and this too shall pass...

"and this too shall pass away..." How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! - how consoling in the depths of affliction!" - Abraham Lincoln

To see Jesus...

And for you and me, too, that will be the greatest of all sights. When we awake from the dream men call life, when we put off the image of the earth and break the bonds of time and mortality, when the scales of time and sense have fallen from our eyes and the garment of corruption has been put off and when this mortality has put on immortality and this corruption has put on incorruption and we awake in the everlasting morning, that will be the sight that will stir us and hold us. ~ Clarence Macartney

Until forever...

I Love you, I adore you

Life without you would be gray... unlivable

Don't you ever go away, forever won't you stay

And when the appointed time comes

 the time when leaf subsides to leaf

we will discard this mortal shell hand in hand amidst of our loves

to be received by our King

 you and I forever, I promise

 until eternity...

Written by Kenneth L Johnson

My own enemy...

Mystified, stymied, confused and wearied. The white flag is in my hand by my side, how badly I want it to wave... if not for them.

Gifted with a curse, cursed with a gift, how easy it is to lose sight, to drift, to just let go in a moment of insanity, how easy...

Misunderstood, looked at as a monster, I intimidate I suppose.

Embraced by a few and that is sad, that hurts.

Can't you see the longing to be a part, behind the walls I've built around my heart, mortared in with the fear of rejection?

I suppose the weirdo I will be, as they constantly say to me, I'll retreat to my cave once again... I am my own worst enemy,

I am my own worst enemy...

Some people...

“Some people bring joy wherever they go, and some people bring joy whenever they go.”


― Mark Twain

The definition of "class" ~ Ann Landers

I was given this by a co-worker who kept a copy in his wallet snipped from the newspaper...

Definition of "Class" by Ann Landers

Class never runs scared. It is surefooted and confident and it can handle whatever comes along.

Class has a sense of humor. It knows that a good laugh is the best lubricant for oiling the machinery of human relations.

Class never makes excuses. It takes lumps and learns from past mistakes.

Class knows good manners are nothing more than a series of petty sacrifices.

Class bespeaks an aristocracy unrelated to ancestors or money. A blue blood can be totally without class while the son of a Welsh miner may ooze class from every pore.

Class can "walk with kings and keep it's virtue and talk with crowds and keep the common touch."

Everyone is comfortable with the person who has class because he is comfortable with himself.

Lord of the years that are left to me...

When I stand at the judgment seat of Christ

And He shows me His plan for me,

The Plan of my life as it might have been

Had He had His way, and I see



How I blocked Him here, and I checked Him there,

And I would not yield my will

Will there be grief in my Savior's eyes,

Grief, though He loves me still?



He would have me rich, and I stand there poor,

Stripped of all but His grace,

While memory runs like a hunted thing

Down the paths I cannot retrace.



Then my desolate heart will well-nigh break

With the tears that I cannot shed;

I shall cover my face with my empty hands,

I shall bow my uncrowned head...



Lord of the years that are left to me,

I give them to Thy hand;

Take me and break me, mould me to

The pattern Thou hast planned!



~Martha Snell Nicholson



Bruce Larson on fellowship.

The neighborhood bar is possibly the best counterfeit there is for the fellowship Christ wants to give His church. It’s an imitation, dispensing liquor instead of grace, escape rather than reality, but it is a permissive, accepting, and inclusive fellowship. It is unshockable. It is democratic. You can tell people secrets and they usually don’t tell others or even want to. The bar flourishes not because most people are alcoholics, but because God has put into the human heart the desire to know and be known, to love and be loved, and so many seek a counterfeit at the price of a few beers.  ~ Bruce Larson

My baby, she wrote me a letter ♥



You...

Written by Angela L. Johnson




Abraham Lincoln Quote

"The inclination to exchange thoughts with one another is probably an original impulse of our nature. If I be in pain I wish to let you know it, and to ask your sympathy and assistance; and my pleasurable emotions also, I wish to communicate too and share with you..."

Abraham Lincoln, February 11, 1859

Secret to true peace

The secret to true peace: Keep short accounts with God. In doing so (honestly that is) you will find you tend to do the same with everyone else.

Ravi Zacharias on the definition of "atheism"...

...Atheism comes from literally the Greek "Alpha" the negative and "Theism" the word Theos for God, negative God, there is no God, that's what the word "Atheism" really means.

 It is not saying, "I do not think there is a God." It is not even saying, "I do not believe there is a God" it is affirming the non-existance of God, it affirms a negative. Now you know we don't need to take too long into that because anyone with an introductory course in philosophy recognizes that it is a logical contradiction, "How can you affirm a negative in the absolute?"

It would be like me saying to you, "there is no such thing as a white stone with black dots anywhere in all of the galaxies of this universe."  The only way I can affirm that is if I had unlimited knowledge of this universe!

So to affirm an absolute negative is self-defeating because what you are saying is, "I have infinite knowledge in order to say to you there is nobody with infinite knowledge."  Atheism as a system is self-defeating!

Bertrand Russell recognized that so he did a quick two-step on it, he moved to agnosticism. Agnosticism is very easy to defend, all you have to prove is that you don't know. Now you see agnosticism actually sounds rather sophisticated when it comes from the Greek, because the alpha is the negative and gnosko is "to know"  i.e "one who doesn't know" from the Latin it sounds much more uncomplementary because it literally is a one on one equation with being an ignoramus, "one who doesn't know" Agnosticism/ignoramus, same idea...

Others May... You cannot

  

My thanks to Pastor Harold Warner III who shared this in a "men's discipleship" sermon...

OTHERS MAY... YOU CANNOT

If God has called you to be really like Jesus He will draw you into a life

of crucifixion and humility, and put upon you such demands of obedience,

that you will not be able to follow other people, or measure yourself by

other Christians, and in many ways He will seem to let other people do

things which He will not let you do.

Other Christians and ministers who seem very religious and useful, may

push themselves, pull wires, and work schemes to carry out their plans,

but you cannot do it, and if you attempt it, you will meet with such

failure and rebuke from the Lord as to make you sorely penitent.

Others may boast of themselves, of their work, of their successes, of

their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such

thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification

that will make you despise yourself and all your good works.

Others may be allowed to succeed in making money, or may have a legacy

left to them, but it is likely God will keep you poor, because He wants

you to have something far better than gold, namely

a helpless dependence upon Him,

that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by

day out of an unseen treasury.

The Lord may let others be honored and put forward, and keep you hidden

in obscurity, because He wants to produce some choice fragrant fruit for

His coming glory, which can only be produced in the shade. He may let

others be great, but keep you small. He may let others do a work for Him

and get the credit for it, but He will make you work and toil on without

knowing how much you are doing; and then to make your work still more

precious He may let others get credit for the work which you have done,

and thus make your reward ten times greater whe Jesus returns.

The Holy Spirit will put a strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and

will rebuke you for little words and feelings or for wasting your time,

which other Christians never feel distressed over. So make up your mind

that God is an Infinitely Sovereign Being, and has a right to do as He

pleases with His own. He may not explain to you a thousand things which

puzzle your reason in His dealings with you, but if you absolutely sell

yourself to be His love slave, He will wrap you up in Jealous Love, and

bestow  upon you many blessings which come only to those who are in the

inner circle.

Settle it forever, then that you are to deal directly with the Holy

Spirit, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or

chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that He does not seem

to use with others. Now, when you are so possessed with the living God

that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this

peculiar, personal, private, jealous guardianship and managment

of the Holy Spirit over your life, then you will have found the vestibule of Heaven.

Others may... You cannot.

  

~G. D. Watson (1845-1924).~