On Waiting

"Learn to wait - life's hardest lesson,
Conned perchance, through blinding tears,
While the heart-throbs slowly echo
To the tread of passing years.

Learn to wait - hope's slow fruition;
Faint not, though the way seem long;
There is joy in each condition,
Hearts, through suffering, may grow strong.

Constant sunshine, however welcome,
Never would ripen fruit or flower;
Giant oaks owe half their greatness
To the scathing tempest's power.

Thus a soul untouched by sorrow
Aims not at a higher state;
Joy seeks not a brightest morrow,
Only sad hearts learn to wait.

Human strength and human greatness
Spring not from life's sunny side,
Heroes must be more than driftwood
Floating on a waveless tide."

-The humbler poets: a collection of newspaper and periodical verse, 1870-1885

On Sharpening

"Exhort one another daily, lest you become hardened by the deceitfulness of sin." -Hebrews 3:13

"The Sepulchre in the Garden"

Where the end of hope is, there is the brightest beginning of fruition. Where the darkness is thickest, there the bright beaming light that never is set is about to emerge.

- Henry Ward Beecher

Who we really are

"Adversity is like a strong wind.

It tears away from us all but the things that cannot be torn,

so that we see ourselves as we really are."

-Arthur Golden

Living in Denial

"Faith has nothing to do with feelings, or with impressions, with improbabilities, or with outward appearances. If we desire to couple them with faith, then we are no longer resting on the Word of God because faith needs nothing of the kind." -George Mueller

Excuses

"Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz, 'Ask the Lord your God for a sign, whether i the deepest depths or in the highest heights.'

But Ahaz said, 'I will not ask; I will not put the Lord to the test.'"

-Isaiah 7:10-12

Ahaz wants to be seen as righteous by refusing to test God. Really, God told him to ask for a sign, and Ahaz didn't want to hear what He had to say. We might try to use "righteous" excuses to avoid hearing from God, but He wants us to question and listen with honest hearts.

The Necessity of Friction

"Passing where the trolley engines are supplied with electricity, I asked, 'How do they make power?'

'Why,' he said, 'just by the revolution of the wheels and the friction they produce. The rubbing creates the electric current.'

And so, when God wants to bring more power into your life, He brings more pressure. Because opposition is essential to a true equilibrium of forces."

-A.B. Simpson

Woe to ... Me

"Woe to those who call evil good

and good evil

who put darkness for light

and light for darkness,

who put bitter for sweet

and sweet for bitter."

-Isaiah 5:20

"I will not doubt. Well anchored is this faith,

Like some staunch ship, my soul braves every gale;

So strong its courage that it will not quail

To breast the mighty unknown sea of death.

Oh, may I cry, though body parts with spirit,

'I do not doubt,' so listening worlds may hear it,

With my last breath."

"'In fierce storms,' said an old seaman, 'we must do one thing; there is only one way: we must put the ship in a certain position and keep her there.'"

-Streams in the Desert