Category Archives: Quotes

Words: Part II

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Speaking of how humility factors in the journey of every person, Joan Chittister said it this way…

Humility requires first and foremost what the ancients called memoria dei, ‘the awareness of God,’ at all times, in all places, at the center of all things.  It is so easy to make ourselves gods of the tiny little kingdoms we occupy.  We climb very small ladders and then assume that we have risen to the heights of our humanity.

The realization that God is god and that we are not requires serious reflection.  Striving for all the tops of all the pyramids in the world will not change the fact that no person ever really reaches the top of anything and that the real acme of creation lies deep within the soul and waits for us to bow before it in awareness and in praise.  Those whose lives are lived without listening to their hearts, those who make themselves, their work, their status, their money their god, never find the God of the universe, who waits quietly within for us to exhaust our compulsive race to nowhere. 

Words

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I’ve had more chance to read recently than usual.  And I’m thankful.

Words are powerful in my world.  It’s regularly impressed upon me how the lives of people I’ve never met have spoken powerfully into my own life… through thoughts thought, language found, and words recorded.

I like to dream that my words might do that for someone someday.  I’d like to try.

Then a line from a Zorro movie comes to mind…

“You were trying.  She was succeeding.”

And so I follow this post with several from people who’ve recently succeeded in blessing me with their words.

Eugene Peterson on Sabbath

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A friend (can I call you that, Darin?) passed this on to me some time ago. After reading it several times, it’s time to post it.

This is from “Christ Plays in Ten thousand Places” (page 117)…

If there is no Sabbath- no regular and commanded not-working, not-talking — we soon become totally absorbed in what we are doing and saying, and God’s work is either forgotten or marginalized. When we work we are most god-like, which means that it is in our work that it is easier to develop god-pretensions. Un-sabbathed, our work becomes the entire context in which we define our lives. We lose God-consciousness, God-awareness, sightings of resurrection. We lose the capacity to sing “this is my fathers world” and end up chirping little self-centred ditties about what we are doing and feeling.

The Most difficult command to keep, a most difficult practice to cultivate. It is one of the most abused and distorted practices of the Christians life. Many through the centuries have suffered much under oppressive Sabbath regimes. And more than a few of us have been among the oppressors.

Recent years have convinced me that most of us have missed this Sabbath thing seriously, if not completely.

Whereas we sometimes perceive it as a law or tedious set of rules that Jesus appears to have disliked, Scripture appears to paint it more as a divine rhythm, a thread in the fabric of reality. It just might be built right into the very essence of the universe.

And if any of that is true, then swimming against the flow might prove to be more destructive than we might have first imagined.

If you haven’t started chewing on the Sabbath idea yet, it’s time to begin.

Peterson is a good fellow to start with, so pop that piece in and start chewing.

Words by Richard Wurmbrand

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Do you know this man? 

Richard Wurmbrand.

Among much else, he’s the founder of Voice of the Martyrs, which I have mentioned in an earlier post… and will likely continue to mention.

Here’s something he wrote in “In God’s Underground“, which tells of his time in prison for his faith…

“The prison years did not seem long for me, for I discovered, alone in my cell, that beyond belief and love there is a delight in God: a deep and extraordinary ecstasy of happiness that is like nothing in this world.  And when I came out of jail I was like someone who comes down from a mountaintop where he has seen for miles around the peace and beauty of the countryside, and now returns to the plain.”

Man… do those words make anyone else stir just a bit?! 

Or shake your head?

Words by Scott Pollard

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After making one of the biggest trades in NBA history by acquring Kevin Garnett, the Boston Celtics had a roster of three all-stars with few to no solid role players. That was addressed this week as Eddie House and Scott Pollard were added.  Here’s what I love about Pollard, who averaged 1 point and 1.3 rebounds a game last year… these are his words from his press conference…

“Getting Kevin Garnett has been kind of a big deal. But now that us two are here, you really have a chance,” Pollard joked on Thursday at news conference. “I’m excited to be the cornerstone of this team.”

Classic!