The Week In Words

Posted on September 5, 2010 by Barbara Harper

Welcome to The Week In Words, where we share quotes from the last week’s reading. If something you read this past week inspired you, caused you to laugh, cry, think, dream, or just resonated with you in some way, please share it with us, attributing it to its source, which can be a book, newspaper, blog, Facebook — anything that you read. More information is here.

Also, if you’ve posted a quote on your blog this past week, feel free to link it here as well. You don’t have to save it for Mondays. And please do read and comment even if you’re not posting quotes.

Here are some quotes that spoke to me:

From Diane‘s Facebook status:

“There is only one person holy enough to fulfill the righteous requirement of the law and it’s not you. Rest.” Elyse Fitzpatrick

I can’t tell you what immediate rest that gave my soul. Even though I know we’re both saved and kept by God’s grace through faith and not our own efforts, somehow there is still a part of me that strives to be “good enough” — and only Christ ever was. What a rest we find in Him.

Seen at Challies:

“Endurance and perseverance are qualities we would all like to possess, but we are loath to go through the process that produces them.” —Jerry Bridges

So true.

Seen at girltalk:

“It is faith that enlivens our work with perpetual cheerfulness. It commits every part of it to God, in the hope, that even mistakes shall be overruled for his glory; and thus relieves us from an oppressive anxiety, often attendant upon a deep sense of our responsibility. The shortest way to peace will be found in casting ourselves upon God for daily pardon of deficiencies and supplies of grace, without looking too eagerly for present fruit.” Charles Bridges

From an e-mail:

Loneliness is inner emptiness.
Solitude is inner fulfillment.
– Richard J. Foster

I’ve pondered the difference between loneliness and solitude often but had never quite thought of it that way. I think another simple difference is whether you want to be alone or not: when you want to be, it is blissful solitude; if not, it’s loneliness. 🙂

From Rita Vernoy‘s Facebook status:

Don’t be afraid to fail. Don’t waste energy trying to cover up failure. Learn from your failures and go on to the next challenge. It’s OK. If you’re not failing, you’re not growing.-H. Stanley Judd

One of the most life-changing message I ever heard was one on college on failure.

By the way, just as a disclaimer, I am not familiar with most of the authors quoted, and therefore please don’t take these quotes as an endorsement. I just posted them for the value of the individual quotes themselves and the food for thought they offered.

If you’ve read anything that particularly spoke to you that you’d like to share, please either list it in the comments below or write a post on your blog and then put the link to that post (not your general blog link) in Mr. Linky below. I do ask that only family-friendly quotes be included.

The Week In Words

Posted on August 29, 2010 by Barbara Harper

Here are some that caught my eye this week:

A quote at the end of a Good Clean Funnies e-mail:

“Don’t ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.” ~ Robert Frost.

Good advice! In many ways! Some fences, both physical and immaterial, are there for very good reasons.

From Diane‘s Facebook status:

‎“Believe God’s love and power more than you believe your own feelings and experiences. Your rock is Christ, and it is not the rock that ebbs and flows but the sea.” – Samuel Rutherford

I love the imagery and the truth in that.

I have a few others in my file, but I think I will just keep it short this week.

Do You Have the Son?

Posted on August 28, 2010 by Barbara Harper

You may have wealth, a comfortable lifestyle, and all you would ever need of this world’s goods, but do you have the Son?

You may have good friends and good times, but do you have the Son?

You may have religious ritual, but do you have the Son?

You may have a clear conscience, but do you have the Son?

You may have respectability, but do you have the Son?

Your good deeds may outweigh your bad deeds, but do you have the Son?

And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. I John 5:11-12.

He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. John 3:36.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. John 3:16-19

How Can I Fear?

Posted on August 22, 2010 by Barbara Harper

When shadows fall and the night covers all
There are things that my eyes cannot see.
I never fear, for the Saviour is near.
My LORD abides with me!

How can I fear? Jesus is near!
He ever watches over me!
Worries all cease; He gives me peace.
How can I fear with Jesus?

When I’m alone and I face the unknown
And I fear what the future may be,
I can depend on the strength of my Friend!
He walks along with me.

How can I fear? Jesus is near!
He ever watches over me!
Worries all cease; He gives me peace.
How can I fear with Jesus?

Jesus is King! He controls everything!
He is with me each night and each day.
I trust my soul to the Saviour’s control;
He drives all fear away!

How can I fear? Jesus is near!
He ever watches over me!
Worries all cease; He gives me peace.
How can I fear with Jesus?

Lyrics: Ron Hamilton, 1982

Sexuality in Christian Fiction

Posted on August 19, 2010 by Barbara Harper

One of the issues that keeps many Christian people from reading a lot of modern fiction is the proliferation of explicit sexual scenes. Yet now I seem to be finding more sexuality in Christian fiction — not full-fledged descriptions, but more of a window into that activity than I really want to read and imagine.

It’s not that I and Christians in general don’t like sex. It was God’s idea, after all: He invented it not only for procreation but also for enjoyment, within the parameters for which He created it (within marriage, to one spouse, between a man and woman.) Enjoyed as He meant it, it is a wonderful expression of love and intimacy.

But as Quilly once so aptly put it, I don’t enjoy sex as a spectator sport. I think it is meant to be private.

I do understand that some Christian authors write sexual scenes to show show how a person could easily get into trouble sexually without meaning to. And I understand that some want to portray sexuality in a normal, healthy, marital way, reasoning that, 1) it is okay to do so since God created it, and 2) if all sexuality in literature is the “wrong” variety (illicit, adulterous, etc.), then that gives readers a warped view of what it is meant to be.

And Song of Solomon is in the Bible after all, as well as graphic verses like Proverbs 5:19. And I am glad they are: they helped immensely when, as a young wife, I had to change my mind set from thinking of sex as something I needed to avoid and resist as an unmarried woman to something I was now free to enjoy. I knew that intellectually, but there were times of going over these passages to assure myself that it really was ok now.

I don’t think I have seen anything as graphic as those passages in Christian fiction, but I have read some passages that made me feel uncomfortable in the sense of feeling aroused or feeling voyeuristic — and that’s not how I want to feel when reading! Especially Christian fiction!

My appeal to any author, Christian or secular, would be to remember the “less is more” principle. A hint in this area is usually better than a full-fledged description. Some of you may remember on the TV sitcom “Happy Days” that occasionally Mrs. Cunningham would head upstairs saying something about “feeling frisky,” and Mr. Cunningham would get a goofy grin on his face and rush upstairs after her. It was cute, it revealed they were happy in that area of their lives, and that was all we needed to know.

By contrast, in one Christian book I just finished, a couple’s wedding night was portrayed step-by-step until they actually got into bed, and though I would say it was tastefully done and not explicit, and it fit naturally into the story, I still didn’t want to be left with the mental image of a man undressing his wife even though in reality it is a normal and wholesome thing.

What do you think? Are you comfortable with the portrayal of Christian married couples as sexual beings in Christian fiction? Is it helpful to portray married Christian sexuality as normal, healthy, and fun? How much is too much? At what point do you close a book or avoid an author (or avoid recommending an author) because of sexual content?

The Week In Words

Posted on August 16, 2010 by Barbara Harper

Just a further note — if you’ve posted a quote on your blog this past week, feel free to link it here as well. You don’t have to save it for Mondays. And please do read and comment even if you’re not posting quotes.

Here are a few that stood out to me this week:

On several friends’ Facebook statuses:

The happiest people don’t have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything they have.

That speaks much to being content with such things as we have, as we’re instructed to be (Hebrews 13:5-6). It seems no matter how much we have, there is always a craving for more.

I saw this at Semicolon’s:

“It is not enough to simply teach children to read; we have to give them something worth reading. Something that will stretch their imaginations–something that will help them make sense of their own lives and encourage them to reach out toward people whose lives are quite different from their own.”~Katharine Paterson, U.S. National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature

I so agree with this! I am astounded when I hear parents or teachers say, “I don’t care what my kids are reading as long as they’re reading.” We don’t say the same about physical food: “I don’t care what my kids are eating, as long as they’re eating.” Why would we care less about what kids are putting into their brains? I am not talking about the extremes of censorship but rather teaching discernment and providing good books to read (for them and ourselves). There are so many good choices, we don’t need to read shoddy stuff just to have something to read.

Then in an article titled 10 Writing Tips at ChristianWritingToday.com (I got there via Semicolon’s link to 8 Writing Tips From C. S. Lewis on the same site) these first two were the ones that most stood out to me:

1. Write only when you have something to say. (Playwright David Hare).

2. The reader is a friend, not an adversary, not a spectator. (Jonathan Franzen)

That second one especially spoke to me: if writing is to be a means of communication rather than just self-expression, writers need to engage the reader, and then not be offended if a reader doesn’t “get” or like something, but rather look for ways to better communicate with the reader (though of course we all understand that we can’t please everybody. But pleasing and effectively communicating aren’t always the same thing.)

Then from an Elisabeth Elliot e-mail devotinal from her book A Lamp For My Feet concerning Romans 12:1-2:

The primary condition for learning what God wants of us is putting ourselves wholly at his disposal. It is just here that we are often blocked. We hold certain reservations about how far we are willing to go, what we will or will not do, how much God can have of us or of what we treasure. Then we pray for guidance. It will not work. We must begin by laying it all down–ourselves, our treasures, our destiny. Then we are in a position to think with renewed minds and act with a transformed nature. The withholding of any part of ourselves is the same as saying, “Thy will be done up to a point, mine from there on.”

That is the sticking point, isn’t it? I want God’s perfect will in my life…unless it means that.

From the same source comes this quote:

If God is almighty, there can be no evil so great as to be beyond his power to transform. That transforming power brings light out of darkness, joy out of sorrow, gain out of loss, life out of death.

Sometimes we boggle at the evil in the world and especially in ourselves, feeling that this sin, this tragedy, this offense cannot possibly fit into a pattern for good. Let us remember Joseph’s imprisonment, David’s sin, Paul’s violent persecution of Christians, Peter’s denial of his Master. None of it was beyond the power of grace to redeem and turn into something productive. The God who establishes the shoreline for the sea also decides the limits of the great mystery which is evil. He is “the Blessed Controller of all things.” God will finally be God, Satan’s best efforts notwithstanding.

We tend to want bad things prevented rather than transformed. That day will come, but it is not now. A friend once said she realized that if God were to wipe out all the evil in the world, He would have to wipe out all of us, for we all sin. I am thankful He transforms us rather than just doing away with us, and and we can trust Him to limit what He allows of evil and trust Him to somehow work it together for good (Romans 8:28) until the day when it is taken out of the way completely.

If you have some family-friendly quotes you’d like to share, please leave the link to your “Week In Words” post (not just to your general blog) with Mr. Linky below. Of course, it is fine to just leave a quote in the comments section if you’d rather. I hope you’ll visit some of the other participants, too: this is a small enough meme so far that it is not hard to visit around with others who love to glean quotes from their reading as well.

The Week In Words Participants

1. bekahcubed

2. Susan

3. Jerrie

(Mr. Linky is closed for this post: Please see the current Week In Words post to put your new quotes in.)

Laudable Linkage

Posted on August 14, 2010 by Barbara Harper

I saw some great things around the Internet the last couple of weeks. Let me know if you find any of them useful!

Supernatural Love at Femina. We all need it. This is a great delineation of what it looks like, how to apply I Cor. 13 in everyday life. It’s geared toward moms, but of course the chapter and many of the principles listed could be applied in multitudes of ways.

Strength For a Weary Mom at girltalk.

Defining Success as a Parent at The M.O.B. Society. I love this site! I wish there had been something like it when my guys were small.

Confession Is Not Propitiatory at My Two Cents. It’s not how hard we confess that appropriates our forgiveness. Amen.

Thinking About Immigration Missiologically at MissioMishmash.

Davis Bunn and Writer’s Conferences. Maybe some day…

And on the crafty front:

Gifts Bags From Newspapers.

And a neat idea for storing fabric (HT to Lizzie).

And a couple of funnies from icanhascheezburger.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Have a great Saturday!

“David encouraged himself in the LORD his God”

Posted on August 11, 2010 by Barbara Harper

This is a sentence that has intrigued me often, and I have been mulling over it from time to time for several weeks. That might have something to do with the fact that we’ve moved away from our two oldest sons, and though we keep in touch, it is not the same as hearing what goes on in their everyday lives and helping them put life into perspective or quietly praying when the time isn’t right for motherly advice. I want them to continue developing this habit and skill of encouraging themselves in the Lord.

As Christians we are supposed to encourage each other, but sometimes there is no one at hand to talk to, or sometimes another person doesn’t really understand, or even if they do understand and do try to help, it’s ineffectual if we do not take their wisdom and encouragement in for ourselves.

The passage that this verse comes from is I Samuel 30. David had been anointed king earlier, but he was not the acting king yet: in fact, he was in hiding from King Saul, who wanted to kill him. While David and his men had been away from their camp, Amalekites had swept in, burned everything, and taken the women and children captive. David’s men spoke of stoning him out of their distress over their families. And at that point, “David encouraged himself in the LORD his God” (verse 6b).

How did David encourage himself? Verse 7 says he asked the priest for the ephod and inquired of the Lord what to do.

We don’t have ephods these days — though sometimes that seems like it would be nice when we need a direct answer as to what to do next! But we have the whole word of God and the continually indwelling Holy Spirit if we’re Christians. One of the many reasons it is so important to read and hear the Word of God regularly is that, as we take it in, we get to know our God and His character better, and the Holy Spirit can then bring back to our minds the truths we’ve learned (John 14:26).

David wrote in Psalm 63 in an earlier situation (I Samuel 23:14, according to the reference notes in my Bible), “My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips: When I remember thee upon my bed, and meditate on thee in the night watches. Because thou hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice” (verses 5-7). All through his life you find him inquiring of the Lord or going back to what he knew of God’s character and His word. Near the end of his life he passed this same encouragement on to his son, Solomon: in I Chronicles 28:9 he told him, “And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind: for the LORD searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts: if thou seek him, he will be found of thee; but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever,” and verse 20, “Be strong and of good courage, and do it: fear not, nor be dismayed: for the LORD God, even my God, will be with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee, until thou hast finished all the work for the service of the house of the LORD.”

May we all encourage ourselves in the Lord throughout our lives.

The Week In Words

Posted on August 9, 2010 by Barbara Harper

Here are some quotes that spoke to me this week:

From the Elisabeth Elliot e-mail devotionals, this taken from her book A Lamp For My Feet:

How can this person who so annoys or offends me be God’s messenger? Is God so unkind as to send that sort across my path? Insofar as his treatment of me requires more kindness than I can find in my own heart, demands love of a quality I do not possess, asks of me patience which only the Spirit of God can produce in me, he is God’s messenger. God sends him in order that he may send me running to God for help.

Sometimes the very circumstance in our lives that we’re chafing against is the one God is using to work something necessary into our hearts and characters that we would not learn or develop any other way.

That goes along with something I read at Washing the Feet of the Saints:

In a recent conversation with a delightful young friend, we considered what it means to die to self, particularly in the ordinary tasks of every day life, and to live sacrificially in our home and community to the glory of Christ.

The “dying” this young lady referenced was a simple household chore that had nothing to do with family/elderly caregiving, but it’s application was obvious. My friend lamented that it should be easier to put her desires and contentment aside for the benefit of other. “But then it wouldn’t be dying,” I countered.

That last line really hit me between the eyes. Thanks, Patricia, for that perspective.

From the August 4 reading from Our Daily Walk by F. B. Meyer:

The best way of increasing our knowledge of God s infinite nature, is by the reverent study of His Word. It is a flimsy religion which discounts doctrine. What the bones are to the body, doctrine is to our moral and spiritual life. What law is to the material universe, doctrine is to the spiritual.

This reminded me of some of the truths I wrote a few years ago about the importance of learning doctrine when we read the Bible rather than just looking for warm fuzzies. The warm fuzzies fly away like dandelion seeds if they are not based on the bedrock of doctrine that we can rely on no matter what the circumstances are.

Then from today’s reading of Meyer’s devotionals:

From Act 7:2-5, we learn that the Call to Abram to go forth, which originally came in Ur of the Chaldees, was repeated in Haran, after his father’s death. Probably Terah delayed his son’s obedience. Let us help our children to realize God’s call, even though we be left lonely on the other side of the river.

This was particularly potent as we just moved away from our oldest two sons and daughter-in-law and are experiencing those pangs of realization in everyday life of their absence. I have read more than one missionary biography in which a well-meaning Christian mother who was active in missionary support balked and resisted when it came to her son or daughter going to the mission field. I do not know if any of mine are called to the mission field yet, but I do not want to stand in the way of any of them doing whatever God’s will is for their lives out of a desire to keep them close to me.

(Mr. Linky is now closed for this post. Please see the newest Week In Words post to add links.)

The Week In Words Participants

1. bekahcubed

2. e-Mom @ Chrysalis

The Week In Words

Posted on August 2, 2010 by Barbara Harper

Here are a few I’ve read in various places:

Seen on Diane‘s Facebook status:

“I think sometimes a lot of the wear and tear on our lives is from fighting the circumstances that God has allowed to come into our lives.” Nancy Leigh DeMoss

I think that is probably true. It’s not usually surrender that’s the problem as much as the struggle against surrender.

Also seen at Diane‘s:

“It takes grace to give grace, takes hope to give hope, takes love to give love. I can give these to you because Christ gave them to me.”-Paul David Tripp

I can only minister to others what I have received from Christ.

Seen at girltalk:

When I have learnt to love God better than my earthly dearest, I shall love my earthly dearest better than I do now.

Insofar as I learn to love my earthly dearest at the expense of God and instead of God, I shall be moving towards the state in which I shall not love my earthly dearest at all.

When first things are put first, second things are not suppressed but increased.  ~ C. S. Lewis, Letters of C.S. Lewis (8 November, 1952)

So true!

And I am so thankful for this truth expressed in the Heidelberg Catechism (which I had not heard of before) shared by Chris Anderson at My Two Cents:

Question 60: How are thou righteous before God?

Answer: Only by a true faith in Jesus Christ; so that though my conscience accuse me, that I have grossly transgressed all the commandments of God, and kept none of them, and am still inclined to all evil; notwithstanding, God, without any merit of mine, but only of mere grace, grants and imputes to me, the perfect satisfaction, righteousness and holiness of Christ; even so, as if I never had had, nor committed any sin: yea, as if I had fully accomplished all that obedience which Christ has accomplished for me; inasmuch as I embrace such benefit with a believing heart.

Special note for next week: we’re moving this week, and I am not sure when we will have Internet access and when my desktop PC will be set up and ready to use. If I can set up The Week In Words next Monday, I will, but if you don’t see it here, that means I wasn’t able to, and you can hang on to those quotes for the following Monday.

If you have some family-friendly quotes you’d like to share, please leave the link to your “Week In Words” post with Mr. Linky below. I hope you’ll visit some of the other participants as well: this is a small enough meme so far that it is not hard to visit around with others who love to glean quotes from their reading as well.