Don't let anything or anyone disturb you when you are in the zone. Let inspiration alone be your companion.
It is better not to try shortcuts. You just might meet with an accident if you do.
To be able to love someone even when that
person does not return the love is the kind of freedom that should be
particularly desired.
To be able to love anyone without expecting anything in return is an enviable freedom.
Not to care about results is a great freedom, which may even improve one's performance.
True freedom is to be able to do something without expecting any response from anyone.
Don't wait for someone to do the dirty work. Do it yourself if you care about the mess.
God does not always speak. Nor is he always silent. That is why it is hard to turn away from him.
Sometimes you just have to keep quiet. The undesirable will leave on its own.
Moderate desire will not get you to the
top. If you want to climb an impossible peak, you need to be madly
passionate about getting there.
Prayer is not a matter of uncertainty, but certainty. Almost certain is not certain. Total certainty is total abandonment.
You cannot be a sensible person of faith.
You can only be a crazy person of faith. In this world, the true people
of faith are perceived by the faithless as lunatics.
If you do something because you have to do
it, it is better for you not to do it. It is good for you to do
something only when you want to do it.
Life
may seem hopelessly complicated. Some may even find it meaningless.
The world is an evil place, some think. Yet God loved the world so much.
What did he see in this world that captured his heart? He saw his own
children without a sense of identity. He saw human beings misled by the
devil, who usurped the role of father. God saw people behave like their
satanic father. And he had to do something
to redeem his children from the clutches of this murderer. If he had
done nothing, that would have shown us that he did not love us. But he
actually did something, which changed the course of history. He sent
his only Son. Jesus Christ came into this world. He came to take us all
back to God. And his sacrificial death for us on the cross, establishes
beyond doubt the love that God has for us. That God is love is an
eternal truth. That God loves human beings is the specific truth that
Jesus Christ demonstrated to us. Whether we believe in the truth of
God's love is up to each and every one of us. We may not be convinced
of any truth regarding God. But if we would only believe, despite our
doubts, that will do. And God will be pleased.
God
is love. We are his children made in his image. Yet, we are so full of
hate, you say. And God does nothing to stop this hatred from spreading
like wildfire. What about wars and genocides? What about evil tyrants
who gas their own countrymen? Why does God not intervene, when innocent
children are abused and killed? Didn't God himself order genocides,
you ask. Didn't God himself order the killing
of all Canaanites, children included, in the Bible? If he is like
that, how could he be described as a lover of humanity? This is my
response: let Jesus Christ be a mirror to God. Whatever Jesus is, God
is. Whatever Jesus is not, God is not. Did Jesus order genocides? Did
Jesus advocate cruelty of any kind? Did Jesus not lay down his life for
all human beings? Does that not show his love for us? Did he sacrifice
himself so that we may perish on earth, and even go to hell? No, he
did that, so that we may live with him in heaven. Only God loved us so
much that he did not want us to perish. Also, consider how patient God
is with the world. The first century Christians expected Jesus to
return in their own lifetime. Twenty centuries later, we are still
waiting for the end of all things. Why is God taking his time? I believe
he is waiting on account of his love. He loves us so much, that he does
not want to put an end to everything, without giving everyone a
chance. This may not still convince you of God's love, But God does not
want to convince anyone of his love. He wants us to believe in his love,
even when we think we see the opposite of it.
God
is all-powerful. Yet he seems to do nothing, when we want him so
desperately to help us. He even seems not to care about us. Did he not
walk away from his disciples, when they were tossing about in that wild
sea? Why does God behave like this? God wants to build our trust, you
say. God wants us to enlarge our faith. Did he not reprove his
disciples for the little faith they showed? Yes, that
could very well be the case. In difficult times, God seems distant and
uncaring. It is at that time, we must hang on to the eternal truth that
God does not abandon his children. No one who trusted in him was ever
disappointed. But, there are many cases of disappointments with God, you
say. That however, is the short-term picture. But in the long-term,
from an eternal point of view we ought to believe that if we place our
trust in God, he will not disappoint us, no matter what happens while
we undertake the journey from earth to heaven.
God is good. But his goodness is not easy
to understand or appreciate. He is good in a way human beings cannot
conceive. His goodness may come across to us as its very antithesis. But
let us remember that we see very little right now. And much of our
understanding is coloured by our selfishness. If God did not do what we
wanted, he is just not good, we think childishly. But if we want to know
God's goodness, we have to give up our childish way of thinking. We
need to believe in more than what we can see. We need to believe in the
eternal truths of God.
Trust in God even though the pain is great
and inexplicable. How can a good God allow such turmoil and disorder?
How can he remain indifferent to pain? Could God be not as powerful or
good as we thought? Such questions may linger in your mind. But
relegate them to the periphery. Let faith alone be your greatest
impulse, and let the eternal truths about God occupy the centre. And let
our hope in the eternal virtues of God rage like an inextinguishable
fire.
Should I be happy that I am popular?
Should I be happy about my influence on others? I derive happiness from
whatever popularity and influence that I have in this world. However,
let my chief happiness not consist in statistical achievements, but in
God-ordained and meaningful connections that help save lives.
Marriage makes little sense if you have a
child while you are still engaged. It is unfair to the child that will
be born. And it completely overrides God's design of the holy union,
which marriage ought to be. People should be willing to wait for great
blessings, and should consider them very sacred, that they don't
trivialise it by doing it their own way.
You cannot understand God all the time.
There will be times when you will totally misunderstand him. There will
be times when God will seem insensitive and cruel. But remember this in
your darkest hour. God is on your side, and always good, as long as you
keep trusting in him. All things, even terrible things, will work
together for your good in the end, if you will only hold on to your
faith.
Don't focus on your disability. But focus on your ability and be happy that you can still do something useful today.
Be happy about what you can do. Don't be sad about what you can't do. This is how you get the most out of your life right now.
The world is not your own. Even the piece
of land that you may own right now will have to be relinquished on the
day of your death. So, live your life knowing that you own nothing. And
be aware that you are owned by God. Your soul belongs to him. So, you
belong to him. Live knowing that you are owned by God, and if you have
anything now, it is God who has given you temporary control over it.
The best way to live is to be grateful for every day as if it were our last.
A very hard part of life is dying. And
when you have die to early and suddenly and painfully, it has the power
to destroy you utterly. But it can also be a golden opportunity to
overcome fear and hopelessness and embrace the life that is everlasting
with greater passion and tenacity than would be the case when a person
dies in ripe old age.
Paul never intended his letters to be a
part of the Bible. They were included in the Bible many years later. We
need to read them carefully because there are many personal opinions in
these letters, along with God-given instruction. We should ask the help
of the Holy Spirit to make a distinction between personal opinions and
divine instructions.
The biblical writers do not always speak
for God. Sometimes they speak their opinion. We need to make a
distinction between God's words and human opinion And we cannot do this
withoutGod's help.
Only God knows what is right for you. Let
him decide it in his own time in his own way. But if you are in a rush,
you may do it your way. But you will have to live with the consequences.
The purposes of God are beyond human
understanding. Suffice it to say, if it is meant to happen, it will. But
if it doesn't, accept God's no with grace. And even that grace must
come from him.
I didn't know who I was until ten years
ago. And it has been a steady unravelling of God's plan in my life. I
discovered myself, as I was actually doing what the Holy Spirit inspired
in me. It started with a casual video recording of the Lord's Prayer
with my limited smartphone camera. Now it has emerged into compulsive
video-making, churning out message after message, generated by some
invisible mechanism that works even in total darkness. My tools and
output have evolved in time. I talk and write at a pace that I cannot
fully understand. It looks like I have more energy and direction than I
expected from myself.
Let the Holy Spirit guide you. He is your
Master, and he is at work in you. When he empowers you and directs you,
you will know that somehow. Your work will display a quality, which you
never had before. It will benefit others in ways in which you had never
imagined before. Do not train yourself to do this. But let the Spirit
train you up in God's ways. And he is a most unconventional teacher. He
may guide you in total darkness, but he will eventually bring you out
into everlasting light.
When you are a child, you will be a child.
You are a growing child with growing awareness of who you are and what
you should do. You are by no means grown up until God completes his work
in you. You will discover yourself more and more, as the Spirit's inner
work makes outward manifestations.
We are all rebels. We all rebel against
God daily. We fail him daily. We deny him daily. But he will forgive us
daily, if only we would admit our failings and return to him seeking his
grace.
Don't worry about failing God. Every
disciple of Jesus Christ failed. The greatest among the disciples denied
him three times, to save his own skin. But Jesus Christ restored him to
his position, when he received three tearful assurances of love from
that person. When Jesus Christ could welcome betrayers back again, you
need not worry about your own betrayal of God.
The greatest discovery we can make about
ourselves is that we belong to God. He paid a high price for us, to
secure our souls, so that we may live forever. When we realize this, our
old perception of us will cease to matter, degree by degree, until our
old way of life will make way for the new way.
You are a child of God. There is nothing more to find out about yourself.
It is not enough if you pray for peace. You should also work for peace.
Not everyone knows the language of the
heart. Some know only the language of the wallet. It takes time to
develop the heart, and those who know the language of the heart should
teach it to those who do not know it. And they should do so patiently,
allowing time for learning.
Let us thank God for his precious Son,
Jesus Christ. May Good Friday be a day when Man and God will connect
meaningfully. Let the Calvary scene inspire lost sons and daughters to
return to their Father.
Knowing that Jesus Christ died for us is not enough. We need to
experience why He had to die for us. We need to experience sin, and why
it is impossible for us to make atonement for our own sins. When we
recognize that, we will be able to appreciate what Jesus Christ did on
the cross. And we will be able to respond desirably to His Father, who
sent him to us. May Good Friday be a day of such responses. God bless
you all.
Till then let me not give up this
struggle. I will not cease to do what God tells me to do in my heart. I
have walked far and abandoned much. If I wanted to turn back, it will be
too late. But I do not want to turn back. I want to go where this path
leads me. And though there are horrible disturbances and impediments
before me, I will overcome them all with the strength of God. For when I
am weak, then he is strong in me. Let the people of God continue to
trod in troubled paths. For God himself goes with us, and he is near us,
when the journey becomes unbearable.
The disciples of Jesus quarrelled among
themselves. There were rivalries and jealousies among them. I notice the
same spirit of strife in my home. People are constantly warring and
competing. There is no time or desire for giving and serving. If service
is rendered, it is often done grudgingly and complainingly. In such an
environment, God has allowed his desert flower to grow within me. Not
only have I bloomed in hostile ground, others have also seen me and been
delighted by me. This is my great consolation as I toss around on a
sleepless night, which threatens to go on without end.
I have spoken of strength despite a
terrible weakness in me. I have spoken of light despite a great darkness
within me. I have spoken of peace, even as war raged in me and out of
me. I have spoken of godliness, even as ungodly anger and discord
surrounded me nearly uninterruptedly in my life. I feel I must speak of
what I have not experienced, because even if it is not true in my life,
it is true according to God and precious in his sight, and what matters
to him matters to me.
I go through the Jesus experience every
day. When I pray, the people around me are often sleepy and weary. But I
continue to pray. I continue to hope in a new day, when the ugliness
will be dispelled, and the suffering will cease.
I will not let the attitudes of people
shape my worship of God. I will worship God as I am led by his Spirit.
Even if people around me are sleeping, or not paying attention, and even
if people are fighting and quarrelling bitterly, I will continue to
read the Bible, and say prayers for the well-being of all. This is my
labour. This is my cross. But it is a pretty small cross compared to
another I bear silently.
Even an excellent depiction of Jesus
Christ does not automatically lead to salvation of souls. People may
receive the message and fail to respond to it with their hearts. The act
of conveying a message is twofold: one, the ability of the communicator
and two, the receptivity of the receiver. The success of communication
lies equally with the receiver, whose mental and spiritual states are
vital to his receiving the message. So ultimately success in the process
of conveying Christ to others does not lie in the hands of the
communicator, but in the hands of God who alone facilitates both the
communication and its reception.
If miracles happen every day, they may not
qualify as miracles. Still, it is not a bad idea to think that miracles
happen every day. It helps us develop gratitude for small blessings.
A madness is overwhelmed only by another. You cannot sweep it away by rational arguments.
You cannot rationalize a mania. Even if you try, you cannot lessen its severity.
Jesus had to fall from a place of
adoration to a place of disgrace for the sake of human beings. It is
because of that fall we get to rise to the level where God is. Somebody
had to fall to get us to rise. Somebody had to be punished for us to be
exonerated.
The
sudden fall of Jesus took place because God had ordained it. Spiritual
forces obedient to God’s will were at work in the life of Jesus,
particularly in those final days of his life. They orchestrated the
catastrophic events that culminated in the Calvary moment. Even though
the Roman governor, Pilate, tried to save Jesus from his deadly fate, he
could not prevail over the clamorous mob who unequivocally
demanded that Jesus Christ be crucified. The Good Friday moment was
above all spiritually induced. It was not brought about by the
argumentative skills of Caiaphas and his priestly cohorts or the mob
they so successfully incited against Jesus Christ. They might have had a
small role to play in the way the events played out. But powerful
spiritual forces were the ones that dictated the course of events in an
unalterable way. These unseen forces are ultimately responsible for the
Messiah falling into disgrace, and being sentenced to a form of death
reserved for the worst criminals in the Roman empire. For such was the
will of God, that his only Son should suffer the worst death as the
worst criminal ever on earth. Let human beings who observe this terrible
fall of the greatest man who ever lived remember that this ignominious
fate was thrusted upon him for our sakes. Jesus suffered and died in the
worst possible manner to save us from sin and death. And let us not
forget that he fell from a great height to a great depth, so that we may
rise from a great depth to a great height, by God’s grace.
The fall of Jesus Christ is the rise of Man.
As you wave your palms exuberantly today,
don't get lost in the ritual, but try to remember the truth that Christ
must be king in your life. Or you will only be an onlooker and not an
inhabitant in his kingdom.
Reaching people should not be the goal. Helping people should be the goal.
You can pray a most fervent prayer and
still receive a negative answer. Jesus Christ discovered that the day
before his death. Answers are ultimately in God's hands, and not always
in the quality of our prayers.
You cannot discard your past, because the
present is all that matters. Learn from the past, and avoid past
mistakes in the present. If you do this, your future will be better.
When you wait for something and it finally
happens, it may give you some joy. But when you are tired of waiting
for something, and it finally happens, it may fail to give you any joy.
When something doesn't happen when you want it to happen, it does not make a great impact when it finally happens.
I'm from a place of trouble, so I believe
I can understand those who are in trouble. Trouble varies from person
to person, but the reaction to trouble should be the same. You should
face it bravely and calmly. And you should hope that your life will get
better. If you are a believer in God, you should rely on God to solve
your problem. No matter how terrible your situation is, believe that God
will help you find a way out of it eventually. Stand firm then, and
stop complaining and feeling sorry for yourself. Otherwise, you will be
in worse trouble than you are in right now.''
You need to weather your storm. And if you
believe in God, trust in him, and cast your cares on him. Your worry
will only make you feel worse.
You are small only if you want to be. Think of yourself as big and capable of handling the troubles in your life.
Many in this world have problems. And some
have many problems. But it is not to your advantage when you buckle
under the weight of your problems. You need to face them, and do even
better. You need to overcome them. That is what true living is all
about.
Does
love your neighbour mean only love a fellow believer? If you love only
believers, what is the great achievement in that? Jesus Christ told us
to love our enemies. But how do we love our enemies? We pray for them.
We ask God to be gracious to them. We pray that God would show mercy to
them. But should we live with them as best friends? I don't think so. We
should try to get along with all kinds
of people. But we cannot live with people who hate God, unless we are
forced by circumstances. Sometimes, in a marriage, people find
themselves unequally yoked in the spiritual sense. That is when people
need to stay faithful to their marriage vows despite spiritual
differences. In all other cases, it is best to maintain a distance
between the believer and the unbeliever. But distance in this sense does
not mean frostiness or hatred. It just means a physical and mental
space brought about by spiritual incompatibility. And this may be
necessary for most spiritual humans, who are vulnerable to the evil of others.
God is doing something new in your life
every day. So be ready to see the new. He asks you to do something new
today, something you have never done before. Be willing to be used in a
new way.
In this life with God, be prepared to see
your weakness thoroughly exposed. It is when you know your utter
inadequateness, you will discover God’s overwhelming adequateness.
God rarely asks you to do what is easy.
Many times he asks you to do something, which you find very challenging.
But you should be willing to do what God asks of you, for he will
provide you with the resources to do his task. But to be enabled by God,
you need to trust in him more than in your own intelligence.
Seldom do people stay and prove through their actions what they passionately said.
We don't like to be called servant. We'd
rather be called worker or something even less disparaging. But God has
called us to be servants. God himself became a servant, and he served us
by doing for us what we could not do for ourselves. So let us not be
dismayed by the label servant. It is mightier to serve in heaven than to
reign on earth.
A poor talker who is a great doer, is better than a great talker who is a poor doer. Actions always matter more than words.
You serve God by serving his creations.
You honour God by respecting the works of his hands. You worship God by
sharing his love with those who have never known him. You live for God
by dying for all that you desire selfishly for yourself. You work for
God by doing what many others are unwilling to do, for such work is
beneath their self-image, and offers no gain that they value.
We need to walk dry roads to reach wet
places. We need to travel with parched mouths for a long time to reach a
place where our thirst will be permanently satisfied. We need to
experience lasting pain to receive a joy that cannot be taken away from
us. This is heaven's design for earth. And the sooner we realize it, the
better for us.
Don't spend your time seeing what you have
seen before. But devote your time to seeing what you have never seen
before. When you have seen the old, turn to what is new, and always be
in search of the new.
Don't criticize your servant. Be willing
to serve like her, and do what she is not able to do. Show your servant
by example how to serve.
Talk less and do more. The greatest doers
are the least among talkers. Action is what matters in the end. Your
words will amount to nothing, if they are not superseded by action.
Instead of complaining about what someone
has not done, do the work that is incomplete or unattempted, and don't
even complain about it. This is what will make you a great worker.
We should learn to be happy with what we
have accomplished in less-than-ideal circumstances. Instead of berating
the flawed process, we should be grateful for the end result.
The best way to worship God is by giving
thanks for the life he gave you. The best way to give thanks to God for
life is by enjoying the life he gave you. The best way to enjoy life is
by expressing the gifts that God gave you. The best way to express the
gifts you have is by sharing them with with others. It is by making
others happy that you are happy. And you cannot worship God without
being happy in this life.
Take care that you don't spurn your
brother on your way to worship God today. Make things right with your
brother so that everything is right between you and God.
You cannot love God without loving
people. You cannot worship God without honouring people. You cannot have
a good relationship with God without having a good relationship with
the people around you.
Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Easter and
Christmas are man-made holidays. We need to think about God every day.
We need to celebrate Jesus Christ every day. We need to think of the
birth of Jesus Christ every day. We need to remember the death of Jesus
Christ every day.
We worship God by honouring one another.
We celebrate God by celebrating one another. If we fail in interpersonal
relationships, we will also fail in our relationship with God.
God is with us. No matter what is against us, it cannot succeed. So, let us not be afraid. Let us trust in God today.
Being in Christ means believing that we
have a Saviour called Jesus Christ, who saved us from our sins, and who
conquered death for us, and made us right before God, and gave us his
Spirit, who lives within us, revealing to us the mind of God, and
enabling our mind to agree with God's mind, as we submit to him degree
by degree.
The commandments of God will never cease
to be important. Only perfect obedience to them will not be by us, but
by Jesus Christ, who has already done it for us.
The commandments of God cannot be obeyed
perfectly by anyone. Only Jesus Christ could obey. And if we are in him,
we have also obeyed perfectly.
It is the law that gives sin its power. It is the Spirit that frees you from the power of sin.
You should consider yourselves dead to the
law of Moses. You died to it when you were born of the Spirit. If you
still live under the law, you are under its curse. For no human except
Jesus Christ was justified by keeping the law. You now live in the
Spirit by the grace of God. But if it is the law that you prefer, you
will find out that it will arouse every desire that it forbids.
When we are born again, it means that we have died already. When we are born of the spirit we have already died to the flesh.
God is good. In difficult times, he has helped me once more. He turned my wailing into dancing once more.
The advise that I give is first for myself and then for others.
I minister to myself, thus I minister to others.
The more you look at something, the less remarkable it becomes.
If you are happy about what you received today, even though it is little, you surely have a big heart.
Sin is dead. God is alive. This is the truth that overrules every worldly reality, if you are born of the Spirit.
You don't always have to do good. You
don't always have to enthuse others. Sometimes you should just sit down
and take care of yourself. If you cannot take care of yourself, you
cannot take care of others.
