It is the broken heart that pleases God

"The best things of life come out of wounding. Wheat is crushed before it becomes bread. Incense must be cast upon the fire before its odors are set free. The ground must be broken with the sharp plough before it is ready to receive the seed. It is the broken heart that pleases God. The sweetest joys in life are the fruits of sorrow. Human nature seems to need suffering to fit it for being a blessing to the world." (Steams in the Desert) -- L. B. Cowan

Look to the "Faithful One" for Victory

J. Hudson Taylor, the great missionary often said, "It is not by trying to be faithful, but in looking to the Faithful One, that we win the victory."

Doing God's Work--God's Way

"Yet another way of working is to begin with God; to ask His plans, and to offer ourselves to Him to carry out His purposes." -- Hudson Taylor (Emphasis supplied). Wycliffe Handbook of Preaching and Preachers, W. Wiersbe, p. 243.

'My name is I AM'

"I was regretting the past and fearing the future. Suddenly my Lord was speaking. 'My name is I AM.' He paused, I waited. He continued. 'When you live in the past with its mistakes and regrets it is hard. I am not there. My name is not, I WAS. When you live in the future with its problems and fears it is hard. I am not there. My name is not, I WILL BE. But when you live in this moment, it is not hard. I am here. My name is I AM.'" - Helen Malacoat

Faith and Hope

"…Faith looks backward—hope looks onward and upward. Faith is concerned with the Person who promises—hope with the One and the things promised. Faith accepts—hope expects. Faith appropriates—hope anticipates. Faith believes and takes—hope desires and waits. Faith comes by hearing—hope comes by experience. Faith the root—hope is the fruit." -- G.H. Knight

Kindness is the "common-language" of Love

"One time Paul Harvey spoke about a man named Carl Coleman who was driving to work when a woman tried to pass him with her car and got too close and dinged his fender with hers.

They both pulled over and when she saw the damage she started crying. She admitted that it was her fault, but it was a brand-new car, it had only been out of the showroom two days!

How was she ever going to face her husband?

Mr. Coleman was sympathetic but explained they had to exchange their licenses and registrations.

When the woman reached into the glove compartment and pulled out the papers the first paper was a note, obviously written by a man; it read: "In case of accident, remember, Honey, it's you I love, not the car." (Paul Harvey Jr., Paul Harvey's for What It's Worth, 1992, p. 31)

Attributes of God

"There are seasons in the lives of all when it is not easy, no not even for Christians, to believe that God is faithful. Our faith is sorely tried, our eyes bedimmed with tears, and we can no longer trace the outworkings of His love. Our ears are distracted with the noises of the world, harassed by the atheistic whisperings of Satan, and we can no longer hear the sweet accents of His still small voice. Cherished plans have been thwarted, friends on whom we relied have failed us, a professed brother or sister in Christ has betrayed us. We are staggered. We sought to be faithful to God, and now a dark cloud hides Him from us. We find it difficult, yea, impossible, for carnal reason to harmonize His frowning providence with His gracious promises. Ah, faltering soul, severely tried fellow pilgrim, seek grace to heed Isa. 50:10..." (A.W. Pink, The Attributes of God, pp. 53-54)

Meeting God in your prison of circumstances.

"Whenever you get into a prison of circumstances, be on watch. Prisons are rare places for seeing things. It was in prison that Bunyan saw his wondrous allegory and Paul met the Lord and John looked through heaven's open door and Joseph saw God's mercy. God has no chance to show His mercy to some of us except when we are in some distressing sorrow. The night is the time to see the stars." -- F. B. Meyer

Do you really want to see a revival begin?

“Do you really want to see a revival begin?  Then go back to your home and draw a circle around you on the floor. Then get down on your knees in the middle of the circle and ask God to convert everybody inside that circle. When you do that, and God answers, you are experiencing the start of revival.” -- Gypsy Smith

"In omitting the Cross you have cut the Achilles' tendon of the Church: it cannot move, nor even stand, when this is gone. Holy work falls to the ground: it faints and dies when the blood of Jesus is taken away. The Cross must be put in the front more than ever by the faithful, because so many are unfaithful." -- Charles Spurgeon

Three Kinds of People

Blaise Pascal once wrote, "There are three kinds of people: those who have sought God and found him, and these are reasonable and happy; those who seek God and have not yet found him, and these are reasonable and unhappy; and those who neither seek God nor find him, and these are unreasonable and unhappy."

Fellowship with God must never become selfish

"Fellowship with God must never become selfish. We must also fellowship with other Christians in the local assembly. Apparently, some of the wavering believers had been absenting themselves from the church fellowship. It is interesting to note that the emphasis here is not on what a believer gets from the assembly, but rather on what he can contribute to the assembly. Faithfulness in church attendance encourages others and provokes them to love and good works. One of the strong motives for faithfulness is the soon coming of Jesus Christ." -- Warren Wiersbe (The Bible Exposition Commentary, 1989, Chariot Victor Publishing.)

Good & Evil Both Have Their Harvest

"It must be remembered that evil has its harvest as well as good. there is a harvest of misery and woe, a harvest for the gathering , binding and burning of the tares- as well as for the gathering of the wheat into the garner of heaven." -- Joseph Seiss

Midnight-Fire

Blaise Pascal, the famed 17th-century French scientist and philosopher, experienced in his lifetime a personal, overwhelming encounter with God that changed his life. Those who attended him at his death found a worn, creased paper in his clothing, close to his heart; apparently a reminder of what he had felt and sensed in God's very presence. In Pascal's own hand it read:

"From about half-past ten at night, to about half after midnight-fire! 0 God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob - not the God of philosophers or the wise. The God of Jesus Christ who can be known only in the ways of the Gospel. Security. Feeling. Peace. Joy. Tears of joy-Amen!"

Problem of Forgivness

". . . you must make every effort to kill every taste of resentment in your own heart—every wish to humiliate or hurt him or to pay him out. The difference between this situation and the one in such you are asking God’s forgiveness is this. In our own case we accept excuses too easily; in other people’s we do not accept them easily enough.

As regards my own sin it is a safe bet (though not a certainty) that the excuses are not really so good as I think; as regards other men’s sins against me it is a safe bet (though not a certainty) that the excuses are better than I think. One must therefore begin by attending to everything which may show that the other man was not so much to blame as we thought.

But even if he is absolutely fully to blame we still have to forgive him; and even if ninety-nine percent of his apparent guilt can be explained away by really good excuses, the problem of forgiveness begins with the one percent guilt which is left over. To excuse what can really produce good excuses is not Christian character; it is only fairness. To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.

This is hard. It is perhaps not so hard to forgive a single great injury. But to forgive the incessant provocations of daily life—to keep on forgiving the bossy mother-in-law, the bullying husband, the nagging wife, the selfish daughter, the deceitful son—how can we do it? Only, I think, by remembering where we stand, by meaning our words when we say in our prayers each night ‘forgive our trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us.’ We are offered forgiveness on no other terms. To refuse it is to refuse God’s mercy for ourselves. There is no hint of exceptions and God means what He says" -- C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory (New York: Harper Collins, 2001; Originally published 1949), 181-183

How to respond in times of trouble

In times of trouble say first, "He brought me here. It is by His will I am in this strait place, in that I will rest."

Next, "He will keep me here in His love, and give me grace in this trial to behave as His child."

Then say, "He will make the trial a blessing, teaching me lessons He intends me to learn, and working in the grace He means to bestow."

And last say, "In His good time He can bring me out again. How and when, He knows."

Therefore say, "I am here: by God's appointment, in His keeping, under His training, and for His time."

Success a breeding ground for ethical failure

"Not every man can carry a full cup. Sudden elevation frequently leads to pride and a fall. The most exacting test of all to survive is prosperity." -- Oswald Chambers

Fear or Faith?

"Fear imprisons, faith liberates; fear paralyzes, faith empowers; fear disheartens, faith encourages; fear sickens, faith heals; fear makes useless, faith makes serviceable—and, most of all, fear puts hopelessness at the heart of life, while faith rejoices in its God." - Harry Emerson Fosdick

The Effect of Worship

Richard J. Foster said, "If worship does not change us, it has not been worship. To stand before the Holy One of eternity is to change. Worship begins in holy expectancy; it ends in holy obedience."

Fear imprisons, faith liberates ...

Fear imprisons, faith liberates; fear paralyzes, faith empowers; fear disheartens, faith encourages; fear sickens, faith heals; fear makes useless, faith makes serviceable—and, most of all, fear puts hopelessness at the heart of life, while faith rejoices in its God.

-- Harry Emerson Fosdick