Browse By Topic 
A Activity
"The question is not merely what we can feel, but what we can do, for Christ; not how many tears we can shed, but how many sins we can mortify; not what rapture we can experience, but what self-denial we can practice; not what happy frames we can enjoy, but what holy duties we can perform."
— JOHN ANGELL JAMES.
Source: SAGE Digital Library
"The worst days of darkness through which I have ever passed have been greatly alleviated by throwing myself with all my energy into some work relating to others."
— GARFIELD
Source: SAGE Digital Library
Topics/Tags: Activity; Work; Humility; Servanthood
You never will be saved by works; but let us tell you most solemnly that you never will be saved without works.
— T. L. CUYLER
Source: SAGE Digital Library
Topics/Tags: Good Works; Activity; Salvation, conditions of
"If we view this microcosm, the human body, we shall find that the heart does not receive the blood to store it up; but while it pumps it in at one valve, it sends it forth at another. The blood is always circulating everywhere, and is stagnant nowhere.
"The same is true of all the fluids in a healthy body; they are in a constant state of expenditure. If one cell stores for a few moments its peculiar secretion, it only retains it till it is perfectly fitted for its appointed use in the body; for if any cell in the body should begin to store up its secretion, its store would soon become the cause of inveterate disease. Nay, the organ would soon lose the power to secrete at all, if it did not give forth its products.
"The whole of the human system lives by giving. The eye can not say to the foot: “I have no need of thee, and will not guide thee.” For if it does not perform its watchful office, the whole man will be in the ditch, and the eye will be covered with mire. If the members refuse to contribute to the general stock, the whole body will become poverty-stricken, and be given up to the bankruptcy of death.
"Let us learn, then, from the analogy of nature, the great lesson that, to get, we must give; that, to accumulate, we must scatter; that, to make ourselves happy, we must make others happy; and that, to get good and become spiritually vigorous, we must do good and seek the spiritual good of others."
— SPURGEON
Source: SAGE Digital Library
Savvy consumers know that most manufacturers equip their appliances, computers, and electronic devices with a "Standby" mode these days. Supposedly, the standby mode allows the consumer to save energy while keeping the gadget powered up and ready for use.
However, a recent study in the US showed that the energy WASTED in the United States every year by machines on "standby" costs consumers $1 billion a year, and would be enough to power a large city such as Chicago or London!
New Scientist magazine reported that, since many items spend much more time in "standby" than they do in normal use, such appliances actually use a MAJORITY of their energy in "standby" mode.
Christians, we must be careful not to expend all of our energy and resources in "standby-for-Jesus" mode! Do we spend most of our effort GETTING READY to serve? … or do we spend most of our effort actually DOING the work of service?
Source: excite.com, 8/28/98
Bruce Springsteen sang a song called "Glory Days" in which he described the longing of several of his friends to return to days gone by. He sings of a former star high school athlete wishing for a return to his exciting, glamorous days of stardom.
I had a friend was a big baseball player,
back in high school
He could throw that speed ball by you,
make you look like a fool, boy
Saw him the other night ...
I was walkin' in, he was walkin' out
We went back inside ...
but all he kept talkin' about—Glory Days...
The instances of athletes enduring in stardom for an entire career are really the exception, not the rule. Many a former big-play-maker is sitting around today wondering, like the character in Springsteen’s song, where the "glory days" went.
Are WE doing the work God has called us to do TODAY? … or, are we simply sitting around longing for the "glory days" of yesterday to return?
Source: Zeke Moore
Topics/Tags: Memory; Glory, temporal; Work; Activity
"Blessed is the man who is too busy to worry in the daytime, and too sleepy to worry at night."
— Earl Riney, in "Church Management"
Truly, worry feeds on idleness. The cure for many of our worries and anxieties involves simply getting BUSY and serving God in whatever capacity God has given us.
Source: "12,000 Religious Quotation," ed. Frank Mead, Baker Book House, p. 478.
"All successful men have agreed in one thing,- they were causationists. They believed that things went not by luck, but by law; that there was not a weak or a cracked link in the chain that joins the first and last of things."
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), U.S. essayist, poet, philosopher. The Conduct of Life, ch. 2 (1860).
_______
Simply put, we will get out of life what we are willing to put into it. Yes, God can 'multiply' our efforts—but remember that zero multiplied is still zero.
Source: The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations, in Microsoft Bookshelf '98
Topics/Tags: Work; Diligence; Activity; Cause and effect
A pastor was asked about his Church membership. "We have eight
hundred members," he said. "How many active members?" the questioner
asked. "All of them," the pastor replied. "Half are working with me
and half are working against me."
Source: Clergy/Leaders' Mail List, #504: "We Cannot Be Neutral"
Topics/Tags: Ministers, christian; Activity; Conflict; Strife
It's interesting that, in C.S. Lewis' fantasy on heaven and hell titled The Great Divide, hell is portrayed as a very busy place. We are reminded that the church can be "busy" without truly being spiritually healthy. If the church has all the right programs and organizations and activities, but is not of God, it is spiritually dead.
Source: "Proclaim," 1989 #4, p. 9.
Topics/Tags: Activity; Death, spiritual
Browse By Topic A Activity