Viktor Frankl, from Man’s Search for Meaning:
…success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself….”
Humility doesn’t mean hiding your gift
Glenna Marshall, clarifying humility:
Humility doesn’t mean hiding. Humility means acknowledging that everything you have is from God. Why would you want to hide what He’s given you?
Read the whole post here: The mountains cry out.
When you’re moving in the right direction, expect difficulty.
Expect difficulty when you do what’s right. Great opportunity is often accompanied by great opposition. The apostle Paul said of the work in Ephesus, ‘A great door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many who oppose me’ (1 Cor. 16:9). He chose to think primarily about the great open door, not the daunting opponents!
— Unquestionable Character: A 21-day Study in Stewardship
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Remember that Satan is the accuser of believers. He delights in heaping guilt feelings upon you…. When you feel Satan’s arrows of accusation, you are probably on the right track.
– May 15, Jesus Calling, by Sarah Young
Image: Eon Images
Leonard Bernstein (and Dilbert), on achievement and deadlines
Leonard Bernstein:
Two things are necessary for great achievement: A plan, and not quite enough time.”
Dilbert image: Copyright Scott Adams, Inc.
Van Gogh on the struggle to create beautiful things
Vincent van Gogh:
I long so much to make beautiful things. But beautiful things require effort and disappointment and perseverance.”
Another good one, by Pablo Picasso:
Inspiration exists, but it has to find us working.”
How to cure your fear of failure
Trent Nelson:
The fear of failure is nothing more than an irrational panic over the… unknown variables that [you] equate to impending doom. …And disappears completely when you focus on reasonable outcomes.
“When you find yourself distracted by impending failures, it almost always means you have a distorted view of yourself, and what role you play in your own business….
“Falling flat on your face is an essential a part of the job, and without it you’re bound to stunt your growth. …By rejecting the notion that you could-possibly fu– up, you’re restricting your access to one of the most sought-after resources on the planet: Hindsight….
“The best way to overcome failure is to see it for what it really is: A necessary speedbump on the way to success.”
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Don’t just talk/think about God; talk TO God
In this devotional by John Piper, he looks at the 23rd Psalm, and how the writer — King David — switches back and forth between talking about God (“He”) and to God (“You”):
The lesson I have learned from this form is that it is good not to talk very long about God without talking to God.
Every Christian is at least an amateur theologian — that is, a person who tries to understand the character and ways of God and then put that into words….
But what I have learned from David in Psalm 23 and other psalms, is that I should interweave my theology with prayer. I should frequently interrupt my talking about God by talking to God.
Not far behind the theological sentence, “God is generous,” should come the prayerful sentence, “Thank you, God.”
On the heels of, “God is glorious,” should come, “I adore your glory.”
What I have come to see is that this is the way it must be if we are feeling God’s reality in our hearts as well as describing it with our heads.’
Who’s really at work here?
Oswald Chambers:
Do we get into the [habit] of letting God work, or are we so amazingly important that we really wonder… what the Almighty does before we are up in the morning?!”
Place the pen in God’s hand
Suzie Eller:
Every story is unique and each story — including yours — is important to God. And this is our promise: Brokenness does not have to be the final chapter….
Begin to imagine what you will look like in the hands of your Savior. This opens the door to hope. It places the pen in God’s hand, instead of the past, a person or a feeling.
“It changes your question from, ‘What’s wrong with me?’ to ‘What miracle does God want to perform in me?'”
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A prisoner’s Christmas: Insights about how Jesus came to Earth – and why
This Christmas marks the third year Idaho pastor Saeed Abedini has been separated from his family.
Abedini, an American citizen, is currently serving an eight-year sentence after an Iranian court found him guilty of trying to establish a network of churches in private homes.
Rajai Shahr Prison, 2014
Merry Christmas!
These days are very cold here. My small space beside the window is without glass, making most nights unbearable to sleep. The treatment by fellow prisoners is also quite cold and at times hostile…. These conditions have made this upcoming Christmas season very hard, cold and shattering for me….
These cold and brittle conditions have made me wonder why God chose the hardest time of the year to become flesh…. Why did God choose the hardest place to be born, in the cold weather? Why did God choose to be born in a manger in a stable, which is very cold, filthy and unsanitary with an unpleasant smell? Why did the birth have to be in such a way that it was not only hard physically, but also socially? It must have brought such shame for Mary and her fiancé that she was pregnant before marriage in the religious society of that time.
Dear sisters and brothers, the fact of the Gospel is that it is not only the story of Jesus, but it is the key of how we are to live and serve like Jesus. Today, we — like Him — should come out of our safe comfort zone in order to proclaim the Word of Life and Salvation though faith in Jesus Christ… and to proclaim His resurrection. We should be able to tolerate the cold, the difficulties and the shame in order to serve God. We should be able to enter into the pain of the cold dark world. Then we are able to give the fiery love of Christ to the cold wintery manger of those who are spiritually dead. It might be necessary to come out of the comfort of our lives and leave the loving embrace of our family to enter the manger of the lives of others, such as it has been for me for the third consecutive Christmas….
The same way that the heat from the earth’s core melts the hard stones in itself and produces lava, the fiery love of God, Jesus Christ, through the virgin Mary’s womb came to earth on Christmas to melt the hard heart of sin and wickedness of the world…. In the same process, the work of the Holy Spirit is a fiery rain… that flows into our body, soul and spirit and brings the light of Christ into us and through us, making this dark, cold, wintry world into radiant burning brightness…. Hallelujah!
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This entire post is edited from an article at The Huffington Post.
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