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The Busyness Of Things Obscures Our Concentration On God ... Never Let A Hurried Lifestyle Disturb The Relationship Of Abiding In Him. This Is An Easy Thing To Allow, But We Must Guard Against It.

-Oswald Chambers

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The Busyness Of Things

Oswald Chambers

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The Busyness Of Things Obscures Our Concentration On God ... Never Let A Hurried Lifestyle Disturb The Relationship Of Abiding In Him. This Is An Easy Thing To Allow, But We Must Guard Against It.

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Are You Debating Whether You Should Take A Step Of Faith In Jesus, Or Whether You Should Wait Until You Can Clearly See How To Do What He Has Asked? Simply Obey Him With Unrestrained Joy. When He Tells You Something And You Begin To Debate, It Is Because You Have A Misunderstanding Of What Honors Him And What Doesn't. Are You Faithful To Jesus, Or Faithful To Your Ideas About Him?

Never Forget That Our Capacity And Capability In Spiritual Matters Is Measured By, And Based On, The Promises Of God.

If I Obey Jesus Christ, The Redemption Of God Will Flow Through Me To The Lives Of Others, Because Behind The Deed Of Obedience Is The Reality Of Almighty God.

The Entrance Into The Kingdom Is Through The Panging Pains Of Repentance Crashing Into A Man's Respectable Goodness; Then The Holy Ghost, Who Produces These Agonies Begins The Formation Of The Son God In The Life.

The Only Way We Can Be Of Use To God Is To Let Him Take Us Through The Crooks And Crannies Of Our Own Characters.

It Is The Unseen And The Spiritual In People That Determines The Outward And The Actual.

The Only Basis On Which To Work For God Is An Esteemed Appreciation Of His Deliverance.

Living A Life Of Faith Means Never Knowing Where You Are Being Led.

We Look Upon Prayer Simply As A Means Of Getting Things For Ourselves, But The Biblical Purpose Of Prayer Is That We May Get To Know God Himself.

One Of The Greatest Hindrances In Coming To Jesus Is The Excuse Of Temperament. We Make Our Temperament And Our Natural Affinities Barriers To Coming To Jesus. The First Thing We Realize When We Come To Jesus Is That He Pays No Attention Whatever To Our Natural Affinities. We Have The Notion That We Can Consecrate Our Gifts To God. You Cannot Consecrate What Is Not Yours; There Is Only One Thing You Can Consecrate To God, And That Is Your Right To Yourself (romans 12:1). If You Will Give God Your Right To Yourself, He Will Make A Holy Experiment Out Of You. God’s Experiments Always Succeed

Faith That Is Sure Of Itself Is Not Faith; Faith That Is Sure Of God Is The Only Faith There Is.

If You Have Had No Tension In Your Life, Never Been Screwed Up By Problems, Your Mortality Well Within Your Own Grasp, And Someone Tells You That God So Loved You That He Gave His Son To Die For You, Nothing But Good Manners Will Keep You From Being Amused.

The Greatest Competitor Of Devotion To Jesus Is Service For Him.

The Moment We Recognize Our Complete Weakness And Our Dependence Upon Him Will Be The Very Moment That The Spirit Of God Will Exhibit His Power.

God Can Do Nothing For Me Until I Recognize The Limits Of What Is Humanly Possible, Allowing Him To Do The Impossible.

What A Blessed Habit I Have Found My Prayer List, Morning By Morning, It Takes Me Via The Throne Of All Grace Straight To The Intimate Personal Heart Of Each One Mentioned Here, And I Know That He Who Is Not Prescribed By Time And Geography Answers Immediately.

I Have No Right To Say I Believe In God Unless I Order My Life As Under His All-seeing Eye.

Complete Weakness And Dependence Will Always Be The Occasion For The Spirit Of God To Manifest His Power.

Watch Your Motive Before God; Have No Other Motive In Prayer Than To Know Him.

If Our Hopes Are Being Disappointed Just Now, It Means They Are Being Purified.

Being Disappointed

Worship God In The Difficult Circumstances, And When He Chooses, He Will Alter Them In Two Seconds.

Spiritual Maturity Is Not Reached By The Passing Of The Years, But By Obedience To The Will Of God. Some People Mature Into An Understanding Of God’s Will More Quickly Than Others Because They Obey More Readily; They More Readily Sacrifice The Life Of Nature To The Will Of God.

A River Reaches Places Its Source Never Knows.

At Times God Puts Us Through The Discipline Of Darkness To Teach Us To Heed Him. Song Birds Are Taught To Sing In The Dark, And We Are Put Into The Shadow Of God’s Hand Until We Learn To Hear Him.

To Choose Suffering Makes No Sense At All; To Choose God's Will In The Midst Of Our Suffering Makes All The Sense In The World.

Remember Whose You Are And Whom You Serve.

To Be 'in The Will Of God' Is Not A Matter Of Intellectual Discernment, But A State Of Heart.

Our Lord’s Making Of A Disciple Is Supernatural. He Does Not Build On Any Natural Capacity Of Ours At All. God Does Not Ask Us To Do The Things That Are Naturally Easy For Us- He Only Asks Us To Do The Things That We Are Perfectly Fit To Do Through His Grace, And That Is Where The Cross We Must Bear Will Always Come.

Be Persistent With Your Disturbance Until You Get Face To Face With The Lord Himself. Don't Deify Common Sense.

Our Yesterdays Present Irreparable Things To Us; It Is True That We Have Lost Opportunities Which Will Never Return, But God Can Transform This Destructive Anxiety Into A Constructive Thoughtfulness For The Future. Let The Past Sleep, But Let It Sleep On The Bosom Of Christ. Leave The Irreparable Past In His Hands, And Step Out Into The Irresistible Future With Him.

The Disciple Is Rich Not In Possessions, But In Personal Identity.

The God Who Guides The Stars, Unhasting And Unresting, Will As Assuredly Fulfill What He Has Promised.

Temptations In The Life Of Faith Are Not Accidents; Each Temptation Is Part Of A Plan, A Step In The Progress Of Faith.

If Ever We Are Going To Be Made Into Wine, We Will Have To Be Crushed; You Cannot Drink Grapes. Grapes Become Wine Only When They Have Been Squeezed. I Wonder What Kind Of Finger And Thumb God Has Been Using To Squeeze You, And You Have Been Like A Marble And Escaped?

The Bible Talks Plentifully About Joy, But It Nowhere Talks About A 'happy Christian.' Happiness Depends On What Happens; Joy Does Not. Remember, Jesus Christ Had Joy, And He Prayed 'that They Might Have My Joy Fulfilled In Themselves.'

Watch The Things You Say You Can't Believe, And Then Recall The Things You Accept Without Thinking, Like Your Own Existence.

If Your Faith Is In Experiences, Anything That Happens Is Likely To Upset That Faith.

Don't Waste Time Asking God To Keep You From Doing Things. Don't Do Them.

You Must Learn To Wrestle Against The Things That Hinder Your Communication With God.

Communication With God

Yielding To Jesus Will Break Every Form Of Slavery In Any Human Life.

Patience Has The Meaning Of Testing-a Thing Drawn Out And Tested, Drawn Out To The Last Strand In A Strain Without Breaking, And Ending In Sheer Joy. The Strain On A Violin String When Stretched To The Uttermost Gives It Its Strength; And The Stronger The Strain, The Finer Is The Sound Of Our Life For God, And He Never Strains More Than We Are Able To Bear.

We Are Here For God's Designs, Not For Our Own

Beware Of Any Work For God That Causes Or Allows You To Avoid Concentrating On Him. A Great Number Of Christian Workers Worship Their Work. The Only Concern Of Christian Workers Should Be Their Concentration On God.

When We Pray "in The Name Of Jesus" The Answers Are In Accordance With His Nature, And If We Think Our Prayers Are Unanswered It Is Because We Are Not Interpreting The Answer Along This Line.

If In Preaching The Gospel You Substitute Your Knowledge Of The Way Of Salvation For Confidence In The Power Of The Gospel, You Hinder People From Getting To Reality.

Preaching The Gospel

We Have No Right To Judge Where We Should Be Put, Or To Have Preconceived Notions As To What God Is Fitting Us For. God Engineers Everything; Wherever He Puts Us, Our One Great Aim Is To Pour Out A Whole-hearted Devotion To Him In That Particular Work. 'whatsoever Thy Hand Findeth To Do, Do It With Thy Might.'

Only One In A Thousand Sits Down In The Midst Of It All And Says—i Will Watch My Father Mend This. God Must Not Be Treated As A Hospital For Our Broken “toys,” But As Our Father.

Tell God You Are Ready To Be Offered, And God Will Prove Himself To Be All You Ever Dreamed He Would Be.

If We Obey God It Is Going To Cost Other People More Than It Costs Us, And That Is Where The Sting Comes In. If We Are In Love With Our Lord, Obedience Does Not Cost Us Anything, It Is A Delight, But It Costs Those Who Do Not Love Him A Good Deal.

The Secret Of The Missionary Is...i Am His, And He Is Carrying Out His Work Through Me.

What Hinders Me From Hearing Is That I Am Taken Up With Other Things. It Is Not That I Will Not Hear God, But I Am Not Devoted In The Right Place. I Am Devoted To Things, To Service, To Convictions, And God May Say What He Likes But I Do Not Hear Him.

The Greatest Competitor Of Devotion To Jesus Is Service To Him. It Is Never 'do, Do' With The Lord, But 'be, Be' And He Will 'do' Through You. The Only Way To Keep True To God Is By A Steady Persistent Refusal To Be Interested In Christian Work And To Be Interested Alone In Jesus Christ.

God Gets Me Into A Relationship With Himself Whereby I Understand His Call, Then I Do Things Out Of Sheer Love For Him On My Own Account. To Serve God Is The Deliberate Love-gift Of A Nature That Has Heard The Call Of God.

Our Lord's First Obedience Was To The Will Of His Father, Not To The Needs Of Men; The Saving Of Men Was The Natural Outcome Of His Obedience To The Father.

Beware Of Any Belief That Makes You Self-indulgent; It Came From The Pit, No Matter How Beautiful It Sounds.

Beware Of Reasoning About God's Word - Obey It.

The Historic Idea That The Devil Tempts Men Had This Remarkable Effect, It Produced The Man Of Iron Who Fought; The Modern Idea Of Blaming His Heredity Or His Circumstances Produces The Man Who Gives In At Once.

It Never Cost A Disciple Anything To Follow Jesus; To Talk About Cost When You Are In Love With Anyone Is An Insult.

Our Lord's Conception Of Discipleship Is Not That We Work For God, But That God Works Through Us.

God Answers Prayer On The Ground Of Redemption And On No Other Ground.

Many People Begin Coming To God Once They Stop Being Religious.there's Only One Master Of The Heart-jesus, Not Religion.

When God Gives A Vision, Transact Business On That Line, No Matter What It Costs.

We Impoverish God In Our Minds When We Say There Must Be Answers To Our Prayers On The Material Plane; The Biggest Answers To Our Prayers Are In The Realm Of The Unseen.

The Path Of Peace For Us Is To Hand Ourselves Over To God And Ask Him To Search Us, Not What We Think We Are, Or What Other People Think We Are, Or What We Persuade Ourselves We Are Or Would Like To Be, But 'search Me Out, O God, Explore Me As I Really Am In Thy Sight.'

Spiritual Lust Causes Me To Demand An Answer From God, Instead Of Seeking God Himself Who Gives The Answer.

The Teaching Of The Sermon On The Mount Is Not--do Your Duty, But--do What Is Not Your Duty. It Is Not Your Duty To Go The Second Mile, To Turn The Other Cheek, But Jesus Says If We Are His Disciples We Shall Always Do These Things. There Will Be No Spirit Of--"oh, Well, I Cannot Do Any More, I Have Been So Misrepresented And Misunderstood". . . Never Look For Right In The Other Man, But Never Cease To Be Right Yourself. We Are Always Looking For Justice; The Teaching Of The Sermon On The Mount Is--never Look For Justice, But Never Cease To Live It.

Are You Willing To Give And Be Poured Out Until You Are Used Up And Exhausted-not Seeking To Be Ministered To, But To Minister?

If I Obey Jesus Christ In The Seemingly Random Circumstances Of Life, They Become Pinholes Through Which I See The Face Of God.

I Have To Get To The Point Of The Absolute And Unquestionable Relationship That Takes Everything Exactly As It Comes From Him. God Never Guides Us At Some Time In The Future, But Always Here And Now. Realize That The Lord Is Here Now, And The Freedom You Receive Is Immediate.

Faith Is Deliberate Confidence In The Character Of God Whose Ways You Cannot Understand At The Time.

Take Yourself By The Scruff Of The Neck And Shake Off Your Incarnate Laziness.

The Central Point Of The Kingdom Of Jesus Christ Is A Personal Relationship With Him, Not Public Usefulness To Others.

The Marvel Of The Redemptive Reality Of God Is That The Worst And The Vilest Can Never Get To The Bottom Of His Love. Paul Did Not Say That God Separated Him To Show What A Wonderful Man He Could Make Of Him, But To "to Reveal His Son In Me

It Is A Great Thing To See Physical Courage, And Greater Still To See Moral Courage, But The Greatest To See Of All Is Spiritual Courage; Oh, To See A Person Who Will Stand True To The Integrity Of Jesus Christ No Matter What He Or She Goes Through!

The Test Of A Man’s Religious Life And Character Is Not What He Does In The Exceptional Moments Of Life, But What He Does In The Ordinary Times, When There Is Nothing Tremendous Or Exciting On. The Worth Of A Man Is Revealed In His Attitude To Ordinary Things When He Is Not Before The Footlights.

Jesus Christ Can Afford To Be Misunderstood; We Cannot. Our Weakness Lies In Always Wanting To Vindicate Ourselves.

Let God Fling You Out (as Seed), And Do Not Go Until He Does. If You Select Your Own Spot, You Will Prove An Empty Pod. If God Sows You, You Will Bring Forth Fruit.

Leave The Irreparable Past In His Hands, And Step Out Into The Irresistible Future With Him.

Forgiveness Is The Divine Miracle Of Grace. The Cost To God Was The Cross Of Christ.

The Bible Is Not A Book That You Can Open And Say, 'now, Lord, Put Some Magic Into My Soul That Will Open Up The Meaning Of This Book.' There Is Only One Way Really To Understand The Word, And That Is Through Wrestling With The Circumstances And Happenings Of Life.

Faith Is Unutterable Trust In God, Trust Which Never Dreams That He Will Not Stand By Us.

God Regenerates Us And Puts Us In Contact With All His Divine Resources, But He Cannot Make Us Walk According To His Will.

Whenever God's Will Is In The Ascendant All Compulsion Is Gone. When We Choose Deliberately To Obey Him Then With All His Almighty Power.

Patience Is More Than Endurance. A Saint's Life Is In The Hands Of God Like A Bow And Arrow In The Hands Of An Archer. God Is Aiming At Something The Saint Cannot See, And He Stretches And Strains, And Every Now And Again The Saint Says--'i Cannot Stand Anymore.' God Does Not Heed, He Goes On Stretching Till His Purpose Is In Sight, Then He Lets Fly. Trust Yourself In God's Hands. Maintain Your Relationship To Jesus Christ By The Patience Of Faith. 'though He Slay Me, Yet Will I Trust In Him.

If We Are Devoted To The Cause Of Humanity, We Shall Soon Be Crushed And Broken-hearted, For We Shall Often Meet With More Ingratitude From Men Than We Would From A Dog; But If Our Motive Is Love To God, No Ingratitude Can Hinder Us From Serving Our Fellow Men.

We Must Learn To Tell Ourselves The Truth On The Basis Of God’s Word.

God Works This Unspeakable Mystery Of Entire Sanctification In Your Life And Mine. People Try To Seek The Experience Of Entire Sanctification In Ways Other Than God's Way; But The Wonderful Spirit Of God Will Remove Confusion And Enable Us To See That The Only Means To Obtain The Experience Of Entire Sanctification By Faith Is The Grace Of God.

If We Have Never Had The Experience Of Taking Our Commonplace Religious Shoes Off Our Commonplace Religious Feet, And Getting Rid Of All The Undue Familiarity With Which We Approach God, It Is Questionable Whether We Have Ever Stood In His Presence.

The Dearest Friend On Earth Is A Mere Shadow Compared With Jesus Christ.

When A Man’s Heart Is Right With God The Mysterious Utterances Of The Bible Are Spirit And Life To Him. Spiritual Truth Is Discernible Only To A Pure Heart, Not To A Keen Intellect. It Is Not A Question Of Profundity Of Intellect, But Of Purity Of Heart.

There Is No Condition Of Life In Which We Cannot Abide In Jesus. We Have To Learn To Abide In Him Wherever We Are Placed.

When We Preach The Love Of God There Is A Danger Of Forgetting That The Bible Reveals Not First The Love Of God But The Intense, Blazing Holiness Of God, With His Love At The Center Of That Holiness.

Ask God For What You Want, But You Cannot Ask If You Are Not Asking For A Right Thing. When You Draw Near To God, You Cease From Asking For Things."your Father Knows What Things You Have Need Of, Before You Ask Him." Then, Why Ask? That You May Get To Know Him.

There Is Actually Only One Thing You Can Dedicate To God, And That Is Your Right To Yourself. If You Will Give God Your Right To Yourself, He Will Make A Holy Experiment Out Of You - And His Experiments Always Succeed.

Take Care Lest You Play The Hypocrite By Spending All Your Time Trying To Get Others Right Before You Worship God Yourself.

It Is Better To Enter Into Life Maimed But Lovely In God’s Sight Than To Appear Lovely To Man’s Eyes But Lame To God’s.

Every Man Carries His Kingdom Within, And No One Knows What Is Taking Place In Another's Kingdom. 'no One Understands Me!' Of Course They Don't, Each One Of Us Is A Mystery. There Is Only One Who Understands You, And That Is God. Hand Yourself Over To Him.

Jesus Christ Became Incarnate For One Purpose, To Make A Way Back To God That Man Might Stand Before Him As He Was Created To Do, The Friend And Lover Of God Himself.

There Have Been Prophets And Students Who Handle The Bible Like A Child's Box Of Bricks; They Explain To Us The Design And Structure And Purpose; But As Time Goes On Things Do Not Work Out In Their Way At All. They Have Mistaken The Scaffolding For The Structure, While All The Time God Is Working Out His Purpose With A Great And Undeterred Patience.

As Christians We Are Not Out For Our Own Cause At All, We Are Out For The Cause Of God, Which Can Never Be Our Cause. We Do Not Know What God Is After, But We Have To Maintain Our Relationship With Him Whatever Happens.

Our Relationship

God Never Estimates What We Give From Impulse. We Are Given Credit For What We Determine In Our Hearts To Give; For The Giving That Is Governed By A Fixed Determination. The Spirit Of God Revolutionises Our Philanthropic Instincts. Much Of Our Philanthropy Is Simply The Impulse To Save Ourselves An Uncomfortable Feeling. The Spirit Of God Alters All That. As Saints Our Attitude Towards Giving Is That We Give For Jesus Christ's Sake, And From No Other Motive.

Quit Praying About Yourself And Spend Your Life For The Sake Of Others As The Bondservant Of Jesus. That Is The True Meaning Of Being Broken Bread And Poured-out Wine In Real Life.

When Once You Realize All That It Cost God To Forgive You, You Will Be Held As In A Vice, Constrained By The Love Of God.

Am I Learning How To Use My Bible? The Way To Become Complete For The Master’s Service Is To Be Well Soaked In The Bible; Some Of Us Only Exploit Certain Passages. Our Lord Wants To Give Us Continuous Instruction Out Of His Word; Continuous Instruction Turns Hearers Into Disciples.

God Does Not Make Us Holy In The Sense Of Character; He Makes Us Holy In The Sense Of Innocence, And We Have To Turn That Innocence Into Holy Character By A Series Of Moral Choices.

God Seems To Have A Delightful Way Of Upsetting The Things We Have Calculated On Without Taking Him Into Account. We Get Into Circumstances Which Were Not Chosen By God, And Suddenly We Find We Have Been Calculating Without God; He Has Not Entered In As A Living Factor. The One Thing That Keeps Us From The Possibility Of Worrying Is Bringing God In As The Greatest Factor In All Our Calculations.

Live In A Constant State Of Expectancy, And Leave Room For God To Come In As He Decides.

We Are Not To Preach The Doing Of Good Things; Good Deeds Are Not To Be Preached, They Are To Be Performed.

By Realizing The Reality Of Our Prince Within Us, We Are Never Bothered Again By The Fact That We Do Not Understand Ourselves, Or That Other People Do Not Understand Us. The Only One Who Truly Understands Me Is The One Who Made Me And Who Redeems Me... It Is A Tremendous Freedom To Get Rid Of Every Kind Of Self-consideration And Learn To Care About Only One Thing - The Relationship Between Our Prince And Ourselves.

Prayer Imparts The Power To Walk And Not Faint.

Some Of The Qualities Of #‎ God Must Be Merged Into Us Before Our #‎ Prayers Can Be Fit For His Acceptance.

Never Water Down The Word Of God, But Preach It In Its Undiluted Sternness. There Must Be Unflinching Faithfulness To The Word Of God, But When You Come To Personal Dealings With Others, Remember Who You Are- You Are Not Some Special Being Created In Heaven, But A Sinner Saved By Grace.

If God Sees That My Spiritual Life Will Be Furthered By Giving The Things For Which I Ask, Then He Will Give Them, But That Is Not The End Of Prayer. The End Of Prayer Is That I Come To Know God Himself.

In The Will Of God" Is Not A Matter Of Intellectual Discernment, But A State Of Heart... It's Motto Is --" My Father Can Do What He Likes With Me, He May Bless Me To Death, Or Give Me A Bitter Cup; I Delight To Do His Will.

When We Are Consciously Aware Of Being Used As Broken Bread And Poured Out Wine, We Have Yet Another Level To Reach - A Level Where All Awareness Of Ourselves And What God Is Doing Through Us Is Completely Eliminated. A Saint Is Never Consciously A Saint - A Saint Is Consciously Dependent On God.

Speak, Lord”; Make Time To Listen. Chastening Is More Than A Means Of Discipline, It Is Meant To Get Me To The Place Of Saying, “speak, Lord.”

Beware Of Being Obsessed With Consistency To Your Own Convictions Instead Of Being Devoted To God. The Important Consistency In A Saint Is Not To A Principle But To The Divine Life. It Is Easier To Be An Excessive Fanatic Than It Is To Be Consistently Faithful, Because God Causes An Amazing Humbling Of Our Religious Conceit When We Are Faithful To Him.

Prayer Is The Supreme Activity Of All That Is Noblest In Our Personality, And The Essential Nature Of Prayer Is Faith.

God Never Gives Us Discernment In Order That We May Criticize, But That We May Intercede.

To Say That 'prayer Changes Things' Is Not As Close To The Truth As Saying, 'prayer Changes Me And Then I Change Things.' God Has Established Things So That Prayer, On The Basis Of Redemption, Changes The Way A Person Looks At Things.

Peace Is The Deepest Thing A Human Personality Can Know; It Is Almighty

God's Training Ground, Where The Missionary Weapons Are Found, Is The Hidden, Personal, Worshiping Life Of The Saint.

Have You Ever Realized That You Can Give Things To God That Are Of Value To Him? Or Are You Just Sitting Around Daydreaming About The Greatness Of His Redemption, While Neglecting All The Things You Could Be Doing For Him? I'm Not Referring To Works Which Could Be Regarded As Divine And Miraculous, But Ordinary, Simple Human Things - Things Which Would Be Evidence To God That You Are Totally Surrendered To Him.

I Cannot Give Up My Will - I Must Exercise It, Putting It Into Action.

Prayer Is Not Only Asking, It Is An Attitude Of Heart That Produces An Atmosphere In Which Asking Is Perfectly Natural, And Jesus Says, "every One That Asketh Receiveth."

The Test Of The Life Of A Saint Is Not Success, But Faithfulness In Human Life As It Actually Is. We Will Set Up Success In Christian Work As The Aim; The Aim Is To Manifest The Glory Of God In Human Life, To Live The Life Hid With Christ In God In Human Conditions. Our Human Relationships Are The Actual Conditions In Which The Ideal Life Of God Is To Be Exhibited.

Every God-given Vision Will Become Real If We Will Only Have Patience.

No Healthy Christian Ever Chooses Suffering; He Chooses God's Will, As Jesus Did, Whether It Means Suffering Or Not.

At His Ascension Our Lord Entered Heaven, And He Keeps The Door Open For Humanity To Enter.

The People Who Influence Us Most Are Not Those Who Buttonhole Us And Talk To Us, But Those Who Live Their Lives Like The Stars In Heaven And The Lilies In The Field, Perfectly Simply And Unaffectedly. Those Are The Lives That Mould

There Is No Need To Get To A Place Of Prayer; Pray Wherever You Are.

It Is Possible To Know All About Doctrine And Yet Not Know Jesus. The Soul Is In Danger When Knowledge Of Doctrine Outsteps Intimate Touch With Jesus. ....have I A Personal History With Jesus Christ? The One Sign Of Discipleship Is Intimate Connection With Him, A Knowledge Of Jesus Christ Nothing Can Shake.

Never Say You Will Pray About A Thing; Pray About It.

Drudgery Is One Of The Finest Touchstones Of Character There Is. Drudgery Is Work That Is Very Far Removed From Anything To Do With The Ideal - The Utterly Mean Grubby Things; And When We Come In Contact With Them We Know Instantly Whether Or Not We Are Spiritually Real.

Service Is The Overflow Which Pours From A Life Filled With Love And Devotion. But Strictly Speaking, There Is No Call To That. Service Is What I Bring To The Relationship And Is The Reflection Of My Identification With The Nature Of God.

Beware Of Bartering The Word Of God For A More Suitable Conception Of Your Own.

Very Few Of Us Know Anything About Loyalty To Christ -- For My Sake. It Is That Which Makes The Iron Saint.

One Life Totally Devoted To God Is Of More Value To Him Than One Hundred Lives Which Have Been Simply Awakened By His Spirit.

Watch Human Nature; We Are So Built That If We Do Not Get Thrilled In The Right Way, We Will Get Thrilled In The Wrong. If We Are Without The Thrill Of Communion With God, We Will Try To Get Thrilled By The Devil, Or By Some Concoction Of Human Ingenuity.

The Greatest Answer To Prayer Is That I Am Brought Into A Perfect Understanding With God, And That Alters My View Of Actual Things.

Grapes Become Wine Only When They Have Been Squeezed.

Character In A Saint Means The Disposition Of Jesus Christ Persistently Manifested.

The Peace That Jesus Gives Is Never Engineered By Circumstances On The Outside.

A Man Ceases To Be An Honest Doubter The Moment He Refuses One Way Of Getting At The Truth Because He Does Not Like That Way.

When We Become Advocates Of A Creed, Something Dies; We Do Not Believe God, We Only Believe Our Belief About Him.

Prayer Is Simple, As Simple As A Child Making Known Its Wants To It Parents.

Joy Comes From Seeing The Complete Fulfillment Of The Specific Purpose For Which I Was Created And Born Again, Not From Successfully Doing Something Of My Own Choosing.

Today Jesus Christ Is Being Dispatched As The Figurehead Of A Religion, A Mere Example. He Is That, But He Is Infinitely More; He Is Salvation Itself, He Is The Gospel Of God.

We Will Suffer A Sharp Painful Disullisionment Before We Fully Surrender. When People Really See Themselves As The Lord Sees Them, It Is Not The Terribly Offensive Sins Of The Fleshthat Shock Them, But The Awful Nature Of The Pride Of Their Own Hearts Opposing Jesus Christ. When They See Themselves In The Light Of The Lord, The Shame, The Horror, And Desperate Conviction Hit Home For Them.

It Is Easier To Serve God Without A Vision, Easier To Work For God Without A Call, Because Then You Are Not Bothered By What God Requires; Common Sense Is Your Guide, Veneered Over With Christian Sentiment. You Will Be More Prosperous And Successful, More Leisure-hearted, If You Never Realize The Call Of God.

Can Jesus Christ See The Agony Of His Soul In Us? He Can't Unless We Are So Closely Identified With Him That We Have His View Concerning The People For Whom We Pray. May We Learn To Intercede So Wholeheartedly That Jesus Christ Will Be Completely And Overwhelmingly Satisfied With Us As Intercessors.

What Is The Sign Of A Friend? Is It That He Tells You His Secret Sorrows? No, It Is That He Tells You His Secret Joys. Many People Will Confide Their Secret Sorrows To You, But The Final Mark Of Intimacy Is When They Share Their Secret Joys With You.

Some Prayers Are Followed By Silence (from God) Because They Are Wrong, Others Because They Are Bigger Than One Can Understand. It Will Be A Wonderful Moment For Some Of Us When We Stand Before God And Find That The Prayers We Clamored For In Early Days And Imagined Were Never Answered, Have Been Answered In The Most Amazing Way, And That God's Silence Has Been The Sign Of The Answer.

Let The Attitude Of Your Life Be A Continual Willingness To "go Out" In Dependence Upon God, And Your Life Will Have A Sacred And Inexpressible Charm About It That Is Very Satisfying To Jesus. You Must Learn To "go Out" Through Your Convictions, Creeds, Or Experiences Until You Come To The Point In Your Faith Where There Is Nothing Between Yourself And God.

Many People Have Turned Back Because They Are Afraid To Look At Things From God's Perspective. The Greatest Spiritual Crisis Comes When A Person Has To Move A Little Farther On In His Faith Than The Beliefs He Has Already Accepted.

Some Of Us Are Like The Dead Sea, Always Taking In But Never Giving Out, Because We Are Not Rightly Related To The Lord Jesus.

The Best Measure Of A Spiritual Life Is Not Its Ecstasies But Its Obedience.

We Think We Understand Another Person's Struggle Until God Reveals The Same Shortcomings In Our Lives.

Beware Of Giving Over To Mere Dreaming When Once God Has Spoken. Leave Him To Be The Source Of All Your Dreams And Joys And Delights, And Go Out And Obey What He Has Said. If You Are In Love, You Do Not Sit Down And Dream About The One You Love All The Time, You Go And Do Something For Him; And That Is What Jesus Christ Expects Us To Do. Dreaming After God Has Spoken Is An Indication That We Do Not Trust Him.

When I See Jesus Christ I Simply Want To Be What He Wants Me To Be.

It Is Misleading To Imagine That We Are Developed In Spite Of Our Circumstances, For We Are Developed Because Of Them. It Is Mastery In Circumstances That Is Needed, Not Mastery Over Them.

If You Want To Be Of Use To God, Maintain The Proper Relationship With Jesus Christ By Staying Focused On Him & He Will Make Use Of You Every Minute You Live- Yet You Will Be Unaware, On The Conscious Level Of Your Life, That You Are Being Used Of Him.

Prayer Is The Vital Breath Of The Christian; Not The Thing That Makes Him Alive, But The Evidence That He Is Alive.

The Resentment Of Discipline Of Any Kind Will Warp The Whole Life Away From God's Purpose.

The Purpose Of Prayer Is To Reveal The Presence Of God Equally Present, All The Time, In Every Condition.

Keep Your Soul Fit To Manifest The Life Of The Son Of God. Never Live On Memories; Let The Word Of God Be Always Living And Active In You.

Watch Where Jesus Went. The One Dominant Note In His Life Was To Do His Father's Will. His Was Not The Way Of Wisdom Or Of Success, But The Way Of Faithfulness.

One Of The Most Subtle Burdens God Ever Puts On Us As Saints Is This Burden Of Discernment Concerning Other Souls. He Reveals Things In Order That We May Take The Burden Of These Souls Before Him And Form The Mind Of Christ About Them. It Is Not That We Bring God Into Touch With Our Minds, But That We Rouse Ourselves Until God Is Able To Convey His Mind To Us About The One For Whom We Intercede.

Happiness Is Not A Sign That We Are Right With God; Happiness Is A Sign Of Satisfaction, That Is All, And The Majority Of Us Can Be Satisfied On Too Low A Level.

The Christian Life Is Stamped By 'moral Spontaneous Originality,' Consequently The Disciple Is Open To The Same Charge That Jesus Christ Was, Viz., That Of Inconsistency. But Jesus Christ Was Always Consistent To God, And The Christian Must Be Consistent To The Life Of The Son Of God In Him, Not Consistent To Hard And Fast Creeds. Men Pour Themselves Into Creeds, And God Has To Blast Them Out Of Their Prejudices Before They Can Become Devoted To Jesus Christ.

Prayer Is The Way The Life Of God Is Nourished.

Obedience To The Call Of Christ Nearly Always Costs Everything To Two People- The One Who Is Called, And The One Who Loves That One.

The Measure Of The Worth Of Our Public Activity For God Is The Private Profound Communion We Have With Him.

We Are Not Built For The Mountains And The Dawns And Aesthetic Affinities, Those Are For Moments Of Inspiration, That Is All. We Are Built For The Valley, For The Ordinary Stuff We Are In, And That Is Where We Have To Prove Our Mettle. Spiritual Selfishness Always Wants Repeated Moments On The Mount. We Feel We Could Talk Like Angels And Live Like Angels, If Only We Could Stay On The Mount. The Times Of Exaltation Are Exceptional, They Have Their Meaning In Our Life With God, But We Must Beware Lest Our Spiritual Selfishness Wants To Make Them The Only Time.

We Must Build Our Faith Not On Fading Lights But On The Light That Never Fails.

Worship And Intercession Must Go Together, The One Is Impossible Without The Other. Intercession Means That We Rouse Ourselves Up To Get The Mind Of Christ About The One For Whom We Pray.

God Never Gives Strength For Tomorrow, Or For The Next Hour, But Only For The Strain Of The Minute.

It Is In The Middle That Human Choices Are Made; The Beginning And The End Remain With God. The Decrees Of God Are Birth And Death, And In Between Those Limits Man Makes His Own Distress Or Joy.

The Truth Is We Have Nothing To Fear And Nothing To Overcome Because He Is All In All And We Are More Than Conquerors Through Him.

Repentance Always Brings A Person To The Point Of Saying, “i Have Sinned.” The Surest Sign That God Is At Work In His Life Is When He Says That And Means It. Anything Less Is Simply Sorrow For Having Made Foolish Mistakes-a Reflex Action Caused By Self-disgust.

Now Is The Time For Us To Stop Seeking Our Own Satisfaction And To Pour Out Our Lives Before Him.

The Whole Idea Of The Prayers Of The Saints Is That God's Holiness, God's Purpose, God's Ways May Be Brought About Irrespective Of Who Comes Or Goes.

We Think Of Prayer As A Preparation For Work, Or A Calm After Having Done Work, Whereas Prayer Is The Essential Work.

At The Back Of It There Lies The Central Citadel Of Obstinacy: I Will Not Give Up My Right To Myself--the Thing God Intends You To Give Up If Ever You Are Going To Be A Disciple Of Jesus Christ.

We Always Know When Jesus Is At Work Because He Produces In The Commonplace Something That Is Inspiring.

Is He Going To Help Himself To Your Life, Or Are You Taken Up With Your Conception Of What You Are Going To Do? God Is Responsible For Our Lives, And The One Great Keynote Is Reckless Reliance Upon Him.

Get Alone With Jesus And Either Tell Him That You Do Not Want Sin To Die Out In You - Or Else Tell Him That At All Costs You Want To Be Identified With His Death.

The Goal Of Faithfulness Is Not That We Will Do Work For God, But That He Will Be Free To Do His Work Through Us. God Calls Us To His Service And Places Tremendous Responsibilitie S On Us. He Expects No Complaining On Our Part And Offers No Explanation On His Part. God Wants To Use Us As He Used His Own Son.

Human Nature, If Healthy, Demands Excitement; And If It Does Not Obtain Its Thrilling Excitement In The Right Way, It Will Seek It In The Wrong. God Never Makes Bloodless Stoics; He Makes No Passionless Saints.

People Say That It Is So Hard To Bring Jesus Christ And Present Him Before The Lives Of Men Today. Of Course It Is. It Is So Hard That It Is Impossible Except By The Power Of The Indwelling Holy Ghost.

Many Of Us Suffer From Temptations From Which We Have No Business To Suffer.

The People Who Influence Us Are Those Who Have Stood Unconsciously For The Right Thing. They Are Like The Stars And The Lilies, And The Joy Of God Flows Through Them All The Time.

The Greatest Test Of Christianity Is The Wear And Tear Of Daily Life; It Is Like The Shining Of Silver: The More It Is Rubbed The Brighter It Grows.

Fretting Springs From A Determination To Get Our Own Way.

We Think Rightly Or Wrongly About Prayer According To The Conception We Have In Our Minds Of Prayer. If We Think Of Prayer As The Breath In Our Lungs And The Blood From Our Hearts, We Think Rightly. The Blood Flows Ceaselessly, And Breathing Continues Ceaselessly; We Are Not Conscious Of It, But It Is Always Going On. We Are Not Always Conscious Of Jesus Keeping Us In Perfect Joint With God, But If We Are Obeying Him, He Always Is.

There Is Only One Relationship That Matters, And That Is Your Personal Relationship To A Personal Redeemer And Lord. Let Everything Else Go, But Maintain That At All Cost, And God Will Fulfill His Purpose Through Your Life. (this Includes Meeting The Needs Of Your Heart.) One Individual Life May Be Of Priceless Value To God's Purposes, And Yours May Be That Life.

Am I As Spontaneously Kind To God As I Used To Be, Or Am I Only Expecting God To Be Kind To Me? Am I Full Of The Little Things That Cheer His Heart Over Me, Or Am I Whimpering Because Things Are Going Hardly With Me? There Is No Joy In The Soul That Has Forgotten What God Prizes.

Do We So Appreciate The Marvelous Salvation Of Jesus Christ That We Are Our Utmost For His Highest?

Have You Ever Sought God With Your Whole Heart, Or Have You Simply Given Him A Feeble Cry After Some Emotionally Painful Experience?

Painful Experiences

The Saint Is Hilarious When He Is Crushed With Difficulties Because The Thing Is So Ludicrously Impossible To Anyone But God.

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John B. S. Haldane

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