One of the most memorable statements by former US president Jimmy Carter was on his faith as he penned in his 1997 book ‘Sources of Strength: Meditations on Scripture for a Living Faith’ — “We should live our lives as though Christ were coming this afternoon”. For decades, both during and long after his presidency, Jimmy Carter famously taught Sunday School at Maranatha Baptist Church in his hometown of Plains, Georgia. In 1997, he compiled those Bible lessons, personal prayers, and biblical meditations into a daily devotional book titled Sources of Strength.The quote appears within a reflection on the Christian doctrine of the Second Coming and the idea of spiritual readiness. Instead of treating the return of Christ as a distant, abstract event or getting bogged down in trying to predict an exact date, Carter argued it should be treated as an immediate, daily motivation.The famous quote by Carter bridged deep theology with practical, everyday action. It transformed an abstract religious concept into an urgent call to do good right now.When Carter was relatively unknown, he said the same thing in his classes. He first used the phrase in March 1976 while addressing his Bible class at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, Georgia. At the time, Carter was a relatively unknown former Georgia governor running a dark-horse campaign for the presidency.
Jimmy Carter’s life, politics, Nobel prize
Born in the tiny town of Plains, Georgia, in 1924, Carter grew up on his family’s rural farm, deeply influenced by the devout Baptist faith of his community. He graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1946 and entered the groundbreaking nuclear submarine program. However, when his father died in 1953, Carter made the difficult decision to resign his military commission and return to Plains to run the family’s failing peanut farming business, successfully turning it into a thriving enterprise.Carter entered politics in the 1960s as a Georgia State Senator and won the Georgia governorship in 1970. He gained national attention as part of a new wave of moderate southern governors who openly rejected the region’s long history of segregation, actively working to remove racial barriers and dismantle bureaucratic government waste.In the wake of the Watergate scandal—which left the American public deeply cynical about politicians—Carter launched a long-shot bid for the presidency in 1976. Running as an honest, deeply religious political outsider who promised “I will never lie to you,” he defeated incumbent Gerald Ford to become the 39th president of the United States.In 1980, he suffered a landslide defeat to Ronald Reagan.Carter viewed his electoral defeat as an opening for a new kind of service. In 1982, he and his wife, Rosalynn, founded The Carter Center in Atlanta. Through the center, Carter spent the next four decades acting as a global peacemaker, monitoring over 100 free elections worldwide, and championing global health initiatives. Most notably, the Carter Center led a relentless international campaign that successfully brought the horrifying Guinea worm disease to the absolute brink of total global eradication. In 2002, Carter was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. He died at the age of 100 in December 2024.
