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Tuesday 31 August 2010

Never commit suicide; you may regret it later. - Churchill

All I ask is the chance to prove that money can’t make me happy - Spike Miligan

Death is not extinguishing the light; it is extinguishing the lamp because the dawn has come. - Rabindranath Tagore

... what is the relationship of the Church to the state? Here, again, is a
highly controversial subject. The Roman Catholic idea was that the Church was the state and controlled everything in the state and, as I reminded you at the beginning, the Church did that. At the opposite extreme is the so-called ‘Erastian’ view, an idea first propounded by a man called Erastus, who, I regret to say, was a medical man. I feel I must, on some occasion, give you thehistory of the unfortunate interventions of medical men in the doctrinal history of the Church! Erastus, unfortunately, was the man who started the pernicious doctrine that the Church is a branch of the state. Now that is, of course, the view in England with regard to the Anglican Church....
Erastianism, I repeat, is the belief that the Church is a kind of department of
state, and that it is ruled and governed by the state, so that the head of the
state appoints bishops and other dignitaries and functionaries in the Church....
There, then, are the Roman Catholic and the Erastian views of Church and state. But over against these, surely, we must agree, if we go carefully through the Scriptures, that there is a third view which can be described as ‘the two estates’. People who hold this view believe that God owns everything. God is the Lord of the universe, as well as the Lord of the Church. God has ordained the state: ‘The powers that be,’ says Paul, ‘are ordained of God’ (Rom. 13:1).
Magistrates and other types of rulers were not made by man but were ordained by God. Yes, but there is this other estate, the Church, and the two exist side by side. The one does not control the other. They are both separate and they are both under God.
That, I suggest to you, is the picture given by the New Testament. There is no indication at all of anything coming anywhere near a state Church. The first believers were independent of governments. They met under the lordship and in the presence of Christ. And outside was the great state to which they belonged. While still citizens of that state, they had entered into a realm which, in a sense, had nothing at all to do with the state. And throughout the centuries that has been the Reformed view of the relationship between the state and the Church.
In exactly the same way, we cannot find in the Scriptures such a thing as a
‘national’ Church, surely quite the reverse. Paul writes, ‘There is neither
Greek nor Jew … Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free’ (Col. 3:11). The Church is something different, consisting of those people who have been born again and have spiritual life, who are, as we have seen, members of the mystical body of Christ, and gather together in their local assembly—church— call it what you will, with Christ as the head.-Lloyd-Jones, D. M. (1998). The church and the last things (11–12). Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books.





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Monday 30 August 2010

The word of the Lord God of Hosts is not a plea or a request: it is a summons. ~ R. J. Rushdoony

There are two kings and two kingdoms in Scotland. There is King James, the head of the commonwealth, and there is Jesus Christ, the King of the Church, whose subject King James VI is, and of whose kingdom he is not a king nor a lord nor a head, but a member. Sir, those whom Christ hath called and commanded to watch over His church have power and authority from Him to govern His spiritual kingdom both jointly and severally, and which no Christian king should control or discharge, but fortify and assist, otherwise they are not faithful subjects of Christ and members of His church. Sir, when you were in your swaddling clothes, Christ Jesus reigned freely in this land in spite of all His enemies. His officers and ministers convened and assembled for the ruling and welfare of His church, which was ever for your welfare, defence, preservation, when those same enemies were seeking your destruction and cutting off. - Andrew Melville to King James VI of Scotland

12% of all paper used in the UK is used by the government - Douglas MacWilliams, heard on BBC Radio 4's Today 30. 10. 10.

The secret of success is honesty and fair dealing - fake that and you've got it made - Groucho Marx

That [the future] is not for us to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us. - Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings

Sunday 29 August 2010

The great cause of neglecting the Scriptures is not want of time, but want of heart, some idol taking the place of Christ. - Robert Chapman

We must remember that our experience of union with God, our
feeling of His presence, is altogether accidental and
secondary. It is only a side effect of His actual presence in
our souls, and gives no sure indication of that presence in any
case. For God Himself is above all apprehensions and ideas and
sensations, however spiritual, that can ever be experienced by
the spirit of man in this life. - Thomas Merton (1915-1968), No Man is an Island, New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1955; reprint,Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2002, p. 225

Do not trust your memory, it is a net full of holes; the most beautiful prizes slip through it. - Georges Duhamel

It is commonly observed that a sudden wealth, like a prize drawn in a lottery or a large bequest to a poor family, does not permanently enrich.- Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803 - 1882

Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.- Theodore Roosevelt, 1858 - 1919

I can forgive Alfred Nobel for having invented dynamite, but only a fiend in human form could have invented the Nobel Prize. - George Bernard Shaw, 1856 - 1950

Saturday 28 August 2010

The vigour of our spiritual life will be in exact proportion to the place held by the Bible in our life and thoughts. -George Muller

A crust eaten in peace is better than a banquet partaken in anxiety. - Aesop

Courage is the price that life extracts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things; Knows not the livid loneliness of fear.- Amelia Earhart, 1897 - 1937

Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without. - Siddhartha Gautama, 563 - 483 BC
(No. If comes from above, but this is Buddhism encapsulated- GJW)

Five great enemies to peace inhabit with us: avarice, ambition, envy, anger and pride. If those enemies were to be banished, we should infallibly enjoy perpetual peace. - Francesco Petrarch, 1304 - 1374

Our work for peace must begin within the private world of each one of us. To build for man a world without fear, we must be without fear. To build a world of justice, we must be just. - Dag Hammarskjöld, 1905 - 1961

Friday 27 August 2010

The world is full of abundance and opportunity, but far too many people come to the fountain of life with a sieve instead of a tank car, a teaspoon instead of a steam shovel. They expect little and as a result they get little.- Ben Sweetland

Not what we have, but what we enjoy, constitutes our abundance.- John Petit-Senn, 1792 - 1870

Many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head, and knows not that it brings abundance to drive away hunger.- Basil, 329 - 379

Found a little patched-up inn in the village of Bulson.... Proprietor had nothing but potatoes; but what a feast he laid before me. Served them in five different courses: potato soup, potato fricassee, potatoes creamed, potato salad, and finished with potato pie. It may be because I had not eaten for 36 hours, but that meal seems about the best I ever had. - Douglas MacArthur, 1880 - 1964, in his World War I diary

It is no small honour that God for our sake has so magnificently adorned the world, in order that we may not only be spectators of this beauteous theatre, but also enjoy the multiplied abundance and variety of good things which are presented to us in it. - John Calvin, 1509 - 1564

Thursday 26 August 2010

They burned his bones to ashes and cast them into the Swift, a neighbouring brook running close by. Thus the brook conveyed his ashes to the Avon, the Avon into the Severn, the Severn into the narrow seas and they into the main ocean. And so the ashes of Wycliffe are symbolic of his doctrine, which is now spread throughout the world.- Thomas Fuller: The Church History of Britain (1655)

I am weak; Satan is mighty; God is almighty.-Unknown

The superior man acquaints himself with many sayings of antiquity and many deeds of the past, in order to strengthen his character thereby.-John Milton, 1608 - 1674

A faithful friend is a strong defense; And he that hath found him hath found a treasure. - Louisa May Alcott, 1832 - 1888

Wednesday 25 August 2010

We crave the velvet touch of grace for our own battered lives but instinctively want to hammer the struggling lives surrounding us with law.- Matt Redmond

Family life is the normal context in which we can learn that a life filled with thinking about others instead of ourselves is the sure road to the most fulfilling joys and satisfactions.- Alan Keyes

The most powerful ties are the ones to the people who gave us birth ... it hardly seems to matter how many years have passed, how many betrayals there may have been, how much misery in the family: We remain connected, even against our wills. - Anthony Brandt

The family. We were a strange little band of characters trudging through life sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us all together. - Erma Louise Bombeck, 1927 - 1996

The institution of the family is decisive in determining not only if a person has the capacity to love another individual but in the larger social sense whether he is capable of loving his fellow men collectively. The whole of society rests on this foundation for stability, understanding, and social peace. - Daniel Patrick Moynihan, 1927 - 2003

The children have been a wonderful gift to me, and I'm thankful to have once again seen our world through their eyes. They restore my faith in the family's future.- Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, 1929 - 1994

I worry about people who get born nowadays, because they get born into such tiny families, sometimes into no family at all. When you're the only pea in the pod, your parents are likely to get you confused with the Hope Diamond. And that encourages you to talk too much. - Russell Baker

Tuesday 24 August 2010

Joy is the serious business of Heaven. C S Lewis

Faith is to the soul what life is to the body. Prayer is to
faith what breath is to the body. How a person can live and not
breathe is past my comprehension, and how a person can believe and not pray is past my comprehension too.-J. C. Ryle (1816-1900), A Call to Prayer, published in the 1850's as a pamphlet, p. 1

I've just been on a once-in-a-lifetime holiday. I'll tell you what, never again. -Tim Vine

I was put on this earth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I'm so far behind I will never die. ~ Calvin of Calvin & Hobbes

I liked things better when I didn't understand them. ~ Calvin of Calvin & Hobbes
Joy is the serious business of Heaven. C S Lewis

Faith is to the soul what life is to the body. Prayer is to
faith what breath is to the body. How a person can live and not
breathe is past my comprehension, and how a person can believe and not pray is past my comprehension too.-J. C. Ryle (1816-1900), A Call to Prayer, published in the 1850's as a pamphlet, p. 1

I've just been on a once-in-a-lifetime holiday. I'll tell you what, never again. -Tim Vine

I was put on this earth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I'm so far behind I will never die. ~ Calvin of Calvin & Hobbes

I liked things better when I didn't understand them. ~ Calvin of Calvin & Hobbes
To be sensible of our corruption and abhor our own transgressions is the first symptom of spiritual health.-J. C. Ryle

Keep your lamp burning, and let God place it where He will.-Unknown


Although men are accused of not knowing their own weakness, yet perhaps as few know their own strength. It is in men as in soils, where sometimes there is a vein of gold, which the owner knows not of.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


When a true genius appears in this world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


Positiveness is a good quality for preachers and orators, because he that would obtrude his thoughts and reasons upon a multitude, will convince others the more, as he appears convinced himself.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


The latter part of a wise man's life is taken up in curing the follies, prejudices, and false opinions he had contracted in the former.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745


The power of fortune is confessed only by the miserable; for the happy impute all their success to prudence or merit.-Jonathan Swift, 1667 - 1745

Sunday 22 August 2010

Talent

Everyone in this world has talents and flaws. The smart people use their talents. The happy people accept their flaws. —John Lithgow

Instinct is untaught ability. —Alexander Bain

Talent is formed in stillness; character, in the world's chaos. —Wolfgang von Goethe

The used key is always bright. —Benjamin Franklin

When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, 'I used everything you gave me.' —Erma Bombeck
Poor human reason, when it trusts in itself, substitutes the strangest absurdities for the highest divine concepts.-John Chrysostom (345?-407)

Friendship is the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person, having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words.- George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans), 1819 - 1880

Friends do not live in harmony merely, as some say, but in melody.- Henry David Thoreau, 1817 - 1862

Treat your friends as you do your pictures, and place them in their best light.-- Jennie Jerome Churchill, 1854 - 1921

Love is flower like; Friendship is like a sheltering tree. - Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1772 - 1834

Saturday 21 August 2010

To suppose that whatever God requireth of us that we have power of ourselves to do, is to make the cross and grace of Jesus Christ of none effect. -John Owen

A consciousness of our powerlessness should cast us upon Him who has all power. Here then is where a vision and view of God's sovereignty helps, for it reveals His sufficiency and shows us our insufficiency. —Arthur W. Pink

I should count a life well spent, and the world well lost, if, after tasting all its experiences and facing all its problems, I had no more to show at its close, or to carry with me to another life, than the acquisition of a real, sure, humble, and grateful faith in the Eternal and Incarnate Son of God.-P. T. Forsyth

Jesus once declared that God is "kind toward the unthankful
and evil" (St. Luke 6:35), and I remember preaching a sermon on
this text to a horrified and even astonished congregation who
simply refused to believe (so I gathered afterwards) in this
astounding liberality of God. That God should be in a state of
constant fury with the wicked seemed to them only right and
proper, but that God should be kind towards those who were
defying or disobeying His laws seemed to them a monstrous
injustice. Yet I was but quoting the Son of God Himself, and I
only comment here that the terrifying risks that God takes are
part of His Nature. We do not need to explain or modify His
unremitting love towards mankind.-J. B. Phillips (1906-1982), Making Men Whole, London:Highway Press, 1952, p. 27-28

Friday 20 August 2010

If our words be not sharpened, and pierce not as nails, they will hardly be felt by stony hearts. To speak slightly and coldly of heavenly things is nearly as bad as to say nothing of them at all. - Richard Baxter

The Christian is the real radical of our generation, for he
stands against the monolithic, modern concept of truth as
relative. But too often, instead of being the radical, standing
against the shifting sands of relativism, he subsides into
merely maintaining the status quo. If it is true that evil is
evil, that God hates it to the point of the cross, and that
there is a moral law fixed in what God is in Himself, then
Christians should be the first into the field against what is
wrong.- Francis A. Schaeffer (1912-1984), The God Who is There [1968], in The Francis A. Schaeffer Trilogy, Good News Publishers, 1990, p. 118

Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.- Johann von Goethe

Realize that you must lead a dying life; the more a man dies to himself, the more he begins to live unto God.-Thomas Kempis

The advantages of afflictions, when the Lord is pleased to employ them for the good of his people, are many and great. –John Newton

Thursday 19 August 2010

I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.- Mother Teresa

We are called to an everlasting preoccupation with God.-A. W. Tozer

Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console him for what he is.- Francis Bacon, 1561 - 1626

Natural abilities are like natural plants; they need pruning by study.- Francis Bacon, 1561 - 1626

Money is like muck, not good except it be spread.- Francis Bacon, 1561 - 1626

Prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue.-- Francis Bacon, 1561 - 1626

Virtue is like a rich stone: best plain set.- Francis Bacon, 1561 - 1626


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Question reality. Question authority.
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Wednesday 18 August 2010

Wisdom in knowing the difference between the principle and the man is freedom from discrimination, bigotry and hatred of your fellow man. - Bonnie Bon

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a Muslim. ~Mark Twain (1835-1910)

Success, recognition, and conformity are the bywords of the modern world where everyone seems to crave the anesthetizing security of being identified with the majority.- Martin Luther King, Jr, 1929 - 1968

We must combine the toughness of the serpent with the softness of the dove, a tough mind and a tender heart.- Martin Luther King, Jr, 1929 - 1968

Many are willing that Christ should be something, but few will consent that Christ should be everything."-Alexander Moody Stuart

Tuesday 17 August 2010

When God gives a promise, He always tries our faith. Just as the roots of trees take firmer hold when they are contending with the wind, so faith takes a firmer hold when it struggles with adverse appearances.-Robert Murray McCheyne, Comfort in Sorrow, Christian Focus, 2002, p. 40,

I would be true, for there are those who trust me;
I would be pure, for there are those who care;
I would be strong- for there is much to suffer;
I would be brave, for there is much to dare.
I would be friend of all- the foe, the friendless;
I would be giving, and forget the gift.
I would be humble, for I know my weakness;
I would look up- and laugh- and love- and lift.
Howard Arnold Walter

The English Established Church... will more readily pardon an attack on 38 of its 39 articles than on 1/39 of its income. - Karl Marx, Capital

Have you ever noticed that to the Left, political ideology is a
religion, while to the rest of us, religion is the antidote to their
political ideology?
The bedrock of the Left's political philosophy is the principle that the state is dominant over man. That forms the basis for Marxism, Socialism, Nazism, or any of the other -isms proven over the past century to be a failure. Religion, particularly Christianity, teaches that only God is superior to man.
Therefore, the Left cannot accept religion and must denigrate those who do. In the alternative, they must substitute allegiance to and worship at the altar of a statist ideology with particular emphasis on unfettered abortion rights, with the same fervor and belief as do those who believe in the direct relationship between God and man.
The United States, founded on the tenet that the state serves the citizen, whose rights come from God, has become the most successful nation in the history of mankind. In order for the Left to change the United States into a socialist paradise, they must overthrow the founding principle of the country. - Steve McCann, Have You Ever Noticed?
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/08/have_you_ever_noticed.html
There are great limits upon the human imagination. We can
only rearrange the elements God has provided. No one can create
a new primary color, a third sex, a fourth dimension, or a
completely original animal. Even by writing a book, planting a
garden, or begetting a child, we never create anything in the
strict sense; we only take part in God's creation.-Kathryn Lindskoog (1934-2003), C. S. Lewis, Mere Christian, Glendale, Cal.: G/L Publications, 1973, reprint, Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1981, p. 48


Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear. - Ambrose Redmoon


It takes as much courage to have tried and failed as it does to have tried and succeeded.- Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1906 - 2001


Courage is the ladder on which all the other virtues mount. - Brendan Behan, 1923 - 1964


Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; Courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen. - Carl Hermann Voss


You gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face.... You must do that which we think we cannot. - Eleanor Roosevelt, 1884 - 1962


Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others.- Robert Louis Stevenson, 1850 - 1894

Sunday 15 August 2010

God's omnipotence means [His] power to do all that is not
intrinsically impossible. You may attribute miracles to Him,
but not nonsense. This is no limit to His power. If you choose
to say, "God can give a creature free will and at the same time
withhold free will from it," you have not succeeded in saying
anything about God: meaningless combinations of words do not
suddenly acquire meaning simply because we prefix to them the
two other words "God can." It remains true that all things are
possible with God: the intrinsic impossibilities are not things
but nonentities. It is no more possible for God than for the
weakest of His creatures to carry out both of two mutually
exclusive alternatives--not because His power meets an
obstacle, but because nonsense remains nonsense even when we talk it about God.-C. S. Lewis (1898-1963), The Problem of Pain, New York: Macmillan, 1944, p. 16

In general, the art of government consists in taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other.- François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778

Monsieur l'abbé, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.-François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778

Civility is so easy that it's a wonder we don't have more of it - Harry Truman

Saturday 14 August 2010

My sins are many, but, oh, it is nothing to Jesus to take them all away. - Spurgeon

Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.- François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778
(nb not true but illustrative of enlightenment folly - GJW)

The wicked can have only accomplices, the voluptuous have companions in debauchery, self-seekers have associates, the politic assemble the factions, the typical idler has connections, princes have courtiers. Only the virtuous have friends.-François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778

A minister of state is excusable for the harm he does when the helm of government has forced his hand in a storm; but in the calm he is guilty of all the good he does not do.François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778-

All men would then be necessarily equal, if they were without needs. It is the poverty connected with our species which subordinates one man to another. It is not inequality which is the real misfortune, it is dependence.- François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778

Friday 13 August 2010

No candle which God lights was ever meant to burn alone.- J. C. Ryle

Character, like a photograph, develops in darkness.- Yousuf Karsh, 1908 - 2002

Without Christ I was like a fish out of water. With Christ I am in the ocean of love.- Sadhu Singh

Without realizing what was happening, most of us gradually
came to take for granted the premises underlying this
philosophy of optimism. We proceeded to live these
propositions, though we would not have stated them as blandly
as I set them forth here:
Man is inherently good.
Individual man can carve out his own salvation with the
help of education and society through progressively better
government.
Reality and values worth searching for lie in the material
world that science is steadily teaching us to analyze,
catalogue, and measure. While we would not deny the existence
of inner values, we relegate them to second place.
The purpose of life is happiness, [which] we define in
terms of enjoyable activity, friends, and the accumulation of
material objects.
The pain and evil of life--such as ignorance, poverty,
selfishness, hatred, greed, lust for power--are caused by
factors in the external world; therefore, the cure lies in the
reforming of human institutions and the bettering of
environmental conditions.
As science and technology remove poverty and lift from us
the burden of physical existence, we shall automatically become
finer persons, seeing for ourselves the value of living the
Golden Rule.
In time, the rest of the world will appreciate the
demonstration that the American way of life is best. They will
then seek for themselves the good life of freedom and
prosperity. This will be the greatest impetus toward an end of
global conflict.
The way to get along with people is to beware of religious
dictums and dogma. The ideal is to be a nice person and to live
by the Creed of Tolerance. Thus we offend few people. We live
and let live. This is the American Way.-Catherine Marshall (1914-1983), Beyond Our Selves, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961, p. 5-6

Thursday 12 August 2010

I need the opportunity to free my mind of sorrow, personal concerns; to see my world through the mirrored reflection of holiness. I need a time of prayer to leap beyond what is limiting in me as a person, to rediscover what is important and what is trivial, to take counsel with what my tradition stresses as the living faith. I need prayer.- Albert Silverman

Nothing is small or great in God's sight; whatever He wills
becomes great to us, however seemingly trifling, and if once
the voice of conscience tells us that He requires anything of
us, we have no right to measure its importance.0Jean Nicolas Grou (1731-1803), The Hidden Life of the Soul, London: Rivingtons, 1870, p. 217

They tell me I rub the fur the wrong way. I don’t. Let the cat turn around!-Billy Sunday

There is more treasure in books than in all the pirates' loot on Treasure Island and at the bottom of the Spanish Main .. and best of all, you can enjoy these riches every day of your life.- Walter Elias Disney, 1901 - 1966

Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make reading one of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him. - Maya Angelou

Wednesday 11 August 2010

Hope is not wishful thinking, nor fanciful imagination. Hope is the realism of the man of faith who knows that there is a line of meaningful development from the past, through the present, into the future. Hopelessness is the true condition of hell.-Joshua Haberman

"For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory!" 2 Corinthians 4:17
Oh Christians! under your greatest troubles--lie your greatest treasures!
"It is good for me to be afflicted--that I might learn Your statutes!" Psalm 119:71
By the greatest affliction--God teaches us the greatest instruction. When a believer lies under God's hand which afflicts him--he lies in God's heart which loves him!
Afflictions are good--but not pleasant.
Sin is pleasant--but not good.
There is more evil in a drop of sin--than there is in a sea of afflictions!
God by affliction, separates the sin He hates so deadly--from the soul He loves so dearly!
The believer studies more how to adorn the cross--than how to avoid the cross! Tell me, oh believer, is not Christ with His cross--better than the world with its crown?
"God disciplines us for our good--that we may share in His holiness." Hebrews 12:10
Suppose, Christian, that the furnace is hot, seven times hotter--it is but to make you seven times more holy! Fiery trials--make golden Christians! Sin has brought many a believer unto suffering--and suffering has kept many a believer from sinning! It is better to be preserved in brine--than to rot in honey!
"I know, O Lord, that Your laws are righteous, and in faithfulness You have afflicted me!" Psalm 119:75
William Dyer, Fiery Trials--Make Golden Christians!."Christ's Famous Titles"

The greatest gift is a passion for reading. It is cheap, it consoles, it distracts, it excites, it gives you knowledge of the world and experience of a wide kind. It is a moral illumination. - Elizabeth Hardwick, 1916 - 2007

No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting. - Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, 1689 - 1762

Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. - Richard Steele, 1672 - 1729

Tuesday 10 August 2010

Leaness of body and soul may go together. -John Owen

The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it,
for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.
The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth
will bring their splendor into it.-Revelation 21:23,24 (NIV)

My windows open to the autumn night,
In vain I watched for sleep to visit me:
How should sleep dull mine ears, and dim my sight,
Who saw the stars, and listened to the sea?

Ah, how the City of our God is fair!
If, without sea, and starless though it be,
For joy of the majestic beauty there,
Men shall not miss the stars, nor mourn the sea.
Lionel P. Johnson (1867-1902), Poems, London: Elkin Mathews, 1895, p. 77

I know no light but Yours, Lord.- RMA

Though a thermosceptic I strong on recycling, especially of quotes- GJW


fa

Monday 9 August 2010

Since He looked upon me, my heart is not my own. He hath run away to heaven with it.—Samuel Rutherford

It is impossible for a man to be a Christian without
having Christ; and if he has Christ he has at the same time
all that is in Christ.- Martin Luther (1483-1546)
Long-range goals keep you from being frustrated by short-term failures.- J.C. Penney

I count all that part of my life lost which I spent not in communion with God or in doing good.-John Donne

"He got up from supper, laid aside His robe, took a towel, and tied it around Himself. Next, He poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples' feet and to dry them with the towel tied around Him." John 13:4-5
When the Lord Himself would stoop to the humblest and lowest act of service, and teach His disciples to do the same--the washing of feet was the one He chose. During His earthly walk--Jesus saw all humble deeds in both their present and future dignity. He knew how and why it was, that he who would be greatest--must be the servant of all. He connected service and reward together. In His mind--all humble deeds of service were invested with great dignity. Jesus never did a humble deed, or took up a menial position, or uttered a lowly speech, without a consciousness of the true nobility attached to them. Therefore, with great joy did He perform all His humble service!
It is just here that we fail. We have little power of association. We isolate our humble services and deeds--from their eternal principles and thoughts, and then our services become burdensome, and our duties become toilsome--and failure is too often the result. Let us realize the nobility of our humble services. Let us remember that our now all-glorious Redeemer once said, "I am among you as the One who serves." Luke 22:27
Life, and common every-day service and duties, will wear a new aspect to us--when we see them tending to such a glorious consummation! We shall have fresh heart and energy--when we realize that the future will compensate abundantly for them.
"So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet--you ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example that you also should do just as I have done for you." John 13:14-15
Philip Bennett Powe.You ought to wash one another's feet!

Sunday 8 August 2010

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by better men than himself. - John Stuart Mill

I often say my prayers
But do I ever pray?
And do the wishes of my heart
Go with the words I say?

I may as well kneel down
And worship gods of stone,
As offer to the living God
A prayer of words alone.

For words without the heart
The Lord will never hear,
Nor will He to those lips attend
Whose prayers are not sincere.

Lord teach me what I need,
And teach me how to pray;
Nor let me ask Thy grace,
Not feeling what I say."
John Burton

Morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless.- Martin Luther King, Jr, 1929 - 1968

We shall have to repent in this generation, not so much for the evil deeds of the wicked people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.- Martin Luther King, Jr, 1929 - 1968

Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power; religion gives man wisdom which is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals mainly with values. The two are not rivals. They are complementary.- Martin Luther King, Jr, 1929 - 1968
"While we were still sinners--Christ died for us!" Romans 5:8
He loved us more than His own life! The 'pelican' feeds her young ones with her own blood. Oh! sirs, Christ is our pelican, who has nourished and fed us with His own blood. "My flesh is real food and my blood is real drink," says Christ.
Christ's red blood--has taken away our red guilt!
Scarlet-red sinners--have become milk-white saints, when washed in His blood!
All our precious mercies--come swimming to us in Christ's precious blood!
Christ bled love at every vein! His drops of blood--were drops of love! Yes, the more bloody He was--the more lovely! He was most lovely upon the cross--because then He showed most love to us!
Christ took upon Him our shame--that we might be partakers of His glory!
He died our death--that we might live His life!
He suffered our hell--that we might enjoy His heaven!
He endured the sorest pains--that we might enjoy the sweetest pleasures!
He went through the furnace of wrath--to keep us out of the flames of hell!
Oh! how infinitely does He love us-William Dyer, "Christ's Famous Titles" Christ is Our Pelican!

I hope you will never forget that the Bible is the history of God's acts to men, not of men's thoughts about God. It begins from Him. He is acting and speaking in it throughout.- Frederick Denison Maurice (1805-1872), Ecclesiastical History, London: Macmillan, 1854, p. 222, 2

Oh, let none think his labor is lost because the fruit does not immediately appear. - John Wesley, 1703 - 1791

A small daily task if it really be daily, will beat the labors of a spasmodic Hercules -Anthony Trollope, 1815 - 1882

Friday 6 August 2010

It is not the babbling of our lips, nor dignity of our words, but the prayer of the heart is the offering that pleaseth, through the only means of his Son. For our prayer profiteth us, because we offer Christ to his Father. Whosoever resorteth to God without Christ, he resorteth in vain. Our prayer pleaseth because of Jesus Christ, whom we offer. So that it is faith, faith, faith is the matter. It is no prayer that is without faith, it is but a lip-labouring and mockery, without faith; it is but a little babbling.- Hugh Latimer

Whenever you're sitting across from some important person, always picture him sitting there in a suit of long red underwear. That's the way I always operated in business.- Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr, 1888 - 1969

Democracy is finished in England. It may be here.-Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr, 1888 - 1969

If you want to make money, go where the money is.=Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr, 1888 - 1969

We must get into the picture business. This is a new industry and a gold mine. It looks like another telephone industry.= Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr, 1888 - 1969 (Which is interesting coming from a man who made his money as a bootlegger)

Joseph Joubert (1754-1824)

What our eyes see, our imagination can no longer see. The same things cannot be the object of both kinds of seeing. —Joseph Joubert, Notebooks, 1797

The imagination has made more discoveries than the eye. —Joseph Joubert, Notebooks, 1797

Images have had a great influence on realities. —Joseph Joubert, Notebooks, 1798

The sign then makes us forget the thing signified. —Joseph Joubert, Notebooks, 1798

What is closest to our senses [is] farthest from our soul. —Joseph Joubert, Notebooks, 1800

Genuine bon mots surprise those from whose lips they fall, no less than they do those who listen to them.--Joseph Joubert, _Pense'es_, 1842

Be charitable and indulgent to every one but thyself. Joubert (1754-1824)

Those who never retract their opinions love themselves more than they love truth. -- Joseph Joubert

Wisdom is the strength of the weak. —Joseph Joubert

Illusion is in sensations. Error is in judgments. We know truth and at the same time take pleasure in illusion. —Joseph Joubert

Deism. The human species cannot accommodate itself to it. This doctrine relates to our strengths but not to our weaknesses. —Joseph Joubert

In order to be known, [God] would have to make us immortal and give us another life. —Joseph Joubert

The dying inherit the dead. —Joseph Joubert, Auster, Paul, The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert (NYRB, 2005)]

Never cut what you can untie.-- Joseph Joubert

Choose in marriage only a woman whom you would choose as a friend if she were a man.- Joubert

Thursday 5 August 2010

"Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows!" John 16:33
"You will fill me with joy in Your presence, with eternal pleasures at Your right hand!" Psalm 16:11
Cheer up, Christian! The sweetness of the crown which shall be enjoyed--will make amends for the bitterness of the cross which was endured. This world is all the hell that you shall ever have!
Here you have your bad things--your good things are yet to come!
Here you have your bitter things--but your sweet things are yet o come!
Here you have your prison--but your palace is yet to come!
Here you have your rags--your royal robes are yet to come
Here you have your sorrow--your joy is yet to come!
Here you have your hell--your heaven is yet to come!
After the cup of affliction--comes the cup of salvation!
Oh, sirs, under the greatest troubles--lie your greatest treasures!
The seed of sorrow on earth--shall reap a golden crop of joy in heaven!
Those who sow holiness in the seed-time of their lives--shall reap happiness in the harvest of eternity!
Oh! sirs, never think to have an end of your sorrow--until there is an end of your sin!
The apostle tells us, "Our light affliction, which is for a moment--works for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory!"
A grain of affliction--works a weight of glory!
A short moment of pain--works an eternity of pleasures!
Therefore saints, be of good cheer! Here is comfort for you--your best days are yet to come!-= William Dyer, "Christ's Famous Titles"

The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed a standard citizenry, to put down dissent and originality.- Henry Louis Mencken, 1880 - 1956

The best education consists in immunizing people against systematic attempts at education.- Paul Karl Feyerabend, 1924 - 1994

Education rears disciples, imitators, and routinists, not pioneers of new ideas and creative geniuses. The schools are not nurseries of progress and improvement, but conservatories of tradition and unvarying modes of thought.- Ludwig von Mises, 1881 - 1973

Wednesday 4 August 2010

Your home can be a place for dying or living, for wilting or blooming, for anxiety or peace, for discouragement or affirmation, for criticism or approval, for profane disregard or reverence, for suspicion or trust, for blame or forgiveness, for alienation or closeness, for violation or respect, for carelessness or caring. By your daily choices, you will make your home what you want it to be.- Carole Sanderson Streeter

We grasp for truth and lose it till it comes to us by love.-Madeleine L'Engle

Nothing but glory will make tight and fast our leaking and rifty vessels.
- Samuel Rutherford

"Your Father--who sees in secret." Matthew 6:6
Can anyone hide himself from the Lord in secret places? Can I, under any circumstances, escape His notice? Impossible!The eye of God has been fixed upon me every second of this day; it is now at this moment fixed fully upon me. But it is my Father's eye! My Father sees in secret! He sees my needs--and my woes. He sees every secret working of my foes--and will save me from them. He sees every secret influence which is likely to injure me--and will prevent it. He sees . . . the secret workings of my heart, my hidden thoughts, my unuttered desires, my soul conflicts, my private temptations. But He sees also my secret sins! Every evil thought, every improper action, every unfitting word--passes under His eye!Solemn consideration this!May it make me cautious. May it preserve me. . . from yielding to temptation, from nourishing sinful thoughts, and from acting inconsistent with my profession. My heavenly Father sees me! He sees me at this moment! He sees me
every moment! He sees my most secret motives, thoughts, and purposes!He who thus sees me--hates every sin with an infinite hatred!- James Smith, "The Pastor's Evening Visit", My Father's Eye!

Tuesday 3 August 2010

It is a mistake to think that some of our impulses--say mother love or patriotism--are good, and others, like sex or the fighting instinct, are bad. All we mean is that the occasions on which the fighting instinct or the sexual desire need to be restrained are rather more frequent than those for restraining mother love or patriotism. But there are situations in which it is the duty of a married man to encourage his sexual impulse and of a soldier to encourage the fighting instinct. There are also occasions on which a mother's love for her own children or a man's love for his own country have to be suppressed or they will lead to unfairness towards other people's children or countries.- C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

The view of evil implied by Marxism, expressed by Shaw and maintained by modern psychotherapy, which regards it as the by-product of circumstances which circumstances can, therefore, alter and even eliminate—has come to seem to me intolerably shallow, and the contrary view of it as endemic in man—more particularly in its Christian form, the doctrine of original sin—to express a deep and essential insight into human nature. - C. E. M. Joad (1891-1953), The Recovery of Belief [1952]

It was because we rejected the doctrine of original sin that we on the left were always being disappointed - disappointed by the failure of true socialism to arrive, by the behavior of nations and politicians, and above all by the recurrent fact of war. C. E. M. Joad (1891-1953), The Recovery of Belief [1952]

Earth's crammed with heaven, and every common bush afire with God; and only he who sees takes off his shoes; the rest sit round it and pluck blackberries.- Elizabeth Barrett Browning

It is better to debate a question without settling it than to settle a question without debating it -Joseph Joubert: 1754 - 1824

Monday 2 August 2010

Counterfeit Gods

One of the signs that an object is functioning as an idol is that fear becomes one of the chief characteristics of life. When we center our lives on the idol, we become dependent on it. If our counterfeit god is threatened in any way, our response is complete panic. We do not say, “What a shame, how difficult,” but rather “This is the end! There’s no hope!”
This may be a reason why so many people now respond to U.S. political trends in such an extreme way. When either party wins an election, a certain percentage of the losing side talks openly about leaving the country. They become agitated and fearful for the future. They have put the kind of hope in their political leaders and policies that once was reserved for God and the work of the gospel. When their political leaders are out of power they experience a death. They believe that if their policies and people are not in power, everything will fall apart. They refuse to admin how much agreement they actually have with the other party, and instead focus on the points of disagreement. The points of contention overshadow everything else, and a poisonous environment is created.- -Timothy Keller,Counterfeit Gods, p98


Another sign of idolatry in our politics is that opponents are not considered to be simply mistaken, but to be evil. After the last presidential election [i.e. 2008 election which Obama won], my eighty-four-year-old mother observed, “It used to be that whoever was elected as your president, even if he wasn’t the one you voted for, he was still your president. That doesn’t seem to be the case any longer.” After each election, there is now a significant number of people who see the incoming president lacking moral legitimacy. The increasing political polarization and bitterness we see in U.S. politics today is a sign that we have made political activism into a form of religion. How does idolatry produce fear and demonization?
Dutch-Canadian philosopher Al Wolters taught that in the biblical view of things, the main problem in life is sin, and the only solution is God and his grace. The alternative to this view is to identify something besides sin as the main problem with the world and something besides God as the main remedy. That demonizaes something that is not completely bad, and makes an idol out of soemthing that cannot be the ultimate good. -Timothy Keller,Counterfeit Gods,

The great danger is to single out some aspect or phenomenon of God’s good creation and identify it, rather than the alien intrusion of sin, as the villain in the drama of human life… This “something” has been variously identified as … the body and its passions (Plato and much of Greek philosophy), culture in distinction from nature (Rousseau and Romanticism), institutional authority, especially in the state and the family (much of depth psychology), technology and management techniques (Heidegger and Ellul)… The Bible is unique in its uncompromising rejection of all attempts … to identify part of creation as either the villain or the savior.- Al Wolters quoted in Timothy Keller,(Counterfeit Gods,

This accounts for the constant political cycles of overblown hopes and disillusionment, for the increasingly poisonous political discourse, and for the disproportionate fear and despair when one’s political party loses power. But why do we deify and demonize political causes and ideas? Reinhold Niebuhr answered that, in political idolatry, we make a god out of having power. -Timothy Keller,(Counterfeit Gods, p101)

Sunday 1 August 2010

It is certain that the use of singing in churches (which I may mention in passing) is not only very ancient, but was also used by the Apostles, as we may gather from the words of Paul, “I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also,” (1 Cor. 14:15). In like manner he says to the Colossians, “Teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord,” (Col. 3:16). In the former passage, he enjoins us to sing with the voice and the heart; in the latter, he commends spiritual Songs, by which the pious mutually edify each other. That it was not an universal practice, however, is attested by Augustine (Confess. Lib. 9 cap. 7), who states that the church of Milan first began to use singing in the time of Ambrose, when the orthodox faith being persecuted by Justina, the mother of Valentinian, the vigils of the people were more frequent than usual; and that the practice was afterwards followed by the other Western churches. He had said a little before that the custom came from the East. He also intimates (Retract. Lib. 2) that it was received in Africa in his own time. His words are, “Hilarius, a man of tribunitial rank, assailed with the bitterest invectives he could use the custom which then began to exist at Carthage, of singing hymns from the book of Psalms at the altar, either before the oblation, or when it was distributed to the people; I answered him, at the request of my brethren.” And certainly if singing is tempered to a gravity befitting the presence of God and angels, it both gives dignity and grace to sacred actions, and has a very powerful tendency to stir up the mind to true zeal and ardor in prayer. We must, however, carefully beware, lest our ears be more intent on the music than our minds on the spiritual meaning of the words. Augustine confesses (Confess. Lib. 10 cap. 33) that the fear of this danger sometimes made him wish for the introduction of a practice observed by Athanasius, who ordered the reader to use only a gentle inflection of the voice, more akin to recitation than singing. But on again considering how many advantages were derived from singing, he inclined to the other side. If this moderation is used, there cannot be a doubt that the practice is most sacred and salutary. On the other hand, songs composed merely to tickle and delight the ear are unbecoming the majesty of the Church, and cannot but be most displeasing to God.- John Calvin, Institutes, Book III, Chapter 20, Section 32

Is there a real Islam? Or just Islams? - John Edward Philips

We live in a world possessed. And we know it, Johan Huizinga, 1935, in Bob Goudzwaard 1967-2007, Idols of Our Time Foreword by Howard Snyder and edited by Mark Vander Vennen, Intervarsity Press, Downer’s Grove, 1984

What is the goal toward which we are heading? The peaceful enjoyment of liberty and equality; the reign of that eternal justice whose laws have been inscribed, not in marble and stone, but in the hearts of all men, even in that of the slave who forgets them and in that of the tyrant who denies them.- MAXIMILIEN ROBESPIERRE, THE POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF TERROR, SPEECH TO THE CONVENTION, FEBRUARY 5, 1794, the Reign of Terror, which ended with his arrest and execution in 1794