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Blog post"Where there is no vision, the people perish" (Proverbs 29:18). If we do not have a vision or goal in mind or we don't know where we want to go, we may likely end up in a place not of our choosing.
The story of Florence Chadwick gives interesting insight into the importance of keeping our goals at the forefront. Chadwick swam the Catalina Channel in southern California and established national and international records. She then attempted to break the record fo -
Blog postAristotle sees ethical theory as a field distinct from the rest. Its methodology must match its subject matter—good action—and must respect the fact that in this field many generalizations hold only for the most part. We study ethics in order to improve our lives, and therefore its principal concern is the nature of human well-being.
Aristotle follows Socrates and Plato in taking the virtues to be central to a well-lived life. Like Plato, he regards the ethical virtues (justic -
Blog post“We believe that we can change the things around us in accordance with our desires—we believe it because otherwise we can see no favorable outcome. We do not think of the outcome which generally comes to pass and is also favorable: we do not succeed in changing things in accordance with our desires, but gradually our desires change. The situation that we hoped to change because it was intolerable becomes unimportant to us. We have failed to surmount the obstacle, as we were absolutely determined
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Blog postIn a culture where fast food restaurants dominate the landscape, fasting seems out of place, out of step with the times. The marketing menu fed to us today has convinced us that if we do not have three square meals each and every day (with snacks in between) we are on the verge of starvation.
Scripture has so much to say about fasting that we would do well to look seriously at this ancient practice. The list of biblical ‘biggies’ who fasted: -
Blog postThe ivory gods,
And the ebony gods,
And the gods of diamond and jade,
Sit silently on their temple shelves
While the people
Are afraid.
Yet the ivory gods,
And the ebony gods,
And the gods of diamond-jade,
Are only silly puppet gods
That the people themselves
Have made.
~ Langston Hughes -
Blog postSome people do things completely differently from the way you would do them. It does not mean that they are right or that you are wrong. It means that people are different. There are things that people say which you would probably say in a different way, at a different time. It does not mean that people are wrong to speak up, to speak out, or to speak their minds. Nor does it mean that you are wrong for choosing not to do so. It means that people are different.
Different -
Blog post2 Corinthians 1:8,10: "We do not want you to be uninformed, sisters and brothers, about the troubles we experienced in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself ... God has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us."
One of the most interesting things about this pa -
Blog postEdward Wilson went with professor Scott on his last expedition to the Antarctic as doctor and zoologist. He endured the terrible winter journey with Bowers and Cherry-Garrard when they went in search of Emperor Penguin eggs (and he was one of the five who reached the South Pole in January 1912. The following words are from Edward Wilson's diary:
The more we try the clearer becomes our insight, and the more we use our thinking faculties the quicker they become in their power o -
Blog postWe are they that go, that go,
Plunging before the hidden blow.
We run the byways of the earth,
For we are fugitive from birth,
Blindfolded, with wide hands abroad
That sow, that sow the sullen sod.
We cannot wait, we cannot stop
For flushing field or quickened crop;
The orange bow of dusky dawn
Glimmers our smoking swath upon;
blindfolded still we hurry on.
How do we know the ways we run
That are bl -
Blog postIt's easy to see the tide of feelings in a child, where they come and go quickly and openly. As we grow, one of our spiritual tasks is to move beyond this purely emotional response to life and begin to cultivate "habits of the heart," as Daphne calls them. What this means is that we learn to love even when we don't feel loving, be kind when we'd rather be curt, and feel grateful when we don't particularly feel like being thankful. In this way, we turn feelings, which come and go, into
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Blog postDo you ever feel that life is just one long routine day after another? You wake up, take a shower, brush your teeth, get dressed, head off to work, and blah, blah, blah,. Well, if one more day of the "same ol' stuff" makes you feel cranky, it might be time for a spontaneity break.
Now I know that the idea of scheduling a spontaneity break sounds like a contradiction in terms, but when you consider how our society lives and thrives by the clock, it makes sense.& -
Blog postPeople who are emotionally dependent often carry an unspoken feeling that life is passing them by, that they have missed their personal boat somewhere along the way. Life, which had promised to be so exciting, full of joy and surprises, has turned out to be as level and barren as the salt flats. The truth is, if life feels flat, it probably means we're letting others define what our life should be and haven't taken the risk to find out who we are and what we want.
Children are -
Blog postHebrews 11:1-2 "Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for."
The two key words here are sure and certain. Faith is about being sure and certain of something. This raises the question at the heart of the confusion often surrounding the topic of faith: Sure and certain about what?
Fortunately, the author of Hebrews (whose identity is a mystery) a -
Blog post‘O DREARY life,’ we cry, ‘O dreary life!’
And still the generations of the birds
Sing through our sighing, and the flocks and herds
Serenely live while we are keeping strife
With Heaven's true purpose in us, as a knife
Against which we may struggle! ocean girds
Unslackened the dry land, savannah-swards
Unweary sweep,—hills watch, unworn; and rife
Meek leaves drop yearly from the forest-trees,
To show above the unwasted stars that pass
I -
Blog postWhen I play the piano, I sometimes finish a piece by holding my foot on the sustain pedal and listening intently as the sound fades and eventually merges with the surrounding silence. When the last note is barely audible, there is a moment when I am not certain if I am still hearing the note or imagining it, whether it is part of me or part of the world.
No matter how hard I struggle to discern where I leave off and others begin, ultimately I find that there is no decisi -
Blog postMoods are part of the human condition. When you're in a high mood, life looks good. You have perspective and common sense. In high moods, things don't feel so hard, problems seem less formidable and easier to solve. In a high mood, relationships flow easily and communication is easy and graceful.
In low moods, life looks unbearably serious and hard. You have little perspective; it seems as if people are out to get you. Life seems to be all a -
Blog postHappiness, to some, elation;
Is, to others, mere stagnation.
Days of passive somnolence,
At its wildest, indolence.
Hours of empty quietness,
No delight, and no distress.
Happiness to me is wine,
Effervescent, superfine.
Full of tang and fiery pleasure,
Far too hot to leave me leisure
For a single thought beyond it.
Drunk! Forgetful! This the bond: it
Means to give one's soul to gain
Life's quintessence. Even pain
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Blog postI suspect that the most basic and powerful way to connect to another person is to listen. Just listen. Perhaps the most important thing we ever give each other is our attention. And especially if it's given from the heart. When people are talking, there's no need to do anything but receive them. Just take them in. Listen to what they are saying. Care about it. Caring is more important than understanding. It has taken me a long time to believe in the power of simply saying, &quo
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Blog postLet us spend one day as deliberately as Nature, and not be thrown off the track by every nutshell and mosquito's wing that falls on the rails. Let us rise early and fast, or break fast, gently and without perturbation; let company come and let company go, let the bells ring and the children cry—determined to make a day of it.
Why should we knock under and go with the stream? Let us not be upset and overwhelmed in that terrible rapid and whirlpool called a dinner, s -
Blog postWhen Robert Morrison set out in 1807 as the first Protestant missionary to China he had to travel by way of America as the East India Company, which had the monopoly of the trade with India and the East, refused to allow missionaries to travel to India or China in any British vessel.
His American host records this incident when they visited the captain of the ship on which he was to sail…
‘We set out together to the counting house of the ship owner previous to his embar
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