11 Teach me Your way, LORD,
and I will live by Your truth.
Give me an undivided mind to fear Your name. (M)
12 I will praise You with all my heart, Lord my God,
and will honor Your name forever. (N)
13 For Your faithful love for me is great,
and You deliver my life from the depths of Sheol. (O)
14 God, arrogant people have attacked me;
a gang of ruthless men seeks my life.
They have no regard for You. (P)
15 But You, Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God,
slow to anger and abundant in faithful love and truth. (Q)
16 Turn to me and be gracious to me.
Give Your strength to Your servant;
save the son of Your female servant. (R)
17 Show me a sign of Your goodness;
my enemies will see and be put to shame
because You, LORD, have helped and comforted me.
05 January 2011
02 January 2011
Thought for Today
Our hearts are the wrapping which preserve God’s
word, we need to no more.
-The Koran, Sura 4:155
When was the last time you sat down to have a heart to heart with yourself? Have you really examined your heart lately? Are you harboring childhood wounds? Are you still nursing a broken heart? Are you frightened? Angry? Guilty or ashamed? Is there someone you need to apologize to? Who have you forgiven lately? If God were to speak through your heart today, what would you hear? In the everyday quest to get through life, we sometimes forget we really do have all we need. It’s tucked away safely inside of us. It contributes to our thoughts and motivates our actions. If we clear it out it will actually speak to us and tell us exactly what to do. When was the last time you had a heart to heart with yourself?
With a pure heart, I am balanced in life.
word, we need to no more.
-The Koran, Sura 4:155
When was the last time you sat down to have a heart to heart with yourself? Have you really examined your heart lately? Are you harboring childhood wounds? Are you still nursing a broken heart? Are you frightened? Angry? Guilty or ashamed? Is there someone you need to apologize to? Who have you forgiven lately? If God were to speak through your heart today, what would you hear? In the everyday quest to get through life, we sometimes forget we really do have all we need. It’s tucked away safely inside of us. It contributes to our thoughts and motivates our actions. If we clear it out it will actually speak to us and tell us exactly what to do. When was the last time you had a heart to heart with yourself?
With a pure heart, I am balanced in life.
29 December 2010
Thought for Today
Life Quiz 1
ANONYMOUS
This isn’t like any other quiz . . . don't bother getting a pen and paper.
1. Name the five wealthiest people in the world.
2. Name the last five Heisman Trophy winners.
3. Name the last five winners of the Miss America contest.
4. Name the ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer prizes.
5. Name the last half dozen Academy Award winners for Best Actor and Best Actress.
6. Name the last decades’ worth of World Series winners.
How did you do?
The point is, none of us remembers the headliners of yesterday. And these are no second-rate achievers. They’re the best in their fields. But the applause dies. Awards tarnish. Achievements are forgotten.
Life Quiz 2
ANONYMOUS
Now here’s another quiz. See how you do on this one.
1. Name two teachers who aided your journey through school.
2. Name three friends who helped you through a difficult time.
3. Name five people who taught you something worthwhile.
4. Think of five people who have made you feel appreciated and special.
5. Think of five people you enjoy spending time with.
6. Name six people whose stories have inspired you.
Easier?
The lesson!
The people who make a difference in your life aren’t the ones with the most credentials, the most money, the most awards; they’re the ones who care. On which list would your name be placed?
ANONYMOUS
This isn’t like any other quiz . . . don't bother getting a pen and paper.
1. Name the five wealthiest people in the world.
2. Name the last five Heisman Trophy winners.
3. Name the last five winners of the Miss America contest.
4. Name the ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer prizes.
5. Name the last half dozen Academy Award winners for Best Actor and Best Actress.
6. Name the last decades’ worth of World Series winners.
How did you do?
The point is, none of us remembers the headliners of yesterday. And these are no second-rate achievers. They’re the best in their fields. But the applause dies. Awards tarnish. Achievements are forgotten.
Life Quiz 2
ANONYMOUS
Now here’s another quiz. See how you do on this one.
1. Name two teachers who aided your journey through school.
2. Name three friends who helped you through a difficult time.
3. Name five people who taught you something worthwhile.
4. Think of five people who have made you feel appreciated and special.
5. Think of five people you enjoy spending time with.
6. Name six people whose stories have inspired you.
Easier?
The lesson!
The people who make a difference in your life aren’t the ones with the most credentials, the most money, the most awards; they’re the ones who care. On which list would your name be placed?
27 December 2010
Thought for Today
8 I know your works. Because you have limited strength, have kept My word, and have not denied My name, look, I have placed before you an open door that no one is able to close. Rev 3:8
21 December 2010
Thought for Today
A Share in Suffering
It is only by living completely in this world that one learns to have faith. One must completely abandon any attempt to make something of oneself, whether it be a saint, or a converted sinner, or a chuchman (a so called priestly type!), a righteous person or an unrighteous one, a sick person or a healthy one. By this-worldliness I mean living unreservedly in life’s duties, problems, successes and failures, experiences and perplexities. In so doing we throw ourselves completely into the arms of God, taking seriously not our own sufferings. But those of God in the world-watching with Christ in Gethsemane. That, I think, is faith; that is metanoia; and that is how one becomes human and a Christian. How can success make us arrogant, or failure lead us astray, when we share in God’s sufferings through a life of this kind?
from A Testament to Freedom 510
It is only by living completely in this world that one learns to have faith. One must completely abandon any attempt to make something of oneself, whether it be a saint, or a converted sinner, or a chuchman (a so called priestly type!), a righteous person or an unrighteous one, a sick person or a healthy one. By this-worldliness I mean living unreservedly in life’s duties, problems, successes and failures, experiences and perplexities. In so doing we throw ourselves completely into the arms of God, taking seriously not our own sufferings. But those of God in the world-watching with Christ in Gethsemane. That, I think, is faith; that is metanoia; and that is how one becomes human and a Christian. How can success make us arrogant, or failure lead us astray, when we share in God’s sufferings through a life of this kind?
from A Testament to Freedom 510
17 December 2010
Thouhgt for Today
Witness
Sitting here one night six floors up on my little balcony when
I heard shots and saw them boys running. My eyes went straight
to the lot beside Mason’s bar and I saw something black not
moving in the weeds and knew a body lying there and knew it
was dead. A fifteen year old boy the papers said. Whole bunch
of sirens and cops and spinning lights the night I’m talking about.
I watched till after they rolled him away and then everything got
quiet again as it ever gets round here so I’m sure the boy’s people
not out there that night. Didn’t see them till next morning when
I’m looking down at those weeds and a couple’s coming slow on
Frankstown with a girl by the hand, had to be the boy’s baby sis-
ter. They pass terrible Mason’s and stop right at the spot the boy
died. Then they commence to swaying, bowing, hugging, wav-
ing their arms about. Forgive me, Jesus, but look like they grief
dancing, like the sidewalk too cold or too hot they had to jump
around not to burn up. How’d his people find the exact spot.
Did they hear my old mind working to lead them, guide them
along like I would if I could get up out this damn wheelchair and
take them by the hand.
excerpt from Briefs by John Edgar Wideman
Sitting here one night six floors up on my little balcony when
I heard shots and saw them boys running. My eyes went straight
to the lot beside Mason’s bar and I saw something black not
moving in the weeds and knew a body lying there and knew it
was dead. A fifteen year old boy the papers said. Whole bunch
of sirens and cops and spinning lights the night I’m talking about.
I watched till after they rolled him away and then everything got
quiet again as it ever gets round here so I’m sure the boy’s people
not out there that night. Didn’t see them till next morning when
I’m looking down at those weeds and a couple’s coming slow on
Frankstown with a girl by the hand, had to be the boy’s baby sis-
ter. They pass terrible Mason’s and stop right at the spot the boy
died. Then they commence to swaying, bowing, hugging, wav-
ing their arms about. Forgive me, Jesus, but look like they grief
dancing, like the sidewalk too cold or too hot they had to jump
around not to burn up. How’d his people find the exact spot.
Did they hear my old mind working to lead them, guide them
along like I would if I could get up out this damn wheelchair and
take them by the hand.
excerpt from Briefs by John Edgar Wideman
21 November 2010
Thought for Today
I am your constant companion. I am your greatest helper or heaviest burden. I will push you onward or drag you down to failure. I am completely at your command. Half the things you do you might just as well turn over to me and I will be able to do them quickly and correctly. I am easily managed--you must merely be firm with me. Show me exactly how you want something done and after a few lessions I will do it automatically. I am the servant of all great men; and alas, of all failures, as well. Those who are great, I have made great. Those who are failures, I have made failures. I am not a machine, though I work with all the precision of a machine plus the intelligence of a man. You may run me for profit or run me for ruin--it makes no difference to me. Take me, train me, be firm with me, and I will place the world at your feet. Be easy with me and I will destroy you. Who am I? I am habit!
-Anonymous
-Anonymous
Thought for Today
I am your constant companion. I am your greatest helper or heaviest burden. I will push you onward or drag you down to failure. I am completely are your command. Halt the things yo do you might just as well turn over to me and I will be able to do them quickly and correctly. I am easily managed--you must merely be firm with me. Show me exactly how you want something done and after a few sessions I will do it automatically. I am the servant of all great men; and alas, of all failures, as well. Those who are great, I have made them great. Those who are failures, I have made failures. I am not a machine, though I work with all the precision of a machine plus the intelligence of a man. You may run me for profit or run me for ruin--it makes no difference to me. Take me, train me, be firm with me, and I will place the world at your feet. Be easy with me and I will destroy you. Who am I? I am habit!
-Anonymous
-Anonymous
09 November 2010
Thought for Today
"Doubtless it is a rule in poetry that if you do your own work well, you will find you have done also work you never dreamed of."
-C.S. Lewis
-C.S. Lewis
08 November 2010
Thought for Today
Exploring the question brings more wisdom than having the answer.
— A Course in Miracles
If you attack a problem, you are going to get your butt whipped. Anything you attack will fight back. Chances are, if you have a problem, it is bigger than you; it crept up on you or you didn’t know what you were doing in the first place. Don’t attack your problems. Face them, confess them, and understand what they are— that is the process. The process teaches and brings a richness that will help you avoid future problems. When you attack a problem is means you want a solution. The solution is not always the answer, but the process is. The process keeps you in the moment and your must be in the moment to fully experience the solution. When you wrestle, attack or fight a problem you are focused on a place you are not—the future. You are here, in the moment exactly where the problem is. So calm down, understand what is really going on and them surrender to the process.
Today I will not attack a problem; I will go through the solution process.
— A Course in Miracles
If you attack a problem, you are going to get your butt whipped. Anything you attack will fight back. Chances are, if you have a problem, it is bigger than you; it crept up on you or you didn’t know what you were doing in the first place. Don’t attack your problems. Face them, confess them, and understand what they are— that is the process. The process teaches and brings a richness that will help you avoid future problems. When you attack a problem is means you want a solution. The solution is not always the answer, but the process is. The process keeps you in the moment and your must be in the moment to fully experience the solution. When you wrestle, attack or fight a problem you are focused on a place you are not—the future. You are here, in the moment exactly where the problem is. So calm down, understand what is really going on and them surrender to the process.
Today I will not attack a problem; I will go through the solution process.
Thought for Today
What is it that would make a creature as fierce, majestic and powerful as a lion is, subject itself to the intimidation of a man, a whip and a chair? The lion has been taught to forget what it is.
06 November 2010
Thought for Today
O God, I Need Thee (1951)
Howard Thurman
I Need Thy Sense of Time
Always I have an underlying anxiety about things.
Sometimes I am in a hurry to achieve my ends
And am completely without patience. It is hard for me
To realize that some growth is slow,
That all processes are not swift. I cannot always discriminate
Between what takes time to develop and what can be rushed,
Because my sense of time is dulled.
I measure things in terms of happenings.
O to understand the meaning of perspective
That I may do all things with a profound sense of leisure --of
time.
I Need Thy Sense of Order
The confusion of the details of living
Is sometimes overwhelming. The little things
Keep getting in my way providing ready-made
Excuses for failure to do and be
What I know I ought to do and be.
Much time is spent on things that are not very important
While significant things are put into an insignificant place
In my scheme of order. I must unscramble my affairs
So that my life will become order. O God, I need
Thy sense of order.
I Need Thy Sense of the Future
Teach me to know that life is ever
On the side of the future,
Keep alive in me the forward look, the high hope,
The onward surge. Let me not be frozen
Either by the past or present.
Grant me, O patient Father, Thy sense of the future
Without which all life would sicken and die.
Howard Thurman
I Need Thy Sense of Time
Always I have an underlying anxiety about things.
Sometimes I am in a hurry to achieve my ends
And am completely without patience. It is hard for me
To realize that some growth is slow,
That all processes are not swift. I cannot always discriminate
Between what takes time to develop and what can be rushed,
Because my sense of time is dulled.
I measure things in terms of happenings.
O to understand the meaning of perspective
That I may do all things with a profound sense of leisure --of
time.
I Need Thy Sense of Order
The confusion of the details of living
Is sometimes overwhelming. The little things
Keep getting in my way providing ready-made
Excuses for failure to do and be
What I know I ought to do and be.
Much time is spent on things that are not very important
While significant things are put into an insignificant place
In my scheme of order. I must unscramble my affairs
So that my life will become order. O God, I need
Thy sense of order.
I Need Thy Sense of the Future
Teach me to know that life is ever
On the side of the future,
Keep alive in me the forward look, the high hope,
The onward surge. Let me not be frozen
Either by the past or present.
Grant me, O patient Father, Thy sense of the future
Without which all life would sicken and die.
04 November 2010
Thought for Today
Interrupted by God
We must be ready to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God, who will thwart our plans and frustrate our ways time and again, even daily, by sending people across our path with their demands and requests. We can, then pass them by, preoccupied with our more important daily tasks, just as the priest--perhaps reading the Bible--passed by the man who had fallen among robbers (Luke 10:31). When we do that, we pass by
the visible sign of the cross raised in our lives to show us that God’s way, and not our way, is what counts. It is a strange fact that, of all people, Christians and theologians often consider their work so important and urgent that they do not want to let anything interrupt it. They think they are doing God a favor, but actually they are despising God’s “crooked yet straight path” (Gottfried Arnold). They want to know nothing about how human plans are thwarted. But it is part of the school of humility that we must not spare our hand where it can perform a service. We do not manage our time ourselves but allow it to be occupied by God.
-from Life Together 99-100
We must be ready to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God, who will thwart our plans and frustrate our ways time and again, even daily, by sending people across our path with their demands and requests. We can, then pass them by, preoccupied with our more important daily tasks, just as the priest--perhaps reading the Bible--passed by the man who had fallen among robbers (Luke 10:31). When we do that, we pass by
the visible sign of the cross raised in our lives to show us that God’s way, and not our way, is what counts. It is a strange fact that, of all people, Christians and theologians often consider their work so important and urgent that they do not want to let anything interrupt it. They think they are doing God a favor, but actually they are despising God’s “crooked yet straight path” (Gottfried Arnold). They want to know nothing about how human plans are thwarted. But it is part of the school of humility that we must not spare our hand where it can perform a service. We do not manage our time ourselves but allow it to be occupied by God.
-from Life Together 99-100
01 November 2010
Thought for Today
Lead Me, Guide Me (1953)
Doris Akers
I am weak and I need Thy strength and pow’r,
To help me over my weakest hour,
Let me thru the darkness Thy face to see,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
Lead me, guide along the way,
For if you lead me I cannot stray.
Lord, let me walk each day with Thee,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
Help me tread in the paths of righteousness,
Be my aid when Satan and sin oppress.
I am putting all my trust in Thee,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
I am lost, if you take your hand from me,
I am blind without Thy Light to see,
Lord, just always let me Thy servant be,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
Doris Akers
I am weak and I need Thy strength and pow’r,
To help me over my weakest hour,
Let me thru the darkness Thy face to see,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
Lead me, guide along the way,
For if you lead me I cannot stray.
Lord, let me walk each day with Thee,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
Help me tread in the paths of righteousness,
Be my aid when Satan and sin oppress.
I am putting all my trust in Thee,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
I am lost, if you take your hand from me,
I am blind without Thy Light to see,
Lord, just always let me Thy servant be,
Lead me, oh Lord, lead me.
31 October 2010
Thought for Today
Freedom and Truth
We know that all truth which exists in the presence of God must lead to the cross. The community that follows Christ must go with him to the cross. Because of their truth and freedom thy will be hated by the world. Nor can a people find truth and freedom if they do not place themselves in the judgment of God’s truth. Likewise, a people will remain in untruth and slavery until such time as they receive and continue to receive their truth and freedom from God alone, until they know that truth and freedom lead to love; indeed, until they know that the way of love leads to the cross. If a people are really able to acknowledge this today, then a free people, the only people that are not slaves to themselves, but who are free servants of God’s truth.
We know that all truth which exists in the presence of God must lead to the cross. The community that follows Christ must go with him to the cross. Because of their truth and freedom thy will be hated by the world. Nor can a people find truth and freedom if they do not place themselves in the judgment of God’s truth. Likewise, a people will remain in untruth and slavery until such time as they receive and continue to receive their truth and freedom from God alone, until they know that truth and freedom lead to love; indeed, until they know that the way of love leads to the cross. If a people are really able to acknowledge this today, then a free people, the only people that are not slaves to themselves, but who are free servants of God’s truth.
30 October 2010
Thought for Today
Who Am I?
Am I really what others say about me?
Or am I only what I know of myself?
Restless, yearning and sick, like a bird in its cage,
Struggling for the breath of life,
as though someone were choking my throat;
hungering for colors, for flowers, for the songs of birds,
thirsting for kind words and human closeness,
shaking with anger at capricious tyranny and the pettiest slurs,
bedeviled by anxiety, awaiting great events that might never occur,
fearfully powerless and worried for friends far away,
weary and empty in prayer, in thinking in doing,
weak, and ready to take leave of it all.
Who am I? This man or the other?
As I then this man today and tomorrow another?
Am I both all at once? An impostor to others,
but to me little more than a whining despicable weakling?
Does what is in me compare to a vanquished army,
that flees in disorder before a battle already won?
Who am I? They mock me these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, you know me, O God. You know I am yours.
-from A Testament to Freedom 514
Am I really what others say about me?
Or am I only what I know of myself?
Restless, yearning and sick, like a bird in its cage,
Struggling for the breath of life,
as though someone were choking my throat;
hungering for colors, for flowers, for the songs of birds,
thirsting for kind words and human closeness,
shaking with anger at capricious tyranny and the pettiest slurs,
bedeviled by anxiety, awaiting great events that might never occur,
fearfully powerless and worried for friends far away,
weary and empty in prayer, in thinking in doing,
weak, and ready to take leave of it all.
Who am I? This man or the other?
As I then this man today and tomorrow another?
Am I both all at once? An impostor to others,
but to me little more than a whining despicable weakling?
Does what is in me compare to a vanquished army,
that flees in disorder before a battle already won?
Who am I? They mock me these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, you know me, O God. You know I am yours.
-from A Testament to Freedom 514
07 October 2010
Thought for Today
The Golf Links
The golf links lie so near the mill
That almost every day
The laboring children can look out
And see the men at play.
-- Sarah Norcliffe Cleghorn
The golf links lie so near the mill
That almost every day
The laboring children can look out
And see the men at play.
-- Sarah Norcliffe Cleghorn
02 October 2010
Thought for Today
To be defined by our fears is to accept as normal the lowest possible level of emotional intelligence.
Inner strength comes not from stoic endurance or even heroic resistance, but from doing what God means us to do in life, despite fear, doubt, an even death. The kind of inner strength that stands the test, even when we wish we were not tested, is best described by Saint Paul in Romans 8: For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
30 September 2010
Thought for Today
Until I learned to trust,
I never learned to pray,
and I did not learn to fully trust
till sorrows came my way.
Until I felt my weakness,
His strength I never knew,
nor dreamed til I was stricken
that He could see me through.
He who drinks deepest of sorrow
drinks deepest too of grace;
He sends the storm so He Himself
can be our hiding place.
His heart that seeks our highest good,
knows well when things annoy;
We would not long for heaven
if earth held only joy."
author Unknown
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