Quotes for the Day - Tuesday, August 31, 2010

"Most people will content themselves with what is good. Fewer people will not settle until it's better. But the rare souls among us are those who press only for the best. Which are you?" ---James Ryle

"Faith is unutterable trust in God, trust which never dreams that He will not stand by us." ---Oswald Chambers

"Stress is like salt and pepper; a little of it makes food tastier while too much ruins it.  Life without stress would be boring.  The only people completely free of stress are stacked neatly in the cemetery.  You are alive and life is stressful.  Stress is a necessary element of life." ---Walter Albritton in Life is Short So Laugh Often, Live Fully and Love Deeply

 

"Too many churches want more young people as long as they act like old people, more newcomers as long as they act like old-timers, more children as long as they are as quiet as adults, more ethnic families as long as they act like the majority in the congregation.  We can do better." ---Robert Schnase in Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations

"Look around you and you will notice how frequently success and partnership are seen in each other's company." ---Marcus Buckingham in The One Thing You Need to Know

Quotes for the Day - Monday, August 30, 2010

"The mature person soon realizes that there is no way to change the past. To fret about past mistakes is to waste energy that could be applied to today’s opportunities." ---Walter Albritton in Altar Call (Column), Opelika - Auburn News (Alabama), August 29, 2010.








"It is not so true that 'prayer changes things' as that prayer changes me and I change things." ---Oswald Chambers








"People need to know God loves them, that
they are of supreme value, and that their life has significance. People need to know that they are not alone; that when they face life's difficulties, they are surrounded by a community of grace; and that they do not
have to figure out entirely for themselves
how to cope with family tensions, self-doubts, periods of despair, economic reversal, and the temptations that hurt themselves or others.  People need to know the peace that runs deeper than an absence of conflict, the hope that sustains them even through the most painful periods of grief, the sense of belonging that blesses them and stretches them and lifts them out of their own preoccupations." ---Robert Schnase in Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations





"The Church of Jesus Christ is a sleeping giant.  Its unrealized potential is almost staggering to contemplate.  There exists in people today a vast amount of goodwill; there is genuine desire to be used.  The desire is real and the resources are rich, but we have not found the right combination.  The harvest is plentiful, and there are potential harvesters, but the effective call has not yet been made." ---Elton Trueblood in The Company of the Committed, 1961.






"How simple it is to say thank you.  In a matter of seconds, we can make someone else's day simply by showing our gratitude.  People do have a powerful need to be appreciated." ---Hal Urban in Life's Greatest Lessons: 20 Things That Matter

Quotes for the Day - Sunday, August 29, 2010

"We look upon prayer as a means of getting things for ourselves; the Bible idea of prayer is that we may get to know God Himself." ---Oswald Chambers









"Spiritual leaders need to ward off an insidious perfectionism that may permeate their thinking.  Carrying unrealistic expectations about your own and others' performance eventually violates people by robbing them of the joy of celebrating their strengths.  It is idolatrous as well to set aside God's work in people through his sovereign distribution of talent and substitute another design requirement that is fabricated around organizational requirements, not people development.  God is in the people-development enterprise." ---Reggie McNeal in Practing Greatness: 7 Disciplines of Extraordinary Spiritual Leaders






"Thankfulness does wonders for the soul.  All we need to do is ask ourselves what's getting our attention.  When we focus on what's right instead of what's wrong, life improves considerably." ---Hal Urban in Life's Greatest Lessons: 20 Things That Matter







"Relationships live in conversations.  How can a relationship survive without conversation?  Conversations are the most powerful way to communicate, and the conversations we have either build or destroy." ---Bart Sayle and Surinder Kumar in Riding the Blue Train








" . . . the best leaders . . . practice.  They discipline themselves to practice the words, the images, and the stories they will use to help us perceive the future more clearly."
---Marcus Buckingham in The One Thing You Need to Know

Quotes for the Day - Saturday, August 28, 2010

                                                                     


"We don't succeed by doing something right one time; we succeed by doing things right on a regular basis.  Habits are the key to all success." ---Hal Urban in Life's Greatest Lessons: 20 Things That Matter

"The Church of Jesus Christ, with all its blemishes, its divisions, and its failures, remains our best hope of spiritual vitality.  However poor it is, life without it is worse." ---Elton Trueblood in The Company of the Committed, 1961.

"When the bottom falls out people do not need a lecture; they need compassion.  Not pity.  Compassion is that rare gift that inspires people to believe in themselves because someone else believes in them.  Compassion is staying with someone that everyone else has given up on.  Compassion is snatching a friend from the jaws of despair and convincing him to dust himself off and try again." ---Walter Albritton in Life is Short So Laugh Often, Live Fully and Love Deeply







"Clarity is the antidote to anxiety, and therefore clarity is the preoccupation of the effective leader.  If you do nothing else as a leader, be clear." ---Marcus Buckingham in
The One Thing You Need to Know









"A common acronym for fear is

                  False
                  Events
                  Appearing
                  Real."

Bart Sayle and Surinder Kumar in Riding the Blue Train

Quotes for the Day - Friday, August 27, 2010

"Treasure your relationships more than your stuff.  People are more important things.  Be content with what you have.  If you have anything you love more than your family and friends, give it away.  Things cannot hold your hand when you are hurting." ---Walter Albritton in Life is Short So Laugh Often, Live Fully and Love Deeply





 "The Church cannot fulfill its sacred vocation unless it is a penetrating force, as salt is, and the penetration cannot even begin unless the fellowship which is the Church has something of the character of an explosion." ---Elton Trueblood in The Incendiary Fellowship


" . . . it is instructive to consider the gap between adults and children when it comes to learning and accomplishing new things.  Adults analyze and think, contemplate and debate.  Children just do.  Adults allow experiences, life filters, fears—and, most important, Limiting Beliefs—to factor into what they do. Children haven’t learned limits yet and therefore go through early life less concerned with the consequences of failure. Later, the fear of failure prevents a person from stepping out on a limb and taking risks that could lead to extraordinary outcomes.” ---Bart Sayle and Surinder Kumar in Riding the Blue Train






"Partnership is not the crutch of the imperfect, but the secret of the successful." ---Marcus Buckingham in The One Thing You Need to Know








"The more self-aware leaders become, the greater their capacity to respect other people for who they are" ---Reggie McNeal in Practicing Greatness: 7 Disciplines of Extraordinary Spiritual Leaders