I couldn't say anything. My throat was closed up, probably swollen from snake venom. All I could do was look at him as he knelt over me.
That's okay. Looking at his gorgeous face one last time is enough for me. I'll die a happy woman.
I was so tired. My eyelids were too heavy to keep open. I closed my eyes and waited for death to come. Ren cleared a space and sat down near me. Pillowing my head on his arm, he pulled me onto his lap and into his arms. I smiled.
Even better. I can't open my eyes to see him anymore, but I can feel his arms around me. My warrior angel can carry me in his arms up to heaven.
He squeezed my closer to his body and whispered something in my ear that I couldn't make out. Then darkness overtook me. — Colleen Houck

Without stirring abroad, One can know the whole world; Without looking out of the window One can see the way of heaven. The further one goes The less one knows. — Lao-Tzu

It was like looking at heaven from the ferry to hell. — Sabrina Jeffries

What does our baby think of the cord sprouting
into the whoosh whoosh of my wife's heartbeat?
And does Ramon imagine the lines of seaweed
are kite strings stretching into a heaven of water?

I see Ramon and our baby looking up,
up where stretched-out skin, the roof of the world,
lets in the light of day, up where the sun
is a ballet of burning coins. The heart - a kite
like a bucking bronc straining to break into sky. — Vince Gotera

Having a child makes you realize the importance of life - narcissism goes out the window. Heaven on earth is looking at my little boy. The minute he was born, I knew if I never did anything other than being a mom, I'd be fine. — Jenny McCarthy

My conduct, Pugstyles,' said Mr Gregsbury, looking round upon the deputation with gracious magnanimity - 'my conduct has been, and ever will be, regulated by a sincere regard for the true and real interests of this great and happy country. Whether I look at home, or abroad; whether I behold the peaceful industrious communities of our island home: her rivers covered with steamboats, her roads with locomotives, her streets with cabs, her skies with balloons of a power and magnitude hitherto unknown in the history of aeronautics in this or any other nation - I say, whether I look merely at home, or, stretching my eyes farther, contemplate the boundless prospect of conquest and possession - achieved by British perseverance and British valour - which is outspread before me, I clasp my hands, and turning my eyes to the broad expanse above my head, exclaim, Thank Heaven, I am a Briton! — Charles Dickens

We have to understand - not justify - what gives rise to this tragedy. It's not because they're looking for beautiful virgins in heaven, as Orientalists portray it. Palestinian people are in love with life. If we give them hope - a political solution - they'll stop killing themselves. — Mahmoud Darwish

Part of what we pick up in looking at Jesus in the gospel is a way of viewing the whole world. That worldview informs all our values and deeply shapes our thinking and decision-making. Another part of what we absorb is greater confidence in Jesus' counsel and his promises. This has its own powerful effect on what we fear and desire and choose. Another part of what we take up from beholding the glory of Christ is greater delight in his fellowship and deeper longing to see him in heaven. This has its own liberating effect from the temptations of this world. All these have their own peculiar way of changing us into the likeness of Christ. Therefore, we should not think that pursuing likeness to Christ has no other components than just looking at Jesus. Looking at Jesus produces holiness along many different paths. — John Piper

We want to get behind the beauty, but it is only a surface. It is like a mirror that reflects to us our own desire for good. It is a sphinx, an enigma, a sorrowfully irritating mystery. We want to feed on it, but it is only an object we can look on; it appears to us from a certain distance. The great sorrow of human life is knowing that to look and to eat are two different operations. Only on the other side of heaven, where God lives, are they one and the same operation. Children already experience this sorrow when they look at a cake for a long time and nearly regret eating it, but are powerless to help themselves. Maybe the vices, depravities and crimes are nearly always or even always in their essence attempts to eat beauty, to eat what one can only look at. Eve initiated this. If she lost our humanity by eating a fruit, the reverse attitude - looking at a fruit without eating it - must be what saves. — Simone Weil

It wasn't disgust she felt for Karou, not anymore; it was indignation. Incredulity. A man like Akiva crosses worlds to find you, infiltrates the enemy capital just to dance with you, bends heaven and hell to avenge your death, saves your comrade and kin from torture and death, and you send him off looking gut-punched, diminished, carved hollow? — Laini Taylor

Deliver me, O God, from too intense an application to even necessary business. I know how this dissipates my thoughts from the one end of all my business, and impairs that lively perception I would ever retain of thee standing at my right hand. I know the narrowness of my heart, and that an eager attention to earthly things leaves it no room for the things of heaven. O teach me to go through all my employments with so truly disengaged a heart, that I may still see thee in all things, and see thee therein as continually looking upon me, and searching my reins; and that I may never impair that liberty of spirit which is necessary for the love of thee. — Steven W. Manskar

Mother told me always to follow the golden rule.And she said it's really a sin to be mean and cruel.So remember if you're untrueAngels up in heaven are looking at you. — Hal David

His eyes were dimmed with tears, and, looking humbly up to heaven, he wept for the innocence he had lost. — James Joyce

34 And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. Mk7.35 And straightway his ears were opened, — Anonymous

But for me at any rate it was all part of dissolving the God trip or father-figure trip. Facing up to reality instead of always looking for some kind of heaven. — John Lennon

And don't go whining to God about it. It was pretty clear that there was no God up there, no kindly old gent looking down, keeping score in a notebook. You did good, you did bad, it didn't make any difference, did it? This one's going to heaven, this one's going to hell, this one's going to Disneyland.
No. God wouldn't have let any of this shit happen. If you were going to believe in anything, then believe in the devil. He was much more real than God. Up there causing mischief. Laughing at the chaos he'd created. — Charlie Higson

We know from Philo there was already a Jewish tradition of a preexistent being named Jesus who was the Form of God (Element 40). It cannot be claimed Philo came up with this notion on his own, since that would entail a wildly improbable coincidence. So we surely are looking at a derivation from an earlier Divine Logos doctrine. Then we're told this Jesus did not try to seize power from God in heaven (as by some accounts Satan had once done, resulting in his fall to the lower realms), but instead divested himself of all his power and higher being, enslaving himself (either to God's plan or the world of flesh) by 'being made' [genomenos] in the 'likeness' of men (not literally becoming a man, but assuming a human body, and thus wearing human 'flesh'). — Richard C. Carrier

I believed, from the solitary and thoughtful way in which my mother murmured her song, that she was alone. And I went softly into the room. She was sitting by the fire, suckling an infant, whose tiny hand she held against her neck. Her eyes were looking down upon its face, and she sat singing to it. I was so far right, that she had no other companion.
I spoke to her, and she started, and cried out. But seeing me, she called me her dear Davy, her own boy! and coming half across the room to meet me, kneeled down upon the ground and kissed me, and laid my head down on her bosom near the little creature that was nestling there, and put its hand up to my lips.
I wish I had died. I wish I had died then, with that feeling in my Heart! I should have been more fit for Heaven than I ever have been since. — Charles Dickens

Speaking of which," he murmured.
Hyacinth's mouth fell open as he dropped down to one
knee. "What are you doing?" she squeaked, frantically
looking this way and that. Lord St. Clair was surely peeking
out at them, and heaven only knew who else was, too.
"Someone will see," she whispered.
He seemed unconcerned. "People will say we're in
love."
"I - " Good heavens, but how did a woman argue
against that?
"Hyacinth Bridgerton," he said, taking her hand in his,
"will you marry me?"
She blinked in confusion. "I already said I would."
"Yes, but as you said, I did not ask you for the right reasons.
They were mostly the right reasons, but not all."
"I - I - " She was stumbling on the words, choking on
the emotion.
He was staring up at her, his eyes glowing clear and
blue in the dim light of the streetlamps. "I am asking you
to marry me because I love you," he said — Julia Quinn

But I would rather be with you, somewhere in San Francisco on a back porch in July, just looking up to Heaven, at this crescent in the sky — Robert Hunter

The heavens are not filled with hostility. The sky does not express a frown. When I look up I do not contemplate a face of brass, but the face of infinite good will. Yet when I was a child, many a picture has made me think of God as suspicious, inhumanly watchful, always looking round the corner to catch me at the fall. That "eye," placed in the sky of many a picture, and placed there to represent God, filled my heart with chilling fear ... Heaven overflows with good will toward us! Our God not only wishes good, he wills it! — John Henry Jowett

The superior man is quiet and calm, waiting for the appointments of heaven, while the mean man walks in dangerous paths, looking for lucky occurrences. — Confucius

I was brought up to be honest; the trouble is it gets me nowhere."
Liking her better, he smiled and said, "It'll get us to heaven."
"Will it?"
"If heaven existed."
"Do you not believe in heaven, Mr. Fielding, may I ask?" she said, looking at him shyly.
"I do not. Yet I believe that honesty gets us there. — E. M. Forster

I'm well aware that it's life I need, and it's life I'm looking for. But the offer has gotten "interpreted" by well-meaning people to say, "Oh, well. Yes, of course ... God intends life for you. But that is eternal life, meaning, because of the death of Jesus Christ you can go to heaven when you die." And that's true ... in a way. But it's like saying getting married means, "Because I've given you this ring, you will be taken care of in your retirement." And in the meantime? Isn't there a whole lot more to the relationship in the meantime? (It's in the meantime that we're living out our days, by the way.) Are we just lost at sea? What did Jesus mean when he promised us life? I go back to the source, and what I find is just astounding. — John Eldredge

I know no surer way of shaking off the dreary crust formed about the soul by the trying to do one's duty or the patient enduring of having somebody else's duty done to one, than going out alone, either at the bright beginning of the day, when the earth is still unsoiled by the feet of the strenuous and only God is abroad; or in the evening, when the hush has come, out to the blessed stars, and looking up at them wonder at the meanness of the day just past, at the worthlessness of the things one has struggled for, at the folly of having been so angry, and so restless, and so much afraid. Nothing focusses life more exactly than a little while alone at night with the stars. What are perfunctory bedroom prayers hurried through in an atmosphere of blankets, to this deep abasement of the spirit before the majesty of heaven? And as a consecration of what should be yet one more happy day, of what value are those hasty morning devotions, — Elizabeth Von Arnim

At times, Zen does get into some Buddhist Cosmology. Nishijima Roshi, my main teacher would talk about that and almost every time immediately say that it was only one way of looking at it. Whenever addressing realms of Heaven or Hell, he'd also address that it was just a psychological state. — Brad Warner

The desire to make the horse happy and the cabman happy, had reached the point of a bizarre longing to take them to bed with him. And that, he knew, was impossible. For Stevie was not mad. It was, as it were, a symbolic longing; and at the same time it was very distinct, because springing from experience, the mother of wisdom. Thus when as a child he cowered in a dark corner scared, wretched, sore, and miserable with the black, black misery of the soul, his sister Winnie used to come along, and carry him off to bed with her, as into a heaven of consoling peace. Stevie, though apt to forget mere facts, such as his name and address for instance, had a faithful memory of sensations. To be taken into a bed of compassion was the supreme remedy, with the only one disadvantage of being difficult of application on a large scale. And looking at the cabman, Stevie perceived this clearly, because he was reasonable. — Joseph Conrad

O, the sorrow of us all,
to wander the earth in a shell.
And looking to the heavens,
we lay to rest in hell.
The suffering of the innocent
in the midst of Jacob's well.
How the miles fled between us,
and that distance is still great.
Though on the same shore we now sit,
in temporal quietude to wait.
The moon is our bright witness;
it will lead us to the gate. — Craig Froman

Eternity is not just looking to the future and our place with God in Heaven, but it is looking at our Eternity as if it were only moments away. — Beth Nimmo

They had a year of joy, twelve months of the strange heaven which the salmon know on beds of river shingle, under the gin-clear water. For twenty-four years they were guilty, but this first year was the only one which seemed like happiness. Looking back on it, when they were old, they did not remember that in this year it had ever rained or frozen. The four seasons were coloured like the edge of a rose petal for them. — T.H. White

We can enjoy Heaven now. We can have half of the enjoyment ahead of time by looking forward to it, thinking about it, reading about it and anticipating it. — David Berg

Forbid the day when vivisection shall be practised in every college and school, and when the man of science, looking forth over a world which will then own no other sway than his, shall exult in the thought that he has made of this fair earth, if not a heaven, at least a hell for animals. — Lewis Carroll

(Phillipians 3:14) No Lots wife here. No looking back at Sodom and Gomorrah here. Paul knows it is out there in the future, up ahead wherever heaven is taking us, that we will win "the prize" of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. — Jeffrey R. Holland

When you are old you can look back and see yourself when you are young. It is almost like looking down from heaven. And you see yourself as a young woman, just a big girl really, half awake to the world. You see yourself happy, holding in your arms a good, decent, gentle, beloved young man with the blood keen in his veins, who before long is going to disappear, just disappear, into a storm of hate and flying metal and fire. And you just don't know it. — Wendell Berry

Look Mister, I don't care what you think, you are bald. If the census had a "bald" category, You'd be in it, no problem. If you go to heaven, you're going to bald heaven. If you go to hell, you're going to bald hell. Have you got that straight? Then stop looking away from the truth. Let's go now. I'm taking you straight to bald heaven, nonstop. — Haruki Murakami

If I had a husband I should want a good one, a man with a head on his shoulders, and a heart. Even if I were young and good-looking, I doubt whether I could please myself. As it is I am likely to be taken bodily to heaven, as to become any man's wife. — Anthony Trollope

The rest of my days I'm going to spend on the sea. And when I die, I'm going to die on the sea. You know what I shall die of? I shall die of eating an unwashed grape. One day out on the ocean I will die
with my hand in the hand of some nice looking ship's doctor, a very young one with a small blond moustache and a big silver watch. "Poor lady," they'll say, "The quinine did her no good. That unwashed grape has transported her soul to heaven. — Tennessee Williams

The frontier between hell and heaven is only the difference between two ways of looking at things. — George Bernard Shaw

Find the Key ! Find the Key ! If you want to open the Doors of Heaven ! Without which, you can at best, look from outside, like the pauper looking in through the window at your food when hungry. Find the Key ! — AainaA-Ridtz

Her hair was the brightest living gold, and despite the poverty of her clothing, seemed to set a crown of distinction on her head. Her brow was clear and ample, her blue eyes cloudless, and her lips and the moulding of her face so expressive of sensibility and sweetness, that none could behold her without looking on her as of a distinct species, a being heaven-sent, and bearing a celestial stamp in all her features. — Mary Shelley

If you were looking for a sign from heaven, baby, I'd say they're all around you. Take note. — Willow Aster

Whilst the beautifully crafted image of Michel Angelo's youthful looking priestess
looks out from her position on the ceiling of the sistine chapel linked forever with
Heaven Earth and Time. — Daniel Peter Buckley

The Yogic system does not talk about God. It does not talk about the soul or heaven. Such talk invariably makes people hallucinatory. Yoga talks only about the barriers that you have set up, because this resistance is all that needs to be attended to. The creator is not looking for your attention. The ropes that bind you and the walls that block you- these are one hundred percent of your making. And these are all you need to unknot and dismantle. You have no work with existence. You only have work with the existence that you created. — Sadhguru

If I'd ever taken the time to wonder about my soul being as black as this town seemed to believe, I knew the moment Ashton stepped out of her little white Jetta looking like an angel from Heaven that my soul was damned to Hell. — Abbi Glines

No more quickly can a person rob you of your joy and peace than when that individual succeeds at making you feel like you're less than worthy of God as compared to his/her own self. The old adage "You're on your way to hell, and I'm on my way to heaven" spoken or implied to another, is the most predominantly effective way to make someone feel better about himself; and he doesn't even have to prove he's better in this life on earth because now he can just say "Wait 'til I'm looking down at you while you're in hell!" But don't be robbed of your joy and peace, individuals or groups of people like that don't know where God is; He is a whisper-distance away from you, is all. — C. JoyBell C.

The Earth - from our altitude at Hubble, we're 350 miles up. We can see the curvature. We can see the roundness of our home, our home planet. And it's the most magnificent thing I've ever seen. It's like looking into Heaven. It's paradise. — Michael J. Massimino

Why did you tell me all this?"
"So if I die, you'd know not to come looking for me when you get to heaven. — Lorraine Heath

Don't fret. We all experience it. We must. For despite our humanity love is the only way we can be like gods. It is in love that we glimpse heaven during our lifetime and have proof that there's something worth looking forward to in the end. — Felix Alexander

Do you think Charlotte will let me handle the investigation?"
"Do you think you can be trusted in Downworld? The gaming hells, the dens of magical vice, the women of loose morals ... "
Will smiled the way Lucifer might have smiled, moments before he fell from heaven. "Would tomorrow be to early to start looking, do you think?
Jem sighed. 'Do what you like, William. You always do. — Cassandra Clare

Without going out of my door, I can know all things on earth. Without looking out of my window I could know the ways of heaven. The farther one travels, The less one knows, the less one really knows. — George Harrison

But that's the thing Artie. What if Romani isn't a man " Amelia said leaning forward.
"Great. We'll alert Scotland Yard and tell them they're looking for a vampire. Or a werewolf. I'm assuming you've cross-referenced this with the lunar cycles."
"What if it's a name " Amelia said undaunted. She spread the files across the desk. "A name that has been used by a lot of people for a very long time."
"Excellent." Her boss pushed the files aside and returned to his order and his lists and his life. "You cracked it. Great work. I'll call the Henley right away and tell them Leonardo's Angel Returning to Heaven was stolen by a name. — Ally Carter

And the fierce wind is an echo of angry childhood and of a very scared boy looking out the window - remembering my dead dog outside by the wounded house as the gray Texas dust gradually covered her up - and thinking: It isnt fair! Why cant dogs go to Heaven? — John Rechy