Adventure is worthwhile in itself.
Better do a good deed near at home than go far away to burn incense.
Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things; knows not the livid loneliness of fear.
Flying might not be all plain sailing, but the fun of it is worth the price.
I want to do it because I want to do it.
In soloing - as in other activities - it is far easier to start something than it is to finish it.
Never do things others can do and will do if there are things others cannot do or will not do.
Never interrupt someone doing what you said couldn't be done.
No kind action ever stops with itself. One kind action leads to another. Good example is followed. A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees. The greatest work that kindness does to others is that it makes them kind themselves.
Obviously I faced the possibility of not returning when first I considered going. Once faced and settled there really wasn't any good reason to refer to it.
Please know that I am aware of the hazards. I want to do it because I want to do it. Women must try to do things as men have tried. When they fail, their failure must be a challenge to others.
The more one does and sees and feels, the more one is able to do, and the more genuine may be one's appreciation of fundamental things like home, and love, and understanding companionship.
The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward.
The most effective way to do it, is to do it.
The woman who can create her own job is the woman who will win fame and fortune.
There are two kinds of stones, as everyone knows, one of which rolls.
There is so much that must be done in a civilized barbarism like war.
Women must pay for everything. They do get more glory than men for comparable feats, but, they also get more notoriety when they crash.
Women, like men, should try to do the impossible. And when they fail, their failure should be a challenge to others.
~ Amelia Earhart, American Aviator, 1898-1937
Friday, July 20, 2007
Better Truth than a Lie
"It hurts to say that," he said, shrugging. "But better to get hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie."
~ Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner, p. 58
~ Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner, p. 58
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Advancing in another direction
"We are not retreating - we are advancing in another direction."
~ Douglas MacArthur, U.S. W.W. II general in the Pacific
~ Douglas MacArthur, U.S. W.W. II general in the Pacific
Monday, July 16, 2007
Dementors
Prof. Lupin to Harry Potter:
"Get too near a Dementor, and every good feeling, every happy memory, will be sucked out of you."
J.K. Rowling, Prisoner of Azkaban
"Get too near a Dementor, and every good feeling, every happy memory, will be sucked out of you."
J.K. Rowling, Prisoner of Azkaban
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
A Prayer of Alan Paton
Help me, O Lord, to be more loving. Help me O Lord, not to be afraid to love the outcast, the leper, the unmarried pregnant woman, the traitor to the State, the man out of prison.
Help me by my love to restore the faith of the disillusioned, the disappointed, the early bereaved. Help me by my love to be the witness of your love.
And may I this coming day be able to do some work of peace for you.
~ Alan Paton, a South African writer,
author of "Cry the Beloved Country"
who made a courageous stand against racism
Help me by my love to restore the faith of the disillusioned, the disappointed, the early bereaved. Help me by my love to be the witness of your love.
And may I this coming day be able to do some work of peace for you.
~ Alan Paton, a South African writer,
author of "Cry the Beloved Country"
who made a courageous stand against racism
A Man Fell into a Pit
Once upon a time a man fell into a pit and couldn’t get himself out.
A sensitive person came along and said, “I feel for you down there.”
A practical person came along and said, “I knew you were going to fall in sooner or later.”
A Pharisee said, “Only bad people fall into a pit.”
A mathematician calculated how he far he fell.
A news reporter wanted an exclusive story on his pit.
An IRS agent asked if he was paying taxes on the pit.
A self-pitying person said, “You haven’t seen anything until you’ve seen my pit.”
A mystic said, “Just imagine that you’re not in a pit.”
An optimist said, “Things could be worse.”
A pessimist said, “Things will get worse.”
Jesus, seeing the man, took him by the hand and lifted him out of the pit!
~ Ray Pritchard, The Lawyer Who Wanted a Loophole
A sensitive person came along and said, “I feel for you down there.”
A practical person came along and said, “I knew you were going to fall in sooner or later.”
A Pharisee said, “Only bad people fall into a pit.”
A mathematician calculated how he far he fell.
A news reporter wanted an exclusive story on his pit.
An IRS agent asked if he was paying taxes on the pit.
A self-pitying person said, “You haven’t seen anything until you’ve seen my pit.”
A mystic said, “Just imagine that you’re not in a pit.”
An optimist said, “Things could be worse.”
A pessimist said, “Things will get worse.”
Jesus, seeing the man, took him by the hand and lifted him out of the pit!
~ Ray Pritchard, The Lawyer Who Wanted a Loophole
The Homeless Woman’s Poem
A homeless woman once approached a preacher for help, but because he was busy and helpless, he turned her away and offered to pray for her instead.
The homeless woman, it is said, wrote this poem as a response too that insensitive minister:
"I was hungry, and you formed a humanities group to discuss my hunger.
I was imprisoned, and you crept off quietly to my chapel and prayed for my release.
I was naked, and in your mind you debated the morality of my appearance.
I was sick, and you knelt and thanked God for your health.
I was homeless, and you preached to me the spiritual shelter of the love of God.
I was lonely, and you left me alone to pray for me.
You seem so holy, so close to God but I am still very hungry - and lonely - and cold."
~ Source unknown
The homeless woman, it is said, wrote this poem as a response too that insensitive minister:
"I was hungry, and you formed a humanities group to discuss my hunger.
I was imprisoned, and you crept off quietly to my chapel and prayed for my release.
I was naked, and in your mind you debated the morality of my appearance.
I was sick, and you knelt and thanked God for your health.
I was homeless, and you preached to me the spiritual shelter of the love of God.
I was lonely, and you left me alone to pray for me.
You seem so holy, so close to God but I am still very hungry - and lonely - and cold."
~ Source unknown
Neighborly Prayer
Some of you may be familiar with a story by journalist Tom Junod. It is a true story of a young man afflicted with cerebral palsy. Cerebral palsy did not affect this young man’s mind, but it affected his motor skills and his ability to speak. The boy could only communicate through typing on his computer.
In addition to his physical disabilities, the boy suffered emotional problems after some of his care givers callously abused him. Overwhelmed with self-hatred, the boy often hit himself. Using his computer, he wrote to his mother that he wished he could die.
There was one thing that seemed to bring the boy comfort: watching “Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.” The kindly, mild-mannered Mr. Rogers emphasized that all people are valuable and worthy of love. His calming demeanor and accepting message touched the boy’s heart and gave him hope.
One day a children’s foundation set up a meeting between the boy and his hero, Mr. Rogers. Upon meeting Mr. Rogers, the boy became so nervous that he began hitting himself, and his mother had to take him to another room to calm him down. When he returned, Mr. Rogers carried on their conversation as if nothing had happened.
And then Mr. Rogers ended the conversation by asking the boy a very special favor: would this boy pray for him? The boy was floored by this request. Would he pray for Mr. Rogers? He had always been the object of someone else’s prayers.
But from that day forward, the boy began praying for Fred Rogers, and he experienced a new sense of hope and self-esteem through this act of praying for a man he so admired. When Tom Junod complimented Fred Rogers on this idea, Rogers reacted with surprise. He had been sincere in his request for the boy’s prayers.
As he said, “I didn’t ask him for his prayers for HIM, I asked for me. I asked him because I think that anyone who has gone through challenges like that must be very close to God. I asked him because I wanted his intercession.”
King Duncan, Collected Sermons, adapted from Tom Junod, Esquire, November 1998
In addition to his physical disabilities, the boy suffered emotional problems after some of his care givers callously abused him. Overwhelmed with self-hatred, the boy often hit himself. Using his computer, he wrote to his mother that he wished he could die.
There was one thing that seemed to bring the boy comfort: watching “Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.” The kindly, mild-mannered Mr. Rogers emphasized that all people are valuable and worthy of love. His calming demeanor and accepting message touched the boy’s heart and gave him hope.
One day a children’s foundation set up a meeting between the boy and his hero, Mr. Rogers. Upon meeting Mr. Rogers, the boy became so nervous that he began hitting himself, and his mother had to take him to another room to calm him down. When he returned, Mr. Rogers carried on their conversation as if nothing had happened.
And then Mr. Rogers ended the conversation by asking the boy a very special favor: would this boy pray for him? The boy was floored by this request. Would he pray for Mr. Rogers? He had always been the object of someone else’s prayers.
But from that day forward, the boy began praying for Fred Rogers, and he experienced a new sense of hope and self-esteem through this act of praying for a man he so admired. When Tom Junod complimented Fred Rogers on this idea, Rogers reacted with surprise. He had been sincere in his request for the boy’s prayers.
As he said, “I didn’t ask him for his prayers for HIM, I asked for me. I asked him because I think that anyone who has gone through challenges like that must be very close to God. I asked him because I wanted his intercession.”
King Duncan, Collected Sermons, adapted from Tom Junod, Esquire, November 1998
Monday, July 09, 2007
Charles Kettering quotes
A person must have a certain amount of intelligent ignorance to get anywhere.
A problem well stated is a problem half-solved.
An inventor fails 999 times, and if he succeeds once, he's in. He treats his failures simply as practice shots.
An inventor is simply a fellow who doesn't take his education too seriously.
Believe and act as if it were impossible to fail.
Every time you tear a leaf off a calendar, you present a new place for new ideas and progress.
High achievement always takes place in the framework of high expectation.
I object to people running down the future. I am going to live all the rest of my life there.
If you have always done it that way, it is probably wrong.
If you want to kill any idea in the world, get a committee working on it.
In America we can say what we think, and even if we can't think, we can say it anyhow.
Inventing is a combination of brains and materials. The more brains you use, the less material you need.
It doesn't matter if you try and try and try again, and fail. It does matter if you try and fail, and fail to try again.
It is not a disgrace to fail. Failing is one of the greatest arts in the world.
Keep on going, and the chances are that you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I never heard of anyone ever stumbling on something sitting down.
Knowing is not understanding. There is a great difference between knowing and understanding: you can know a lot about something and not really understand it.
My definition of an educated man is the fellow who knows the right thing to do at the time it has to be done. You can be sincere and still be stupid.
My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there.
No one would have crossed the ocean if he could have gotten off the ship in the storm.
One fails forward toward success.
Our imagination is the only limit to what we can hope to have in the future.
People are very open-minded about new things - as long as they're exactly like the old ones.
People think of the inventor as a screwball, but no one ever asks the inventor what he thinks of other people.
Problems are the price of progress. Don't bring me anything but trouble. Good news weakens me.
The biggest job we have is to teach a newly hired employee how to fail intelligently. We have to train him to experiment over and over and to keep on trying and failing until he learns what will work.
The future can be anything we want it to be, providing we have the faith and that we realize that peace, no less than war, required "blood and sweat and tears."
The only difference between a problem and a solution is that people understand the solution.
The only time you mustn't fail is the last time you try.
The opportunities of man are limited only by his imagination. But so few have imagination that there are ten thousand fiddlers to one composer.
The world hates change, yet it is the only thing that has brought progress.
The Wright brothers flew right through the smoke screen of impossibility.
There exist limitless opportunities in every industry. Where there is an open mind, there will always be a frontier.
There is a great difference between knowing and understanding: you can know a lot about something and not really understand it.
Thinking is one thing no one has ever been able to tax.
We need to teach the highly educated man that it is not a disgrace to fail and that he must analyze every failure to find its cause. He must learn how to fail intelligently, for failing is one of the greatest arts in the world.
We often say that the biggest job we have is to teach a newly hired employee to fail intelligently... to experiment over and over again and to keep on trying and failing until he learns what will work.
We should all be concerned about the future because we will have to spend the rest of our lives there.
You can be sincere and still be stupid.
You can't have a better tomorrow if you are thinking about yesterday all the time.
You will never stub your toe standing still. The faster you go, the more chance there is of stubbing your toe, but the more chance you have of getting somewhere.
~ Charles Kettering
American Inventor, b. 1876, d. 1958
www.brainyquote.com
Sunday, July 08, 2007
She thinks I'm real!
A family settled down for dinner at a restaurant. The waitress first took the order of the adults, then turned to the seven year old. 'What will you have?' she asked.
The boy looked around the table timidly and said, 'I would like to have a hot dog.'
Before the waitress could write down the order, the mother interrupted. 'No hot dogs,' she said, 'Get him a steak with mashed potatoes and carrots.'
The waitress ignored her. 'Do you want ketchup or mustard on your hot dog?' she asked the boy.
'Ketchup.'
'Coming up in a minute,' said the waitress as she started for the kitchen.
There was a stunned silence when she left. Finally the boy looked at everyone present and said, 'Know what? She thinks I'm real!'
~ Anthony deMello in The Heart of the Enlightened
The boy looked around the table timidly and said, 'I would like to have a hot dog.'
Before the waitress could write down the order, the mother interrupted. 'No hot dogs,' she said, 'Get him a steak with mashed potatoes and carrots.'
The waitress ignored her. 'Do you want ketchup or mustard on your hot dog?' she asked the boy.
'Ketchup.'
'Coming up in a minute,' said the waitress as she started for the kitchen.
There was a stunned silence when she left. Finally the boy looked at everyone present and said, 'Know what? She thinks I'm real!'
~ Anthony deMello in The Heart of the Enlightened
Thursday, July 05, 2007
No Theories
"Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children; now I have six children and no theories."
~ John Wilmot
~ John Wilmot
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Denominations
“I don’t care what denomination you belong to, as long as you’re ashamed of it.”
~ Rabbi Irving “Yitz” Greenberg
~ Rabbi Irving “Yitz” Greenberg
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Monday, June 25, 2007
Reasoning Correctly
I prefer the company of peasants because they have not been educated sufficiently to reason incorrectly.
~ Michel de Montaigne
Saturday, June 23, 2007
What You Heard is Not What I Meant
I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.
~ Robert McCloskey
~ Robert McCloskey
Friday, June 22, 2007
Monday, June 18, 2007
A Crystal-Clear Reflection of a Love
Today, throughout the world, Taizé’s name evokes peace, reconciliation, communion and the ardent expectation of a springtime of the Church:
“When the Church listens, heals, reconciles, then she becomes what she is in her most radiant aspect: a crystal-clear reflection of a love.” (Brother Roger)
http://www.taize.fr/en_article2468.html
“When the Church listens, heals, reconciles, then she becomes what she is in her most radiant aspect: a crystal-clear reflection of a love.” (Brother Roger)
http://www.taize.fr/en_article2468.html
Saturday, June 16, 2007
We Went Up and Up
One of the elders used to say: In the beginning when we got together we used to talk about something that was good for our souls, and we went up and up, and ascended even to heaven.
But now we get together and spend our time in criticizing everything, and we drag one another down into the abyss.
~ Wisdom of the Desert Fathers
But now we get together and spend our time in criticizing everything, and we drag one another down into the abyss.
~ Wisdom of the Desert Fathers
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Manipulative Skills
Therapy doesn't actually help sociopaths--it further enables their bad behavior by sharpening their manipulative skills.
~ from a study by Samuel Yochelson and Stanton Samenow, psychiatrists specializing in the criminal mind
~ from a study by Samuel Yochelson and Stanton Samenow, psychiatrists specializing in the criminal mind
Charles M. Schulz quotes
A whole stack of memories never equal one little hope.
All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt.
Aunt Marion was right... Never marry a musician, and never answer the door.
Big sisters are the crabgrass in the lawn of life.
Decorate your home. It gives the illusion that your life is more interesting than it really is.
Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It is already tomorrow in Australia.
I have a new philosophy. I'm only going to dread one day at a time.
I know the answer! The answer lies within the heart of all mankind! The answer is twelve? I think I'm in the wrong building.
I love mankind; it's people I can't stand.
I think I've discovered the secret of life - you just hang around until you get used to it.
If I were given the opportunity to present a gift to the next generation, it would be the ability for each individual to learn to laugh at himself.
Life is like a ten speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use.
Life is like an ice-cream cone, you have to lick it one day at a time.
My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right?
No problem is so formidable that you can't walk away from it.
No problem is too big to run away from.
Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter quite like unrequited love.
Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, "Where have I gone wrong?" Then a voice says to me, "This is going to take more than one night."
That's the secret to life... replace one worry with another.
The way I see it, it doesn't matter what you believe just so you're sincere.
There is no problem so big it cannot be run away from.
There's a difference between a philosophy and a bumper sticker.
Try not to have a good time... this is supposed to be educational.
Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement.
You're a good man, Charlie Brown.
~ Charles M. Schulz
All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt.
Aunt Marion was right... Never marry a musician, and never answer the door.
Big sisters are the crabgrass in the lawn of life.
Decorate your home. It gives the illusion that your life is more interesting than it really is.
Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It is already tomorrow in Australia.
I have a new philosophy. I'm only going to dread one day at a time.
I know the answer! The answer lies within the heart of all mankind! The answer is twelve? I think I'm in the wrong building.
I love mankind; it's people I can't stand.
I think I've discovered the secret of life - you just hang around until you get used to it.
If I were given the opportunity to present a gift to the next generation, it would be the ability for each individual to learn to laugh at himself.
Life is like a ten speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use.
Life is like an ice-cream cone, you have to lick it one day at a time.
My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right?
No problem is so formidable that you can't walk away from it.
No problem is too big to run away from.
Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter quite like unrequited love.
Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, "Where have I gone wrong?" Then a voice says to me, "This is going to take more than one night."
That's the secret to life... replace one worry with another.
The way I see it, it doesn't matter what you believe just so you're sincere.
There is no problem so big it cannot be run away from.
There's a difference between a philosophy and a bumper sticker.
Try not to have a good time... this is supposed to be educational.
Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement.
You're a good man, Charlie Brown.
~ Charles M. Schulz
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
The spirit of man is the candle of the LORD
The spirit of man is the candle of the LORD, searching all the inward parts of the belly.
~ Proverbs 20:27 KJV
~ Proverbs 20:27 KJV
Be Careful What You Pretend to Be
"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be."
~ Kurt Vonnegut
Friday, June 01, 2007
Song of Solomon 8:6-10
6 Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, passion fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame.
7 Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If one offered for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly scorned.
8 We have a little sister, and she has no breasts. What shall we do for our sister, on the day when she is spoken for?
9 If she is a wall, we will build upon her a battlement of silver; but if she is a door, we will enclose her with boards of cedar.
10 I was a wall, and my breasts were like towers; then I was in his eyes as one who brings peace.
7 Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If one offered for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly scorned.
8 We have a little sister, and she has no breasts. What shall we do for our sister, on the day when she is spoken for?
9 If she is a wall, we will build upon her a battlement of silver; but if she is a door, we will enclose her with boards of cedar.
10 I was a wall, and my breasts were like towers; then I was in his eyes as one who brings peace.
Nothing for Us to Do
"If there was nothing wrong in the world there wouldn't be anything for us to do."
~ George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist
~ George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist
Fools Corrupt Power
“Power does not corrupt men. Fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power.”
~ George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist
~ George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Consolation in Existing Churches
"Those who seek consolation in existing churches often pay for their peace of mind with a tacit agreement to ignore a great deal of what is known about the way the world works."
~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, 1990
~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, 1990
Clergy and the Rest of the Nation
"It will, I believe, be everywhere found, that as the clergy are, or are not what they ought to be, so are the rest of the nation."
~ Jane Austen (1775 - 1817), Mansfield Park
Quotations by Author Randy K. Milholland
Quotations by Author Randy K. Milholland
Webcomic pioneer
Sometimes old things need to go away. That way, we have room for the new things that come into our lives.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive webcomic, 09-17-05
Never confuse the faith with the supposedly faithful.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 10-19-06
The only time anyone's admitted they were a Christian before was when they were busy telling me why they're better than me.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 10-19-06
We all have a few failures under our belt. It's what makes us ready for the successes.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Midnight Macabre, 10-18-05
In the end, we decide if we're remembered for what happened to us or for what we did with it.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 06-29-06
In the end, you'll know which people really love you. They're the ones who see you for who you are and, no matter what, always find a way to be at your side.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 08-23-05
Things aren't magically better if that's what you're hoping for. It's not that simple.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 02-11-05
Typos are very important to all written form. It gives the reader something to look for so they aren't distracted by the total lack of content in your writing.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 07-03-05
It's a lot like nature. You only have as many animals as the ecosystem can support and you only have as many friends as you can tolerate the bitching of.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 08-16-05
Sometimes people do things that hurt and it's not because they mean to. They just do. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with you, but you end up hurt because of it.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 08-23-05
It hurts to find out that what you wanted doesn't match what you dreamed it would be.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 09-07-04
The only thing that lasts longer than a friend's love is the stupidity that keeps us from knowing any better.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 09-07-06
The shortest verse in the Bible is 'Jesus wept.' The only thing wrong with it is the past tense.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 10-10-06
Slow and steady wins the race, then wastes no time grinding salt-caked glass in your open wounds.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 11-06-05
Sometimes the measure of friendship isn't your ability to not harm but your capacity to forgive the things done to you and ask forgiveness for your own mistakes.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 11-07-05
There are people I know who won't hurt me. I call them corpses.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 12-06-05
Could you imagine how horrible things would be if we always told others how we felt? Life would be intolerably bearable.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 12-09-05
Why do we have to wait for special moments to say nice things or tell people we care about them?
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 12-09-05
The only way to be truly misogynistic is to be a woman.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive webcomic, 11-11-04
It's not a matter of whether or not someone's watching over you. It's just a question of their intentions.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 03-24-07
Success only hurts the first time.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 04-01-2006
I barely trust established sources of information. I have a hard time finding [Wikipedia], an encyclopedia that anyone can alter, to be a safe way to learn about anything except how many idiots think their opinions are a suitable substitute for facts.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 10-31-2006
I guess that's how death works. It doesn't matter if we're ready or not. It just happens.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 11-29-2006
Forgiveness is one of the many horrible side effects of loving someone.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 12-29-05
www.quotationspage.com/
Webcomic pioneer
Sometimes old things need to go away. That way, we have room for the new things that come into our lives.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive webcomic, 09-17-05
Never confuse the faith with the supposedly faithful.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 10-19-06
The only time anyone's admitted they were a Christian before was when they were busy telling me why they're better than me.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 10-19-06
We all have a few failures under our belt. It's what makes us ready for the successes.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Midnight Macabre, 10-18-05
In the end, we decide if we're remembered for what happened to us or for what we did with it.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 06-29-06
In the end, you'll know which people really love you. They're the ones who see you for who you are and, no matter what, always find a way to be at your side.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 08-23-05
Things aren't magically better if that's what you're hoping for. It's not that simple.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 02-11-05
Typos are very important to all written form. It gives the reader something to look for so they aren't distracted by the total lack of content in your writing.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 07-03-05
It's a lot like nature. You only have as many animals as the ecosystem can support and you only have as many friends as you can tolerate the bitching of.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 08-16-05
Sometimes people do things that hurt and it's not because they mean to. They just do. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with you, but you end up hurt because of it.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 08-23-05
It hurts to find out that what you wanted doesn't match what you dreamed it would be.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 09-07-04
The only thing that lasts longer than a friend's love is the stupidity that keeps us from knowing any better.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 09-07-06
The shortest verse in the Bible is 'Jesus wept.' The only thing wrong with it is the past tense.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 10-10-06
Slow and steady wins the race, then wastes no time grinding salt-caked glass in your open wounds.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 11-06-05
Sometimes the measure of friendship isn't your ability to not harm but your capacity to forgive the things done to you and ask forgiveness for your own mistakes.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 11-07-05
There are people I know who won't hurt me. I call them corpses.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 12-06-05
Could you imagine how horrible things would be if we always told others how we felt? Life would be intolerably bearable.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 12-09-05
Why do we have to wait for special moments to say nice things or tell people we care about them?
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 12-09-05
The only way to be truly misogynistic is to be a woman.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive webcomic, 11-11-04
It's not a matter of whether or not someone's watching over you. It's just a question of their intentions.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 03-24-07
Success only hurts the first time.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 04-01-2006
I barely trust established sources of information. I have a hard time finding [Wikipedia], an encyclopedia that anyone can alter, to be a safe way to learn about anything except how many idiots think their opinions are a suitable substitute for facts.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 10-31-2006
I guess that's how death works. It doesn't matter if we're ready or not. It just happens.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 11-29-2006
Forgiveness is one of the many horrible side effects of loving someone.
~ Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive, 12-29-05
www.quotationspage.com/
Jesus of Nazareth - Introduction
from Jesus of Nazareth,
Joseph Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI
(underlining added)
Introduction
"Religions do not aim merely to answer the question about our provenance; all religions try in one way or another to lift the veil of the future. They seem important precisely because they impart knowledge about what is to come, and so show man the path he has to take to avoid coming to grief." (p. 2)
"[Jesus] shows us the face of God, and in so doing he shows us the path that we have to take." (p. 4)
Jesus, the new Moses promised in Deut. 18:15, knows God "face to face":
"Jesus is only able to speak about the Father in the way he does because he is the Son, because of his filial communion with the Father. The Christological dimension--in other words, the mystery of the Son as revealer of the Father--is present in everything Jesus says and does. ...
The disciple who walks with Jesus is thus caught up with him into communion with God. And that is what redemption means: this stepping beyond the limits of human nature, which had been there as a possibility and an expectation in man, God's image and likeness, since the moment of creation." (p. 7-8)
The great Christ-hymn of the Letter to the Philippians
"As early as twenty or so years after Jesus' death, the great Christ-hymn of the Letter to the Philippians (cf. Phil 2:6-11) offers us a fully developed Christology stating that Jesus was equal to God..." (p. xxii)
Philippians 2:5-15
5 Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, 7 but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, 8 he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death-- even death on a cross.
9 Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
12 Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.
14 Do all things without murmuring and arguing, 15 so that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, in which you shine like stars in the world.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Women, wine and song
"Who loves not women, wine and song
remains a fool his whole life long."
~ Martin Luther
remains a fool his whole life long."
~ Martin Luther
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Prayer used by Mohandas Gandhi
a prayer/poem that Gandhi is said to have often recited to himself:
Let hundreds like me perish, but let Truth prevail.
Let us not reduce the standards of Truth
even by a hair's breadth
for judging erring mortals like myself.
In judging myself I shall try to be as harsh as truth,
as I want others also to be.
Measuring myself by that standard I must exclaim with Surdas*:
~ attributed to Mohandas K. Gandhi
*Surdas - a 14th century Indian poet/ Saint /mystic/ Holy man
Let hundreds like me perish, but let Truth prevail.
Let us not reduce the standards of Truth
even by a hair's breadth
for judging erring mortals like myself.
In judging myself I shall try to be as harsh as truth,
as I want others also to be.
Measuring myself by that standard I must exclaim with Surdas*:
" Where is there a wretch
So wicked and loathsome as I?
I have forsaken my Maker,
So faithless have I been.
~ attributed to Mohandas K. Gandhi
*Surdas - a 14th century Indian poet/ Saint /mystic/ Holy man
Prayer for Healing - Gloria Copeland
quoted from And Jesus healed them all
by Gloria Copeland
1981
p. 35-36
by Gloria Copeland
1981
p. 35-36
T.L. Osborn says, “Any person can turn any promise of God into the power of God equal to what it promises by believing that promise enough to act upon it.” If you believe this Gospel that I’ve shared with you, NOW is the time to act.~ Gloria Copeland
As you proclaim your freedom in Jesus’ name, give action to the Word that you have heard.
If you are not born again, make Jesus Christ your Lord and Savior.
If you are blind, look and see.
If you are paralyzed, move.
If you are deaf, hear.
If you are lame, leap up and walk.
If there is something that you could not do before, DO IT NOW!
Say this out loud with all boldness:
“The Gospel that I have heard is the power of God unto salvation. I confess Jesus Christ as Lord over my life: spirit, soul, and body. I receive the power of God to make me sound, whole, delivered, saved, healed, now. I act on the Word of God and I receive the power of God.
“Sickness, disease, pain, I resist you in the name of Jesus. You are not the will of God. I enforce the Word of God on you. I will not tolerate you in my life. Leave my presence. I will never allow you back.
"My days of sickness and disease are over! I am the healed. I am the saved. The power of sickness has been forever broken over my life.
“Jesus bore my sickness, weakness and pain. And I am forever free. Sickness shall no longer lord it over me. Sin shall no longer lord it over me. Fear shall no longer lord it over me. Satan shall no longer lord it over me. I have been redeemed from the curse of the law. I proclaim my freedom in Jesus’ name.
“TODAY the Gospel is the power of God to me unto salvation. I receive the Gospel. I act on the Gospel. I am made whole in Jesus’ name!”
Act!
Praise. Move. See. Hear.
Straighten up! Be delivered! Be free. Be sound.
Be healed in the name of Jesus!
What I Accomplished
Why Angelina Jolie says she doesn't care if people mock her for being so outspoken:
May 23, 2007
"I'm gonna be dead one day, and what people say about me is gonna be what I accomplished and what I did in my life," and not gossip. "I have a lot I want to do in this world."TV interview on the Today show and Dateline NBC
May 23, 2007
Monday, May 21, 2007
Emotional and Mental Stability Factors
Peace Of Mind
Duke University did a study on “peace of mind.” Factors found to contribute greatly to emotional and mental stability are:
1. The absence of suspicion and resentment. Nursing a grudge was a major factor in unhappiness.
2. Not living in the past. An unwholesome preoccupation with old mistakes and failures leads to depression.
3. Not wasting time and energy fighting conditions you cannot change. Cooperate with life, instead of trying to run away from it.
4. Force yourself to stay involved with the living world. Resist the temptation to withdraw and become reclusive during periods of emotional stress.
5. Refuse to indulge in self-pity when life hands you a raw deal. Accept the fact that nobody gets through life without some sorrow and misfortune.
6. Cultivate the old-fashioned virtues—love, humor, compassion and loyalty
7. Do not expect too much of yourself. When there is too wide a gap between self-expectation and your ability to meet the goals you have set, feelings of inadequacy are inevitable.
8. Find something bigger than yourself to believe in. Self-centered egotistical people score lowest in any test for measuring happiness.
~ Source unknown
Duke University did a study on “peace of mind.” Factors found to contribute greatly to emotional and mental stability are:
1. The absence of suspicion and resentment. Nursing a grudge was a major factor in unhappiness.
2. Not living in the past. An unwholesome preoccupation with old mistakes and failures leads to depression.
3. Not wasting time and energy fighting conditions you cannot change. Cooperate with life, instead of trying to run away from it.
4. Force yourself to stay involved with the living world. Resist the temptation to withdraw and become reclusive during periods of emotional stress.
5. Refuse to indulge in self-pity when life hands you a raw deal. Accept the fact that nobody gets through life without some sorrow and misfortune.
6. Cultivate the old-fashioned virtues—love, humor, compassion and loyalty
7. Do not expect too much of yourself. When there is too wide a gap between self-expectation and your ability to meet the goals you have set, feelings of inadequacy are inevitable.
8. Find something bigger than yourself to believe in. Self-centered egotistical people score lowest in any test for measuring happiness.
~ Source unknown
Sunday, May 20, 2007
The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptized
According to the Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox traditions
http://beta1.catholicculture.org/library/view.cfm?recnum=7529 as of 5/20/07 (bold added)
by International Theological Commission
"Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God," Vatican City, 2005 (Roman Catholic Church)
Introduction
1. St. Peter encourages Christians to be always ready to give an account of the hope that is in them (cf. 1 Pt 3:15-16). (1) This document deals with the hope that Christians can have for the salvation of unbaptized infants who die. It indicates how such a hope has developed in recent decades and what its grounds are so as to enable an account of that hope to be given.
. . .
1.2. The Greek Fathers
11. Very few Greek fathers dealt with the destiny of infants who die without baptism because there was no controversy about this issue in the East. Furthermore, they had a different view of the present condition of humanity.
For the Greek fathers, as the consequence of Adam’s sin, human beings inherited corruption, passibility and mortality, from which they could be restored by a process of deification made possible through the redemptive work of Christ. The idea of an inheritance of sin or guilt — common in Western tradition — was foreign to this perspective since in their view sin could only be a free, personal act.(11) Hence, not many Greek fathers explicitly deal with the problem of the salvation of unbaptized children.
Anastasius of Sinai expresses this even more clearly: For him, unbaptized children do not go to Gehenna. But he is not able to say more; he does not express an opinion about where they do go, but leaves their destiny to God's judgment.(13)
12. Alone among the Greek fathers, Gregory of Nyssa wrote a work specifically on the destiny of infants who die, De infantibus praemature abreptis libellum. (14) The anguish of the church appears in the questions he puts to himself: The destiny of these infants is a mystery, "something much greater than the human mind can grasp."(15) He expresses his opinion in relation to virtue and its reward; in his view there is no reason for God to grant what is hoped for as a reward. Virtue is not worth anything if those who depart this life prematurely without having practiced virtue are immediately welcomed into blessedness.
Continuing along this line, Gregory asks, "What will happen to the one who finishes his life at a tender age, who has done nothing, bad or good? Is he worthy of a reward?"(16) He answers, "The hoped for blessedness belongs to human beings by nature, and it is called a reward only in a certain sense."(17)
Enjoyment of true life (zoe and not bios) corresponds to human nature and is possessed in the degree that virtue is practiced. Since the innocent infant does not need purification from personal sins, he shares in this life corresponding to his nature in a sort of regular progress, according to his capacity. Gregory of Nyssa distinguishes between the destiny of infants and that of adults who lived a virtuous life. "The premature death of newborn infants does not provide a basis for the presupposition that they will suffer torments or that they will be in the same state as those who have been purified in this life by all the virtues."(18)
Finally, he offers this perspective for the reflection of the church: "Apostolic contemplation fortifies our inquiry, for the One who has done everything well, with wisdom (Ps 104:24), is able to bring good out of evil."(19)
13. Gregory of Nazianzus does not write about the place and status after death of infants who die without sacramental baptism, but he enlarges the subject with another consideration. He writes, namely, that these children receive neither praise nor punishment from the just judge because they have suffered injury rather than provoked it. "The one who does not deserve punishment is not thereby worthy of praise, and the one who does not deserve praise is not thereby deserving of punishment."(20)
The profound teaching of the Greek fathers can be summarized in the opinion of Anastasius of Sinai: "It would not be fitting to probe God's judgments with one's hands."(21)
14. On the one hand, these Greek fathers teach that children who die without baptism do not suffer eternal damnation, though they do not attain the same state as those who have been baptized. On the other hand, they do not explain what their state is like or where they go. In this matter the Greek fathers display their characteristic apophatic sensitivity.
http://beta1.catholicculture.org/library/view.cfm?recnum=7529 as of 5/20/07 (bold added)
by International Theological Commission
"Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God," Vatican City, 2005 (Roman Catholic Church)
Introduction
1. St. Peter encourages Christians to be always ready to give an account of the hope that is in them (cf. 1 Pt 3:15-16). (1) This document deals with the hope that Christians can have for the salvation of unbaptized infants who die. It indicates how such a hope has developed in recent decades and what its grounds are so as to enable an account of that hope to be given.
. . .
1.2. The Greek Fathers
11. Very few Greek fathers dealt with the destiny of infants who die without baptism because there was no controversy about this issue in the East. Furthermore, they had a different view of the present condition of humanity.
For the Greek fathers, as the consequence of Adam’s sin, human beings inherited corruption, passibility and mortality, from which they could be restored by a process of deification made possible through the redemptive work of Christ. The idea of an inheritance of sin or guilt — common in Western tradition — was foreign to this perspective since in their view sin could only be a free, personal act.(11) Hence, not many Greek fathers explicitly deal with the problem of the salvation of unbaptized children.
They do, however, discuss the status or situation — but not the place — of these infants after their death. In this regard the main problem they face is the tension between God's universal salvific will and the teaching of the Gospel about the necessity of baptism. Pseudo-Athanasius says clearly that an unbaptized person cannot enter the kingdom of God. He also asserts that unbaptized children will not enter the kingdom but neither will they be lost, for they have not sinned. (12)passibility definition inserted by blogger:
American Heritage Dictionary
pas·si·ble adj. Capable of feeling or suffering; sensitive: a passible type of personality. [Middle English, from Old French, from Latin passibilis, from Latin passus, past participle of patī, to suffer; see pē(i)- in Indo-European roots.]
Anastasius of Sinai expresses this even more clearly: For him, unbaptized children do not go to Gehenna. But he is not able to say more; he does not express an opinion about where they do go, but leaves their destiny to God's judgment.(13)
12. Alone among the Greek fathers, Gregory of Nyssa wrote a work specifically on the destiny of infants who die, De infantibus praemature abreptis libellum. (14) The anguish of the church appears in the questions he puts to himself: The destiny of these infants is a mystery, "something much greater than the human mind can grasp."(15) He expresses his opinion in relation to virtue and its reward; in his view there is no reason for God to grant what is hoped for as a reward. Virtue is not worth anything if those who depart this life prematurely without having practiced virtue are immediately welcomed into blessedness.
Continuing along this line, Gregory asks, "What will happen to the one who finishes his life at a tender age, who has done nothing, bad or good? Is he worthy of a reward?"(16) He answers, "The hoped for blessedness belongs to human beings by nature, and it is called a reward only in a certain sense."(17)
Enjoyment of true life (zoe and not bios) corresponds to human nature and is possessed in the degree that virtue is practiced. Since the innocent infant does not need purification from personal sins, he shares in this life corresponding to his nature in a sort of regular progress, according to his capacity. Gregory of Nyssa distinguishes between the destiny of infants and that of adults who lived a virtuous life. "The premature death of newborn infants does not provide a basis for the presupposition that they will suffer torments or that they will be in the same state as those who have been purified in this life by all the virtues."(18)
Finally, he offers this perspective for the reflection of the church: "Apostolic contemplation fortifies our inquiry, for the One who has done everything well, with wisdom (Ps 104:24), is able to bring good out of evil."(19)
13. Gregory of Nazianzus does not write about the place and status after death of infants who die without sacramental baptism, but he enlarges the subject with another consideration. He writes, namely, that these children receive neither praise nor punishment from the just judge because they have suffered injury rather than provoked it. "The one who does not deserve punishment is not thereby worthy of praise, and the one who does not deserve praise is not thereby deserving of punishment."(20)
The profound teaching of the Greek fathers can be summarized in the opinion of Anastasius of Sinai: "It would not be fitting to probe God's judgments with one's hands."(21)
14. On the one hand, these Greek fathers teach that children who die without baptism do not suffer eternal damnation, though they do not attain the same state as those who have been baptized. On the other hand, they do not explain what their state is like or where they go. In this matter the Greek fathers display their characteristic apophatic sensitivity.
apophatic definition inserted by blogger:
Webster's New Millennium™ Dictionary of English
Main Entry: apophatic
Part of Speech: adj
Definition: pertaining to a knowledge of God obtained through negation
Etymology: Gk. apophatikos
Usage: theology
WordNet
Apophatic adjective - of or relating to the belief that God can be known to humans
only in terms of what He is not (such as 'God is unknowable')
WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.ENDNOTES
1 All scriptural references in this document are to the Revised Standard Version of the Bible (Catholic edition).
2 Cf. International Theological Commission, "Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God," Vatican City, 2005.
11 Cf. D. Weaver, "The Exegesis of Romans 5:12 Among the Greek Fathers and Its Implication for the Doctrine of Original Sin: The 5th-12th Centuries," St. Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 29 (1985), 133-159, 231-257.
12 (Pseudo-)Athanasius, Quaestiones ad Antiochum Ducem, qn. 101 (Patrologia Cursus Completa, Series Graeca PGI, LP Migne (ed.), 28, 660C). Likewise qn. 115 (PG 28, 672A).
13 Anastasius of Sinai, Quaestiones et Responsiones, qn. 81 (PG 89, 709C).
14 De Infantibus Praemature Abreptis Libellum, ab H. Polack ad editionem praeparatum in Colloquio Leidensi testimonies instructum renovatis curis recensitum edendum curavit Hadwiga Horner, in I.K. Downing, I.A. McDonough, H. Homer (ed. cur.), Gregorii Nysseni Opera Dogmatica Minora, Part II, W. Jaeger, H. Langerbeck, H. Homer (eds.), Gregorii Nysseni Opera, Volume III, Part II, Leiden, New York, Copenhagen, Cologne 1987, 65-97.
15 Ibid., 70.
16 Ibid., 81-82.
17 Ibid., 83.
18 Ibid., 96.
19 Ibid., 97.
20 Gregory of Nazianzus, Oratio XL — In Sanctum Baptisma, 23 (PG 36,389B-C).
21 Anastasius of Sinai, Quaestiones et Responsiones, qn. 81 (PG 89, 709C).
Making Poetry -- by Frances Ridley Havergal
Poems By Frances Ridley Havergal
Making Poetry
…
Will you seek it? Will you brave it?
‘Tis a strange and solemn thing,
Learning long before your teaching,
Listening long before your preaching,
Suffering before you sing.
And the songs that echo longest,
Deepest, fullest, truest, strongest,
With your life-blood you will write.
…
http://books.google.com
Frances Ridley Havergal 1836-1879
Francis Ridley Havergal was born December14, 1836, in Astley, England and died 3 June 1879, in Oystermouth, Glamorganshire, Wales. The youngest child of a pastor, she is recognized as one of the most gifted and popular female hymn-writers in England in the last half of the nineteenth century. She was an avid student of the Bible and committed to memory the entire New Testament, the Psalms, Isaiah, and the minor prophets. Her Poetical Works were published in 1884.
Julian's Dictionary of Hymnology says, "her poems are permeated with the fragrance of her passionate love of Jesus."
http://hymnuts.luthersem.edu/hcompan/writers/fhavrgal.htm
Making Poetry
…
Will you seek it? Will you brave it?
‘Tis a strange and solemn thing,
Learning long before your teaching,
Listening long before your preaching,
Suffering before you sing.
And the songs that echo longest,
Deepest, fullest, truest, strongest,
With your life-blood you will write.
…
http://books.google.com
Frances Ridley Havergal 1836-1879
Francis Ridley Havergal was born December14, 1836, in Astley, England and died 3 June 1879, in Oystermouth, Glamorganshire, Wales. The youngest child of a pastor, she is recognized as one of the most gifted and popular female hymn-writers in England in the last half of the nineteenth century. She was an avid student of the Bible and committed to memory the entire New Testament, the Psalms, Isaiah, and the minor prophets. Her Poetical Works were published in 1884.
Julian's Dictionary of Hymnology says, "her poems are permeated with the fragrance of her passionate love of Jesus."
http://hymnuts.luthersem.edu/hcompan/writers/fhavrgal.htm
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Quotes from Andre Gide
Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better.
Be faithful to that which exists within yourself.
Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again.
In hell there is no other punishment than to begin over and over again the tasks left unfinished in your lifetime.
It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for something you are not.
It is easier to lead men to combat, stirring up their passion, than to restrain them and direct them toward the patient labors of peace.
It is not always by plugging away at a difficulty and sticking to it that one overcomes it; often it is by working on the one next to it. Some things and some people have to be approached obliquely, at an angle.
It is only in adventure that some people succeed in knowing themselves - in finding themselves.
Know thyself! A maxim as pernicious as it is ugly. Whoever observes himself arrests his own development. A caterpillar who wanted to know itself well would never become a butterfly.
Nothing prevents happiness like the memory of happiness.
One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.
The most decisive actions of life are most often unconsidered actions.
There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them.
Through loyalty to the past, our mind refuses to realize that tomorrow's joy is possible only if today's makes way for it; that each wave owes the beauty of its line only to the withdrawal of the preceding one.
What another would have done as well as you, do not do it. What another would have said as well as you, do not say it; what another would have written as well, do not write it. Be faithful to that which exists nowhere but in yourself-and thus make yourself indispensable.
Work and struggle and never accept an evil that you can change.
~ Andre Gide, French Novelist (1869-1951)
Snarky Shock
Before you can work effectively in the church, you have to overcome Snarky Shock. The people in church are just as stupid and snarky as everybody else, including you.
~ Truthful Grace
~ Truthful Grace
Mothers and Grief
A mother experiences more than one death, even though she herself will only die once. She fears for her husband; she fears for her children; again she fears for the women and children who belong to her children. … For each of these—whether for loss of possessions, bodily illness, or undesired misfortune—she mourns and grieves no less than those who suffer.
~ John Chrysostom (349–407)
~ John Chrysostom (349–407)
Monday, May 07, 2007
Mother Teresa quotes
Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies.
Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat.
Do not think that love, in order to be genuine, has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired.
Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person.
Each one of them is Jesus in disguise.
Everybody today seems to be in such a terrible rush, anxious for greater developments and greater riches and so on, so that children have very little time for their parents. Parents have very little time for each other, and in the home begins the disruption of peace of the world.
Every time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.
Good works are links that form a chain of love.
I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.
I do not pray for success, I ask for faithfulness.
I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.
I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much.
I think I'm more difficult than critical.
I try to give to the poor people for love what the rich could get for money. No, I wouldn't touch a leper for a thousand pounds; yet I willingly cure him for the love of God.
I want you to be concerned about your next door neighbor. Do you know your next door neighbor?
If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.
If we want a love message to be heard, it has got to be sent out. To keep a lamp burning, we have to keep putting oil in it.
If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one.
If you judge people, you have no time to love them.
If you want a love message to be heard, it has got to be sent out. To keep a lamp burning, we have to keep putting oil in it.
In this life we cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.
Intense love does not measure, it just gives.
It is a kingly act to assist the fallen.
It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.
It is easy to love the people far away. It is not always easy to love those close to us. It is easier to give a cup of rice to relieve hunger than to relieve the loneliness and pain of someone unloved in our own home. Bring love into your home for this is where our love for each other must start.
It is impossible to walk rapidly and be unhappy.
It is not the magnitude of our actions but the amount of love that is put into them that matters.
Jesus said love one another. He didn't say love the whole world.
Joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls.
Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.
Let us always meet each other with smile, for the smile is the beginning of love.
Let us more and more insist on raising funds of love, of kindness, of understanding, of peace. Money will come if we seek first the Kingdom of God - the rest will be given.
Let us not be satisfied with just giving money. Money is not enough, money can be got, but they need your hearts to love them. So, spread your love everywhere you go.
Let us touch the dying, the poor, the lonely and the unwanted according to the graces we have received and let us not be ashamed or slow to do the humble work.
Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.
Loneliness is the most terrible poverty.
Love begins at home, and it is not how much we do... but how much love we put in that action.
Love begins by taking care of the closest ones - the ones at home.
Love is a fruit in season at all times, and within reach of every hand.
Many people mistake our work for our vocation. Our vocation is the love of Jesus.
One of the greatest diseases is to be nobody to anybody.
Our life of poverty is as necessary as the work itself. Only in heaven will we see how much we owe to the poor for helping us to love God better because of them.
Peace begins with a smile.
So many signatures for such a small heart.
Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier.
Sweetest Lord, make me appreciative of the dignity of my high vocation, and its many responsibilities. Never permit me to disgrace it by giving way to coldness, unkindness, or impatience.
The biggest disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but rather the feeling of being unwanted.
The greatest destroyer of peace is abortion because if a mother can kill her own child, what is left for me to kill you and you to kill me? There is nothing between.
The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread.
The miracle is not that we do this work, but that we are happy to do it.
The most terrible poverty is loneliness and the feeling of being unloved.
The success of love is in the loving - it is not in the result of loving. Of course it is natural in love to want the best for the other person, but whether it turns out that way or not does not determine the value of what we have done.
There are no great things, only small things with great love. Happy are those.
There is always the danger that we may just do the work for the sake of the work. This is where the respect and the love and the devotion come in - that we do it to God, to Christ, and that's why we try to do it as beautifully as possible.
There is more hunger in the world for love and appreciation in this world than for bread.
There must be a reason why some people can afford to live well. They must have worked for it. I only feel angry when I see waste. When I see people throwing away things that we could use.
There should be less talk; a preaching point is not a meeting point. What do you do then? Take a broom and clean someone's house. That says enough.
We are all pencils in the hand of God.
We can do no great things, only small things with great love.
We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass- grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.
We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.
We shall never know all the good that a simple smile can do.
We think sometimes that poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.
Words which do not give the light of Christ increase the darkness.
~ Mother Teresa (1910-1997)
www.brainyquote.com
Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat.
Do not think that love, in order to be genuine, has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired.
Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person.
Each one of them is Jesus in disguise.
Everybody today seems to be in such a terrible rush, anxious for greater developments and greater riches and so on, so that children have very little time for their parents. Parents have very little time for each other, and in the home begins the disruption of peace of the world.
Every time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.
Good works are links that form a chain of love.
I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.
I do not pray for success, I ask for faithfulness.
I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.
I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much.
I think I'm more difficult than critical.
I try to give to the poor people for love what the rich could get for money. No, I wouldn't touch a leper for a thousand pounds; yet I willingly cure him for the love of God.
I want you to be concerned about your next door neighbor. Do you know your next door neighbor?
If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.
If we want a love message to be heard, it has got to be sent out. To keep a lamp burning, we have to keep putting oil in it.
If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one.
If you judge people, you have no time to love them.
If you want a love message to be heard, it has got to be sent out. To keep a lamp burning, we have to keep putting oil in it.
In this life we cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.
Intense love does not measure, it just gives.
It is a kingly act to assist the fallen.
It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.
It is easy to love the people far away. It is not always easy to love those close to us. It is easier to give a cup of rice to relieve hunger than to relieve the loneliness and pain of someone unloved in our own home. Bring love into your home for this is where our love for each other must start.
It is impossible to walk rapidly and be unhappy.
It is not the magnitude of our actions but the amount of love that is put into them that matters.
Jesus said love one another. He didn't say love the whole world.
Joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls.
Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.
Let us always meet each other with smile, for the smile is the beginning of love.
Let us more and more insist on raising funds of love, of kindness, of understanding, of peace. Money will come if we seek first the Kingdom of God - the rest will be given.
Let us not be satisfied with just giving money. Money is not enough, money can be got, but they need your hearts to love them. So, spread your love everywhere you go.
Let us touch the dying, the poor, the lonely and the unwanted according to the graces we have received and let us not be ashamed or slow to do the humble work.
Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.
Loneliness is the most terrible poverty.
Love begins at home, and it is not how much we do... but how much love we put in that action.
Love begins by taking care of the closest ones - the ones at home.
Love is a fruit in season at all times, and within reach of every hand.
Many people mistake our work for our vocation. Our vocation is the love of Jesus.
One of the greatest diseases is to be nobody to anybody.
Our life of poverty is as necessary as the work itself. Only in heaven will we see how much we owe to the poor for helping us to love God better because of them.
Peace begins with a smile.
So many signatures for such a small heart.
Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier.
Sweetest Lord, make me appreciative of the dignity of my high vocation, and its many responsibilities. Never permit me to disgrace it by giving way to coldness, unkindness, or impatience.
The biggest disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but rather the feeling of being unwanted.
The greatest destroyer of peace is abortion because if a mother can kill her own child, what is left for me to kill you and you to kill me? There is nothing between.
The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread.
The miracle is not that we do this work, but that we are happy to do it.
The most terrible poverty is loneliness and the feeling of being unloved.
The success of love is in the loving - it is not in the result of loving. Of course it is natural in love to want the best for the other person, but whether it turns out that way or not does not determine the value of what we have done.
There are no great things, only small things with great love. Happy are those.
There is always the danger that we may just do the work for the sake of the work. This is where the respect and the love and the devotion come in - that we do it to God, to Christ, and that's why we try to do it as beautifully as possible.
There is more hunger in the world for love and appreciation in this world than for bread.
There must be a reason why some people can afford to live well. They must have worked for it. I only feel angry when I see waste. When I see people throwing away things that we could use.
There should be less talk; a preaching point is not a meeting point. What do you do then? Take a broom and clean someone's house. That says enough.
We are all pencils in the hand of God.
We can do no great things, only small things with great love.
We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass- grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.
We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.
We shall never know all the good that a simple smile can do.
We think sometimes that poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.
Words which do not give the light of Christ increase the darkness.
~ Mother Teresa (1910-1997)
www.brainyquote.com
Doing the Impossible for the Ungrateful
John Calvin quotes
A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent.
All the blessings we enjoy are Divine deposits, committed to our trust on this condition, that they should be dispensed for the benefit of our neighbors.
Augustine does not disagree with this when he teaches that it is a faculty of the reason and the will to choose good with the assistance of grace; evil, when grace is absent.
Build a man a fire and he will be warm for a day; set him on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life.
Every one of us is, even from his mother's womb, a master craftsman of idols.
For there is no one so great or mighty that he can avoid the misery that will rise up against him when he resists and strives against God.
God preordained, for his own glory and the display of His attributes of mercy and justice, a part of the human race, without any merit of their own, to eternal salvation, and another part, in just punishment of their sin, to eternal damnation.
God tolerates even our stammering, and pardons our ignorance whenever something inadvertently escapes us - as, indeed, without this mercy there would be no freedom to pray.
However many blessings we expect from God, His infinite liberality will always exceed all our wishes and our thoughts.
I consider looseness with words no less of a defect than looseness of the bowels.
Is it faith to understand nothing, and merely submit your convictions implicitly to the Church?
Knowledge of the sciences is so much smoke apart from the heavenly science of Christ.
Man's mind is like a store of idolatry and superstition; so much so that if a man believes his own mind it is certain that he will forsake God and forge some idol in his own brain.
No man is excluded from calling upon God, the gate of salvation is set open unto all men: neither is there any other thing which keepeth us back from entering in, save only our own unbelief.
Seeing that a Pilot steers the ship in which we sail, who will never allow us to perish even in the midst of shipwrecks, there is no reason why our minds should be overwhelmed with fear and overcome with weariness.
The torture of a bad conscience is the hell of a living soul.
There is no work, however vile or sordid, that does not glisten before God.
There is no worse screen to block out the Spirit than confidence in our own intelligence.
There is not one blade of grass, there is no color in this world that is not intended to make us rejoice.
We must remember that Satan has his miracles, too.
Yet consider now, whether women are not quite past sense and reason, when they want to rule over men.
You must submit to supreme suffering in order to discover the completion of joy.
~ John Calvin, French Theologian (1509-1564)
www.brainyquote.com
All the blessings we enjoy are Divine deposits, committed to our trust on this condition, that they should be dispensed for the benefit of our neighbors.
Augustine does not disagree with this when he teaches that it is a faculty of the reason and the will to choose good with the assistance of grace; evil, when grace is absent.
Build a man a fire and he will be warm for a day; set him on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life.
Every one of us is, even from his mother's womb, a master craftsman of idols.
For there is no one so great or mighty that he can avoid the misery that will rise up against him when he resists and strives against God.
God preordained, for his own glory and the display of His attributes of mercy and justice, a part of the human race, without any merit of their own, to eternal salvation, and another part, in just punishment of their sin, to eternal damnation.
God tolerates even our stammering, and pardons our ignorance whenever something inadvertently escapes us - as, indeed, without this mercy there would be no freedom to pray.
However many blessings we expect from God, His infinite liberality will always exceed all our wishes and our thoughts.
I consider looseness with words no less of a defect than looseness of the bowels.
Is it faith to understand nothing, and merely submit your convictions implicitly to the Church?
Knowledge of the sciences is so much smoke apart from the heavenly science of Christ.
Man's mind is like a store of idolatry and superstition; so much so that if a man believes his own mind it is certain that he will forsake God and forge some idol in his own brain.
No man is excluded from calling upon God, the gate of salvation is set open unto all men: neither is there any other thing which keepeth us back from entering in, save only our own unbelief.
Seeing that a Pilot steers the ship in which we sail, who will never allow us to perish even in the midst of shipwrecks, there is no reason why our minds should be overwhelmed with fear and overcome with weariness.
The torture of a bad conscience is the hell of a living soul.
There is no work, however vile or sordid, that does not glisten before God.
There is no worse screen to block out the Spirit than confidence in our own intelligence.
There is not one blade of grass, there is no color in this world that is not intended to make us rejoice.
We must remember that Satan has his miracles, too.
Yet consider now, whether women are not quite past sense and reason, when they want to rule over men.
You must submit to supreme suffering in order to discover the completion of joy.
~ John Calvin, French Theologian (1509-1564)
www.brainyquote.com
Martin Luther quotes
All who call on God in true faith, earnestly from the heart, will certainly be heard, and will receive what they have asked and desired.
Be a sinner and sin strongly, but more strongly have faith and rejoice in Christ.
Be thou comforted, little dog, Thou too in Resurrection shall have a little golden tail.
Blood alone moves the wheels of history.
Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.
Every man must do two things alone; he must do his own believing and his own dying.
Everything that is done in the world is done by hope.
Faith is a living and unshakable confidence, a belief in the grace of God so assured that a man would die a thousand deaths for its sake.
Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times.
Faith is permitting ourselves to be seized by the things we do not see.
Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.
First I shake the whole Apple tree, that the ripest might fall. Then I climb the tree and shake each limb, and then each branch and then each twig, and then I look under each leaf.
For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver.
For where God built a church, there the Devil would also build a chapel.
Forgiveness is God's command.
God writes the Gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars.
God writes the gospel not in the Bible alone, but on trees, and flowers, and clouds, and stars.
Grant that I may not pray alone with the mouth; help me that I may pray from the depths of my heart.
Here I stand; I can do no other. God help me. Amen!
How soon not now becomes never.
I am afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures and engraving them in the heart of the youth.
I am more afraid of my own heart than of the pope and all his cardinals. I have within me the great pope, Self.
I feel much freer now that I am certain the pope is the Antichrist.
I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all; but whatever I have placed in God's hands, that I still possess.
I more fear what is within me than what comes from without.
I shall never be a heretic; I may err in dispute, but I do not wish to decide anything finally; on the other hand, I am not bound by the opinions of men.
If he have faith, the believer cannot be restrained. He betrays himself. He breaks out. He confesses and teaches this gospel to the people at the risk of life itself.
If I am not allowed to laugh in heaven, I don't want to go there.
If you are not allowed to laugh in heaven, I don't want to go there.
If you young fellows were wise, the devil couldn't do anything to you, but since you aren't wise, you need us who are old.
Justice is a temporary thing that must at last come to an end; but the conscience is eternal and will never die.
Let the wife make the husband glad to come home, and let him make her sorry to see him leave.
Make sure to send a lazy man the angel of death.
Music is the art of the prophets and the gift of God.
My heart, which is so full to overflowing, has often been solaced and refreshed by music when sick and weary.
Next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world.
Nothing good ever comes of violence.
Our Lord has written the promise of resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.
Peace if possible, truth at all costs.
Peace is more important than all justice; and peace was not made for the sake of justice, but justice for the sake of peace.
People must have righteous principals in the first, and then they will not fail to perform virtuous actions.
Pray, and let God worry.
Prayer is a strong wall and fortress of the church; it is a goodly Christian weapon.
Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.
Reason is the enemy of faith.
Some plague the people with too long sermons; for the faculty of listening is a tender thing, and soon becomes weary and satiated.
Superstition, idolatry, and hypocrisy have ample wages, but truth goes a-begging.
The Bible is the cradle wherein Christ is laid.
The fewer the words, the better the prayer.
The God of this world is riches, pleasure and pride.
The human heart is like a ship on a stormy sea driven about by winds blowing from all four corners of heaven.
The Lord commonly gives riches to foolish people, to whom he gives nothing else.
The man who has the will to undergo all labor may win to any good.
The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no limit to this fever for writing.
The reproduction of mankind is a great marvel and mystery. Had God consulted me in the matter, I should have advised him to continue the generation of the species by fashioning them out of clay.
The will is a beast of burden. If God mounts it, it wishes and goes as God wills; if Satan mounts it, it wishes and goes as Satan wills; Nor can it choose its rider... the riders contend for its possession.
There is no more lovely, friendly and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage.
To gather with God's people in united adoration of the Father is as necessary to the Christian life as prayer.
War is the greatest plague that can affect humanity; it destroys religion, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it.
War is the greatest plague that can afflict humanity, it destroys religion, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it.
Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God.
When I am angry I can pray well and preach well.
When schools flourish, all flourishes.
Who loves not women, wine and song remains a fool his whole life long.
You are not only responsible for what you say, but also for what you do not say.
You should not believe your conscience and your feelings more than the word which the Lord who receives sinners preaches to you.
~ Martin Luther, German Theologian (1483-1546)
www.brainyquote.com
Be a sinner and sin strongly, but more strongly have faith and rejoice in Christ.
Be thou comforted, little dog, Thou too in Resurrection shall have a little golden tail.
Blood alone moves the wheels of history.
Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.
Every man must do two things alone; he must do his own believing and his own dying.
Everything that is done in the world is done by hope.
Faith is a living and unshakable confidence, a belief in the grace of God so assured that a man would die a thousand deaths for its sake.
Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times.
Faith is permitting ourselves to be seized by the things we do not see.
Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.
First I shake the whole Apple tree, that the ripest might fall. Then I climb the tree and shake each limb, and then each branch and then each twig, and then I look under each leaf.
For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver.
For where God built a church, there the Devil would also build a chapel.
Forgiveness is God's command.
God writes the Gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars.
God writes the gospel not in the Bible alone, but on trees, and flowers, and clouds, and stars.
Grant that I may not pray alone with the mouth; help me that I may pray from the depths of my heart.
Here I stand; I can do no other. God help me. Amen!
How soon not now becomes never.
I am afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures and engraving them in the heart of the youth.
I am more afraid of my own heart than of the pope and all his cardinals. I have within me the great pope, Self.
I feel much freer now that I am certain the pope is the Antichrist.
I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all; but whatever I have placed in God's hands, that I still possess.
I more fear what is within me than what comes from without.
I shall never be a heretic; I may err in dispute, but I do not wish to decide anything finally; on the other hand, I am not bound by the opinions of men.
If he have faith, the believer cannot be restrained. He betrays himself. He breaks out. He confesses and teaches this gospel to the people at the risk of life itself.
If I am not allowed to laugh in heaven, I don't want to go there.
If you are not allowed to laugh in heaven, I don't want to go there.
If you young fellows were wise, the devil couldn't do anything to you, but since you aren't wise, you need us who are old.
Justice is a temporary thing that must at last come to an end; but the conscience is eternal and will never die.
Let the wife make the husband glad to come home, and let him make her sorry to see him leave.
Make sure to send a lazy man the angel of death.
Music is the art of the prophets and the gift of God.
My heart, which is so full to overflowing, has often been solaced and refreshed by music when sick and weary.
Next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world.
Nothing good ever comes of violence.
Our Lord has written the promise of resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.
Peace if possible, truth at all costs.
Peace is more important than all justice; and peace was not made for the sake of justice, but justice for the sake of peace.
People must have righteous principals in the first, and then they will not fail to perform virtuous actions.
Pray, and let God worry.
Prayer is a strong wall and fortress of the church; it is a goodly Christian weapon.
Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.
Reason is the enemy of faith.
Some plague the people with too long sermons; for the faculty of listening is a tender thing, and soon becomes weary and satiated.
Superstition, idolatry, and hypocrisy have ample wages, but truth goes a-begging.
The Bible is the cradle wherein Christ is laid.
The fewer the words, the better the prayer.
The God of this world is riches, pleasure and pride.
The human heart is like a ship on a stormy sea driven about by winds blowing from all four corners of heaven.
The Lord commonly gives riches to foolish people, to whom he gives nothing else.
The man who has the will to undergo all labor may win to any good.
The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no limit to this fever for writing.
The reproduction of mankind is a great marvel and mystery. Had God consulted me in the matter, I should have advised him to continue the generation of the species by fashioning them out of clay.
The will is a beast of burden. If God mounts it, it wishes and goes as God wills; if Satan mounts it, it wishes and goes as Satan wills; Nor can it choose its rider... the riders contend for its possession.
There is no more lovely, friendly and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage.
To gather with God's people in united adoration of the Father is as necessary to the Christian life as prayer.
War is the greatest plague that can affect humanity; it destroys religion, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it.
War is the greatest plague that can afflict humanity, it destroys religion, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it.
Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God.
When I am angry I can pray well and preach well.
When schools flourish, all flourishes.
Who loves not women, wine and song remains a fool his whole life long.
You are not only responsible for what you say, but also for what you do not say.
You should not believe your conscience and your feelings more than the word which the Lord who receives sinners preaches to you.
~ Martin Luther, German Theologian (1483-1546)
www.brainyquote.com
Friday, May 04, 2007
Carnivorous Sheep
The only place on earth you will find carnivorous sheep is in the church.
~ Jungle Jim, Australia (blog name)
~ Jungle Jim, Australia (blog name)
Monday, April 30, 2007
Music in the Service of God
"I wish to see all arts, principally music, in the service of Him who gave and created them. I would not for all the world forego my humble share of music. Singers are never sorrowful, but are merry, and smile through their troubles in song. Music makes people kinder, gentler, more staid and reasonable. I am strongly persuaded that after theology there is no art that can be placed on a level with music; for besides theology music is the only art capable of affording peace and joy of the heart." ...
"The devil flees before the sound of music almost as much as before the Word of God.”
~ Martin Luther - foreword to the Wittenberg Gesangbuch, 1524
Quotes from Eleanor Roosevelt
Do what you feel in your heart to be right- for you'll be criticized anyway. You'll be damned if you do, and damned if you don't.
Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry is own weight, this is a frightening prospect.
Friendship with ones self is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.
Happiness is not a goal; it is a by-product.
I think, at a child's birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity.
It is better to light one small candle than to curse the darkness.
It is not fair to ask of others what you are unwilling to do yourself.
Never allow a person to tell you no who doesn't have the power to say yes.
Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness that you are able to give.
The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.
The giving of love is an education in itself.
Too often the great decisions are originated and given form in bodies made up wholly of men, or so completely dominated by them that whatever of special value women have to offer is shunted aside without expression.
We are afraid to care too much, for fear that the other person does not care at all.
We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face... we must do that which we think we cannot.
We have to face the fact that either all of us are going to die together or we are going to learn to live together and if we are to live together we have to talk.
What is to give light must endure the burning.
When you cease to make a contribution, you begin to die.
Women are like teabags. We don't know our true strength until we are in hot water!
You can't move so fast that you try to change the mores faster than people can accept it. That doesn't mean you do nothing, but it means that you do the things that need to be done according to priority.
You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.'
You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.
You must do the things you think you cannot do.
~ Eleanor Roosevelt
www.brainyquote.com
Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry is own weight, this is a frightening prospect.
Friendship with ones self is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.
Happiness is not a goal; it is a by-product.
I think, at a child's birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity.
It is better to light one small candle than to curse the darkness.
It is not fair to ask of others what you are unwilling to do yourself.
Never allow a person to tell you no who doesn't have the power to say yes.
Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness that you are able to give.
The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.
The giving of love is an education in itself.
Too often the great decisions are originated and given form in bodies made up wholly of men, or so completely dominated by them that whatever of special value women have to offer is shunted aside without expression.
We are afraid to care too much, for fear that the other person does not care at all.
We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face... we must do that which we think we cannot.
We have to face the fact that either all of us are going to die together or we are going to learn to live together and if we are to live together we have to talk.
What is to give light must endure the burning.
When you cease to make a contribution, you begin to die.
Women are like teabags. We don't know our true strength until we are in hot water!
You can't move so fast that you try to change the mores faster than people can accept it. That doesn't mean you do nothing, but it means that you do the things that need to be done according to priority.
You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.'
You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.
You must do the things you think you cannot do.
~ Eleanor Roosevelt
www.brainyquote.com
Brezhnev’s Widow
As Vice President, George Bush represented the U.S. at the funeral of former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. Bush was deeply moved by a silent protest carried out by Brezhnev’s widow.
She stood motionless by the coffin until seconds before it was closed. Then, just as the soldiers touched the lid, Brezhnev’s wife performed an act of great courage and hope, a gesture that must surely rank as one of the most profound acts of civil disobedience ever committed: She reached down and made the sign of the cross on her husband’s chest.
There in the citadel of secular, atheistic power, the wife of the man who had run it all hoped that her husband was wrong. She hoped that there was another life, and that that life was best represented by Jesus who died on the cross, and that the same Jesus might yet have mercy on her husband.
~ Gary Thomas, in Christianity Today, October 3, 1994, p. 26
She stood motionless by the coffin until seconds before it was closed. Then, just as the soldiers touched the lid, Brezhnev’s wife performed an act of great courage and hope, a gesture that must surely rank as one of the most profound acts of civil disobedience ever committed: She reached down and made the sign of the cross on her husband’s chest.
There in the citadel of secular, atheistic power, the wife of the man who had run it all hoped that her husband was wrong. She hoped that there was another life, and that that life was best represented by Jesus who died on the cross, and that the same Jesus might yet have mercy on her husband.
~ Gary Thomas, in Christianity Today, October 3, 1994, p. 26
Reaction of Dawson Trotman’s Widow
The bitter news of Dawson Trotman’s drowning swept like cold wind across Schroon Lake to the shoreline. Eyewitnesses tell of the profound anxiety, the tears, the helpless disbelief in the faces of those who now looked out across the deep blue water. Everyone’s face except one—Lila Trotman, Dawson’s widow.
As she suddenly walked upon the scene a close friend shouted, "Oh, Lila ... He’s gone. Dawson’s gone!"
To that she replied in calm assurance the words of Psalm 115:3: "But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases."
All of the anguish, the sudden loneliness that normally consumes and cripples those who survive did not invade that woman’s heart. Instead, she leaned hard upon her sovereign Lord, who had once again done what He pleased.
~ Starting Over by Charles R. Swindoll, Multnomah Press, 1977, p. 67
As she suddenly walked upon the scene a close friend shouted, "Oh, Lila ... He’s gone. Dawson’s gone!"
To that she replied in calm assurance the words of Psalm 115:3: "But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases."
All of the anguish, the sudden loneliness that normally consumes and cripples those who survive did not invade that woman’s heart. Instead, she leaned hard upon her sovereign Lord, who had once again done what He pleased.
~ Starting Over by Charles R. Swindoll, Multnomah Press, 1977, p. 67
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Death of a Family
A friend of mine, Dave Johnson, is a policeman in San Jose, California. One morning, he was called to the scene of a family disturbance. When he arrived, he found another family that would soon be added to the casualty list.
“The woman was crying and yelling at her husband who was standing with his hands in the pockets of greasy overalls. I noticed homemade tattoos on his arm, usually a sign that someone had been in prison. I was glad that my “fill unit” had arrived.
I stepped from my patrol car. As I walked towards the two I could hear the woman yelling at her husband to fix whatever he had done to the car so she could leave. He made no reply, but only laughed at her with a contemptuous laugh.
She turned to me and asked me to make him fix the car. My fill unit broke in and we “split” the two up so that we could find a solution to the problem. I began talking to the husband who said that his wife was having an affair and she was leaving. I asked him if they had gone for counseling and he said that he was not interested. He went on to say that he was interested in only getting his “things” back. He said that his wife had hidden them from him.
I asked his wife about his things and she said she wouldn’t give them to him until she got one of the three VCRs they owned. I found out later that his “things” consisted of the narcotics he dealt in.
The other officer went to the wife’s car and began looking under the hood to see if he could spot the trouble. The husband walked over, took the coil from his pocket, and handed it to the officer. He then told his wife that she could have one of the VCRs if he could have his things. She finally agreed and went into the house.
As she entered the house, I noticed two little girls standing in the doorway, watching the drama unfold. They were about eight and ten years old. Both wore dresses and clung to a Cabbage Patch doll. At their feet were two small suitcases. My eyes couldn’t leave their faces as they watched the two people they loved tear each other apart.
The woman emerged with the VCR in her arms and went to the car where she put in into the crowded back seat. She turned and told her husband where he could find his things. They both agreed that they had equal shares of the things they had accumulated in 10 years of marriage.
Then as I stood in unbelief, I watched the husband point to the two little girls and say to the wife, “Well, which one do you want?”
Without any apparent emotion, the mother chose the older one. The girls looked at each other as the older one picked up her suitcase and then climbed into her mother’s car.
I had to stand and watch as the littlest girl, still clutching her Cabbage Patch doll in one hand and her suitcase in the other, watched her big sister and her mother drive off. I watched as tears streamed down her face in total bewilderment. The only “comfort” she received was an order from her father to go into the house as he turned to talk with some friends.
There I stood, the unwilling witness to the death of a family.
Steve Farrar, Point Man, pp. 21-23
“The woman was crying and yelling at her husband who was standing with his hands in the pockets of greasy overalls. I noticed homemade tattoos on his arm, usually a sign that someone had been in prison. I was glad that my “fill unit” had arrived.
I stepped from my patrol car. As I walked towards the two I could hear the woman yelling at her husband to fix whatever he had done to the car so she could leave. He made no reply, but only laughed at her with a contemptuous laugh.
She turned to me and asked me to make him fix the car. My fill unit broke in and we “split” the two up so that we could find a solution to the problem. I began talking to the husband who said that his wife was having an affair and she was leaving. I asked him if they had gone for counseling and he said that he was not interested. He went on to say that he was interested in only getting his “things” back. He said that his wife had hidden them from him.
I asked his wife about his things and she said she wouldn’t give them to him until she got one of the three VCRs they owned. I found out later that his “things” consisted of the narcotics he dealt in.
The other officer went to the wife’s car and began looking under the hood to see if he could spot the trouble. The husband walked over, took the coil from his pocket, and handed it to the officer. He then told his wife that she could have one of the VCRs if he could have his things. She finally agreed and went into the house.
As she entered the house, I noticed two little girls standing in the doorway, watching the drama unfold. They were about eight and ten years old. Both wore dresses and clung to a Cabbage Patch doll. At their feet were two small suitcases. My eyes couldn’t leave their faces as they watched the two people they loved tear each other apart.
The woman emerged with the VCR in her arms and went to the car where she put in into the crowded back seat. She turned and told her husband where he could find his things. They both agreed that they had equal shares of the things they had accumulated in 10 years of marriage.
Then as I stood in unbelief, I watched the husband point to the two little girls and say to the wife, “Well, which one do you want?”
Without any apparent emotion, the mother chose the older one. The girls looked at each other as the older one picked up her suitcase and then climbed into her mother’s car.
I had to stand and watch as the littlest girl, still clutching her Cabbage Patch doll in one hand and her suitcase in the other, watched her big sister and her mother drive off. I watched as tears streamed down her face in total bewilderment. The only “comfort” she received was an order from her father to go into the house as he turned to talk with some friends.
There I stood, the unwilling witness to the death of a family.
Steve Farrar, Point Man, pp. 21-23
The Dark Side of the Human Heart
His Own Heart was Lecherous
One of the most powerful stories I have ever heard on the nature of the human heart is told by Malcolm Muggeridge. Working as a journalist in India, he left his residence one evening to go to a nearby river for a swim. As he entered the water, across the river he saw an Indian woman from the nearby village who had come to have her bath.
Muggeridge impulsively felt the allurement of the moment, and temptation stormed into his mind. He had lived with this kind of struggle for years but had somehow fought it off in honor of his commitment to his wife, Kitty. On this occasion, however, he wondered if he could cross the line of marital fidelity.
He struggled just for a moment and then swam furiously toward the woman, literally trying to outdistance his conscience. His mind fed him the fantasy that stolen waters would be sweet, and he swam the harder for it. Now he was just two or three feet away from her, and as he emerged from the water, any emotion that may have gripped him paled into insignificance when compared with the devastation that shattered him as he looked at her.
“She was old and hideous...and her skin was wrinkled and, worst of all, she was a leper....This creature grinned at me, showing a toothless mask.”
The experience left Muggeridge trembling and muttering under his breath, “What a dirty lecherous woman!”
But then the rude shock of it dawned upon him—it was not the woman who was lecherous; it was his own heart.
Ravi Zacharias, Can Man Live Without God, (Word Publ, Dallas: 1994), pp. 136-137
One of the most powerful stories I have ever heard on the nature of the human heart is told by Malcolm Muggeridge. Working as a journalist in India, he left his residence one evening to go to a nearby river for a swim. As he entered the water, across the river he saw an Indian woman from the nearby village who had come to have her bath.
Muggeridge impulsively felt the allurement of the moment, and temptation stormed into his mind. He had lived with this kind of struggle for years but had somehow fought it off in honor of his commitment to his wife, Kitty. On this occasion, however, he wondered if he could cross the line of marital fidelity.
He struggled just for a moment and then swam furiously toward the woman, literally trying to outdistance his conscience. His mind fed him the fantasy that stolen waters would be sweet, and he swam the harder for it. Now he was just two or three feet away from her, and as he emerged from the water, any emotion that may have gripped him paled into insignificance when compared with the devastation that shattered him as he looked at her.
“She was old and hideous...and her skin was wrinkled and, worst of all, she was a leper....This creature grinned at me, showing a toothless mask.”
The experience left Muggeridge trembling and muttering under his breath, “What a dirty lecherous woman!”
But then the rude shock of it dawned upon him—it was not the woman who was lecherous; it was his own heart.
Ravi Zacharias, Can Man Live Without God, (Word Publ, Dallas: 1994), pp. 136-137
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
A Safe Environment to Grow
People need a safe environment to grow. When you try to hide your flaws, you also hide your gifts.
~ Truthful Grace
~ Truthful Grace
Moses and Job
I taught them everything they know, but not everything I know.
I used to think like Moses. That knocked me down for a couple years and put me in prison. Then I start thinking like Job. Job waited and became the wealthiest and richest man ever 'cause he believed in God.
When God took it, he accepted it; when he brought it back, he accepted it. That's what's happening with me.
I want to say to the young people, Honor thy father and thy mother. Your days will be longer and more fruitful.
I want to say to you, Help yourself, so you can help someone else.
I've been held responsible for taxes I know nothing about.
I've been knocked down a lot of times.
Like Christ said, love thee one another. I learned to do that, and I learned to respect and be appreciative and thankful for what I had.
My expectations of other people, I double them on myself.
Sometimes you struggle so hard to feed your family one way, you forget to feed them the other way, with spiritual nourishment. Everybody needs that.
Thank God for the journey.
When I'm on stage, I'm trying to do one thing: bring people joy. Just like church does. People don't go to church to find trouble, they go there to lose it.
~ James Brown, American Musician
Two Kinds of Light
There are two kinds of light--the glow that illuminates, and the glare that obscures.
All human beings should try to learn before they die what they are running from, and to, and why.
Nowadays men lead lives of noisy desperation.
The wit makes fun of other persons; the satirist makes fun of the world; the humorist makes fun of himself, but in so doing, he identifies himself with people--that is, people everywhere, not for the purpose of taking them apart, but simply revealing their true nature.
~ in Edward R. Murrow television interview
Why do you have to be a nonconformist like everybody else?
I do not have a psychiatrist and I do not want one, for the simple reason that if he listened to me long enough, he might become disturbed.
~ "Carpe Noctem, If You Can", in "Credos and Curios" (1962)
~ James Thurber
US author, cartoonist, humorist, & satirist (1894 - 1961)
www.quotationspage.com
All human beings should try to learn before they die what they are running from, and to, and why.
Nowadays men lead lives of noisy desperation.
The wit makes fun of other persons; the satirist makes fun of the world; the humorist makes fun of himself, but in so doing, he identifies himself with people--that is, people everywhere, not for the purpose of taking them apart, but simply revealing their true nature.
~ in Edward R. Murrow television interview
Why do you have to be a nonconformist like everybody else?
I do not have a psychiatrist and I do not want one, for the simple reason that if he listened to me long enough, he might become disturbed.
~ "Carpe Noctem, If You Can", in "Credos and Curios" (1962)
~ James Thurber
US author, cartoonist, humorist, & satirist (1894 - 1961)
www.quotationspage.com
Monday, April 23, 2007
On Relationships, Exceeding Your Limits, and Making Decisions
On Exceeding Your Limits
I'm fortunate now that I coach at Duke University and we've won a lot. I have some kids who haven't failed that much. But when they get to college, they're going to fail some time. That's a thing that I can help them the most with.
In high school, in sport, I had a coach who told me I was much better than I thought I was, and would make me do more in a positive sense. He was the first person who taught me not to be afraid of failure.
Each group and each youngster is different. As a leader or coach, you get to know what they need.
I think some parents now look at a youngster failing as the final thing. It's a process, and failure is part of the process. I would like it if the teacher and the parents would connect more. I think that used to be, but we're losing a little bit of that right now.
There are kids don't want to do something because they're afraid of looking stupid to their peers. There comes a time when they start protecting themselves, instead of extending. I want to make sure that they're always trying to extend themselves.
Imagination has a great deal to do with winning.
The thing I loved the most - and still love the most about teaching - is that you can connect with an individual or a group, and see that individual or group exceed their limits.
I think you're not a human being unless you have doubts and fears.
Therefore, as a player, as a coach, even though we might have lost in a season or not won a championship, it was like a self-fulfilling prophecy that I'm going to win some time. I've never felt myself a loser.
I always won in my imagination. I always hit the game-winning shot, or I hit the free throw. Or if I missed, there was a lane violation, and I was given another one.
That's what I do now: I lead and I teach. If we win basketball games from doing that, then that's great, but I lead and teach. Those are the two things I concentrate on.
On Making Decisions
The truth is that many people set rules to keep from making decisions.
On Relationships
I have a rule on my team: when we talk to one another, we look each other right in the eye, because I think it's tough to lie to somebody. You give respect to somebody.
To me, teamwork is the beauty of our sport, where you have five acting as one. You become selfless.
The person who has inspired me my whole life is my Mom, because she taught me commitment. She sacrificed.
Throughout my life, my mom has been the person that I've always looked up to.
I had a really bad temper, when I was growing up. Sport helped me channel that temper into more positive acts.
The other thing I knew I had was a high level of competitiveness.
~ Mike Krzyzewski, American Basketball Coach, Duke University
www.brainyquote.com
I'm fortunate now that I coach at Duke University and we've won a lot. I have some kids who haven't failed that much. But when they get to college, they're going to fail some time. That's a thing that I can help them the most with.
In high school, in sport, I had a coach who told me I was much better than I thought I was, and would make me do more in a positive sense. He was the first person who taught me not to be afraid of failure.
Each group and each youngster is different. As a leader or coach, you get to know what they need.
I think some parents now look at a youngster failing as the final thing. It's a process, and failure is part of the process. I would like it if the teacher and the parents would connect more. I think that used to be, but we're losing a little bit of that right now.
There are kids don't want to do something because they're afraid of looking stupid to their peers. There comes a time when they start protecting themselves, instead of extending. I want to make sure that they're always trying to extend themselves.
Imagination has a great deal to do with winning.
The thing I loved the most - and still love the most about teaching - is that you can connect with an individual or a group, and see that individual or group exceed their limits.
I think you're not a human being unless you have doubts and fears.
Therefore, as a player, as a coach, even though we might have lost in a season or not won a championship, it was like a self-fulfilling prophecy that I'm going to win some time. I've never felt myself a loser.
I always won in my imagination. I always hit the game-winning shot, or I hit the free throw. Or if I missed, there was a lane violation, and I was given another one.
That's what I do now: I lead and I teach. If we win basketball games from doing that, then that's great, but I lead and teach. Those are the two things I concentrate on.
On Making Decisions
The truth is that many people set rules to keep from making decisions.
On Relationships
I have a rule on my team: when we talk to one another, we look each other right in the eye, because I think it's tough to lie to somebody. You give respect to somebody.
To me, teamwork is the beauty of our sport, where you have five acting as one. You become selfless.
The person who has inspired me my whole life is my Mom, because she taught me commitment. She sacrificed.
Throughout my life, my mom has been the person that I've always looked up to.
I had a really bad temper, when I was growing up. Sport helped me channel that temper into more positive acts.
The other thing I knew I had was a high level of competitiveness.
~ Mike Krzyzewski, American Basketball Coach, Duke University
www.brainyquote.com
on work, health and relationships
On Work
Dynasty was the opportunity to take charge of my career rather than waiting around like a library book waiting to be loaned out.
I do it because I love acting, I love working, and whether it's radio, television, films, theater, I don't care as long as I can get out there and do it.
I loathe conflict, and I loathe not getting along well with people, so I always try very hard to be on the best terms with the people I work with.
If life throws you a lemon - make lemonade.
Show me a person who has never made a mistake and I'll show you somebody who has never achieved much.
I think it has something to do with being British. We don't take ourselves as seriously as some other countries do. I think a lot of people take themselves far too seriously; I find that a very tedious attitude.
The secret of having a personal life is not answering too many questions about it.
Age is just a number. It's totally irrelevant unless, of course, you happen to be a bottle of wine.
On Health
The problem with beauty is that it's like being born rich and getting poorer.
And I think of that again as I've written in several of my beauty books, a lot of health comes from the proper eating habits, which are something that - you know, I come from a generation that wasn't - didn't have a lot of food.
I mean, I'm a war baby, and we had rationing, and we didn't have sugar and sweets, which is very good for you in actual fact. Because when we had a piece of fruit, we'd gulp it down. It was just great.
Yes, I remember the bombings. Yes, I remember, because - yes, I remember being in air raid shelters. Even though I was evacuated because I was very young, I remember being in air raid shelters and the tremendous feeling of compatibility with everybody.
On Relationships
I've never yet met a man who could look after me. I don't need a husband. What I need is a wife.
No, that's what I think God does to you. He gives you some great gig in which you make a whole heap of money, and you're just on top of the world and on every magazine cover, but your personal life is miserable. And for most of that time, I have to say, my personal life was pretty miserable.
Loneliness is the universal problem of rich people.
The easiest way to convince my kids that they don't really need something is to get it for them.
~ Joan Collins, British actress
Jonathan Edwards' dying words to his wife
When Jonathan Edwards was dying and his wife was far away in Stockbridge and he was down in Princeton, in the 1750's, he dictated a letter to his wife through his daughter Lucy:
quoted in a sermon by Rev. Dr. Tim Russell
Redeemer Presbyterian Church
Seeking to Renew New York City Socially, Spiritually & Culturally
"Give my kindest love to my dear wife and tell her that the uncommon union which has so long subsisted between us has been of such a nature as I trust is spiritual and therefore will continue forever."
quoted in a sermon by Rev. Dr. Tim Russell
Redeemer Presbyterian Church
Seeking to Renew New York City Socially, Spiritually & Culturally
Turning Around Staff Morale
When Elliot L. Shelkrot took over as president and director of the Free Library of Philadelphia, he faced crumbling buildings, leaky roofs, and decreased city funding.
He recalls:
"Shelkrot has since weathered the city's fiscal meltdown and several annual budget crises--and has quietly stabilized library operations, in the eyes of many."
"Phila. library's president resigns"
The Philadelphia Inquirer, p. 1
Monday April 23, 2007
He recalls:
The biggest thing was to turn around the morale of the staff, and I might say even of the board [of library trustees]. To say: "There are things we can do. Let's get on with thinking about things we can do rather than woe is me, how bad things are."
"Shelkrot has since weathered the city's fiscal meltdown and several annual budget crises--and has quietly stabilized library operations, in the eyes of many."
"Phila. library's president resigns"
The Philadelphia Inquirer, p. 1
Monday April 23, 2007
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Frigid or Solid
CALVIN AS BIBLICAL COMMENTATOR
THE LIBRARY OF CHRISTIAN CLASSICS Volume XXIII
Newly translated and edited by JOSEPH HAROUTUNIAN, Ph.D., D.D.
Cyrus H. McCormick Professor of Systematic Theology, McCormick Theological Seminary, Chicago, Illinois
In collaboration with LOUISE PETTIBONE SMITH, A.M., Ph.D. Professor of Biblical History, Emeritus, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts
PHILADELPHIA THE WESTMINSTER PRESS
First published MCMLVIII
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/calcom.txt
Characteristically, his worst term of condemnation for any interpretation is "frigid," by which he means not so much "remote" or "lifeless" as lacking in the power to give living faith to the church; on the other hand, his favorite word of praise is "solid," a sound and sure foundation for the church's faith.from the General Introduction, "CALVIN AS BIBLICAL COMMENTATOR"
THE LIBRARY OF CHRISTIAN CLASSICS Volume XXIII
Newly translated and edited by JOSEPH HAROUTUNIAN, Ph.D., D.D.
Cyrus H. McCormick Professor of Systematic Theology, McCormick Theological Seminary, Chicago, Illinois
In collaboration with LOUISE PETTIBONE SMITH, A.M., Ph.D. Professor of Biblical History, Emeritus, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts
PHILADELPHIA THE WESTMINSTER PRESS
First published MCMLVIII
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/calcom.txt
Atheist Beliefs
"Intelligent people are good at rationalizing how they arrived at their beliefs through unintelligent means."
~ Michael Shermer, atheist, editor of Skeptic Magazine
~ Michael Shermer, atheist, editor of Skeptic Magazine
Words of Anger
There was a little boy with a bad temper. His father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he lost his temper, to hammer a nail in the back fence.
The first day the boy had driven 37 nails into the fence. Then it gradually dwindled down. He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to drive those nails into the fence.
Finally the day came when the boy didn't lose his temper at all. He told his father about it and the father suggested that the boy now pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper.
The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone.
The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence.
"You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence. The fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can put a knife in a man and draw it out, it won't matter how many times you say I'm sorry, the wound is still there. A verbal wound is as bad as a physical one."
~ Author Unknown
The first day the boy had driven 37 nails into the fence. Then it gradually dwindled down. He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to drive those nails into the fence.
Finally the day came when the boy didn't lose his temper at all. He told his father about it and the father suggested that the boy now pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper.
The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone.
The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence.
"You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence. The fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can put a knife in a man and draw it out, it won't matter how many times you say I'm sorry, the wound is still there. A verbal wound is as bad as a physical one."
~ Author Unknown
The Seed
An emperor in the Far East was growing old and knew it was time to choose his successor. Instead of choosing one of his assistants or his children, he decided to do something different. He called young people in the kingdom together one day.
He said, "It is time for me to step down and choose the next emperor. I have decided to choose one of you."
The children were shocked, but the emperor continued.
"I am going to give each one of you a seed today - one very special seed. I want you to plant the seed, water it, and come back here one year from today with what you have grown from this one seed. I will then judge the plants that you bring, and the one I choose will be the next emperor."
One boy, named Ling, was there that day and he, like the others, received a seed. He went home and excitedly, told his mother the story. She helped him get a pot and planting soil, and he planted the seed and watered it, carefully. Everyday, he would water it and watch to see if it had grown.
After about three weeks, some of the other youths began to talk about their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow. Ling kept checking his seed, but nothing ever grew. Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks went by, still nothing. By now, others were talking about their plants, but Ling didn't have a plant and he felt like a failure.
Six months went by--still nothing in Ling's pot. He just knew he had killed his seed. Everyone else had trees and tall plants, but he had nothing. Ling didn't say anything to his friends, however. He just kept waiting for his seed to grow.
A year finally went by and all the youths of the kingdom brought their plants to the emperor for inspection. Ling told his mother that he wasn't going to take an empty pot. But his mother asked him to be honest about what happened. Ling felt sick at his stomach, but he knew his mother was right.
He took his empty pot to the palace. When Ling arrived, he was amazed at the variety of plants grown by the other youths. They were beautiful--in all shapes and sizes. Ling put his empty pot on the floor and many of the other children laughed at him. A few felt sorry for him and just said, "Hey, nice try."
When the emperor arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted the young people. Ling just tried to hide in the back.
"My, what great plants, trees, and flowers you have grown," said the emperor. "Today one of you will be appointed the next emperor!"
All of a sudden, the emperor spotted Ling at the back of the room with his empty pot. He ordered his guards to bring him to the front.
Ling was terrified. He thought, "The emperor knows I'm a failure! Maybe he will have me killed!"
When Ling got to the front, the Emperor asked his name. "My name is Ling," he replied.
All the kids were laughing and making fun of him.
The emperor asked everyone to quiet down. He looked at Ling, and then announced to the crowd, "Behold your new emperor! His name is Ling!"
Ling couldn't believe it. Ling couldn't even grow his seed. How could he be the new emperor?
Then the emperor said, "One year ago today, I gave everyone here a seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it, and bring it back to me today. But I gave you all boiled seeds that would not grow. All of you, except Ling, have brought me trees and plants and flowers.
When you found that the seed would not grow, you substituted another seed for the one I gave you. Ling was the only one with the courage and honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in it. Therefore, he is the one who will be the new emperor!"
If you plant honesty, you will reap trust.
If you plant goodness, you will reap friends.
If you plant humility, you will reap greatness.
If you plant perseverance, you will reap victory.
If you plant consideration, you will reap harmony.
If you plant hard work, you will reap success.
If you plant forgiveness, you will reap reconciliation.
If you plant faith, you will reap miracles.
So be careful what you plant, now; it will determine what you will reap tomorrow. The seeds you now scatter will make life worse or better for you or for the ones who will come after you. Someday you will enjoy the fruits or you will pay for the choices you make.
~ Author Unknown
He said, "It is time for me to step down and choose the next emperor. I have decided to choose one of you."
The children were shocked, but the emperor continued.
"I am going to give each one of you a seed today - one very special seed. I want you to plant the seed, water it, and come back here one year from today with what you have grown from this one seed. I will then judge the plants that you bring, and the one I choose will be the next emperor."
One boy, named Ling, was there that day and he, like the others, received a seed. He went home and excitedly, told his mother the story. She helped him get a pot and planting soil, and he planted the seed and watered it, carefully. Everyday, he would water it and watch to see if it had grown.
After about three weeks, some of the other youths began to talk about their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow. Ling kept checking his seed, but nothing ever grew. Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks went by, still nothing. By now, others were talking about their plants, but Ling didn't have a plant and he felt like a failure.
Six months went by--still nothing in Ling's pot. He just knew he had killed his seed. Everyone else had trees and tall plants, but he had nothing. Ling didn't say anything to his friends, however. He just kept waiting for his seed to grow.
A year finally went by and all the youths of the kingdom brought their plants to the emperor for inspection. Ling told his mother that he wasn't going to take an empty pot. But his mother asked him to be honest about what happened. Ling felt sick at his stomach, but he knew his mother was right.
He took his empty pot to the palace. When Ling arrived, he was amazed at the variety of plants grown by the other youths. They were beautiful--in all shapes and sizes. Ling put his empty pot on the floor and many of the other children laughed at him. A few felt sorry for him and just said, "Hey, nice try."
When the emperor arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted the young people. Ling just tried to hide in the back.
"My, what great plants, trees, and flowers you have grown," said the emperor. "Today one of you will be appointed the next emperor!"
All of a sudden, the emperor spotted Ling at the back of the room with his empty pot. He ordered his guards to bring him to the front.
Ling was terrified. He thought, "The emperor knows I'm a failure! Maybe he will have me killed!"
When Ling got to the front, the Emperor asked his name. "My name is Ling," he replied.
All the kids were laughing and making fun of him.
The emperor asked everyone to quiet down. He looked at Ling, and then announced to the crowd, "Behold your new emperor! His name is Ling!"
Ling couldn't believe it. Ling couldn't even grow his seed. How could he be the new emperor?
Then the emperor said, "One year ago today, I gave everyone here a seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it, and bring it back to me today. But I gave you all boiled seeds that would not grow. All of you, except Ling, have brought me trees and plants and flowers.
When you found that the seed would not grow, you substituted another seed for the one I gave you. Ling was the only one with the courage and honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in it. Therefore, he is the one who will be the new emperor!"
If you plant honesty, you will reap trust.
If you plant goodness, you will reap friends.
If you plant humility, you will reap greatness.
If you plant perseverance, you will reap victory.
If you plant consideration, you will reap harmony.
If you plant hard work, you will reap success.
If you plant forgiveness, you will reap reconciliation.
If you plant faith, you will reap miracles.
So be careful what you plant, now; it will determine what you will reap tomorrow. The seeds you now scatter will make life worse or better for you or for the ones who will come after you. Someday you will enjoy the fruits or you will pay for the choices you make.
~ Author Unknown
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