Quotes to Live By

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.
(John Quincy Adams)

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit. (Aristotle)

Every artist was first an amateur. (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude. (Thomas Jefferson)

It takes ten years to build up a reputation, but only five minutes to ruin one. (Anonymous)

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Assuming Too Much

Annie Wilkerson is Moose Creek’s premiere horse trainer and equine columnist for Montana Living. Money is tight as she tries to put her kid-sister through college and provide for her young nephew. When Annie’s column is cancelled, she’s given first shot at a new lovelorn column—and she can’t afford to turn it down. Only problem is . . . Annie’s never been in love.
Always resourceful, she reluctantly strikes a deal with the town’s smooth-talking ladies’ man Dylan Taylor: She’ll work with his ailing horse, Braveheart, if he’ll help her answer the reader letters.
Working closely with Dylan is harder than Annie imagined, and she quickly realizes she may have misjudged him. But her unwavering conviction that cowboys are nothing but trouble has kept her heart safe for years. And she can’t risk getting hurt now.
The more Annie tries to control things, the more they fall apart. Her feelings are spinning out of control, and her sister’s antics are making life increasingly more difficult. Annie knows she needs to turn the reins over to God, but surrender has never come easily.
When Dylan reveals his feelings for her, Annie doesn’t know what to trust—her head or her heart. The trouble with this cowboy is that he might just be exactly what she needs.
 
The trouble with assuming is that we do it all the time, esp. when we have been hurt in the past. So when a similar situation comes up, our walls instinctively go up and block out everything relating to the present situation. Our mind and our hearts close up and we end up getting hurt in the future.

I have experienced it earlier this semester in college. I took a similar situation from college and assumed that in the present situation, I needed to make a future assumption with this person as well. The past and present person were almost the same in both personality and appearance. They have the same leadership position and they are both directly above me in terms of authority.

James 5:9 - Don't grumble about each other, brothers and sisters, or you will be judged. For look - the Judge is standing at the door!

This was the verse that God gave me when I was judging the girl I wasn't supposed to. I felt guilty and I apologized and asked for forgiveness. Even though it was hard to do, I now feel at peace as I interact with her now. 

Monday, October 1, 2012

Light that Draws the Moth

In a future United States under the power of a charismatic leader, everyone gets the Mark at age thirteen. The Mark lets citizen shop, go to school, and even get medical care—but without it, you are on your own. Few refuse to get the Mark. Those who do . . . disappear.
Logan Langly went in to get his Mark, but he backed out at the last minute. Now he’s on the run from government agents who will stop at nothing to capture him. But Logan is on a mission to find and save his sister, Lily, who disappeared five years ago on her thirteenth birthday, the day she was supposed to receive her Mark.
Logan and his friends, a group of dissenters called the Dust, discover a vast network of the Unmarked, who help them travel safely to the capital city where Lily is imprisoned. Along the way, the Dust receives some startling information from the Markless community, opening their eyes to the message of Christianity and warning that humanity is now entering the End of Days.
When the Dust finally arrives in the capital, it seems that all their careful planning is useless against a government that will do anything to bend its citizens to its will. Can the gentle words Logan has found in a tattered, banned Bible really stand against the most powerful military the world has ever known? Can Logan even sacrifice his own freedom, choosing to act through faith alone?

 This book was action-packed from the first sentence. I could not put this down and I felt a great draw from the beginning to the end and I couldn't take my eyes from it. This book drew me like a light draws a moth from the second I saw and read a blurb about this book...

I can't describe it, but if all books were like this, more people would be drawn to God more. Evan Angler did a great job in writing this book.

BookSneeze 

Being the Bigger Person

Josh McDowell would become one of the world’s most well-known evangelists. But his story begins with a young boy on a farm . . . one who didn’t believe in God.
There’s a saying that childhood is the most beautiful of life’s seasons. And so it should be. But that wasn’t true for Josh McDowell. He was born to an alcoholic father who showed him no love, who valued him only as a farmhand. He endured years of painful abuse. Josh’s mother loved him but was unable to rescue him. In the midst of circumstances no child should have to suffer, Josh cried out to God for help, but He seemed silent. And so Josh believed God wasn’t listening—or even there at all.

How does a boy overcome such adversity to become one of the most impactful evangelists for Christ that the world has ever known?

This is Josh McDowell’s story. For the first time, Josh fully reveals the dramatic spiritual transformation that occurred when he faced his past head-on and put everything entirely in God’s hands. It’s a story of overcoming shame, grief, and despair and embracing real love for the first time. It’s a tale of divine grace: when the worst that life can throw at you happens, you can come out on the other side with a faith that is full, free—and undaunted.


 When I read this book, it moved me to tears and laughter. Josh McDowell's life story was real and transparent. After I read this book, I pondered about how Josh can come from such a bleak childhood, yet become a bestseller today.

I realized that it is clear in the Bible. To become someone great, God will first make you serve mankind. He will humble you until the day you will become the person that God made you to be. But first, there will be great trials in your life that will cause you to stumble and scrape your knees. Those scrapes will hurt and humiliate you, but eventually, it will scab over as you learn your lesson and move forward.

Mark 9:35 says, He sat down, called the twelve disciples over to him, and said, "Whoever wants to be first must take last place and be the servant of everyone else."

I got this book from: Tyndale Blog Network.