Nuggets

[nChrist]

BREAD-AND-CHEESE FAITH!

I will speak very broadly and plainly, and say we need a
bread-and-cheese faith, that is to say-- a faith which believes
that God who feeds the ravens will send us our daily bread;
a faith which believes that the heavenly Father who clothes
the lilies, will much more clothe his children; the faith that can
believe God about the things that are actually around it, and
that does not live in the region of fiction.

Spurgeon, "Hearken and Look; or, Encouragement for Believers"

[nChrist]

Our household gods?

(Thomas Reade, "Christian Experience")

Whatever draws away the heart
from God, is an idol in his sight.

Our domestic ease, our family comforts,
too often become our household gods,
at whose shrine we sacrifice the claims
of Christ.

[nChrist]

"Kindness is one of those ornaments of the Christian
character which make it beautiful in the eyes of men."
-J.C. Ryle

[nChrist]

Ah! what is to hold them back from evil!

(David Magie, "Advice to Youth" 1855)

Young people, you are in danger! In danger
from inward corruption and outward temptation!
In danger from your own native bias to evil, and
from the traps which are set for your feet!

It is proper for me to raise the voice of alarm.

It is enough to make one's heart bleed to see
multitudes of ardent, aspiring youth cast upon
the world, with its ten thousand allurements and
snares! Ah! what is to hold them back from evil!
How are they to be kept from the paths of the
destroyer? If God does not interpose, it would
seem as if they must inevitably perish!

[nChrist]

What you really are

From Spurgeon's sermon, "Holiness Demanded"

Some professors are angelic abroad and devilish at home.

You must know that it is at home that you are what you really are.

I question whether any man is much better than he is
thought to be by his wife and family, for they, after all,
see the most of us, and know the truth about us.

Sir, you may be seen by those outside your family to be
"amiable, Christian, and God-like".

But if your children should have to mark your unkindness,
your lack of fatherly affection for their souls; and your wife
has to complain of your harshness, of the absence of everything
that is Christ-like, you may shrewdly suspect that there is
something wrong in the state of your heart.

[nChrist]

The great master secret of all happy home life!

(J. R. Miller, Secrets of Happy Home Life; 1894)

Christ is the great master secret of all happy home
life! The spirit of Christ alone will enable us to live
together in perfect peace and love. The presence of
Christ in the home is a perpetual blessing . . .
   we cannot be selfish,
   we cannot wrangle and strive,
   we cannot be bitter and unkind,
   we cannot be irritable and unreasonable,
when conscious of the presence of Christ.

If only we can make Christ an abiding guest in our
home, and if we can keep ourselves aware of His
being with us, our household life cannot help but
grow wondrously sweet!

[nChrist]

Adam's rib

(Matthew Henry)

"Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib
 He had taken out of the man, and He brought
 her to the man." Genesis 2:22

Eve was not taken out of Adam's head to top him,
neither out of his feet to be trampled on by him;
but out of his side to be equal with him,
under his arm to be protected by him,
and near his heart to be loved by him.

[nChrist]

If there are but two real Christians in the world

(John Angell James)

There appears to me to be, at the present moment,
a most criminal neglect, on the part of Christian
parents, of the pious education of their children.

That Christian who would carry on a system of pious
education with success, should enforce it with all the
commanding influence of a holy example. Let your
children see all the "beauties of holiness" reflected
from your character, and the grand outline of godly
virtue filled up with all the delicate touches and
varied coloring of the Christian graces.

Let your children have this conviction in their hearts,
"If there are but two real Christians in the world,
 my father is one, and my mother is the other."

It is dreadful--but not uncommon for children to
employ themselves in contrasting the appearance
which their parents make . . .
  at the Lord's table--and at their own table;
  in the house of God--and at home!

[airIam2worship]

Water is the only drink for a wise man. -Thoreau     

[airIam2worship]

EXPERIENCE
 
 
What you've got when you're too old to get a job. -Abramson
 
There is many a profitable good lesson to be learned by experience. -Henry
 
Not what happens to a man.  It is what a man does with what happens to him. -Huxley
 
We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success.  We often discover what will do by finding out what will not do; and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery. -Samuel Smiles
 
Is there any one so wise as to learn by the experience of others? -Voltaire

[nChrist]

"A welfare state is frightened of every poor person who tries to get in and every rich person who tries to get out." —Harry Browne

"Government machinery has been described as a marvelous labor saving device which enables ten men to do the work of one." —John Maynard Keynes

[airIam2worship]

Adam's rib

(Matthew Henry)

"Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib
 He had taken out of the man, and He brought
 her to the man." Genesis 2:22

Eve was not taken out of Adam's head to top him,
neither out of his feet to be trampled on by him;
but out of his side to be equal with him,
under his arm to be protected by him,
and near his heart to be loved by him.

AMEN

[Soldier4Christ]

We're like gold miners. We go through an awful lot of dirt to find a nugget.

Nuggets are hard to find and easy to overlook. They are usually covered with dirt, scarred with needle tracks, and surrounded by empty bottles and "fools gold."

Why should we invest in them? Because God loves them so much. After all, they represent the sum and substance of His criteria and are therefore more than worth the price it takes to find them.

Jay Carty

[airIam2worship]

FORGIVENESS
 
Every person should have a special cemetery lot in which to bury the faults of friends and loved ones. -Anonymous
 
The best way to get even is to forget. -Anonymous
 
Life has taught me to forgive much, but to seek forgiveness still more. -Bismarck
 
His heart was as great as the world, but there was no room in it to hold the memory
of a wrong. -Emerson
 
He who has not forgiven an enemy has never yet tasted one of the most sublime enjoyments of life. -Lavater