Feast of Perpetua, Felicity & their Companions, Martyrs at Carthage, 203 The term "baptism in (or of) the Spirit" conjures up the idea of a separate initiatory experience which every Christian ought to enjoy, whereas evangelicalism is noted for its stress upon a "conversion" experience which marks the beginning of the believer's relationship to his Lord. Too often, alas, conversion has been the end as well as the beginning, with the result that some Christians have looked back, with mingled delight and wistfulness to a past event that now seems to have diminished relevance to daily living. We can fully understand, then, the appeal of a movement which promises a new dimension of Christian living, there in the New Testament, and now available in everyday experience.
To perpetuate the clerical role of answer man, the layman when inside the church building must act as if he has only half a brain, while outside, in the world, he is expected to be an ambassador for Christ, a lay transmitter of faith. Outside, he is to be informed and vocal; inside, he must appear ignorant and mute as a sheep. Christians have within them many questionsâquestions that are at once elementary and profound, questions that would ripple the water were they raised. However, because a Christian is supposed to have "answers", life's important questions are not discussed outside the church building; and, because the pastor is the educated, spiritual authority, they are not discussed inside either.
The underlying questions are always: What is the Church? What is the Church for? If that is not kept in mind, the lay ministry, about which so much is being said at present, remains on the level of a many-sided activity in which the self-assertion of the laity threatens to be more evident than a new manifestation of the Church in modern society. The responsible participation of the laity in the discharge of the Church's divine calling is not primarily a matter of idealism and enthusiasm or organizational efficiency, but a new grasp and commitment to the meaning of God's redemptive purpose with mankind and with the world in the past, the present, and the future: a purpose which has its foundation and inexhaustible content in Christ.
Feast of John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople, Teacher, 407 You must not lose confidence in God because you lost confidence in your pastor. If our confidence in God had to depend upon our confidence in any human person, we would be on shifting sand.
It is not about the pasture of the sheep, but about their wool. [Lat., Non est de pastu ovium quaestio, sed de lana.]
Life is much like writing in ink : All you can do is read over your past and look forward to a blank page for your future that will soon be filled with words that can never be erased.
No matter what happens Today. You must remember that...Today will be Tomorrow's past, and Tomorrow will be Today.
A certain man had invited the pastor and his wife for dinner, and it was little Joey's job to set the table. But when it came time to eat, Joey's mother said with surprise, "Why didn't you give Mrs. Brown a knife and fork dear?". "I didn't think I needed to," Joey explained, "I heard Daddy say she always eats like a horse.".
A customer in a bakery was observed carefully examining all the rich-looking pastries displayed on trays in the glass cases. When a clerk approached him and asked, "What would you like?" he answered, "I'd like that chocolate-covered, cream-filled doughnut, that jelly-filled doughnut and that cheese Danish." Then with a sigh he added, "But I'll take an oat-bran muffin.".
FORTRAN --'the infantile disorder'--, by now nearly 20 years old, is hopelessly inadequate for whatever computer application you have in mind today: it is now too clumsy, too risky, and too expensive to use. PL/I --'the fatal disease'-- belongs more to the problem set than to the solution set. It is practically impossible to teach good programming to students that have had a prior exposure to BASIC: as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration. The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should, therefore, be regarded as a criminal offence. APL is a mistake, carried through to perfection. It is the language of the future for the programming techniques of the past: it creates a new generation of coding bums.
Confess yourself to heaven, Repent what's past, avoid what is to come, And do not spread the compost on the weeds To make them ranker.
The Past lives o'er again, In its effects, and to the guilty spirit The ever-frowning Present is its image.
Enjoy the present hour, be thankful for the past, And neither fear nor wish th' approaches of the last.
Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.
Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.
Hallo! A great deal of steam! the pudding was out of the copper. A smell like a washing-day! That was the cloth. A smell like an eating-house and a pastrycook's next door to each other, with a laundress's next door to that. That was the pudding.
The East bow'd low before the blast, In patient, deep disdain. She let the legions thunder past, And plunged in thought again.
I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain. - Dune, "Litany Against Fear", 1965.
There are three kinds of death in this world. There's heart death, there's brain death, and there's being off the network. â¢Guy Almes A dying man needs to die, as a sleepy man needs to sleep, and there comes a time when it is wrong, as well as useless, to resist. â¢Steward Alsop I do not believe that any man fears to be dead, but only the stroke of death. â¢Francis Bacon When one by one our ties are torn, and friend from friend is snatched forlorn; When man is left alone to mourn, oh! then how sweet it is to die! â¢Anna Letitia Barbauld Living is death; dying is life. We are not what we appear to be. On this side of the grave we are exiles, on that citizens; on this side orphans, on that children. â¢Henry Ward Beecher Loss and possession, Death and life are one. There falls no shadow where There shines no sun. â¢Hilaire Belloc Death is as sure for that which is born, as birth is for that which is dead. Therefore grieve not for what is inevitable. â¢Bhagavad Gita How long after you are gone will ripples remain as evidence that you were cast into the pool of life? â¢Grant M. Bright No one's death comes to pass without making some impression, and those close to the deceased inherit part of the liberated soul and become richer in their humanness. â¢Hermann Broch Though it be in the power of the weakest arm to take away life, it is not in the strongest to deprive us of death. â¢Sir Thomas Browne Men are never really willing to die except for the sake of freedom: therefore they do not believe in dying completely. â¢Albert Camus Well, there's a remedy for all things but death, which will be sure to lay us flat one time or other. â¢Miguel De Cervantes Death is the liberator of him whom freedom cannot release, the physician of him whom medicine cannot cure, and the comforter of him whom time cannot console. â¢Charles Caleb Colton I have wrestled with death. It is the most unexciting contest you can imagine. It takes place in an impalpable grayness, with nothing underfoot, with nothing around, without spectators, without clamor, without glory, without the great desire of victory, without the great fear of defeat. â¢Joseph Conrad While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die. â¢Leonardo Da Vinci Death be not proud, though some have called thee Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so. For, those, whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow. Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me. â¢John Donne A dead atheist is someone who is all dressed up with no place to go. â¢James Duffecy Death is the king of this world: 'Tis his park where he breeds life to feed him. Cries of pain are music for his banquet â¢George Eliot Death is the last enemy: once we've got past that I think everything will be alright. â¢Alice Thomas Ellis The pride of dying rich raises the loudest laugh in hell. â¢John W. Foster Why fear death? It is the most beautiful adventure in life. â¢Charles Frohman Plan for this world as if you expect to live forever; but plan for the hereafter as if you expect to die tomorrow. â¢Ibn Gabirol Fish die belly upward, and rise to the surface. Its their way of falling. â¢Andre Gide Death is the only inescapable, unavoidable, sure thing. We are sentenced to die the day we're born. â¢Gary Mark Gilmore Death is a commingling of eternity with time; in the death of a good man, eternity is seen looking through time. â¢Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe Man has the possibility of existence after death. But possibility is one thing and the realization of the possibility is quite a different thing. â¢George Gurdjieff Oh you who have been removed from God in his solitude by the abyss of time, how can you expect to reach him without dying? â¢Hallaj Death is like an arrow that is already in flight, and your life lasts only until it reaches you. â¢Georg Hermes The call of death is a call of l
When I pastored a country church, a farmer didn't like the sermons I preached on hell. He said, "Preach about the meek and lowly Jesus." I said, "That's where I got my information about hell.".
Death is the last enemy: once we've got past that I think everything will be alright.
A bodily disease may be but a symptom of some ailment in the spiritual past.
The diseases of the present have little in common with the diseases of the past save that we die of them.
She is absolutely inadmissible into society. Many a woman has a past, but I am told that she has at least a dozen, and that they all fit.
Life [is] a culmination of the past, an awareness of the present, an indication of a future beyond knowledge, the quality that gives a touch of divinity.