Christianity - Christianity 2

People in general are equally horrified at hearing the Christian religion doubted, and at seeing it practiced. Samuel Butler

When you think of Jesus as "Prince of Peace," you immediately think of his character.
Jesus was a man of peace.  You see this as you watch him in the different circumstances of life.
He was able to fall asleep in the ship in the midst of a storm so threatening that even
his fishermen disciples were terrified.  He looked at over five thousand hungry people
and he knew what he would do.  Our Lord's peace didn't come from the absence of trouble.
It came from the depths of his soul where he fellowshipped with the Father.
Peace and character go together.  What we do depends a great deal on what we are.
The secret of our Lord's peace was his relationship to his Father.  He loved the Father,
and therefore he trusted the Father.  This gave him peace.

Warren W. Wiersbe

The glory of the star, the glory of the sun--we must not lose either
in the other.  We must not be so full of the hope of heaven that
we cannot do our work on the earth; we must not be so lost in the work
of the earth that we shall not be inspired by the hope of heaven.

Phillips Brooks

Christ himself came down and took possession of me. . .
I had never foreseen the possibility of that,
of a real contact, person to person, here below, between a human being and God. . .
in this sudden possession of me by Christ, neither my sense nor my imagination had any part:
I only felt in the midst of my suffering the presence of a love.

Simone Weil

Robert Fulghum

When we're helping other people, we're nourishing our soul. Depression or unhappiness
means we've got the wrong goal. We have forgotten that peace of mind is our only goal.
By concentrating on helping another person, we renew contact with our soul and with God.
We can feel peaceful again. A sense of joy surrounds us and all
the frustration, agitation, and self-anger disappears.
   Peace of mind has nothing to do with the external world; it has only to do with
our connection with God. Love really is the answer. We're here only to teach love.
When we're doing that, our souls are singing and dancing. When we remind ourselves
that we are spiritual beings, that life and love are the flame eternal, that's when our soul is nourished.

Gerald Jampolsky

 HOME - contents - abundance - acceptance - achievement - action - adversity - advertising - aging - ambition - anger - anticipation
apathy - appreciation - arrogance - attitude - authenticity - awakening - awareness - awe - balance - beauty - being yourself
beliefs - body - brooding - busyness - celebration - challenges - change - character - children - choices - Christianity
coincidence - commitment - common sense - community - comparison - compassion - complaining - compliments - compromise
confidence - conformity - conscience - contentment - control - courage - covetousness - creativity - criticism - cruelty -  death
desire - determination - discouragement - diversity - doubt - dreams - earth - education - ego - encouragement - enlightenment
enthusiasm - envy - eternity - experience - failure -  faith - family - fault-finding - fear - finances - flowers - forgiveness - freedom
friendship - fun - gardening - generosity - gentleness - giving - goals - God - goodness - grace - gratitude - greed - grief - growing up
guilt - happiness - hatred - healing - health - helpfulness - home - honesty - hope - hospitality - humility - ideals -idleness  - idolatry
ignorance -  imagination - impatience - individuality - inspiration - integrity - introspection - intuition - jealousy - joy - judgment - kindness
knowledge - laughter - laziness - leadership - learning - letting go - life - listening - loneliness - love - lying - marriage - materialism - meanness
mindfulness - miracles - mistakes - mistrust - mystery - nature - negative attitude - now - oneness - open-mindedness - opportunity - optimism
pain - patience - peace - perfectionism - perseverance - perspective - pessimism - play - positive thoughts - possessions - potential - prayer
prejudice - pride - principle - purpose - relationships - religion - resentment - respect - responsibility - rest - revenge - risk - role models - sadness
safety - self - self-love - self-pity - self-respect - serving others - shame - silence - simplicity - solitude - spirit - stress - stupidity - success
thoughts - time - today - trust - truth - unfulfilled dreams - values - vanity - war - weight issues - wisdom - wonder - work - worship - youth
spring - summer - fall - winter - worry - Christmas - Thanksgiving - New Year - America - zen sayings - Native American wisdom
The Law of Attraction  - obstacles to living life fully - e-zine archives - quotations contents - our most recent e-zine - articles

Most incredible, however, are the times we know Christ is with us in the midst
of our daily, routine lives. In the middle of cleaning the house or driving somewhere in the pick-up,
He stops us. . . in our tracks and makes His presence known. Often it's in the middle of
the most mundane task that He lets us know He is there with us. We realize, then,
that there can be no "ordinary" moments for people who live their lives with Jesus.

Michael Card
(ellipsis are from source)

Our fathers and mothers looked well to the root of the tree and were willing to wait with patience
for the fruit to appear.  We demand the fruit immediately even though the root may be weak
and knobby or missing altogether.  Impatient Christians today explain away the simple beliefs
of the saints of other days and smile off their serious-minded approach to God
and sacred things . . . . Much that passes for Christianity today is the brief bright effort
of the severed branch to bring forth its fruit in its season.  But the deep laws of life are against it.
Preoccupation with appearances and a corresponding neglect of the out-of-sight root
of the true spiritual life are prophetic signs which go unheeded.  Immediate "results" are
all that matter, quick proofs of present success without a thought of next week
or next year. . . . Bear your cross, follow your Lord and pay no heed
to the passing religious vogue.  The masses are always wrong.
In every generation the number of righteous is small.
Be sure you are among them.

A.W. Tozer

True Christianity is an entirely positive influence.  It comes into a person's life to enlarge and enrich it,
to make it fuller and wider and better; never to restrict it.  You cannot lose anything that is
worth having through acquiring a knowledge of the Truth.  Sacrifice there has to be, but it is only
sacrifice of the things that one is much happier without--never of anything that is worth having.
Many people have the idea that getting a better knowledge of God will mean giving up things
that they will regret losing.  One girl said: "I mean to take up religion later on when I am older,
but I want to enjoy myself for a while first."  This, however, is to miss the whole point.
The things one has to sacrifice are selfishness, fear, and belief in necessary limitation
of any kind.  Above all, one has to sacrifice the belief that there is any power or endurance
in evil apart from the power that we ourselves give it by believing in it.

Emmet Fox

Though Christian charity sounds a very cold thing to people whose heads are full of sentimentality,
and though it is quite distinct from affection, yet it leads to affection. The difference between a Christian
and a worldly person is not that the worldly person has only affections or "likings" and the Christian
has only "charity." The worldly person treats certain people kindly because he or she "likes" them:
the Christians, trying to treat everyone kindly, find themselves liking more and more people
as they go on--including people they could not even have imagined themselves liking at the beginning.

C.S. Lewis

This information should grip us with terror. It means that the greatest revival in history
has so far been impotent to change society. It's revival without reformation. It's a revival
which left the country floundering in spiritual ignorance. It's a change in belief
without a corresponding change in behavior. . . .

The American Gospel has evolved into a gospel of addition without subtraction.
It is the belief that we can add Christ to our lives, but not subtract sin. It is a change in belief
without a change in behavior. It is a spiritual experience without any cultural impact.
It is revival without reformation, without repentance. . . .

The proof of religious conversion is to demonstrate that we have both added a relationship
with Christ and that we have subtracted sin (repentance). And we multiply proof
to a weary world by what we do--our deeds, our obedience. What we do must confirm
what we say. Our deeds are the proof of our repentance.

Patrick Morley

In our whole life melody the music is broken off here and there by rests,
and we foolishly think we have come to the end of time.  God sends
a time of forced leisure, a time of sickness and disappointed plans, and makes
a sudden pause in the hymns of our lives, and we lament that our voice
must be silent and our part missing in the music which ever goes up
to the ear of our Creator.  Not without design does God write the music
of our lives.  Be it ours to learn the time and not be dismayed
at the rests.  If we look up, God will beat the time for us.

John Ruskin

I compare the troubles which we have to undergo in the course of the year
to a great bundle of sticks, far too large for us to lift. But God does not require us
to carry the whole at once. He mercifully unties the bundle, and gives us first one stick,
which we are to carry today, and then another, which we are to carry tomorrow, and so on.
This we might easily manage, if we would only take the burden appointed for us each day;
but we choose to increase our troubles by carrying yesterday's stick over again today,
and adding tomorrow's burden to our load, before we are required to bear it.

John Newton

Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones;
and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily task,
go to sleep in peace. God is awake.

Victor Hugo

Just as there comes a warm sunbeam into every cottage window,
so comes a lovebeam of God's care and pity for every separate need.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

St. Francis of Sales

Henry van Dyke

Communication with God--prayer--is a two-way conversation! It is not just the voice
of praise and petitions, but often communion.  Sitting in silence with God,
listening for whatever He may want to say.  Simply enjoy the fact that He is,
and you are, and you have a relationship with Him.  These special moments with God
are when His fresh breezes can enter your heart and refresh you.

anon

Betty Eadie

I would be true, for there are those who trust me;
I would be pure, for there are those who care;
I would be strong, for there is much to suffer;
I would be brave, for there is much to dare.

I would be friend of all--the foe, the friendless;
I would be giving, and forget the gift;
I would be humble, for I know my weakness;
I would look up, and laugh, and love, and lift.

I would be learning, day by day, the lessons
My heavenly Father gives me in his Word;
I would be quick to hear his slightest whisper,
And prompt and glad to do the things I've heard.

Harold Arnold Walter

Wilferd A. Peterson

Every praying Christian, every person who has an encounter with God,
must have a passionate concern for his or her brother or sister,
his or her neighbor. To treat any one of these as if he were less than
the child of God is to deny the validity of one's spiritual existence.

"Clark, what in your honest opinion is the right standard for determining conduct?
Is the only right standard for everyone, the probable action of Jesus Christ?
Would you say that the highest, best law for a man to live by was contained in asking
the question 'What would Jesus do?' And then doing it regardless of results?
In other words, do you think men everywhere ought to follow Jesus' example
as closely as they can in their daily lives?"

And so one may be without connection with any church, and even
without connection with any established religion, and yet be in spirit,
hence in reality, a much truer Christian than hosts of those who profess
to be His most ardent followers, as indeed Jesus Himself so many
times says. “By their fruits ye shall know them,” said He.
“Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter
into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth
the will of my Father which is in heaven.”

Ralph Waldo Trine

Yes, the Christian religion is an inspiring, health-giving activity.  Jesus said:
"I came that ye might have life and have it more abundantly."  Jesus denounced
and attacked the dry forms and dead rituals that passed for religion in his day.
He was a rebel.  He preached a new kind of religion--a religion that threatened
to upset the world.  That is why he was crucified.  He preached the religion should
exist for people--not people for religion; that the Sabbath was made for people--
not people for the Sabbath.  He talked more about fear than he did about sin.
The wrong kind of fear is a sin--a sin against your health, a sin against the richer,
fuller happier, courageous life that Jesus advocated.  Emerson spoke of himself as
a "Professor of the Science of Joy."  Jesus, too, was a teacher of "the Science of Joy."
He commanded his disciples to "rejoice and leap for joy."

Dale Carnegie