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One Of The Highest Of Human Duties Is The Duty Of Encouragement...it Is Easy To Laugh At Men's Ideals; It Is Easy To Pour Cold Water On Their Enthusiasm; It Is Easy To Discourage Others. The World Is Full Of Discouragers. We Have A Christian Duty To Encourage One Another. Many A Time A Word Of Praise Or Thanks Or Appreciation Or Cheer Has Kept A Man On His Feet. Blessed Is The Man Who Speaks Such A Word.

-William Barclay

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One Of The Highest

William Barclay

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One Of The Highest Of Human Duties Is The Duty Of Encouragement...it Is Easy To Laugh At Men's Ideals; It Is Easy To Pour Cold Water On Their Enthusiasm; It Is Easy To Discourage Others. The World Is Full Of Discouragers. We Have A Christian Duty To Encourage One Another. Many A Time A Word Of Praise Or Thanks Or Appreciation Or Cheer Has Kept A Man On His Feet. Blessed Is The Man Who Speaks Such A Word.

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The Only Way To Get Our Values Right Is To See, Not The Beginning, But The End Of The Way, To See Things Not Only In The Light Of Time But In The Light Of Eternity.

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The Terrible Importance Of This Life Is That It Determines Eternity.

It May Well Be A Sign Of The Decadence Of The Church And The Failure Of Christianity That Gifts Have To Be Coaxed Out Of People, And That Often They Will Not Give At All Unless They Get Something For Their Money In The Way Of Entertainment Or Of Goods. Giving Which Is Real Giving Has A Certain Recklessness In It.

For The Christian, Heaven Is Where Jesus Is. We Do Not Need To Speculate On What Heaven Will Be Like. It Is Enough To Know That We Will Be For Ever With Him.

Religion Fails If It Cannot Speak To Men As They Are.

There Are Certain Things Which Are Lost By Being Kept And Saved By Being Used. Any Individual Talent Is Like That. If It Is Used, It Will Develop Into Something Still Greater. If Someone Refuses To Use It, In The End That Talent Will Be Lost. Supremely So, Life Is Like That.

Individual Talent

Prayer Will Never Do Our Work For Us; What It Will Do Is To Strengthen Us For Work Which Must Be Done.

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Jesus Is The Yes To Every Promise Of God.

When We Love Anyone With Our Whole Hearts, Life Begins When We Are With That Person; It Is Only In Their Company That We Are Really And Truly Alive.

We Have A Duty To Encourage One Another. Many A Time A Word Of Praise Or Thanks Or Appreciation Or Cheer Has Kept A Man On His Feet. Blessed Is The Man Who Speaks Such A Word.

Self-defense Is A Part Of The Law Of Nature; Nor Can It Be Denied The Community, Even Against The King Himself.

The Tragedy Of Life And Of The World Is Not That Men Do Not Know God; The Tragedy Is That, Knowing Him, They Still Insist On Going Their Own Way.

The True, The Genuine Worship Is When Man, Through His Spirit, Attains To Friendship And Intimacy With God. True And Genuine Worship Is Not To Come To A Certain Place; It Is Not To Go Through A Certain Ritual Or Liturgy; It Is Not Even To Bring Certain Gifts. True Worship Is When The Spirit, The Immortal And Invisible Part Of Man, Speaks To And Meets With God, Who Is Immortal And Invisible.

The Word Grace Emphasizes At One And The Same Time The Helpless Poverty Of Man And The Limitless Kindness Of God.

When We Believe That God Is Father, We Also Believe That Such A Father's Hand Will Never Cause His Child A Needless Tear. We May Not Understand Life Any Better, But We Will Not Resent Life Any Longer.

If A Man Fights His Way Through His Doubts To The Conviction That Jesus Christ Is Lord, He Has Attained To A Certainty That The Man Who Unthinkingly Accepts Things Can Never Reach.

The Best Way To Prepare For The Coming Of Christ Is Never To Forget The Presence Of Christ.

The Only Victory Love Can Enjoy Is The Day When Its Offer Of Love Is Answered By The Return Of Love. The Only Possible Final Triumph Is A Universe Loved By God And In Love With God.

There Is No Joy In The World Like The Joy Of Bringing One Soul To Christ.

God Tested Abraham. Temptation Is Not Meant To Make Us Fail; It Is Meant To Confront Us With A Situation Out Of Which We Emerge Stronger Than We Were. Temptation Is Not The Penalty Of Manhood; It Is The Glory Of Manhood.

One Of The Highest Of Human Duties Is The Duty Of Encouragement...it Is Easy To Laugh At Men's Ideals; It Is Easy To Pour Cold Water On Their Enthusiasm; It Is Easy To Discourage Others. The World Is Full Of Discouragers. We Have A Christian Duty To Encourage One Another. Many A Time A Word Of Praise Or Thanks Or Appreciation Or Cheer Has Kept A Man On His Feet. Blessed Is The Man Who Speaks Such A Word.

Every Discouraging Sermon Is A Wicked Sermon... There Could Hardly Be A More Un-christian Way Of Living Than To Go About In Such A Way As To Depress And To Discourage Other People.

Christianity Does Not Think Of Man Finally Submitting To The Power Of God, It Thinks Of Him As Finally Surrendering To The Love Of God. It Is Not That Man's Will Is Crushed, But That Man's Heart Is Broken.

Timothy's Great Value Was That He Was Always Willing To Go Anywhere; And In His Hands A Message Was As Safe As If Paul Had Delivered It Himself. Others Might Be Consumed With Selfish Ambition; But Timothy's One Desire Was To Serve Paul And Jesus Christ. He Is The Patron Saint Of All Those Who Are Quite Content With The Second Place, So Long As They Can Serve.

When We Accept Christ We Enter Into Three New Relationships: (1) We Enter Into A New Relationship With God. The Judge Becomes The Father; The Distant Becomes The Near; Strangeness Becomes Intimacy And Fear Becomes Love. (2) We Enter Into A New Relationship With Our Fellow Men. Hatred Becomes Love; Selfishness Becomes Service; And Bitterness Becomes Forgiveness. (3) We Enter Into A New Relationship With Ourselves. Weakness Becomes Strength; Frustration Becomes Achievement; And Tension Becomes Peace.

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...for Paul Faith Is Always Faith In A Person. Faith Is Not The Intellectual Acceptance Of A Body Of Doctrine; Faith Is Faith In A Person.

In The Time We Have It Is Surely Our Duty To Do All The Good We Can To All The People We Can In All The Ways We Can.

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There Are Two Great Days In A Person's Life - The Day We Are Born And The Day We Discover Why.

The Christian Man Must Aim At That Complete Obedience To God In Which Life Finds Its Highest Happiness, Its Greatest Good, Its Perfect Consummation, Its Peace.

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Inspirational Life

We Are Trying Not So Much To Make God Listen To Us As To Make Ourselves Listen To Him; We Are Trying Not To Persuade God To Do What We Want, But To Find Out What He Wants Us To Do. It So Often Happens That In Prayer We Are Really Saying, 'thy Will Be Changed,' When We Ought To Be Saying, 'thy Will Be Done.' The First Object Of Prayer Is Not So Much To Speak To God As To Listen To Him.

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I Thank You For My Friends, For Those Who Understand Me Better Than I Understand Myself. For Those Who Know Me At My Worst, And Still Like Me. For Those Who Have Forgiven Me When I Had No Right To Expect To Be Forgiven. Help Me To Be As True To My Friends As I Would Wish Them To Be To Me.

Real Repentance Means Coming Not Only To Be Sorry For The Consequences Of Sin But To Hate Sin Itself.

We Are Chosen For Joy. However Hard The Christian Way, It Is Both In The Traveling And In The Goal, The Way Of Joy.

Faith Is Not Only Commitment To The Promises Of Christ; It Is Also Commitment To His Demands.

Love Always Involves Responsibility, And Love Always Involves Sacrifice. And We Do Not Really Love Christ Unless We Are Prepared To Face His Task And To Take Up His Cross.

Here Is An Eternal Truth. Life Cannot Be Divided Into Compartments In Some Which God Is Involved And In Others Of Which He Is Not Involved... The Fact Is That God Does Not Need To Be Invited Into Certain Departments Of Life, And Kept Out Of Others. He Is Everywhere, All Through Life And In Every Activity Of Life. He Hears Not Only The Words That Are Spoken In His Name; He Hears All Words; And There Cannot Be Any Such Thing As A Form Of Words Which Evades Bringing God Into Any Transaction. We Will Regard All Promises As Sacred If We Remember That All Promises Are Made In The Presence Of God.

Certainly Christianity Is An Experience, But Equally Clearly The Validity Of Ane Experience Has To Be Tested. There Are People In Lunatic Asylums Who Have The Experience Of Being The Emperor Napoleon Or A Poached Egg. It Is Unquestionably An Experience, And To Them A Real Experience, But For All That It Has No Kind Of Universal Validity. It Is Necessary To Go Far Beyond Simply Saying That Something Comes From Experience. Before Any Such Thing Can Be Evaluated At All, The Source And Character Of The Experience Must Clearly Be Investigated.

Personal Experiences

Instead Of Our Petulant, Fretful, Irritable Human Hastiness We Should Cultivate In Our Souls The Patience Which Has Learned To Wait On God.

The Danger Of Prosperity Is That It Encourages A False Independence.

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