Quote: Groundless Fears

"...many of God’s people are constantly under apprehensions of calamities which will never occur to them, and they suffer far more in merely dreading them than they would have to endure if they actually came upon them. In their imagination, there are rivers in their way, and they are anxious to know how they shall wade through them, or swim across them. There are no such rivers in existence, but they are agitated and distressed about them. An old proverb says, “Don’t cross the bridge till you come to it;” but these timid people are continually crossing bridges that only exist in their foolish fancies. They stab themselves with imaginary daggers, they starve themselves in imaginary famines, and even bury themselves in imaginary graves. We are such strange creatures that we probably suffer more under blows which never fall upon us than we do under those which do actually come. The rod of God does not strike us as sharply as the rod of our own imagination does; our groundless fears are our chief tormentors, and when we are able to abolish our self-inflictions, all the worries of the world become light and easy. However, it is a pity that Christians who have the gift of faith in Christ given to them, should fall into so guilty and at the same time so painful a habit as this of fearing the oppressor who does not come, and who never will come."

~Needless Fears, sermon #3098 by Charles H. Spurgeon

Video for full sermon below. This quote above starts at 4:10.

Quote: Difficulties

"God shields us from most of the things we fear, but when He chooses not to shield us, He unfailingly allots grace in the measure needed.  It is for us to choose to receive or refuse it. Our joy or our misery will depend on that choice."

"When we try to meet difficulties prematurely we have neither the light nor the strength for them yet. 'As thy days so shall thy strength be' was Moses' blessing for Asher - in other words, your strength will equal your days."

~excerpts from Secure in the Everlasting Arms, 

Elisabeth Elliot

 

What I'm Reading

Stepping Heavenward by Elizabeth Prentiss

"Katy," Helen inquired, "do you always submit to God's will?"

"In great things I do," I said. "What grieves me is that I am constantly forgetting to recognize God's hand in the little everyday trials of life, and instead of receiving them as from him, find fault with the instrument by which he sends them."

Calm My Anxious Heart by Linda Dillow

What Every Christian Needs to Know About the Qur'an by James White

This is an excellent and scholarly work!  I can't recommend it highly enough.  This paragraph in his introduction exemplifies his attitude in undertaking this study.

 The Christian who writes on this subject must do so first and foremost with a commitment to the highest standards of truthfulness and accuracy.  While none of us is perfect, and hence none can claim infallibility in anything we do, our highest goal always must be to honor our commitment to Christ by seeking transparent honesty in all things.  Islamic doctrine denies many of the central truths  that followers of the Messiah hold dear, and because many today use the Qur'an as a pretext for the persecution of Christians, many Christians are willing in essence to let slide the standard and accept unfair, biased and distorted counterarguments.  While I fully understand the human emotion and motivation, I cannot allow myself to entertain such a temptation. 

Quote: "A thousand different things"

"Years ago, I heard Pastor John Piper make a statement that resonated deeply in my heart.  I've shared it countless times since: 'In every situation and circumstance of your life, God is always doing a thousand different things that you cannot see and you do not know.'"

"Regardless of what crisis or complexity may be threatening to engulf your life, God is at work.  You may not see it, but you need to know it's true.  And He's not just doing one or two or a few things in that situation.  He is doing a thousand or more things.

Although at times He may allow us to see some of His purposes, enabling us to say, "Oh, that makes sense," the vast majority of what He is doing is behind the scenes, providentially obscured from our finite view."

 ~from The Quiet Place by Nancy Leigh DeMoss, January 8 daily devotional

Quote: "...disease of desiring to obtain useless knowledge"

"Almost all men are inflicted with the disease of desiring to obtain useless knowledge.  It is is great importance that we should be told what is necessary for us to know, and what the Lord desires us to contemplate, above and below, on the right hand and on the left, before and behind.  The love of Christ is held out to us as the subject which ought to occupy our daily and nightly meditations, and in which we ought to be wholly plunged."

John Calvin, Commentary on Ephesians

Quote: "It is sentences that change my life, not books."

"What I have learned from about twenty-years of serious reading is this. It is sentences that change my life, not books. What changes my life is some new glimpse of truth, some powerful challenge, some resolution to a long-standing dilemma, and these usually come concentrated in a sentence or two. I do not remember 99% of what I read, but if the 1% of each book or article I do remember is a life-changing insight, then I don't begrudge the 99%. And that life-changing insight usually comes in a moment, a moment whose value is all out of proportion to its little size. That's why I call it an "immeasurable moment."

~John Piper, full transcript available here

Spurgeon on Prayer ~ "We do not know what prayer cannot do!"

Yesterday morning I read the following from Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon.  It was just the encouragement and conviction I needed before I reached for my prayer binder.  Take five minutes today to read it, meditate on it and apply it.

"Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens." --Lamentations 3:41 

The act of prayer teaches us our unworthiness, which is a very salutary lesson for such proud people like us. If God gave us favors without constraining us to pray for them we would never know how poor we are, but a true prayer is an inventory of wants, a catalog of necessities, a revelation of hidden poverty. While prayer is an application to divine wealth, it is also a confession of human emptiness. The most healthy state of a Christian is always to be empty of self and constantly depending upon the Lord for provision; to be consistently poor in self and rich in Jesus; to be weak as water personally, but mighty through God to do great exploits. This is where prayer comes in, because while it adores God, it puts the creature where it should be - in the dust. Prayer is in itself, apart from the answer that it brings, a great benefit to the Christian. As the runner gains strength for the race by daily exercise, so for the great race of life we acquire energy by the holy exercise of prayer. Prayer thins the feathers of God's young eaglets, so they may learn to soar above the clouds. Prayer readies God's warriors, and sends them out to combat with their sinews braced and their muscles firm. The praying believer comes out of his closet, even as the sun rises from the chambers of the east, rejoicing like an athlete about to race. Prayer is the uplifted hand of Moses which defeats the Amalekites more than the sword of Joshua; it is the arrow shot from the prophet's chamber announcing defeat to the Syrians. Prayer equips human weakness with divine strength, turns human folly into heavenly wisdom, and gives to the peace of God to troubled souls. We know not what prayer cannot do! We thank You, great God, for the mercy-seat, a wonderful evidence of your marvelous loving-kindness. Help us to use it properly throughout this day!

~from Morning and Evening, October 11, by Charles Spurgeon, revised and updated by Alistar Begg (he basically took out "thee" and fixed the British spelling)

Quote: Do Not Rush. Trust. And Keep a Quiet Heart.

"I think I find the most help in trying to look on all the interruptions and hindrances to work that one has planned out for oneself as discipline, trials sent by God to help one against getting selfish over one's work.  Then one can feel that perhaps one's true work - one's work for God - consists in doing some trifling haphazard thing that has been thrown  into one's day.  It is not a waste of time, as one is tempted to think, it is the most important part of the work of the day - the part one can best offer to God.  After such a hindrance, do not rush after the planned work; trust that the time to finish it will be given sometime, and keep a quiet heart about it.

~quote by Annie Keary taken from Keep a Quiet Heart by Elisabeth Elliot

Quote: Preface to Amy Carmichael's Biography

Here is a convicting quote.  It touches on why the author writes and how we should read.  Is this how I approach books?

"In spite of much that militates against quietness there are people who still read books.  They are the people who keep me going.  I write especially for those who bring to their reading a mind not hidebound by the sensibilities of their time, but prepared to contemplate the Eternally Relevant; to seek in this book specifically the truth and the hidden meaning of a single life."

~Elisabeth Elliot, preface A Chance to Die: The Life and Legacy of Amy Carmichael

Quote: All A Mistake?

I was browsing my bookshelves this afternoon looking for books I've read more than once (that's for another post :-) when I found this dog eared friend.  Here was one of the pages that I had marked.

"It is easy to conclude, when things turn out badly, that it was all a mistake to begin with.

The facts of the gospel do not bear this out. Think of Jesus' choice of apostles. He spent a whole night in prayer before He made his selection. Judas was one of his choices. Peter affirmed, in his sermon on the day of Pentecost, "He was one of our number and had his place in this ministry" (Acts 1:17 NEB). Things could not have turned out worse for him or for Jesus because of him, yet Scripture nowhere suggests that the original choice was a mistake. Judas was still a man, still free to sin.

When we must make decisions, we should bring to bear on them scriptural principles, prayer, and all the intelligence God has dealt out to us. Then we must go on quietly in faith, knowing that the results of our obedience are God's responsibility, not ours."

~excerpt from A Lamp Unto My Feet by Elisabeth Elliot, page 165

Quote: If Satan Took Over

"What would things look like if Satan really took control of a city?  Over half a century ago, Presbyterian minister Donald Grey Barnhouse offered his own scenario in his weekly sermon that was also broadcast nationwide on CBS radio.  Barnhouse speculated that if Satan took over Philadelphia (the city where Barnhouse pastored), all of the bars would be closed, pornography banished, and pristine streets would be filled with tidy pedestrians who smiled at each other.  There would be no swearing.  The children would say, "Yes, sir" and "No ma'am," and the churches would be full every Sunday...where Christ is not preached."

~ Christless Christianity, Michael Horton 

Quote: Why the Classics Endure

"In short, oddities only strike ordinary people. Oddities do not strike odd people. This is why ordinary people have a much more exciting time; while odd people are always complaining of the dulness of life. This is also why the new novels die so quickly, and why the old fairy tales endure for ever. The old fairy tale makes the hero a normal human boy; it is his adventures that are startling; they startle him because he is normal. But in the modern psychological novel the hero is abnormal; the centre is not central. Hence the fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, and the book is monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among dragons; but not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses what a sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of to-day discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world."  ~Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton

Quote Collection

I just spent the past 25 minutes demolishing a pile of papers.  Trash, file, to do.  The pile is gone and I'm victorious. 


In the pile I found a scrap of paper with a quote.  I'm a collector a quotes, you see.  However, having never established a good system they tend to float from one paper pile to another.  So, I decided that as they float by me I enter them here on my blog.  That way you will be encouraged or challenged and I will be more organized. 

"He who grows in grace remembers that he is but dust, and he therefore does not expect his fellow Christians to be anything more.  He overlooks ten thousand of their faults, because he knows his God overlooks twenty thousand in his own case.  He does not expect perfection in the creature, and, therefore, he is not disappointed when he does not find it."  ~Charles Spurgeon~  (source:  sermon "Ripe Fruits, #945")

Mere Christianity quote

"I am trying to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him, "I'm ready  to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God."  That is the one thing we must not say.  A man who is merely a man and said the sort of thing Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.  He would either be a lunatic - on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell.  You must make your choice.  Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse.  You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit on Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God.  But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher.  He has not left that open to us.  He did not intend to."

 Mere Christianity, Book II, Chapter 3

Amen, amen and amen!