December 1, 2005
Ask your children two questions this Christmas. First: "What do you want to give to others for Christmas?" Second: "What do you want for Christmas?" The first fosters generosity of heart and an outward focus. The second can breed selfishness if not tempered by the first.
Anonymous
December 2, 2005
Hold to patience in your hearts, my friends, and put it into action when the situation calls for it. Don't let any abusive word from your neighbour stir up hatred in you, and don't allow any loss of things that pass away to upset you. If you are steadfast in fearing the loss of those things that last forever, you will never take seriously the loss of those that pass away; if you keep your eyes fixed on the glory of our eternal recompense, you will not resent a temporal injury. You must bear with those who oppose you, but also love those you bear with. Seek an eternal reward in return for your temporal losses.
Gregory the Great
Biography
December 3, 2005
Living is learning the meaning of words. That does not mean the long ten syllable words we have to look up in the dictionary. The really great words to master are short ones work, love, hope, joy, pain, home, child, life, death.
Halford E. Luccock
December 4, 2005
True contentment is the power of getting out of any situation all that there is in it.
Gilbert Keith G. K. Chesterton
American Chesterton Society
December 5, 2005
Anxiety is not only a pain which we must ask God to assuage but also a weakness we must ask Him to pardon; for He's told us to take no care for the morrow.
(Clive Staples) C. S. Lewis
Into The Wardrobe
December 6, 2005
Christianity is strange. It bids man recognize that he is vile, even abominable, and bids him desire to be like God. Without such a counterpoise, this dignity would make him horribly vain, or this humiliation would make him terribly abject.
Blaise Pascal
Biography
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Redeeming the Season: Simple Ideas for a Memorable and Meaningful Christmas Please support this ministry site. |
December 7, 2005
The man who gazes upon and contemplates day by day the face of the Lord Jesus Christ, and who has caught the glow of the reality that the Lord is not a theory but an indwelling power and force in his life, is as a mirror reflecting the glory of the Lord.
Alan Redpath
Brief Biography And Bibliography
December 8, 2005
One response was given by the innkeeper when Mary and Joseph wanted to find a room where the Child could be born. The innkeeper was not hostile; he was not opposed to them, but his inn was crowded; his hands were full; his mind was preoccupied. This is the answer that millions are giving today. Like a Bethlehem innkeeper, they cannot find room for Christ. All the accommodations in their hearts are already taken up by other crowding interests. Their response is not atheism. It is not defiance. It is preoccupation and the feeling of being able to get on reasonably well without Christianity.
Billy Graham
Billy Graham Organization
December 9, 2005
Whenever I find myself in the cellar of affliction, I always look about for the wine.
Samuel Rutherford
Selected Letters
December 10, 2005
Just as worship begins in holy expectancy, it ends in holy obedience. If worship does not propel us into greater obedience, it has not been worship.
Richard J. Foster
Brief Biography and List of Works
December 11, 2005
In our physical bodies a toothache makes the whole body react in sympathy; the cessation of that ache makes the whole body give a sigh of relief. Why can't it be that way in the Church? Is it because we're so blind to the close and sympathetic union that Scripture enjoins between the members, that we allow the folly of selfishness to take the place of the wisdom of unselfishness?
Anonymous
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101 Ways to Have a Christian Christmas By Brenda Verner For anyone who longs to experience the true spirit of Christmas, Brenda Verner, the Christian Christmas Lady, provides 101 ways to focus on Jesus this Christmas season. Her practical, creative tips include straightforward projects that focus the home on Christ, fun ways to create family traditions, and for the brave and ambitious, even ways to make an impact for Christ in the community. Easy-to-use tips are divided by category for easy reference. The book has a design-driven two-color interior and attractive packaging that makes it perfect for gift-giving. |
December 12, 2005
How little chance the Holy Spirit has nowadays. The churches and missionary societies have so bound Him in red tape that they practically ask Him to sit in a corner while they do the work themselves.
Charles Thomas (C. T.) Studd
Biography
December 13, 2005
There is no thirst of the soul so consuming as the desire for pardon. The sense of its bestowal is the starting-point of all goodness. It comes bringing with it, if not the freshness of innocence, yet a glow of inspiration that nerves feeble hands for hard tasks, a fire of hope that lights anew the old high ideal, so that it stands before the eye in clear relief, beckoning its to make it out, own. To be able to look into God's face, and know with the knowledge of faith that there is nothing between the soul and Him, is to experience the fullest peace the soul can know. Whatever else pardon may be, it is above all things admission into full fellowship with God.
Charles H. Brent
Brief Biography
December 14, 2005
Truth is truth, whether it's spoken by the lips of Jesus or Balaam's donkey.
George Macdonald
The Golden Key Website
More George MacDonald Materials
December 15, 2005
The birth of Jesus -- Savior, Messiah, Lord -- translates all that is shabby, despairing, and dying into newness, joy, and life. It is a language that even we can hear. A four-year old boy asked, "What's all the fuss about a baby when there's more to the story?" He was right. If we only focus on the birth of Jesus as a sweet story we like remembering, then we miss out on what can happen for us tonight. The God who comes to be with us can take the shabby, hurting, dirty, abandoned, humiliating parts of ourselves and will make them and us new.
Jennie C. Olbrych
December 16, 2005
When a mother saw a thunderstorm forming in mid-afternoon, she worried about her seven-year-old daughter who would be walking the three blocks from school to home. Deciding to meet her, the mother saw her walking nonchalantly along, stopping to smile whenever lightning flashed. Seeing her mother, the little girl ran to her, explaining happily, "All the way home, God's been taking my picture!" Fear is often caused by our perspective.
Anonymous
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Redeeming the Season: Simple Ideas for a Memorable and Meaningful Christmas By Kim Wier & Pam McCune Does your Christmas bring fear of mounting debt and mounds of wrapping paper? Then you'll appreciate these hilarious stories and heartwarming suggestions on how to simplify your celebration and focus on its true significance. Includes ideas for coffee and caroling; family nights; "Gift with Purchase" angels; keepsake holiday cards; "attribute" ornaments; and more. 128 pages, hardcover from Focus on the Family. |
December 17, 2005
Grant that I may not pray alone with the mouth; help me that I may pray from the depths of my heart.
Martin Luther
Biography and Information
December 18, 2005
In a Tibetan village I noticed a crowd of people standing under a burning tree and looking up into the branches. I came near and discovered in the branches a bird which was anxiously flying round a nest full of young ones. The mother bird wanted to save her little ones, but she could not. When the fire reached the nest the people waited breathlessly to see what she would do. No one could climb the tree, no one could help her. Now she could easily have saved her own life by flight, but instead of fleeing she sat down on the nest, covering the little ones carefully with her wings. The fire seized her and burnt her to ashes. She showed her love to her little ones by giving her life for them. If then, this little insignificant creature had such love, how much more must our Heavenly Father love His children, the Creator love His creatures!
Sadhu Sundar Singh
Short Biography
December 19, 2005
It is Christmas every time you let God love others through you... yes, it is Christmas every time you smile at your brother and offer him your hand.
Mother Teresa
Informational Website
December 20, 2005
The devil knows if he can capture your thought life he has won a mighty victory over you.
Smith Wigglesworth
Biography
December 21, 2005
Humility is a strange flower; it grows best in winter weather, and under storms of affliction.
Samuel Rutherford
Selected Letters
December 22, 2005
Jesus Christ became Incarnate for one purpose, to make a way back to God that man might stand before Him as He was created to do, the friend and lover of God Himself.
Oswald Chambers
My Utmost for His Highest
December 23, 2005
Avarice, greed, concupiscence and so forth are all based on the mathematical truism that the more you get, the more you have. The remark of that it is more blessed to give than to receive is based on the human truth that the more you give away in love, the more you are. It is not just for the sake of other people that tells us to give rather than get, but for our own sakes too.
Frederick Buechner
Unofficial Website
More Frederick Buechner Materials
December 24, 2005
The cry of this world for meaning and hope and life, was met one morning far away in the cry of a tiny babe. And with that cry time stopped and started again. And it was new.
Anonymous
December 25, 2005
The Christ-child lay on Mary's lap,
His hair was like a light.
(Oh weary, weary was the world,
But here is all alright.)
Ah, dearest Jesus, Holy Child,
Make thee bed, soft, undefiled
Within my heart, that it may be
A quiet chamber, kept for Thee.
My heart for very joy does leap
My lips no more can silence keep,
I must sing with joyful tongue
That sweetest ancient cradle song.
Gilbert Keith G. K. Chesterton
American Chesterton Society
December 26, 2005
In a couple of days another Christmas will be over. Decorations will be taken down and the grind of daily life will resume. We must do something to remember that the message and meaning of Christmas does not cease when the celebration is over. Christmas is not really about a celebration, Christmas trees, and piles of gifts. Christmas, the coming of Christ, is about everyday life. God is with us and we need to do anything we can, to remember that fact the rest of the year.
Bruce Goettsche
Union Church of La Harpe
December 27, 2005
Let us seek the grace of a cheerful heart, an even temper, sweetness, gentleness, and brightness of mind, as walking in His light, and by His grace. Let us pray to Him to give us the spirit of ever-abundant, everspringing love, which overpowers and sweeps away the vexations of life by its own richness and strength, and which, above all things, unites us to Him who is the fountain and the centre of all mercy, loving-kindness, and joy.
John Henry Newman
Biography
December 28, 2005
Your God is love; love Him and in Him all men, as His children in Christ. Your Lord is a fire; do not let your heart be cold, but burn with faith and love. Your Lord is light; do not walk in darkness. Your Lord is a God of mercy and bountifulness; be also a source of mercy and bountifulness to your neighbours.
Anonymous
December 29, 2005
Preachers with cold hearts will never warm and awaken the consciences of their hearers. Preaching is more than delivering a message from God; it is delivering a message from God in a manner consistent with that content. The message concerns the fire of God's love and the fire of his judgment and hence can be authentically proclaimed only by hearts kindled with the fire of the Holy Spirit. False emotionalism, and the unrealistic dramatization of the message, do not honour the Lord and tend only to alienate non Christians further. But there is a true engagement of the heart in preaching... which is stamped with sincerity and which is an authentic reflection of the heart of the God whose gospel we proclaim. God is looking today for preachers who like his Son will cry out?.
Bruce Milne
December 30, 2005
It is astonishing that scientists will dismiss the idea of a Creator as unscientific, yet turn around and embrace the bizarre, almost mystical concept of a conscious universe.
Charles (Chuck) Colson
Breakpoint
December 31, 2005
I'm part of the fellowship of the unashamed. I have Holy Spirit power. The die has been cast. I have stepped over the line. The decision has been made. I'm a disciple of His. I won't look back, let up, slow down, back away, or be still.
My past is redeemed, my present makes sense, my future is secure. I'm finished with low living, sight walking, small planning, smooth knees, colorless dreams, tamed visions, mundane talking, cheap living, and dwarfed goals.
I no longer need pre-eminence, prosperity, position, promotions, plaudits, or popularity. I don't have to be right, first, tops, recognized, praised, regarded, or rewarded. I now live by faith, lean on His presence, walk by patience, lift by prayer, and labor by power.
My face is set, my gait is fast, my goal is heaven, my road is narrow, my way rough, my companions few, my guide reliable, my mission clear. I cannot be bought, compromised, detoured, lured away, turned back, deluded or delayed. I will not flinch in the face of sacrifice, hesitate in the presence of the adversary, negotiate at the table of the enemy, ponder at the pool of popularity, or meander in the maze of mediocrity.
I won't give up, shut up, let up, until I have stayed up, stored up, prayed up, paid up, preached up for the cause of Christ. I am a disciple of Jesus. I must go till He comes, give till I drop, preach till all know, and work till He stops me. And when He comes for His own, He will have no problems recognizing me - my banner will be clear!
Anonymous African Pastor - Nailed to his wall.
November 2005 / January 2006
