Ray Made It!

On New Year's Day, Ray nearly died.

He fell to the ground near his car in a church parking lot. Fortunately, the pastor of the church and a funeral director (of all people quickly stepped in to breath life back into him- literally. One gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and the other pumped his chest. The pair kept Ray alive until paramedics arrived. Ray had to be shocked three times with a defibrillator to get his heart beating again. But it’s still going and Ray has recovered from that near-death experience.

Like Ray, many people in our community are in trouble right outside of our doors. They are hurting emotionally and spiritually. Let’s work together to reach them, so they know there is hope and there is life. We have a choice before us right now as to whether we’ll get involved or sit on the sidelines during 2009.

Will we be the like the religious men, who passed by the beaten man on the other side of the road, trying to avoid the whole situation? Or will we follow the lead of the Good Samaritan and become the instrument of God in someone’s life?

It’s not about large, extravagant gestures. Just average people, making a difference in small ways as opportunities present themselves.

Stephen Goforth

Bringing Attitude

A healthy attitude is contagious but don't wait to catch it from others. Be a carrier.

Building the World She Wants

How wrong it is for a woman to expect the man to build the world she wants, rather than to create it herself.
Anais Nin

It is True or False?

One of the great difficulties is to keep before the audience’s mind the question of Truth. They always think you you are recommending Christianity not because it is true but because it is good. And in the discussion they will at every moment try to escape from the issue “True – or False” into stuff about a good society, or morals, or the incomes of Bishops, or the Spanish Inquisition, or France, or Poland – or anything whatever. You have to keep forcing them back, and again back, to the real point. Only thus will you be able to undermine their belief that a certain amount of ‘religion’ is desirable but one mustn’t carry it too far. One must keep on pointing out that Christianity is a statement which, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The one thing it cannot be is moderately important.

CS Lewis
God in the Dock

Mistakes and Discoveries

He who never made a mistake never made a discovery.
Samuel Smiles

Darkness

Darkness was cheap and Scrooge liked it.
Charles Dickens

Happiness Depends..

Happiness does not depend on outward things, but on the way we see them.
Leo Tolstoy

Spending your Life

The greatest use of life is to spend it for something that will outlast it.
William James

Mistakes and Fear

The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.
Elbert Hubbard

The great thing in this world is not so much where we are, but in what direction we are moving.
Oliver Wendell Holmes

Failure is Success

Failure is success if we learn from it.
Malcolm Forbes

Getting Older

The great thing about getting older is that you don't lose all the other ages you've been. Madeleine L'Engle

The Better Prayer

The fewer words the better prayer.

Martin Luther

The True Atheists

Great hypocrites are the true atheists.
Francis Bacon

Restart

Failure is the opportunity to begin again more intelligently.
Henry Ford

Making Plans

A goal without a plan is just a wish.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery

The Song

The forest would be quite silent if only the most beautiful birds sang.

Fear of Laughter

God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.

The Cost

Failure is the tuition you pay for success.

Walter Brunell

To Share

God does not create in order to acquire something but in order to share Himself.