A set of rules

We might think that God wanted simple obedience to a set of rules: whereas he really wants people of a particular sort – CS Lewis

We remember

We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way. – Victor Frankl

Getting closer to the truth

We have a natural tendency to look for instances that confirm our story and our vision of the world. We can get closer to the truth by negative instances, not by verification. – Nissim Taleb

Well Done

Well done. is better than well said. -Benjamin Franklin

Becoming Ourselves

We did not change as we grew older; we just became more clearly ourselves. – Lynn Hall

He Gave

“For God so loved the world, that he gave..“ We are never more like him than when we do the same.

God’s Christmas tree

God’s Christmas tree has no colored lights. No ornaments. No trinkets. It is not even pretty to look at. But God has his Christmas tree. It is the cross of Christ.

Luke Two: Jesus’ Doings

It happened in those days that a proclamation went out from President Augustus that every citizen must register. This was the first registration while Quirinus was Secretary of War. So everybody went to register, each going to his own hometown. Joseph too went up from south Georgia from the city of Valdosta, to his home in north Georgia, a place named Gainesville, to register with his bride Mary, who by now was heavily pregnant.

While they were there, her time came, and she gave birth to her first boy. She wrapped him in a blanket and laid him in an apple box. (There was no room for them at the hospital.)

Now there were some farmers in that section who were up late at night tending their baby chicks. And a messenger from the Lord appeared to them, and evidence of the Lord was shining all about them. It nearly scared the life out of them. And the messenger said to them, “Don’t be afraid; for listen, I’m bringing you good news of a great joy in which all people will share. Today your deliverer was born in the city of David’s family. He is the Leader. He is the Lord, And here’s a clue for you: you will find the baby wrapped in a blanket and lying in an apple box.”

And all of a sudden there was with the messenger a crowd of angels singing God’s praises and saying. “Glory in the highest to God, And on Earth, peace to mankind, The object of his favor.”

When the messengers went away from them into the sky, the farmers said to one another, “Let’s go to Gainesville and see how all this the Lord has showed us has turned out.”

So they went just as fast as they could, and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in an apple box. Seeing this, they related the story of what had been told them about this little fellow. The people were simply amazed as they listened to what the farmers told them. And Mary clung to all these words, turning them over and over in her memories. The farmers went back home, giving God the credit and singing his praises for all they had seen and heard, exactly as it had been described to them.

Clarence Jordan
Cotton Patch Gospel

Solving Problems

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them. - Albert Einstein

What we love

We are shaped and fashioned by what we love - Johann Von Goethe

Retreat

We are not retreating--we are advancing in another direction. - General Douglas MacArthur

the Friend of Sinners

Only four women are mentioned in Jesus’ Genealogy in Matthew.

First, there’s Tamar. Harlotry and incest. That’s what we know of Tamar. Read Genesis 38 if you want the details.

The second woman is Rahab. What two words come to mind when you hear her name? For most people who grew up in Sunday School it is Rahab the.. harlot. She was a pagan – and a professional prostitute, according to Joshua chapter two.

The third women is mentioned in verse five. Ruth. A nice lady. But Ruth was a Moabite. She was a Gentile, an outcast, a descendant of incest. In Deut. 23:3, God curses the whole nation of Moabites. But here, God picks up a cursed lady, born of an incestuous relationship and uses her to help bring forth the Messiah.

Now, there’s one more woman mentioned in verse six of Matthew one: "Uriah's wife.” Who was Uriah’s wife? Bathsheba. What do we know about her? She was an adulterous.

And we could go on. But I think we’ve established the point.

What is the message here? Grace. This genealogy was a knockout punch to the Jewish legalist who was so caught up into purity of lineage and the line of descendents and stuff. Matthew introduces their glorious Messiah.. as descending from two harlots, one born out of incest and an adulterous. And they are the only four ladies mentioned in the genealogy other than Mary.

Let it be known that Jesus Christ is the friend of sinners.

He came crashing through the barriers that said, “You have to be born spiritual out of the ‘right kind’ of people.” And today, he comes crashing through barriers we’ve erected too. The barriers that place God in a nice comfortable corner where you can keep an eye on him. He breaks down those excuses that say, “God, you can’t use me. You can’t love me. I’m a sinner.

God built a monument to grace on that genealogy. That’s why you shouldn’t shy away from admitting your past for what it was. It can be a monument to God’s grace in our lives. That’s when God can use us the most. When we realize who we are, where we come from and how much our lives are dependent on God grace.. on receiving it and giving it to others.

If we hide from our past and pretend it didn’t happen, it’s almost as if we are trying to pretend we are people we are not. By admitting who we are, acknowledging how God completely changes our past, He is able to bring us further than he could otherwise and use us more.. just like those people in the genealogy.

Bottom line: You stack up a row of harlots and liars and murderers and cheaters and what do you have? You have Jesus. That’s the way God works.

Stephen Goforth

The way to love

The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost. - G. K. Chesterton

Self-proctology

The unexamined life is not worth living. – Socrates

Admiration and awe

Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the more often and steadily reflection is occupied with them: the starry heaven above me and the moral law within me. Neither of them need I seek and merely suspect as if shrouded in obscurity or rapture beyond my own horizon; I see them before me and connect them immediately with my existence. – Immanuel Kant

Where he stands

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. – Martin Luther King

To Love

To love someone means to see him as God intended him. - Feodor Dostoevsky

The contours of our heart

The type of human being we prefer reveals the contours of our heart. - Ortega T Gassett

Right, right, right

Two wrongs don't make a right, but three rights make a left.

a Man of Value

Try not to become a man of success but rather try to become a man of value. - Albert Einstein

Our Finist Moments

The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.

M. Scott Peck

Here's the Truth

The truth is that life is delicious, horrible, charming sweet, bitter…and that is everything. - Anatole France

Truth and Love

Truth and love are two of the most powerful things in the world; and when they both go together they cannot be easily withstood. - Ralph Cudworth

A man's true measure

The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good. - Samuel Johnson

A True Friend

A true friend stabs you in the front. -Oscar Wilde

Praise and Criticism

The trouble with most of us is that we would rather be ruined by praise rather than saved by criticism.

Today!

Today: one which I’ve never lived before and one which I will never get to live again. The surprise of unwrapping it holds wonder and the privilege of excitement. – Tim Hansel

Persisting

To err is human, to repent divine; to persist devilish. – Ben Franklin

Be nothing

To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. – Elbert Hubbard

New starts

Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending. - Carl Bard

Demading Love

Though I want and need love, I won’t demand it. -Les Carter

Thinking and Acting

Think like a man of action, and act like a man of thought. – Henri Bergson

Why things go wrong

Things don't go wrong and break your heart so you can become bitter and give up. They happen to break you down and build you up so you can be all that you were intended to be. – Charles T. Jones

The Beginning

There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning. – Louis L’Amour

When life buries you

There were two groups... those who didn't die and those who came back to life.
Ester Perel

Discontent

There are two brands of discontent: the brand that merely fosters greed and snarling and back-biting, and the brand that inspires greater and greater effort to reach the desired goal. What is your brand? - BC Forbes

Standing

There are an infinity of angles at which one falls. Only one at which one stands. - GK Chesterton

The Best Teachers

The best teachers... sometimes discard or place less emphasis on traditional goals in favor of the capacity to comprehend, to use evidence to draw conclusions, to raise important questions, and to understand one’s thinking. In most disciplines, that means they emphasize comprehension, reasoning, and brilliant insights over memory, order punctuality, or the spick-and-span.

Spelling, the size of margins or fonts, and the style of footnotes and bibliographies are trivial in comparison to the power to think on paper; conceptual understanding of chemistry is more important than remembering individual details; the capacity to think about one’s thinking - to ponder metacognitively – and to correct it in progress is far more worthy than remembering any name, date, or number.

The ability to understand the principles and concepts in thinking critically through a problem outranks any capacity to reach the correct answer on any particular question. These teachers want their students to learn to use a wide range of information, ideas, and concepts logically and consistently to draw meaningful conclusions. They help their students achieve those levels by providing meaningful directions and exemplary feedback that quietly yet forcefully couple lofty ideals with firm confidence in what students can do – without making any judgments of their worth as human beings. Most significant, they help students shift their focus from making the grade to thinking about personal goals of development.

Ken Bain
What the Best College Teachers Do

The growth opportunities

Take special (and more) time to carefully analyze the unexpected results (successes and failures); that's where the growth opportunities lie.

Disarming anger and lust

The surest means of disarming an anger or a lust (is) to turn your attention from the girl or the insult and start examining the passion itself. – CS Lewis

Success comes

Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.
Henry David Thoreau

Measuring Success

Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome. – Booker T. Washington

Success and Failure

Success is never final;
Failure is never fatal;
It is courage that counts.

Winston Churchill

Letting Winter Pass

Sometimes it is best to lie low, to do nothing but let the winter pass. In such moments, you can collect your self and strengthen your identity.

Someone planted

Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.   Warren Buffett

Pigeon and Statues

Some days you’re the pigeon, some days you’re the statue.

Your Future

Show me your friends and I’ll show you your future.

Social Sins

The seven social sins: politics without principles, wealth without work, pleasure without conscience, knowledge without character, commerce without morality, science without humanity, and worship without sacrifice.

Mahatma Gandhi

Reframing

Reframe the other side’s accusations as opportunities to talk about problems.

The limits of Reason

Reason is not omni-competent.

Defining Success

Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom. - George S. Patton

New eyes

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. Marcel Proust

Rather than..

Rather than talking about your self-imposed limitations, talk about your openness to change and adaptability.

Small Opportunities

Small opportunities are often the beginning of great enterprises.
Demostenes

Living Coherently

Philosophy is important because it’s unavoidable if you want to live a coherent life. -Rebecca Goldstein

A pessimist, a philosopher, and an optimist

A pessimist sees only the dark side of the clouds, and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides, and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all--he's walking on them.

Leonard Louis Levinson

Humility

A poor self-image is not to be equated with humility or the mark of a servant.
Charles Swindoll

Pessimists and Optimists

A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties. - Harry Truman

Listening

The person who’s listening is usually the one worth listening to.

Niceness

A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person.
Dave Barry

Out or In

People who are not busy exploring the world are busy building their egos.
Arvinder Kang

A daily habit

People often say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing--that's why we recommend it daily. - Zig Ziglar

The Path

The path to holiness lies through questioning everything. – M. Scott Peck

Silence

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr

Yesterday's Tools

Our Age of Anxiety is, in great part, the result of trying to do today's jobs with yesterday's tools. - Marshall McLuhan

The hardest teacher

Life is the hardest teacher, it gives the test first and the lesson afterward.

Optimists are...

Optimists are nostalgic about the future.

An Optimist

An optimist is the human personification of spring. Susan J. Bissonette

The True Thing

Only the hand that erases can write the true thing. Meister Eckhart

Getting Acquainted

One of the greatest moments in anybody’s life happens every time he no longer tries to hide from himself but decides to get acquainted with who he really is.

Joys of life

One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others. – Archibald Rutledge

Scarcity

One good husband is worth two good wives; for the scarcer things are, the more they're valued. - Ben Franklin.

Easy deceit

Nothing is easier than self-deceit. For what each man wishes, that he also believes to be true. – Demosthenes

Feeling Inferior

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt

Own your suffering

Neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering. - Carl Jung

Moving forward

Never confuse motion with action. - Ernest Hemingway

Building a Wall

Never build a wall until you know what you're walling in and what you're walling out.

Frightful things

Obstacles are those frightful things we see when we take our eyes off our goal. - Henry Ford

My most cherished possession

My most cherished possession I wish I could leave you is my faith in Jesus Christ, for with him and nothing else you can be happy but without him and with all else you'll never be happy. - Patrick Henry

Perfect friendship

The mark of perfect friendship is not that help will be given when the pinch comes (of course it will) but that having been given, it makes no difference at all.

CS Lewis

Stretching

My own happiest times have not been when all was secure but rather when I was stretching to learn to fulfill a task which called for more than I have to give – and I was trying to give it.

My optimism

My optimism wears heavy boots and is loud. – Henry Rollins

Where dogmatists come from

Most people tend to overcompensate.. people who are riddled with doubts tend to be dogmatists who are never wrong – John Powell

Two Things

My memory is nearly gone, but I remember two things, that I am a great sinner, and that Christ is a great Saviour. - John Newton, author of “Amazing grace”

Additions

Most additions are a result of lack of connectedness and shame.
Paul Myer

Second Winds

Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they've got a second.

Miracles

Miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters too large for some of us to see.
CS Lewis

The Habit of Excellence

Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. - Aristotle

Enmity

Men need no other provocation to enmity than that they find themselves excelled.

Reaction

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances; if there is any reaction, both are transformed.
Carl Jung

Don't wait

Many people think that if they were only in some other place, or had some other job, they would be happy. Well, that is doubtful. So get as much happiness out of what you are doing as you can and don't put off being happy until some future date.

Dale Carnegie

The Test

Nearly all men can stand adversity. but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. - Abraham Lincoln

You can't do that

Many important things are done by folks who simply are too dumb to know they can’t be done.

the necessity of enemies

A man with no enemies is a man with no character. Paul Newman

It cannot be done!

The man who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the man doing it. - Chinese Proverb

Problems

The man who has no problems to solve is out of the game.
Elbert Hubbard

Becoming Wiser

A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than yesterday. - Jonathan Swift

Silence

A man is known by the silence he keeps. - Oliver Herford

wishing and believing

A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true. - Demosthenes

Choosing your enemies

A man can't be too careful in the choice of his enemies. - Oscar Wilde

The simple and the hard

Make simple things easy, and hard things possible.

The Main Thing

The main thing is life is not to be afraid to be human – Pablo Casals

Attractions

Make good more attractive than evil.

Direction

Love is the compass of life.

the fire of love

Love is friendship set on fire

verbally speaking

Love is a verb.

What love does

Love, after all, has far more to do with seeing someone clearly and accepting them fully for who they actually are than it does with feeling attracted to or liking them.

William Bridges

Happiness

A lot of happiness is overlooked because it doesn’t cost anything.

Suffering

Jesus did not come to explain away suffering or remove it. He came to fill it with his Presence. – Paul Claudel

Testing

We’re in perpetual beta.

Backwards and forwards

Life must be lived forwards, however, it can only be understood backwards. – Soren Kierkegaard

Welcome to the fairy tale

Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale. - Hans Christian Andersen

the Climb

Life is in the climb. - Toby Mckeehan

It's Friday but Sunday's a Comin'

It was Friday. It was Friday and my Jesus was dead on the tree. But that was Friday and Sunday's a comin'.

It was Friday and Mary was crying her eyes out. The disciples were running in every direction, like sheep without a shepherd. But that was Friday and Sunday's a comin'.

Friday. They're saying, `As things have been so shall they be. You can't change anything in this world; you can't change anything. But those cynics don't know that it was only Friday. Sunday's comin'.

Friday, them forces that oppress the poor and keep people down, them forces that destroy people, the forces in control, them forces that are gonna rule, they don’t know it’s only Friday. Sunday’s a comin’.

Friday, people are saying darkness is gonna rule the world. Sadness is gonna be everywhere. But they don't know it's only Friday. Sunday's comin'.

It was Friday and on Friday Pilate thought he had washed his hands of a lot of trouble. The Pharisees were struttin' around, laughing and poking each other in the ribs. They thought they were back in charge of things. But they didn't know it was only Friday! Sunday's comin'!

This is the good news. Even though we know this world is rotten, we know it's only Friday...

The full sermon from Tony Campolo

Gethsemane

Looking through the shadowy foliage of Gethsemane, we don't see the classic portrait of Christ, rendered by the artist. We don't see Him in a snow-white robe kneeling beside a big rock, hands peacefully folded, with a look of serenity in His face as a spotlight from heaven illuminates His golden-brown hair.

Instead, we see a man flat on his face, fists pounding the hard earth in agony. We see a fact stained with tears and dirt, hair matted with sweat, facial muscles contorted in pain like the gnarled, twisted olive trees looking on. God was never more human than at this hour.

Have you been in the dark garden of Gethsemane? Betrayed by a friend? Deserted by those around you? Felt abandoned? Lonely?

The next time you think no one cares, pay a visit to Gethsemane and see the man of sorrows. Because seeing God like this does wonders for your suffering.

Charles Swindoll
For Those Who Hurt

Love consists in

Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Let us not despair

Let us not cease to do the utmost, that we may incessantly go forward in the way of the Lord; and let us not despair of the smallness of our accomplishments. -John Calvin

Knowledge and Power

Knowledge isn’t power until it it applied. – Dale Carnegie

Your Darkness

Knowing your darkness is the best method for dealing with the darkness of other people.
Carl Jung

Eyes open

Keep your eyes open before marriage. half shut afterwards.
Benjamin Franklin

Your voice

Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn't mean you are wiser than when it reached only to the end of the bar.
Edward R. Murrow

The distance

Judge a man by the distance he has traveled.

Amateurs and Pros

A lone amateur built the Ark. A large group of professionals built the Titanic.

Trouble and Reading

I've never known any trouble that an hour's reading didn't assuage.
Charles De Secondat

Becoming

It's not about “being.” It’s about “becoming.”

Starting the day

It’s a much happier way to live your life if you wake up in the morning and you think, “What I am going to build that’s great?” not if you wake up saying, “Who are my enemies today, who do I have to beat?"

Phil Libin

Nothing to Hold

It’s Linus when his blanket is in the dryer. There’s nothing to hold on to.
Marilyn Ferguson

Gratitude

It's a sign of mediocrity when you demonstrate gratitude with moderation. -Roberto Benigni

The reality

It is mentally ill to weep over fakery on the screen and not cry over the reality on the street.

Giving

It is not how much we give, but how much love we put into giving.
Mother Teresa

What you might have been

It is never too late to be what you might have been. - George Eliot

Giving advice

It is easy when we are in prosperity to give advice to the afflicted.
Aeschylus

When we are lost

It is an old and ironic habit of human beings to run faster when we have lost our way; and we grasp more fiercely at research, statistics, and technical aids in sex when we have lost the values and meanings of love.

Rollo May

Matters of style and priniciple

In matters of style. swim with the current; In matters of principle. stand like a rock. - Thomas Jefferson

The important thing

The important thing is not to stop questioning. - Albert Einstein

How to make someone covet a thing

In order to make a man covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. - Mark Twian.

The requirements of love

If we want the advantages of love, then we must be willing to take the risks of love. And that requires vulnerability. -Charles Swindoll

False Memories

The opinion of other people can alter our personal memories without our realizing it, according to research by neuroscientists. Writing in the journal Science, Washington University scientists tell about an experiment related to memory conformity. Using an eyewitness style documentary, they found false feedback from others affected the responses of 7 out of 10 people to questions about what they remembered from the film. Even more remarkable is the fact that 4 out of 7 people were not simply conforming to the group, but actually reporting what they now believed to be true.

A team of psychologists showed the quick deterioration of memories by interviewing people about how they first learned about the 9/11 attacks just a few days after the attacks took place. When the researchers came back after one year, more than a third of the details recalled by study participants had changed. In three years time, nearly half of the details were different.

Jonah Lehrer offers this conclusion about these experiments in Wired Magazine:

This research helps explain why a shared narrative can often lead to totally unreliable individual memories. We are so eager to conform to the collective, to fit our little lives into the arc of history, that we end up misleading ourselves.

Humans are storytelling machines. We don’t passively perceive the world – we tell stories about it, translating the helter-skelter of events into tidy narratives. This is often a helpful habit, helping us make sense of mistakes, consider counterfactuals and extract a sense of meaning from the randomness of life. But our love of stories comes with a serious side-effect: like all good narrators, we tend to forsake the facts when they interfere with the plot. We’re so addicted to the anecdote that we let the truth slip away until, eventually, those stories we tell again and again become exercises in pure fiction.

One step at a time

If you're running a 26-mile marathon, remember that every mile is run one step at a time. If you are writing a book, do it one page at a time. -Charles Swindoll

Who is a leader?

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader. – John Quincy Adams

Seeking and Doubt

If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things. -Rene Descartes

Barking Dogs

If you stop every time a dog barks, your road will never end.
Arabian Proverb

In a hole

If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging. – Will Rodgers

Celebrating right

If we celebrate what is right in our lives, we gain the perspective to deal with some of the things that are wrong in our lives.

Accepting my life

If there is a sin against life, it consists perhaps not so much in despairing of life as in hoping for another life and in eluding the implacable grandeur of this life. -Albert Camus

An outlook

I have treated many hundreds of patients. Among [those] in the second half of life--that is to say over 35--there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life.
Carl Jung

Silence

I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.  -Xenocrates

Attitude

Unfolding

Becoming Someone

How many cares one loses when one decides not to be someTHING, but to be someONE. Coco Chanel

Time to Mourn

He that lacks time to mourn, lacks time to mend. Shakespeare

Goals and Wishes

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

The most difficult of all our tasks

For one human being to love another: That is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation. -Rainer Maria Rilke

Better Prayers

The fewer words the better prayer - Martin Luther

It's coming your way

If everything is coming your way, you’re in the wrong lane.
Steven Wright

The goal of education

The chief object of education is not to learn things but to unlearn things.
GK Chesterton

Smile

Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.
Dr. Seuss