"I Thank God for Bitter Things"

I thank God for bitter things;
They've been a 'friend to grace';
They've  driven me from paths of ease
To storm the secret place.

I thank Him for the friends who failed
To fill my heart's deep need;
They've driven me to the Savior's feet,
Upon His love to feed.

I'm grateful too, through all life's way
No one could satisfy,
And so I've found in God alone
My rich, my full supply!

by Florence White Willett

A FABULOUS tool for evangelism. You can do it!!

Watch this video and learn how to illustrate and give a solid gospel presentation.
It is exciting!
http://www.wtsbooks.com/content/2_ways_2_live_content_3.php

Dangerous Prayer

"Lord, cut;
Lord, carve;
Lord, wound;
Lord, do anything that
may perfect Thy Father's
image in us and make us
meet for glory."

-Samuel Rutherford

It can't be both ways.

The sage G. K. Chesterton exposes a strange contradiction in our culture.

"People of the progressive sort are perpetually telling us that the hope of the world is in education. Education is everything. Nothing is more important as training the rising generation.
        They tell us this over and over again, with slight variations of the same formula, and never seem to see what it involves. For if there be any word of truth in all this talk about the education of the child, then there is certainly nothing but nonsense in nine-tenths of the talk about the emancipation of the woman. 
If education is the highest function in the State, why should anybody want to be emancipated from the highest function in the State? It is as if we talked of commuting the sentence that condemned a man to be President of the United States; or a reprieve coming in time to save him from being Pope. If education is the largest thing in the world, what is the sense of talking about a woman being liberated from the largest thing in the world? It is as if we were to rescue her from the cruel doom of being a poet like Shakespeare; or to pity the limitations of an all-round artist like Leonardo da Vinci. 
      In short, if education is really the larger matter, then certainly domestic life is the larger matter; and official or commercial life the lesser matter. It is a mere matter of arithmetic that anything taken from the larger matter will leave it less. It is a mere matter of simple subtraction that the mother must have less time for the family if she has more time for the factory.

             Make up your mind whether you want unlimited education or unlimited emancipation, but do not be such a fool as to suppose you can have both at once."

Uprooting Anger

I am reading Uprooting Anger  by Robert D. Jones right now.  In the past I have sometimes wondered at Jesus saying in the sermon on the mount that anger is murder. But the more I become acquainted with my own sinful heart, the more I understand and believe it.   Jones says that it is hard to see anger in ourselves.  One of our sons has been taking stumps out of the ground this summer.   It is hard work because the roots are deep and tough.  So are the roots of sinful anger. It can either be revealed or concealed.   Either way it is deadly.   I have been concealing anger and the fruit of it was coldness and a severe temptation to punish.   The book is very good -- like having sessions with an excellent Biblical counselor -- homework and all!!!!      For an excellent review and a place to order it, see
http://www.monergismbooks.com/Uprooting-Anger-Biblical-Help-for-a-Common-Problem-p-17146.html

Rest in God's provision for our children.

"It ill becomes the professed servants of God to murmur, because children are withheld:  but it is far worse, to fret because they have a numerous offspring.  Children are in scripture considered as a heritage, and a reward from God to his people; and shall we deem them our encumbrance?  as if he could not provide for many as well as for few!"


The Comprehensive Commentary of the Bible.

Stop the Mantra

"Ladies, we need to stop the mantra that we are just as good as men.  We need to stop cataloging all the areas in which we perceive discrimination.  Instead we need to embrace the reality that when it came time to assigning important roles for the continuance, nurturing, and guidance of the human race, God chose not to send a man to do a job that only a woman could do!"

Andrea Schwartz

Read the whole article here:

http://chalcedon.edu/research/articles/engendered-differences/