Praise in Trials

The Lord may not definitely have planned that this should overtake me, but He has most certainly permitted it. Therefore though it were an attack of an enemy, by the time it reaches me, it has the Lord's permission and therefore all is well. He will make it work together with all life's experiences for good. - C. H. Welch

Praise can heighten your awareness that distressing circumstances are God's blessings in disguise. Your trials rip away the flimsy fabric of your self-sufficiency. This makes room for God's spirit to weave into your life a true and solid confidence--the kind of confidence that Paul expressed in Philippians 4:13: "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." - Ruth Myers, 31 Days of Praise, 124

Man needs difficulties

Quotations from a treasure of a book I discovered...

You know as well as I there's more...there's always one more scene no matter. - Archibald McLeish

In the last resort it is highly improbably that there could ever be a therapy which gets rid of all difficulties. Man needs difficulties; they are necessary for health. - Carl Jung

Die before you die. There is no chance after. - C. S. Lewis

Living as a Witness

This involves “just you, winning one person to the Lord each year, training that person to live a victorious, reproductive Christian life—then the two of you doing the same with two more people the next year. Continuing in this activated, applying the principle of multiplication, your numbers would double each year thereafter…you and the people you discipled…will see six billion people come to a vital, thoroughly-grounded knowledge of the Lord in the early months of the thirty-third year.”
- Pg 27 of Personal Disciple-making by Christopher B. Adsit, Orlando: Campus Crusade for Christ, 1996

2 Timothy 3:12: And indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.

2 Tim. 4:2: Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.

Photo of the central Californian coastline, taken by Natalie

A Sense of the Greatest

But one of the things I, at least, think most people should do in the time that they spend on this planet, is have a sense of the greatest that’s been given to us. A life itself is the greatest gift, to have an immortal soul is extraordinary, but in beginning to understand what that means, I think you’ve got to turn to the greatest writers who can give you some sense of what it’s all been about, why you’re here, what it means and where you’re going. And that means you’ve got to delve into the great writers.

-David Allen White, cross-posted from HeartThoughts

Inspiration from Shakespeare and Glaspey

A brief update from me...if you aren't over at HeartThoughts taking part in all our literary discussions, you are more than welcome to jump in with us.

And just as a side note, King Lear is brilliant. Took an evening to plumb its depths and I found myself having to read certain portions aloud--you can't read Shakespeare silently! The words.... there are not many books that can be said to be truly beautiful but this is definitely one of them.

Some inspiration from Glaspey's A Passion for Books (itself an out-of-print treasure!):

A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say. - Italo Calvino

If the crowns of all the kingdoms of
Europe were laid down at my feet
in exchange for my books and
my love of reading, I
would spurn them all.
- Francis Fenelon

In a very real sense, people who have read good literature have lived more than people who cannot or will not read...It is not true that we can have only one life to live; if we can read, we can live as many more lives and as many kinds of lives as we wish. - S. I. Hayakawa

Our heart makes all the difference

I came across a quote the other day that stopped me in my tracks:

Suffering always changes us, but it does not necessarily change us for the better.

- John Ortberg, The Life You've Always Wanted

Though we wish it were not so, it is true. The question then becomes, "What are we going to do when suffering comes?" If it does not automatically change us to be more like Christ, what else is necessary?

I believe the answer is found in Paul's words. Could it be that one part is to rejoice in them? Romans 8 speaks of the necessity of suffering. Food for thought...

Cherish the Normal Day

Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, savor you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may for it will not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return.

Mary Jean Irion

The Gift of Marriage

“‘Ah! who am I, that God hath saved

Me from the doom I did desire,

And crossed the lot myself had craved

To set me higher?

What have I done that he should bow

From heaven to choose a wife for me?

And what deserved, he should endow

My home with thee?’”

-author unknown, quoted in St. Elmo, by Augusta J. Evans

Quotations from Gretchen's notebook

Interact with them comfortably. Share Christ with them naturally. Love them unconditionally.

- Anonymous

I am convinced that Christianity is a serious and demanding religion. When it is presented as easy and amusing it is another kind of religion altogether.

- Amusing Ourselves to Death

All living--and loving--is made up of little things. Happiness is built day by day from small incidents, actions, and words. No marriage is spoiled by just one quarrel, just one occurrence, just one cruel act. But still, many women have related the details of the final break and sincerely believed this single instance was the beginning of the end--it wasn't--it couldn't possibly be!

- Hold Your Man by Veronica Dengel 1945

The church is like manure. Pile it together and it stinks together. Spread it out and it enriches the world.

-Luis Palou

Mustard seed tells us not to be discouraged by small beginnings.

- Anonymous

Witty Remarks From Jane: Jane Austen Quotables

There are various times when I find myself in need of a suitable response during conversation. If you, too, find yourself desiring clever, silly, or perhaps somewhat unusual replies, look no further. Jane Austen is your solution. Well-known for her witty novels, she has a wealth of superb utterances from which to draw. I have collected several appropriate remarks from the Jane Austen movie “Emma” and “Pride and Prejudice” for your express benefit. Peruse to your delight and prepare to both captivate and confuse your fellow conversationalists.

At a dance, when a gentleman friend asks with whom you’re going to dance with:
“With you if you’ll ask me. After all, we are not brother and sister.”

When those around you are not speaking:
“I believe we must have some conversation…a very little will suffice.”

When you are asked of your hobbies:
“I take pleasure in many things.”

When someone asks what you think of them:
“I hear such different accounts of you as to puzzle me exceedingly.”

When a friend announces her engagement:
“Strawberries! You must have strawberries at your wedding!”

When someone inquires if you are too hot or too cold:
“I am in the perfect state of…warmness.”

When someone is acting particularly hard to please:
“I wouldn’t be as fastidious as you are for a kingdom.”

When there is an awkward gap in a conversation:
“Allow me to interpret the silence.”

When your advice is sought about a certain action:
“I think it would be a wise and relieving thing to do.”

When you are in want of exercise and there is another near you:
“Do take a turn about the room with me. It is so refreshing.”

When asked what you thought of a phenomenal happening:
“We were quite speechless, I tell you, and we have not stopped talking of it since.”

And finally, it is a truth universally acknowledged that when one is uncertain how to answer a statement, the most convenient response is: “Indeed!”

- by Laura Moninger

And some additions by Lisa!

Don't forget:
When asked your opinion of another person on whom you have not given much thought, "Very elegant."

and when faced with being accused of perfection, being a goodie-two-shoes, or some similar character, "It has been my study to avoid those weaknesses which expose a good understanding to ridicule."

From Sense and Sensibility: when in an especially good mood, "Is there any felicity in the world superior to this?"

Photo copyright BBC Productions

On Pooh

I first had my suspicions that Winnie-the-Pooh was more than just an annoying cartoon, when, a couple years ago I read the article "Lessons from a Bear of Very Little Brain" . Don't worry...before I read that I WAS aware that the Disney Winnie-the-Pooh was taken from an old children's book, but that was about as far as my knowledge went. The Disney Pooh had always seemed annoyingly boring (even more so than other cartoons), but after reading that article, I began to wonder if perhaps the original Winnie-the-Pooh was much different than the cartoon character that is all most children know today. And I always meant to someday read the real Pooh stories, but I never got the chance...until I went to Bible college.

I forget exactly how it started...possibly I discovered that my friend Anna had The World of Pooh (which contains Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner...the two original Pooh books by A.A. Milne) and I expressed that I had wanted to read the real Pooh books for a long time...or maybe Anna just wanted to share the delights of Pooh with someone else and I was a very willing ear! Regardless of how it began...it soon became a treat to "get my Pooh story". On evenings when we weren't incredibly busy or didn't have a tremendous amount of homework (and sometimes even if I did have a tremendous amount of homework...but let's get priorities straight here, right?!), I would curl up on Anna's bed under a blanket and she would sit in her blue plush chair and read me "my Pooh story". Sometimes other girls would join us and we would listen intently to the adventures and happenings of Winnie-the-Pooh and his friends.

And oh...the books are so much better than the cartoons (obviously!...is that even a question?!)! So much beyond better that I really don't think that the cartoons should even be referred to as dealing with Winnie-the-Pooh...the weak Disney-fied cartoons and the delightful personalities that A.A. Milne created are two completely opposite things! In one word, the real Pooh books are...delightful. They are full of simple, innocent humor...found mostly in Eeyore's sarcasm. My friends at school heard me say it many times...A.A. Milne is a literary genius! The Pooh books are simple enough that children enjoy them...and delightful enough that adults do too...what brilliant writing!

Obviously, after realizing what a treasure Pooh stories were, I had to have my own to read over and over, so I ordered a copy of The World of Pooh [copyright 1957; E.P. Dutton]. And I discovered that reading Pooh yourself is just as wonderful as listening to it read to you...especially with all the random capitalization of usually-not-capitalized-words A.A. Milne throws in to add to what the characters are saying. For instance... Out of All Danger...Luncheon Time...Thing to Do...Special Pencil Case...Provisions...It Explains Everything...One of the Fiercer Animals...Clever Idea...a Sustaining Book...There It Is...Spotted or Herbaceous Backson...Great Help...Expotition...Very Happy Thursday... etc. Maybe it's just because I love words so much...but I find that kind of thing quite funny!

In order to whet your appetite so you all can share in the delights of Pooh, below are some of my favorite quotes from Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner. Hopefully these will show you just how much you are missing by not reading Pooh!

From Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A. Milne...

"Here we go round the mulberry bush."
"Oh!" said Pooh. He thought for a long time, and then asked, "What mulberry bush is that?"
"Bon-hommy," went on Eeyore gloomily. "French word meaning bonhommy," he explained.
~Chapter VI: In Which Eeyore Has a Birthday and Gets Two Presents

"I'm not asking anybody," said Eeyore. "I'm just telling everybody. We can look for the North Pole, or we can play 'Here we go gathering Nuts and May' with the end part of an ant's nest. It's all the same to me."
~Chapter VIII: In Which Christopher Robin Leads an Expotition to the North Pole

From The House at Pooh Corner by A.A. Milne...

"It's Pooh," said Christopher Robin excitedly...
"Possibly," said Eeyore.
"And Piglet!" said Christopher Robin excitedly.
"Probably," said Eeyore. "What we want is a Trained Bloodhound."
~Chapter I: In Which A House Is Built at Pooh Corner for Eeyore

"Besides, Pooh, it's a very difficult thing, planting unless you know how to do it," he [Piglet] said; and he put the acorn in the hole he had made, and covered it up with earth, and jumped on it.
"I do know," said Pooh, "because Christopher Robin gave me a mastershalum seed, and I planted it, and I'm going to have mastershalums all over the front door."
"I thought they were called nasturtiums," said Piglet timidly, as he went on jumping.
"No," said Pooh. "Not these. These are called mastershalums."
~Chapter IV: In Which It Is Shown That Tiggers Don't Climb Trees

"I shouldn't be surprised if it hailed a good deal tomorrow," Eeyore was saying. "Blizzards and whatnot. Being fine today doesn't Mean Anything. It has no sig- what's that word? Well, it has none of that. It's just a small piece of weather."
~Chapter IV: In Which It Is Shown That Tiggers Don't Climb Trees

"Eeyore, what are you doing there?" said Rabbit.
"I'll give you three guesses, Rabbit. Digging holes in the ground? Wrong. Leaping from branch to branch of a young oak-tree? Wrong. Waiting for somebody to help me out of the river? Right. Give Rabbit time, and he'll always get the answer."
~Chapter VI: In Which Pooh Invents a New Games and Eeyore Joins In

And finally...one that's so true...

"It's so much more friendly with two."
~Chapter IX [of Winnie-the-Pooh]: In Which Piglet Is Entirely Surrounded by Water

- by Jessica Slagg

Following her man and her God

Ever since their first date (a Sunday afternoon presentation of The Messiah), she had known he was the one. "I laid it before the Lord and left it there," she wrote.

But she was called as a missionary to Tibet, and he was not.

"Do you believe that God brought us together?" he asked her in the intervening weeks.

Of course she did.

"In that case, God will lead me and you will do the following."

"And I have been following ever since," wrote Ruth Bell Graham in It's My Turn, (copyright 1982, p. 52).

But for the wife of Billy Graham, following her husband meant staying home, raising their five children while he traveled. That alone tells me she was a woman of strength. And that she got her strength from a never-ending Source.

I picked up my paperback copy of It's My Turn the day after the news of Mrs. Graham's death. It had sat on my shelf unread ever since I'd found it. Now seemed like a good time to read about this woman behind the man, this wife waiting at home for the returning evangelist.

There are few well-renowned people I agree with completely. Even fewer I would choose to emulate in all aspects of their lives. But I can I find what I admire about them, and learn from that.

As with everything I read, I paid particular attention to what she wrote about her marriage. I found much to ponder.

"It is a foolish woman who expects her husband to be to her that which only Jesus Christ Himself can be: always ready to forgive, totally understanding, unendingly patient, invariably tender and loving, unfailing in every area, anticipating every need, and making more than adequate provision. Such expectations put a man under an impossible strain." (p. 74)

And well-aware of the child growing so near the book I held in my lap, her words on motherhood had more to say to me than they might have a year ago.

"A good mother is one who makes it easy for a child to be good." (pg. 102)

The Grahams were obviously both of strong and very different personalities. But they had a love that stayed strong through long separations, and kept growing for almost 64 years of marriage (their 64th anniversary would be August 13th). That is why I paid close attention to their secrets.

"Love is not only the 'union of two good forgivers' but the 'union of two good appreciators.'" (pg. 76)

"A Christian wife's responsibility balances delicately between knowing when to submit and when to outwit. Adapting to our husbands never implies the annihilation of our creativity, rather the blossoming of it." (p. 55)

And she had a faith, that sustained her through it all. That is why I listened carefully to her words.

"For me, spiritual dryness usually follows an extremely busy period. Air must be still for dew to fall, and I was anything but still." (p. 162, emphasis mine)

"Worship and worry cannot live in the same heart: they are mutually exclusive." (p. 137)

Related Posts:
Lifelong Love Aflame
A Valentine from the not-so-Pink House

Yad Vashim unveils a Holocaust diary

“She wanted me to save the diary. She said, ‘I don’t know if I will survive, but I want the diary to live on, so that everyone will know what happened to the Jews." The writings of a young Polish girl have been released to the world this week. Rutka Laskier recounts in vivid detail the horrors of life in the Jewish ghetto in 1943. You can read more here (not for younger readers).

C.S. Lewis on Love

Here are a few of the quotes I've gleaned from recent excursions into Lewis's work. I also just requested the books Miracles and Perelandra from Paperback Swap. They always have Lewis books available. Hurray!

"Love is something more stern and splendid than mere kindness."

"This is one of the miracles of love: It gives a power of seeing through its own enchantments and yet not being disenchanted."

"Love is not affectionate feeling, but a steady wish for the loved person's ultimate good as far as it can be obtained."

"Why love if losing hurts so much? We love to know that we are not alone."

The Bricks of Civilization

Something about this piece from Pilgrim's Inn captured my imagination. Each day as I tidy up in my little house, each night as I cook dinner, set the table, and light the candles, I am creating the bricks that form our happy home, the little corner of this world over which I have dominion. If I were to worry over much about the evils and dangers of world outside these four walls, I would be less able to perpetuate the cheerful, peacefulness of our home. Building the walls and fighting the tide of evil is my husband's job. I'll just keep handing him the bricks of good food, a quiet home, and lots of love...

"...it was homemaking that mattered. Every home was a brick in the great wall of decent living that men erected over and over again as a bulwark against the perpetual flooding in of evil.
But women made the bricks, and the durableness of each civilization depending upon their quality, and it was no good weakening oneself for the brick-making by thinking too much about the flood."

-Elizabeth Goudge in Pilgrim's Inn, pg. 48

Quotations from Gretchen - 2

God didn't save you 1/7th of the way, so we should give him all 7 days. - Dustin Blumenstein

Insanity: Doing the same thing and expecting different results. - Anonymous
Flirting: Doing the same thing and expecting better results - Jennifer Straw
Love: Doing the same thing in a different way everyday for the rest of your life. - Gretchen Glaser

A wife is not her husband's moral custodian. She is God's gift to him, and he is God's gift to her. He does not always act like a gift--nor do we wives, alas. This is perhaps the most important testing ground for the production of the fruits of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Where else, how else, shall we learn them?

There is no other way. Jesus Himself had to "learn obedience by the things which He suffered," not by the things which He enjoyed. Shall we who claim to be His followers expect the cross to be presented to us in a more congenial form?

The cross is an instrument of torture. What else was it meant to be? Yet through that holy cross Christ redeemed the world. He calls us, "o'er the tumult of our life's wild, restless sea," to follow Him. We must choose. He will not force us. He will not invade our freedom to choose not to follow. He offers the cross--in this form and no other--and asks us--ever so gently and quietly--"Will you trust Me? Will you love Me? Will you praise Me?"

-Elisabeth Elliot, The Gatekeeper, August 2001

You don't add Jesus to your life--He becomes your life. -Bill Conn

The highest reward of serving God is not what we get for it but what we become because of it. - Bill Conn

- compiled by Gretchen, spring 2006

Unrequited Love(sickness)

I have long been in the habit of jotting down page numbers of favorite passages as I read a book. My husband now discovers these little slips of paper with random, sequential numbers scrawled in pencil, and asks what it is for. I always laughingly explain that they were quotations I wanted to write down from the book I'd just been reading. And invariably, it is because the words reminded me of him...

The following passages struck a chord with me, because for so many years I loved Merritt without knowing if it was returned. I never managed to express my woes of unrequited love so beautifully, but maybe someone else will find comfort in Elizabeth Goudge's words, knowing that others have trod this oft-lonely path before. Remember, "the readiness is all."

"She had gone into shop after shop and walked round and round in circles for what had seemed like hour after hour, but nothing she looked at had commanded itself to her as a suitable gift for a woman to give a man she loved when the man didn't love her."

"Her own arrogance appalled her. Who and what did she think she was that she should expect this...man to love her? She was much younger than he was, she had neither gifts nor beuty to match his. And yet, trying to see tings as they were, as was her habit, aware that excessive shame was just as distorting to the judgement as excessive arrogance, she knew that she ought to be his wife... But you couldn't hand yourself over if you weren't taken.

"And at this point her thoughts would come up against Hamlet's words, 'The readiness is all,' and cling to them as to a rock. That put it in a nutshell. That was the only possible attitude to life and death as well as to love. You had to be ready to be used or not used, picked up or cast aside, and it didn't really matter which it was provided you yourself were pliant to fate like a reed to the wind.

"...She was going back to that bit of Hampshire between the river and the sea that was now to her the most beloved spot on earth, that was home. She supposed it wasn't really home but it felt like it... That was why she loved it so much, of course... They were David's. They had made him. She had given herself so utterly to this love of hers that it permeated every part of her being and nothing that was connected with David seemed to have any value for her any more... How on earth was she going to get through the rest of her life if...She pulled hersulf up abruptly and groped after Hamlet, but she couldn't seem to get hold of him; she was too tired..."

-Pilgrim's Inn, excerpts from pg. 292-4, by Elizabeth Goudge

Quotes from St. Elmo

“I think, sir, that the noble and true woman of this continent earnestly believe that the day which invests them with the elective franchise would be the blackest in the annals of humanity, would ring the death-knell of modern civilization, of national prosperity, social morality, and domestic happiness! and would consign the race to a night of degradation and horror infinitely more appalling than a return to primeval barbarianism.”

-St. Elmo, by Augusta J. Evans

“The German idea of death is to me peculiarly comforting and touching, ‘Heimgang’—going home. Ah, sir! humanity ought to be homesick; and in thinking of that mansion beyond the star-paved pathway of the sky, whither Jesus has gone to prepare our places, we children of earth should, like the Swiss, never lose our home-sickness. Our bodies are of the dust—dusty, and bent dustward; but our souls floated down from the sardonyx walls of the Everlasting City, and brought with them a yearning maladie du pays, which should help them to struggle back. Sometimes I am tempted to believe that the joys of this world are the true lotos, devouring which, mankind glory in exile and forget the Heimgang. Oh! indeed, ‘here we have no continuing city, but seek one to come.’ Heimgang! Thank God! going home for ever!”

-St. Elmo, by Augusta J. Evans

Reading old friends

"In times of storm and tempest, of indecision and desolation, a book already known and loved makes better reading than something new and untried. The meeting with remembered and well-loved passages is like the continual greeting of old friends; nothing is so warming and companionable.

"Yet tonight, as so often when the mind is tortured by some undecided question, everything he read seemed to have some bearing upon his problem, all his old friends seemed to have something to say to him and most of the time it was something that he did not in the least want to hear."

-from The Bird in the Tree by Elizabeth Goudge

Cat Quotations

Did you know that the YLCF used to be a little girls' club called "The Purry Kittens"? (Click here to read the entire history.) From the time Gretchen and her cousin Melissa were little, they liked cats, kittens, and everything feline! They cut pictures of cats out of magazines and greeting cards, and put them in a note book. They collected books and sayings about cats. And of course, they had numerous kittens of their own. Here Gretchen shows her continued affinity for things feline with this collection of cat quotes...

Work - other people's work - is an intolerable idea to a cat. Can you picture cats herding sheep or agreeing to pull a cart? They will not inconvenience themselves to the slightest degree.

-Dr. Louis J. Camuti

In order to keep a true perspective of one's importance, everyone should have a dog that will worship him and a cat that will ignore him.

-Dereke Bruce

There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.

-Albert Schweitzer

Time spent with cats is never wasted.

-Collette

"If you want to know the character of a man, find out what his cat thinks of him."

-Anonymous

Cats are smarter than dogs. You can't get eight cats to pull a sled through the snow.

-Jeff Valdez

There is no more intrepid explorer than a kitten.

- Jules Champfleury

Cats are a tonic, they are a laugh, they are a cuddle, they are at least pretty just about all of the time and beautiful some of the time.

-Roger Caras

The cat could very well be man's best friend but would never stoop to admitting it.

-Doug Larson

If a dog jumps in your lap, it is because he is fond of you; but if a cat does the same thing, it is because your lap is warmer.

-Alfred North Whitehead

"His mind is like a steel trap--full of mice."

-Foghorn Leghorn

"A kitten is so flexible that she is almost double; the hind parts are equivalent to another kitten with which the forepart plays. She does not discover that her tail belongs to her until you tread on it."

-Henry David Thoreau

"A cat can maintain a position of curled up somnolence on your knee until you are nearly upright. To the last minute she hopes your conscience will get the better of you and you will settle down again."

-Pam Brown

"A dog is like a liberal, he wants to please everybody. A cat doesn't really need to know that everybody loves him."

-William Kunstler

You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat.

-Albert Einstein, when asked to describe radio

"After scolding one's cat one looks into its face and is seized by the ugly suspicion that it understood every word. And has filed it for reference."

-Charlotte Gray

No amount of time can erase the memory of a good cat, and no amount of masking tape can ever totally remove his fur from your couch.

- Leo Dworken

"I called my cat William because no shorter name fits the dignity of his character. Poor old man, he has fits now, so I call him Fitz-William."

- Josh Billings

"When your cat rubs the side of its face along your leg, it's affectionately marking you with its scent, identifying you as its private property, saying, in effect, 'You belong to me'."

-Susan McDonough, D.M.V.

"Cats are dangerous companions for writers because cat watching is a near-perfect method of writing avoidance."

-Dan Greenburg

No one can have experienced to the fullest the true sense of achievement and satisfaction who have never pursued and successfully caught his tail.

-Rosalind Welcher

There are people who reshape the world by force or argument, but the cat just lies there, dozing; and the world quietly reshapes itself to suit his comfort and convenience.

-Allen and Ivy Dodd

"I have studied many philosophers and many cats. The wisdom of cats is infinitely superior."

-Hippolyte Taine

Photo of Nero, one of the Nyquist cats, in his favorite place: Dad's chair