SEPARATION
Three men were caught smuggling Bibles into Russia. They were Jerry Falwell, Oral Roberts, and Bob Jones. The official asked them,” Do you have any last words?”
Jerry Falwell said, “I love America; I’ll be glad to die for my country.”
Oral Roberts said, “Something good is going to happen to me today.”
Bob Jones responded, “Hang me separately from these two scoundrels.”
Attachment to Christ is the only secret of detachment from the world.
—A. J. Gordon
In Kentucky the electricity used over a wide area is generated from the power furnished by the Kentucky River. One night the power failed. All lights were out—no electricity. The engineers tested the power plant but could find nothing wrong with the turbines; they still operated. But still there was no electricity. Hours later a man discovered at the top of the building a black snake which had crawled onto the building and across the wires and had been electrocuted; but its body was still short-circuiting the current.
Christians need to be constantly on the alert lest some “black snake” come wriggling its way into their lives and cause a leakage of power.
Some people were ready one day to go into a coal mine just to look around. Among them was a woman wearing a white dress. The people told her she couldn’t go in with that dress. She insisted she could but they said she couldn’t. Then she went to the foreman and asked him if she could go in. He said, “Why, yes, you can go in, but I can’t guarantee your dress will be white when you come out.”
A pastor asked his young people in a catechism class, “What is religion?” A boy immediately replied, “Religion shows us the things we must not do.”
You are supposed to have your boat in the water and not water in the boat. Christians are in the world, but are not to be of it.
A lady had a canary that could sing beautifully. She kept it in a cage, and one day she thought she would put it outside. So she hung the cage, in which was the bird, on a tree outside. It sang just as beautifully for a while, but after awhile it began to lose its song and to sound like the other birds. Concerned, the lady took it to the “bird doctor.” He said, “Lady, there’s not a thing wrong with your bird. The only trouble is that it has been outside too long.”
A girl caught her hand in a vase. She couldn’t get her hand out, and her parents didn’t want to break the vase so the doctor was called. He worked for three hours but couldn’t get her hand out. He finally said the only way to get her hand out was to break the vase. The father hated to do that so he asked the daughter to relax her hand once more and to try once again to get her hand out.
“But Daddy,” she said, “I can’t relax my hand. If I do I’ll drop the penny I’m holding on to.”
Two men were out in a boat fishing one day. Everything was going along well with one of them. He caught a long string of fish before the other man even had one.
The lucky one said to his friend, “I bet I know what is the matter—your hook is dirty.”
The other man thought to himself, “How could it be dirty when it’s been in the water for hours?”
But the other man persisted and said, “Pull up your line and see.”
So he pulled up his line and exclaimed, “See, I told you so. It’s clean.”
“No, it isn’t,” said his friend. “See this piece of weed? That’s your dirt. Remove that and you will catch fish.”
“Why, that’s not dirt.”
The friend replied, “It may not be dirt to you, but it’s still dirt to the fish.”
SERIOUSNESS
Human affairs are not worthy of much seriousness, and yet one must take them seriously.
—Plato
SERVICE
Teach us, good Lord, to serve Thee as Thou deservest:
To give and not to count the cost;
To fight and not to heed the wounds;
To toil and not to seek for rest;
To labor and not ask for any reward
Save that of knowing that we do Thy will.
—Ignatius Loyola
If you do it because no one else will, it’s a job.
If you are doing it to serve the Lord, it’s a ministry.
If you do it just enough to get by, it’s a job.
If you do it to the best of your ability, it’s a ministry.
If you quit because someone criticized you, it was a job.
If you keep serving, it’s a ministry.
If you quit because no one praised you, it was a job.
If you do it because you think it needs to be done, it’s a ministry.
It is hard to get excited about a job.
It’s almost impossible not to get excited about a ministry.
Average churches are filled with many people, doing many jobs.
Great churches are filled with many people who are involved in ministry.
If your concern is just success, it’s a job.
If your concern is faithfulness to God, it’s a ministry.
People may say, “Well done,” when you do your job.
The Lord will say, “Well done,” when you complete your ministry.
—Bethany Beach Newsletter
All of God’s great men have been weak men who did great things for God because they reckoned on His being with them; they counted on His faithfulness.
—J. Hudson Taylor
You can tell whether you are becoming a servant by how you act when people treat you like one.
—Gordon MacDonald
It is high time we change the ideal of success for the ideal of service.
—Albert Einstein
God always uses the man closest to Him.
—D. L. Moody
At the close of life, the question will not be how much have you got, but how much have you given. Not how much have you won, but how much have you done. Not how much have you saved, but how much have you sacrificed. Not how much were you honored, but how much have you served.
—Nathan C. Schaeffer
Do what you can where you are with what you have.
Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers that are equal to your tasks.
—Phillips Brooks
How often do we attempt work for God to the limit of our incompetency, rather than the limit of God’s omnipotence?
—J. Hudson Taylor
Opportunity with ability make responsibility.
—Bishop Hunt
A Christian worker is good; a worker for Christ is better; but Christ, in a worker, working out His will through Him, is best of all.
The service we render for others is really the rent we pay for our room on this earth.
—Wilfred Grenfell
A talented young minister’s wife was sitting in the pew one Sunday nervously twisting her handkerchief as she waited to sing a solo. An elderly lady who was deaf wrote her a note asking her what was wrong. The paper was returned with this reply, “I’m afraid of what people will think.” The little slip came back with the words, “Sing to God!”
There is no greater threat to our devotion to Christ than our service for Christ.
—Oswald Chambers
Dawson Trotman once said to LeRoy Eims, “Don’t be so busy in the kingdom that you don’t have time for the King.”
Let us do little things as though they were great, because of the majesty of Jesus Christ who does them in us and who lives our life; and do the greatest things as though they were little and easy, because of His omnipotence.
—Blaise Pascal
Be ashamed to die until you have done something for humanity.
—General Douglas MacArthur
In a modest little grave sight in Connecticut, Fanny Crosby is buried with a small gravestone. On it are the words, “She hath done what she could.”
I’m willing to be a servant; I just don’t want to be treated like one.
Never allow the thought “I am of no use where I am.” You are certainly of no use where you’re not.
—Oswald Chambers
Moses was busy with his flock at Horeb.
Gideon was busy threshing wheat by the winepress.
Saul was busy searching for his father’s lost sheep.
David was busy caring for his father’s sheep.
Elisha was busy plowing with twelve yoke of oxen.
Nehemiah was busy bearing the king’s wine cup.
Amos was busy following the flock.
James and John were busy mending their nets.
Matthew was busy collecting taxes.
Saul was busy persecuting the friends of Jesus.
Edwin M. Stanton ran roughshod over Abraham Lincoln in a law case and later was very vindictive. But when Lincoln became president, he invited him to be his Secretary of War. When Stanton learned of this, he was overwhelmed. With tear-filled eyes, he accepted the honor. “Tell him,” he said to the messenger, “that such magnanimity will make me work with him as man was never served before!”
The great violinist Nicolo Paganini willed his marvelous violin to Genoa—the city of his birth—but only on the condition that the instrument never be played. It was an unfortunate condition, for it is a peculiarity of wood that as long as it is used and handled, it shows little wear. As soon as it is discarded, it begins to decay.
The exquisite, mellow-toned violin has become worm-eaten in its beautiful case, valueless except as a relic. The moldering instrument is a reminder that a life withdrawn from all service to others loses its meaning.
—Bits & Pieces
In a remote district of Wales a baby boy lay dangerously ill. The widowed mother walked five miles in the night and through drenching rain to get a doctor. The doctor hesitated about making the trip. “Would it pay?” he questioned. He would receive no money, and besides, if the child’s life were saved, he would grow up, no doubt, to become only a poor laborer. But love for humanity and professional duty conquered, and the little life was saved.
Years after, when this same child—Lloyd George—became prime minister of England, the doctor said, “I never dreamed that in saving the life of that child on the farm hearth, I was saving the life of the greatest man in Wales!”
A young woman gave her life to Christ as a missionary. Many thought she was incapable of the hard work and rugged strain of missionary life. However, she went to the mission field and gave her life unflinchingly to the service of the Lord and her people. Having died years later in the service of her Lord, she was buried and a short epitaph was placed at her grave. It said, “She did what she couldn’t.” What a testimony of a life given to God!
At a railroad station is a man whose job it is to sit and open and close a gate at a certain time when he is signaled. Often someone complains and criticizes him for shutting the gate when he did. When asked how he could work there when there was all that criticism, he answered, “See that man up there? When he signals for me to shut the gate, I shut it regardless of what others say, because he’s the one I work for and who gives me my pay.”
There are three types of Christians who respond to the call of service: (1) rowboat Christians—they have to be pushed wherever they go; (2) sailboat Christians—they always go with the wind; and (3) steamboat Christians—they make up their mind where they ought to go and go there regardless of wind or weather.
Michelangelo once entered the studio of his student Raphael and, viewing one of his landscapes, Michelangelo took a piece of chalk and wrote across it, “Amplius!” (Larger!). Raphael’s perspective was too small.
The anniversaries of my birth are not important. What is important is that I’ve tried to lead a meaningful life. Someone much wiser than I once said, “Life begins when you begin to serve.” Well, I’ve had that opportunity to serve, and I’m especially happy in this work. Maybe because it is service.
—Ronald Reagan
On a cold winter day in 1827 a young university student went to the city of Weimar to visit Johann von Goethe, the noted author. He hoped to interview the great man and to hear from him some weighty words of counsel.
Although the student had no appointment, the famous man of letters received him cordially. The student respectfully requested an autograph and in those days, in addition to the signature, a few wise sentiments were appreciated.
Goethe thought for a moment, and then wrote, “Let each person sweep in front of his own door, and then the whole world will be clean.”
Each person doing his best, linked to other persons exerting their best efforts, can accomplish great things.
—John R. Brahham
Joyce Parfet tells of hearing a minister put together in his sermons these two popular phrases of the day: “What in the world are you doing?” and the somewhat flippant exclamation, “For heaven’s sake!” He suggested that every Christian should respond to this question five times, emphasizing progressively a different portion of these combined expressions, as follows:
“What in the world are you doing for heaven’s sake?”
“What in the world are you doing for heaven’s sake?”
“What in the world are you doing for heaven’s sake?”
“What in the world are you doing for heaven’s sake?”
“What in the world are you doing for heaven’s sake?”
An executive died and went to heaven. There he found all former executives separated into two groups—the failures in one hall and the successful in the other.
Around mealtime he entered the hall of those who failed and was surprised to find the occupants thin and hungry-looking. When the angels began to serve dinner, large platters of delicious food were placed at the table, but before anyone was seated, another angel came along and strapped a long iron spoon to each executive’s arm. The long handle of the spoon was fastened to the wrists and biceps, making it impossible to bend the arm. As a result none was able to lift the spoon to his mouth.
Walking over to the hall of those who had succeeded, he was surprised to find them well fed and healthy. Dinner was already on the table and an angel had just finished strapping the long iron spoons to the arms of the diners. Each executive then dipped his spoon into the food and fed the man seated across from him.
—Bits & Pieces
People talk of the sacrifice I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa. Can that be called a sacrifice which simply pays back a small part of the great debt we owe God? Is anything a sacrifice when it brings its own blessed reward in healthful activity, consciousness of doing good, peace of mind, and a bright hope of a glorious destiny hereafter? Away with such a thought. It’s not sacrifice—it’s a privilege!
—David Livingstone
Some years ago a break in the electric circuit occurred just as King George was about to deliver his radio address at the London Disarmament Conference. A humble workman caught the loose ends in his hands and bridged the gap, becoming for a time a part of the circuit. He didn’t create the power by which the king’s message was transmitted. He only closed the circuit so that it could flow. But through him the king’s will was done.
God is not looking for more stars; He’s looking for more servants.
—Howard G. Hendricks
An elderly widow, restricted in her activities, was eager to serve Christ. After praying about the matter, she decided that although she could not do much walking around to distribute tracts or witness, she was able to play the piano. The next day she placed this small ad in the Oakland Tribune: “Pianist will play hymns by phone daily for those who are sick and despondent—the service is free.” The notice included the number to dial. When people called, she would immediately inquire, “What hymn would you like to hear?” Within a few months she had played for several hundred depressed and lonely individuals. Frequently they would pour out their hearts to her, and she was able to help and encourage them. Later she testified, “That service became the most rewarding thing I ever did in my life.”
SICKNESS
A German went to a doctor and learned he was in poor health. The doctor said he had three months to live. The doctor advised him to marry a Norwegian and move to Wisconsin. “Will that help?” “No, but it will seem longer.”