Our Favorite Service Quotes

Sometimes, it helps to have stirring words to “rally the troops” when you’re gearing up for a service event.  Here are just a few things others have said:

Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little. ~Edmund Burke; Irish author, statesman, philosopher

One of the great movements in my lifetime among educated people is the need to commit themselves to action.  Most people are not satisfied with giving money; we also feel we need to work. ~Peter Drucker; writer, “social ecologist”

Service is the rent we pay to be living. It is the very purpose of life and not something you do in your spare time. ~Marian Wright Edelman; activist, founder of the Children’s Defense Fund

We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can make which, over time, add up to big differences that we often cannot foresee. ~Marian Wright Edelman; activist, founder of the Children’s Defense Fund

Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile. ~Albert Einstein; theoretical physicist

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world. ~Anne Frank; Holocaust victim

I am only one, but I am one.  I cannot do everything, but I can do something.  And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do. ~Edward Everett Hale; author, historian, Unitarian clergyman

Everybody can be great… because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.; clergyman, Civil Rights Activist

I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I do know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve. ~Albert Schweitzer; French theologian, philosopher, missionary