The boy who came back from Heaven

     Self-pit imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption.  The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem & the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are & the larger the problem seems to grow.  Awareness of others is a healthy antidote to this self-focus.
     We're not the only ones with issues, & usually our own struggles are far from the worst we know about.  There is never a moment in life when it's impossible to have a heart filled with gratitiude - no matter what happens.

******

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing:  the lat of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose's one's own way.
-Victor Frankl - survivor of a Nazi Prison camp

*******

The Wedding Machine

It didnt hit her until recently that she has no linkage.  No next generation. No mark on the world.  Nothing to outlive her. -SIS

Friendship for Grown Ups

I've lived enough life to know that my best intentions are no match for the enemy's brilliant use of the weapons of deceit, moments of weakness & things hidden. -Lisa Whelchel

Eclipse

"Look after my heart.... I've left it with you" -Edward to Bella

"Until your heart stops beating Bella, I'll be here fighting" -Jacob to Bella (page 330)

Jacob M. Braude

Consider how hard it is to change yourself & you'll understand what little chance you have in trying to change others.

Ruth: Love, Loss & Legacy

***It is our wisdom to make the best of that which is, for it is seldom that changing our place is mending it. -Matthew Henry

***God's ways are not always the most practical, popular, or unopposed, but they are the most blessed.

***How sad it is when people only HEAR about God's blessing, but never experience it, because they are not in the place where God can bless them. -Warren Wiersbe

***Obedience to God is often wrought with a slew of obstacles that persuade us to change our minds.

***Lack of honest communication has to be one of the ultimate destroyers of relationships, while learning the
quality of gracious but bold speech can be a balm in bitter & complicated situations.

***When God is at work, bitter hopelessness can be the beginning of some surprising good -Hubbard

***May the gospel's truth silence every accusing voice & erase every guilty thought.

***Just as the hollow of winter mysteriously gives rise to the bounty of spring, so times of humbling & hardship prepare us for a wealth of blessing we would have otherwise been unable to handle.

***Its possible that God is more inclined to tend to our outbursts than our detached silence.

***This may be one of the most tragic ways for a Christian to spend her life:  In the right place with all the right resources but without a willing heart. ........I so desperately do not want to get to the end of my life to find I've missed having an eternal impact because I made all of life's decisions based solely on what made sense for me & what was for my benefit - unwilling to yield myself to the Lord.

***All I know is that laying down our lives for others, for the sake of Jesus, is never wasted.  No matter how quiet, how humble, how thankless, God is making a name for you - one that will last an eternity.

Shades of Morning

• Sin was sin - no matter how acceptable in the world...

• "Sin was sin for a reason.  Sin would tear you apart, leave you bleeding, snatch your future & drain away the life.  It would make you alone when you could have had a family at your side." -Taylor

• She'd hung on to her regrets instead of her joys....

CS Lewis

When I was 10, I read fairy tales in secret & would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so.  Now that I am 50, I read them openly.  When I became a man, I put away childish things - including the fear of childishness & the desire to be very grown up.

G.K. Chesterton

Fairy Tales do not tell children the dragons exist.  Children already know that dragons exist!  Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed!

Edwin Louis Cole

You dont drown by falling in the water;  you drown by staying there.

E. Joseph Cossman

The greatest power is often simple patience

Arthur Miller

Betrayal is the only truth that sticks

Michael Pritchard

You dont stop laughing because you grow old.  You grow old because you stop laughing.

Roy Hession

Be careful what you say about the faults & mistakes of others.... they may have already been to the cross about them.

Blaise Pascal

In faith, there is enough light for those who want to believe  & enough shadows to blind those who dont.

General George S. Patton

Now if you are going to win any battle you have to do one thing.  You have to make the mind run the body.  Never let the body tell the mind what to do.  The body will always give up.  It is always tired in the morning, noon & night.  But the body is never tired if the mind is not tired.

"An Absense so Great"

• How could I ever prepare for an absence the size of you?

• Absence is to love what wind is to fire; it extinguishes the small, it enkindles the great. -Comte De Bussy-Rabutin

• How little it takes to appease us when we trust those around us to keep us safe.

• Suzanne was bound by the desire all have when faced with grave emptiness;  the yearning to keep the old routines, hoping they might wash away despair.  And yet, they couldnt because something - everything - had changed.

• I remember that the pastor has said the word "Talent" came from a Roman coin & was a currency.  If I could just learn how to spend it wisely.

Ayleen Lowe

It is better to be alone, then to be with the one who makes you feel alone.

Michael Pastore

It is better to follow the voice inside & be at war with the whole world then to follow the ways of the world & be at war with your deepest self.

Hellen Keller

Do not think of today's failures, but of the success that may come tomorrow.

Haddon Robinson

A young musicians concert was poorly received by the critics.  The famous Finnish composer, Jean Sibelius consoled him by patting him on the shoulder & saying "Remember son, there is no city in the world where they have a statue to a critic"

The Travelers Gift

*I understand that God did not put in me the ability to make right decisions.  He did, however, put in me the ability to MAKE a decision & then MAKE IT RIGHT!"

*In the future, when I am tempted to ask the question, "Why me?", I will immediately counter with the answer, "Why not me?".  Challenges are gifts, opportunities to learn" - Harry Truman

*Adversity is preparation for greatness.  I will accept this preparation.  Why me?  Why not me?  I will be prepared for something great.  -H. Truman

*Jehovah moves mountains to create the opportunity of His choosing.  It is up to you to be ready to move yourself" -King Solomon

"...we are always & forever influenced by those with whom we associate"

"Guard your associations carefully.  Anytime you tolerate mediocrity in your choice of companions, you become more comfortable with mediocrity in your own life.  If a lazy man isnt an irritation to you, it is a sign that you have accepted slothfulness as a way of life" -King Solomon

"My past can never be changed, but I can change the future by changing my actions today"

"When faced with a decision, many people say they are waiting on God.  But I understand, in most cases, God is waiting on me!!!"

"Failure exists only for the person who quits.  I DO NOT QUIT"

"Poor is the man whose future depends on the opinion & permission of others.  Remember this, if you are afraid of criticism, you will die doing nothing!" -Christopher Columbus

"Success requires the emotional balance of a committed heart.  When confronted with a challenge, the committed heart will search for a solution.  The undecided heart searches for an escape" -C Columbus

"Our very lives are fashioned by choice.  First, we make choices... then our choices make us" -Anne Frank

"My smile is the most potent weapon I possess.  It has the strength to forge bonds, break ice, & calm storms.  I will use my smile constantly.  That particular display of a good attitude will tell others what I expect in return"

"A person who is depressed is spending too much time thinking about the way things are now & not enough time thinking about how he wants things to be" -Gabriel

"Times of calamtiy & distress have always been producers of the greatest men.  The hardest steel if produced from the hottest fire.  The brightest star shreds the darkest night" -Gabriel

"For many years, my greatest enemy has been myself.  Every mistake, every miscalcuation, every stumble I made has been replayed again & again in my mind.  Every broken promise, every day wasted, every goal not reached has compounded the disgust I feel for the lack of achievement in my life.  My dismay has developed a paralyzing grip.  When I disappoint myself, I respond with inaction & become more disappointed.  I realize today that it is impossible to fight an enemy living in my head.  By forgiving myself, I erase the doubts, fears, & frustrations that have kept my past in the present.  From this day forward, my history will cease to control my destiny.  I have forgiven myself.  My life has just begun"

"I know the outcome I desire.  I hold fast to my dreams.  I stay the course.  I do not quit.  I will persist without exception.  I will continue DESPITE exhaustion.
I acknowledge that most people quit when exhaustion sets in.  I am not "most people".  I am stronger than most people.  Average people accept exhaustion as a matter of course.  I DO NOT!  Average people compare themselves with other people.  That is why they are average.  I compare myself to my potential.  I am NOT average.  I see exhaustion as a precursor to victory!"

CS Lewis

Friendship is born at the moment when one person says to another "What?  You too?  I thought I was the only one!"

Ralph Waldo Emerson

What you do speaks so loud that I cannot hear what you say.

Dale Carnegie

Remember, happiness doesn't depend on who you are or what you have;  it depends solely on what you think.

Anonymous

Sometimes I would like to ask God why he allows poverty, famine, and injustice in the world when he could do something about it... but I'm afraid he'll ask me the same question.

William Cowper

Satan trembles when he sees the weakest saint upon their knees.

David Thomas

Unselfish & noble actions are the most radiant pages in the biography of souls.

Sally Koch

Great opportunites to help others seldom come, but small ones surround us every day.

Martin Luther

A religion that gives nothing, costs nothing, & suffers nothing, is worth nothing...

William Arthur Ward

We can throw stones, complain about them, stumble on them, climb over them, or built with them.

Torture?

A communist offer told a Christian he was beating, "I am almighty, as you suppose your God to be.  I can kill you!"

The Christian answered, "The power is all on my side.  I can love you while you torture me to death"

Mark Barnett

You may forget how you behaved when the going got tough, but others wont

Anger

Speak when you are angry & you will make the best speech you will ever regret

Proverbs 17:27

A truly wise person uses few words; a person with understanding is even-tempered.

Unknown

Some days you're the dog... & some days, you're the hydrant

Erma Bombeck

If you can laugh at it - you can live with it

Ethel Barrymore

You grow up the day you have your first real laugh... at yourself

Arnold Glascow

Laughter is a tranquilizer with no side effects

Hebrews 13:2

Dont forget to be kind to strangers.  For some who have done this have entertained angels without realizing it.

Unknown

We are, each of us, angels with only one wing... & we can only fly by embracing one another.

Unknown

Friends are angels who lift us to our feet when our wings have trouble remembering how to fly

GK Chesterton

The reason angels can fly is that they take themselves lightly

Dr. Wayne Dyer

The state of your life is nothing more than a reflection of your state of mind.

War inside...

A man told his grandon - "A terrible fight is going on inside of me - a fight between two wolves.  One is evil & represents hate, anger & arrogance, intolerance & superority.  The other is good & represents joy, peace, love, tolerance, understanding, humilty, kindness, empathy, generosity & compassion. 

This same fight is going on inside you - inside every other person too"

The grandson then asked - "Which wolf will win"

The old man replied simply: "The one you feed"

Maurice Maeterlinch

When we lose one we love, our bitterest tears are called forth by the memory of hours when we loved not enough.

Phillip Yancey

• There is no magic cure for a person in pain.  Mainly, such a person needs love, for love instinctively detects what is needed.

• As so often His pattern, God uses very ordinary people to bring about His healing.  Those who suffer don't need our knowledge & wisdom, they need our love.

Stephen Levin

If you were going to die soon & had only one phone call you could make, who would you call & what would you say?..... and why are you waiting?

Ruth E. Renkee

Never fear shadows.  They simply mean there's a light somewhere nearby.

Mark Twain

Always do right.  This will gratify some people and astonish the rest.

Ben Irwin

Most of us spend our lives as if we had another one in the bank.

Unknown

The road to knowledge begins with the turn of a page.

Catching Fireflies

*One day, when Christ shows us what we did for His Kingdom, I pray we can be heard saying "Wow, I didnt know I did all that" -Patsy Clairmont

*In God's economy, our weakness is NOTHING in the presence of His strength!

*Its easy when we do things differently to judge the other one instead of applauding..."

Sounds of Sleigh Bells

*If you hear what's not being said, you'll hear the heart of the matter..." -Jonah

*I learned that just as there are untold types of injuries that all require different treatments, each person also sustains injuries to their hidden man - their mind, will & emotions. They're just as real as any physical injury, but so often people seek help for the bodily damange & ignore the needs of the heart & soul. The Spirit can no more be ignored when it sustains injury than a mutilated leg or severed finger. -Jonah

*Be cautious & wise with your choise of who to talk to, but dont let it (a secret) stay inside you for too long. It'll eat up everything good & grow stronger as you grow weaker. But when you face it through the eyes of someone you trust, you will grow stronger, & it will weaken -Jonah

What Difference Do it Make?

*People ask “How’d that fells get that way?” See that aint the right question to be askin’ cause it might be that ain’t none a’ our business. Our business is to find out is there anything we can do to bring a change in their life. To bring opportunity. To bring hope. -Denver

*Most people on the streets know Jesus love ‘em. But they figure nobody ELSE loves ‘em BUT Jesus. Street people done heard more sermons than most preachers ever preached. Lotta good folks come ‘round the ‘hood, talking ‘bout Jesus this, Jesus that. Tellin us about Him is one thing… who gon’ stick around and SHOW us Jesus? –Denver

*Needy people don’t need no perfect people neither. When Jesus sent His disciples out, He sent Peter right along, knowin Peter had a bad temper & a potty mouth & was gon’ deny Him three times. He sent John & James even though they was full a’pride and fightin over the best seat at the table. He even sent Judas, knowin Judas was gon’ betray Him. Even though Jesus knowed all a’their sins & weakness, He sent ‘em anyways.

*Listen, if the devil ain’t messing with you, he’s already got you –Denver

*I aint got no way to read the mind a’ God, but I ‘xpect part a’His business is making it Christmas for somebody EVERY day! If all the Christians – I mean ALL of ‘em – got outta the pews on Sundays & into the streets, we’d shut the city down. We’d shut down hunger. We’d shut down lonliness. We’d shut down the notion that there is any such of a thing as a person that don’t deserve a kind word & a second chance. – Denver

*It is a blessing to the homeless when they see people who care. But to really help, you’ve got to get down in the pit with people & stay with them until they find the strength to get on your shoulders & climb out. Helping someone is when you find out how to help them move toward wholeness & then hang with them until they make a change”

*That Deborah would get cancer made no more sense than a drive-by shooting… what Denver had said three weeks earlier haunted me. “Those precious to God become important to Satan”….

Martin Luther King Jr.

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

CS Lewis

The future is something, which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.

E.E. Cummings

To be nobody but yourself - in a world that is doing its best, night & day, to make you everybody else - means to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight, and never stop fighting.

Anais Nin

...and the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

William Arthur Ward

Life lived without forgiveness becomes a prison

Let it go

• We so easily allow the winter of regret to eradiate the joy of spring and all things new. Its a mental battle that is as powerful as any fought in trenches or in tanks.

• "Should" is something we can NOT control. It is the past, not the future. So why do we spend all our time beating ourselves up for something we cant get back?

• We cling to our dreams of what we wish the past could have been & set ourselves up to be hurt again & again

• How much of your life have you spent looking in the rearview mirror of your life? Spending too much time with your focus there can lead to a wreck!

• A person preoccupied with herself is a person not preoccupied with God

• I have discovered that its hard to fall off a pedestal when you are washing someone's feet.

• I heard someone say that the hour or two we spend worshipping on a Sunday is the time when we are the least honest & real. Perhaps that is because we are afraid to show who we really are in case we are rejected or judged.

• Kindness is underrated in our world. Simple acts of mercy leave more of the fragrance of Christ because they touch us where we live & where we are the thirstiest.

-Sheila Walsh

Mark Twain

Most people are bothered by those passages in Scriptures which they cannot understand, but as for me, I always notice that the passages in Scripture which troubles me most are those which I DO understand

Corrie Ten Bloom

The purpose of being guilty is to bring us to Jesus. Once we are there, then its purpose is finished. If we continue to make ourselves guilty - to blame ourselves - then that is sin in itself.

Let it go - Sheila Walsh

*I will have lots of quotes still to come - but this story really stood out.....

She opened the box that had been delivered that morning & peeled back layer upon layer of soft, pink tissue paper. Nestled inside was the most beautiful dress she had ever seen. She pulled it out & held it up to the sun that was streaming through her bedroom window.

The dress was exquisite. It was white & had satin ribbons around the waist that tied in a bow in the back. She tried it on & it fit as if it had been tailor made. Not usually given to spontaneity or to dancing, she found herself twirling around & round. The ribbons flew out behind her like flags in a summer breeze.

Suddenly, she caught sight of herself in the mirror. She almost didn't recognize herself: light, FREE, almost childlike. She stopped immediately & took off the dress. Putting it back in the box, she covered it once more with the tissue paper & placed the box under the bed. She took her old gray dress off the chair, pulled it over her head, & straightened her hair in the mirror.

"There," she said. "That's as it should be"

Breast Cancer Patient

I have learned that silence really does have the loudest voice

Rick Pitino

If you tell the truth, a mistake becomes part of your past - if you lie, then it becomes part of your future.

Dr. Laura Schlessinger

The people & circumstances around me do not MAKE me what I am - they REVEAL who I am.

Harry Truman

A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunites & an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties.

Never the Same

I guess sometimes tears are the only words you have left....

Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes

...This kind of forgetting does not erase memory, it lays the emotion surrounding the memory to rest....

Henry Ford

Failure is only the opportunity to more intelligently begin again.

Ann Landers

The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good

The Vigil

He was an uncomplicated, happy man with a soulful laugh that could tenderize the toughest of moments

Albert Einstein

Great spirits will always encounter violent opposition from mediocre minds.

Pablo Picasso

Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die have left undone

Can be done!

The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person doing it

Mark Spitz

We all love to win, but how many people love to train?

Flannery O' Connor

You will have found Christ when you are concerned with other people's suffering & not your own.

Marilyn Ferguson

Your past is NOT your potential. In any hour, you can choose to liberate the future

Courage

Courage is not the absence of fear. Its going ahead despite the fear.

Hellen Keller

I thank God for my handicaps, for through them, I have found myself, my work & my God.

Sundays at Tiffany's

People always remember the worst days of their lives. It becomes a part of them forever.

Rollo May

It is an old & ironic habit of human beings to run faster when we have lost our way

The Noticer

• Whatever you focus on - increases

• When you focus on the things you need, you'll find those needs increasing. If you concentrate your thoughts on what you DONT have, you will soon be concentrating on other things that you had forgotten you dont have - & feel worse!!! If you set your mind on loss - you are more likely to loose... but a GRATEFUL perspective brings happiness & abundance into a persons life.

• A life filled with opportunities and encouragement finds more & more opportunities & encouragement & success becomes inevitable.

• What is it about me that other people would change if they could?

• Its time to stop letting your history control your destiny

• Most people spend so much time fearing the things that are never going to happen or can't be controlled that they have no energy to deal with the few things they can actually handle

• ...the seeds of depression cannot take root in a grateful heart.

• One way to define wisdom is the ability to see, into the future, the consequences of your choices in the present.

Happiness Sold Seperately

Ted used to think he should help patients get a better handle on reality by correcting their senile fantasies. He's learned though that people find it more comforting when you humor them a bit. "Really? Can you imagine? The nerve!" - The patients seemed RELIEVED that someone was at least listening & responding.

Demon: a Memoir

Apologizes are a funny thing. Half the time they're insincere & even when they aren't - there's nothing a person can do to undo whatever he did... -Lucian

6 Hours , One Friday

Jesus only went IN the grave to prove he could come OUT of it!

Jodi Hills

Understanding that heavy things cant fly, she let go of what was weighing on her heart, the things she could no more control than carry, & she gave herself a chance. A chance to reach into the unassuming blue, to embrace the possibilities of an open sky, with an open heart.

She gave herself a chance to soar!

The Penny

• I understand that something doesnt disappear when you push it away. It waits for you & eventually when it beckons, you've got to go back to it.

• People have a way of looking at other people & seeing things the way they THINK them to be, not the way they really are. -Miss Shaw

• The worst thing you can do is go into a day being afraid. -Miss Shaw

• Not many people know how it feels to be so hurt on the inside that you'd rater die than live with it. -Miss Shaw

• I could finally see - how a persons words said a whole lot more about the person who said them than they did about the person they were said to. -Jenny

• I learned that if you offered your hand to reassure & be of good use to someone, it went a long way toward helping YOU overcome how somebody else's hand had done you harm. - Jenny

• When a voice keeps needling at you, it can have the same effect as a steady drip of water wearing a rock into sand -Jenny

• That night, I realized God doesnt always make something go away because we pray. When we pray, He often gives us the strength to stand up to it. -Jenny

Knit Two

• It's a great irony that suffering could bring the gift of compassion

• We grieve loss. Its not always about death.

• We all typically dont go around revealing our secret shame. But sometimes, we are graced with enough awareness to learn from them

A stitch in Time

When a person is down to nothing, that's when God is up to something!

Multiple Blessings

Sometimes knowing a decision is the right one to make doesnt make the sting of consequences any easier to bear. -Kate Gosselin

New Moon

....I found I could survive. I was alert, I felt the pain - the aching loss that radiated out from my chest, sending wracking waves of hurt through my limbs & head - but it was manegable. I could live through it. It didnt feel like the pain had weakened over time - rather that I'd GROWN STRONG ENOUGH to bear it!" -Bella

Post Secret

Sometimes you dont know you've crossed a line until you're on the other side & cant go back

Lousy T-shirt

• Jesus didnt go around asking people to "BELIEVE" in him... instead, he asked people to FOLLOW him!!! According to Jesus, being a Christian is NOT so much abouting believing or behaving correctly, as it is about traveling with him!

• Do you know who you are? YOU'RE THE ONE JESUS LOVES!

Earth to Betsy

• Saint Benedict said "Always, we begin again"

• Making mistakes is part of life - its what do you AFTER you make a mistake that shows who you really are

UnChristiain

• While Knowledge may make us feel important, it is love that really builds up the church" -(1 Cor 8:1 NLT)

• Christians have become famous for what we oppose, rather than who we are FOR!

Henry David Thoreau

"Its not what you look at that matters - its what you see"

The Elevator

"If one desires a thing badly, longing can concoct enough courage to over ride fear"

"Deceit is a lie that wears a smile"

Batman Begins

"My anger outweights my guilt"

"Why do we fall? So that we may learn to pick ourselves up!"

"Its not my name - its what I DO that defines me"

From The Shack

"I suppose that since most of our hurts come through relationships, so will our healing. And I know that grace rarely makes sense for those looking in from the outside"

"Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets"

"It is remarkable how a seemingly insignficant action or event can change our entire lives"

"Sometimes honesty can be incredibly messy"

"Why do we need to pray if God knows everything anyways? Just as we sit & listen to children tell their stories over & over again - or we let them win a race - or let them think they are beating us - we humble ourselves. God does it too - listening to us be His children"