Quotes That Have Spoken To Me Lately

This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.

~George Bernard Shaw

It is not scientific doubt, not atheism, not pantheism, not agnosticism, that in our day and in this land is likely to quench the light of the gospel. It is a proud, sensuous, selfish, luxurious, church-going, hollow-hearted prosperity.

~Frederic D. Huntington, in Forum magazine, 1890

"Live your life in a way that demands explanation."

~Unknown

Burdens

Any concern too small to be a prayer is too small to be a burden.

~ Corrie ten Boom

A New Definition of Ministry

I used to want to be "in ministry". As a kid I thought it would be nice to be a pastor's wife; my grandpa was a Southern Baptist minister and liked the idea of carrying that on, even if I wasn't Baptist! Early in our relationship, Tim and I thought we'd be youth pastors. Time and circumstances eventually changed our minds.

Now my idea of being in ministry has changed. What used to be a title and a job description has become everyday life, reaching out to those around me with the love of Christ. Pastors and those in "official" ministry positions have important and valued places, but sometimes the tough work is best accomplished at the kitchen table- whether you're a pastor, a pastor's wife or a homemaker. As a minister in the field, I have fewer meetings to take up my true ministry time and less planning to do. I'm not concerned with budgets or memberships, sermon preparation or appropriate Sunday attire. What does concern me is the young single mother that God put on my heart at Ian's school. I've started chatting with her, giving her rides when I can and praying for her.

My time in Germany was my personal wilderness experience and now I find myself in a new world and with new ideas of what I'm here for. In the short months since I've begun to see my whole life as fully God's and my daily breath to be used for His glory, it amazes me who I've come in contact with. Lonely new immigrants, single moms, women in difficult marriages, women with emotional issues, women who have lost a mom/dad in the time I've known them. These are all opportunities to share Christ, to be the hands of Jesus in a real way.

We all tend to say we want to do whatever He asks-- but do we mean it? Do you really believe that God has engineered your circumstances to allow you to love someone in a unique way? Look again at your neighbors, your coworkers, the people you go to church with, the cashier at the grocery store; are they your ministry? Does the love of Christ shine through you in a way that blesses them? Have you delved into their lives and seen their needs, how they hurt? Isn't our God big enough for them? Doesn't He live in you? Do you believe God, that he is all they need?

The circumstances of a saint’s life are ordained of God. In the life of a saint there is no such thing as chance. God by His providence brings you into circumstances that you can’t understand at all, but the Spirit of God understands. God brings you to places, among people, and into certain conditions to accomplish a definite purpose through the intercession of the Spirit in you. Never put yourself in front of your circumstances and say, "I’m going to be my own providence here; I will watch this closely, or protect myself from that." All your circumstances are in the hand of God, and therefore you don’t ever have to think they are unnatural or unique. Your part in intercessory prayer is not to agonize over how to intercede, but to use the everyday circumstances and people God puts around you by His providence to bring them before His throne, and to allow the Spirit in you the opportunity to intercede for them. In this way God is going to touch the whole world with His saints.

Am I making the Holy Spirit’s work difficult by being vague and unsure, or by trying to do His work for Him? I must do the human side of intercession— utilizing the circumstances in which I find myself and the people who surround me. I must keep my conscious life as a sacred place for the Holy Spirit. Then as I lift different ones to God through prayer, the Holy Spirit intercedes for them.

Your intercessions can never be mine, and my intercessions can never be yours, ". . . but the Spirit Himself makes intercession" in each of our lives (Romans 8:26). And without that intercession, the lives of others would be left in poverty and in ruin.

~Oswald Chambers

After sanctification, it is difficult to state what your purpose in life is, because God has moved you into His purpose through the Holy Spirit. He is using you now for His purposes throughout the world as He used His Son for the purpose of our salvation. If you seek great things for yourself, thinking, "God has called me for this and for that," you barricade God from using you. As long as you maintain your own personal interests and ambitions, you cannot be completely aligned or identified with God’s interests. This can only be accomplished by giving up all of your personal plans once and for all, and by allowing God to take you directly into His purpose for the world. Your understanding of your ways must also be surrendered, because they are now the ways of the Lord.

I must learn that the purpose of my life belongs to God, not me. God is using me from His great personal perspective, and all He asks of me is that I trust Him. I should never say, "Lord, this causes me such heartache." To talk that way makes me a stumbling block. When I stop telling God what I want, He can freely work His will in me without any hindrance. He can crush me, exalt me, or do anything else He chooses. He simply asks me to have absolute faith in Him and His goodness. Self-pity is of the devil, and if I wallow in it I cannot be used by God for His purpose in the world. Doing this creates for me my own cozy "world within the world," and God will not be allowed to move me from it because of my fear of being "frost-bitten."

~Oswald Chambers

Cheers!

Being Exceptional in the Ordinary Things

Discipleship is built entirely on the supernatural grace of God. Walking on water is easy to someone with impulsive boldness, but walking on dry land as a disciple of Jesus Christ is something altogether different. Peter walked on the water to go to Jesus, but he "followed Him at a distance" on dry land (Mark 14:54). We do not need the grace of God to withstand crises—human nature and pride are sufficient for us to face the stress and strain magnificently. But it does require the supernatural grace of God to live twenty-four hours of every day as a saint, going through drudgery, and living an ordinary, unnoticed, and ignored existence as a disciple of Jesus. It is ingrained in us that we have to do exceptional things for God—but we do not. We have to be exceptional in the ordinary things of life, and holy on the ordinary streets, among ordinary people—and this is not learned in five minutes.

~Oswald Chambers

Baby Zoe

"I have come to the conclusion that faith is more than just claiming the prize. Faith hinges on trust, and trust is understanding that you will not understand. 'His ways are not like our ways, and His thoughts are not like our thoughts.' They are just different, and we cannot comprehend them."

~Jim Simpson, Zoe's father

I've wanted to post about baby Zoe for awhile, but just haven't gotten around to putting the time and effort into it that I want to. I stop over at Zoe's blog now and then and continue to be blessed by the grace and faith that Carmen and Jim display. In the midst of all they are going through, God gets the glory. Most telling of all about their faith in God is how they attribute all praise and honor to Him, no matter what he allows into Zoe's life. Their adoration and faith isn't dependent on circumstances, it hinges alone on God and who he is. What a testimony!

You can get updates on Zoe at this blog. I encourage you to read through it and be blessed. For a list of media stories on the Simpsons and baby Zoe, see this post.

On a side note, Carmen is sister to my beloved blogging friend Nancy at Chocolate Ink. I haven't met Nancy in person, but I feel sure I would love her if I did. Among other things, there's the chocolate thing as well as a mutual love for Harry Connick, Jr!

Knowing God

As it would be cruel to an Amazonian tribesman to fly him to London, put him down without explanation in Trafalgar Square and leave him, as one who knew nothing of English or England, to fend for himself, so we are cruel to ourselves if we try to live in this world without knowing about the God whose world it is and who runs it. The world becomes a strange, mad, painful place, and life in it a disappointing and unpleasant business, for those who do not know about God.

~J.I. Packer, Knowing God

Kicking Moodiness in the Bum

There are certain things in life that we need not pray about— moods, for instance. We will never get rid of moodiness by praying, but we will by kicking it out of our lives. Moods nearly always are rooted in some physical circumstance, not in our true inner self. It is a continual struggle not to listen to the moods which arise as a result of our physical condition, but we must never submit to them for a second. We have to pick ourselves up by the back of the neck and shake ourselves; then we will find that we can do what we believed we were unable to do. The problem that most of us are cursed with is simply that we won’t.

~Oswald Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest

Kindness

Speak tenderly to them.

Let there be kindness in your face, in your eyes,

in your smile, in the warmth of your greeting.

Always have a cheerful smile.

Don't only give your care,

but give your heart as well.

By: Mother Theresa

Size Has Nothing To Do With It

“If you think you're too small to be effective, you have never been in bed with a mosquito.”

~Betty Reese

It's Not About Me

"It is not service that matters, but intense spiritual reality, expecting Jesus Christ at every turn."

"I am not here to realize myself, but to know Jesus"

~Oswald Chambers

Contentment

"If the grass is greener on the other side of the fence, you need to water your lawn."

~Unknown

What We Have To Say

If I thought I had to say it better than anybody else, I'd never start. Better or worse is immaterial. The thing is that it has to be said, by me. We each have to say it, to say it in our own way. Not of our own will, but as it comes out through us. Good or bad, great or little: that isn't what human creation is about. It is that we have to try.

~~ Madeleine L’Engle

A Memory

There are not seven wonders of the world in the eyes

of a child. There are seven million.
~Walt Streightiff

I remember when I was 9 months pregnant with Mark and I desperately wanted him to be born. I would take Amanda, age 2 (almost 3) out for long walks every day. We'd smell the flowers, watch the birds, talk about what was going on around us. To me, it was everyday things I'd already experienced a million times over, but to her it was all new and exciting. I cherish those moments with my first born.

Post by Heather

Redemption

Christ is building His kingdom with earth's broken things. Men want only the strong, the successful, the victorious, the unbroken, in building their kingdoms; but God is the God of the unsuccessful, of those who have failed. Heaven is filling with earth's broken lives, and there is no bruised reed that Christ cannot take and restore to glorious blessedness and beauty. He can take the life crushed by pain or sorrow and make it into a harp whose music shall be all praise. He can lift earth's saddest failure up to heaven's glory.

~J. R. Miller

The Newest Craze...The Rainbow Diet

We took the kids to see Horton Hears a Who. It was such a great movie. My favorite quote was from Katie. She's the one being held by that strange creature on the left.

"In my world all creatures are ponies and they eat rainbows and poop butterflies"

That just made me laugh. It's a great movie if you have the chance to go see it, I highly recommend it.

Post by Heather

(I tried to download the actual scene from youtube, but my computer won't work right now...if you want to see it just go to youtube and type in "Katie" + "Horton Hears a Who"

Happy St Patrick's Day

"There are only two kinds of people in the world, The Irish and those who wish they were."

~Irish saying

Life

“Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it”

~ Charles R Swindoll

Wisdom

“Wisdom is nothing more than healed pain.”

~Robert Gary Lee

I KNEW I liked CS Lewis!

"You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me."

~C.S. Lewis