This unfinished document from 2018 unexpectedly surfaced today. The following random statements I judged worthy of you, were taken from Matthew Kelley’s book, “A Call to Joy: Living In The Presence of God,” Chapter One.
Sometimes you just know things. You do not know how you have come to know them, but deep within you there is an urge to listen to yourself, to trust yourself.
Only two things exist in eternity: joy and misery. We have long labeled them Heaven and hell. When you are with God you dance for joy. This we know as Heaven. When you are separated from God, you are paralyzed by misery. This we know as hell.
When you give to another, you fill yourself, and when you take selfishly, you empty yourself. Taking is not the same as receiving. When you graciously receive, you also fill yourself. Give and receive, but do not take.
Holiness is about grasping the moments of each day and using them to grow and become a better person and about assisting others in achieving the same. It is this that gives glory to God.
Smile, say less & listen more, pray & trust
A smile is an invitation to someone else to dance for joy.
One day a priest found himself walking through the Bowery in New York City, a place for many homeless people can be found. The priest was with three friends, were all on their way to take a ferry ride. As they walked along, they came a man dressed in rags and sitting on the pavement. He was very dirty and looking depressed. When he met the priest’s eyes, he beckoned him to come over. Touched, the priest moved toward him. But his friends quickly spoke up: “Come on, you don’t want to go near that bum.”
The priest ignored their warning and move still closer while his friends watched in amazement. The priest said a few words to the man. Then he smiled and moved on to catch the ferry.
As they were waiting to board, the same man came running up to the priest, sobbing like a child; he pulled out a gun and said, “Father, just before you walked along this morning, I was about to go down an alley and blow my brains out. When you came along, I waved to you and you responded to my call, my cry, my plea. Then you spoke to me as you would speak to someone you love, but it wasn’t any of this that that would stop me from doing what I had planned. As you started to leave, you looked deep into my eyes and smiled. It was a first sign of human affection that I’ve been shown in seven years And I just wanted you to know that today your smile has given me life.“
The two spoke for a while, and the priest discovered that this man had once been a doctor practicing at John Hopkins Hospital. Then the priest gave him his blessing and went on his way.
Later, the priest went to the hospital to find out what he could about this man. He mentioned the man’s name to various doctors and nurses and was told that he had in fact been a doctor there earlier, but he was having some troubles, so he left. No one knew where the priest could find him now.
Three years later the phone rang and the priest was greeted by a well spoken voice saying, “Hello, I’m Dr. Lawson. Remember me from the Bowery? I’m back at the hospital now. I just wanted you to know a smile can make a difference – sometimes all the difference.
Say less and listen more. (SLALM)These five words have improved my relationships with people more than any other. Everyone has a story. Your story is the thread of your life. It is when we lose or forget our story that our lives begin to fall apart.
The voice of God never ceases in our lives; He just uses different channels.
We are always wanting to know more, yet we are often not “prepared” to listen. We want to know more, but we do not live what we already know.
Our big struggle takes place between the false self and the true self. The more we abandon the false self and surrender to the true self, the more we grow in perfection. This battle takes place primarily in our hearts. It is a battle between power and love, between the love of power and the power to love. As we discover and nurture our true selves through prayer and reflection, the power to love grows in our hearts overwhelming and defeating it’s enemy, our inherent love and insatiable thirst for more power.
You will never be in control until you resolve not to be, for it is in the surrendering that we find our freedom. The key to surrendering to the Divine plan is trust.
Whereas, suffering puts us in touch with what is really important, sacrifice spells out our commitment and confirms our love.
Nothing, absolutely nothing, in this life is a coincidence. There are no accidents, just providence. Providence, providence, all is providence. Our happiness comes from seeking, finding, and struggling to live in harmony with this plan. The plan is truth, but it will never be imposed upon us.
To breathe is not a right; it is a gift. One of the first steps toward being able to recognize and be in touch with the divine plan for you is discovering the difference between a right and a gift. In the modern Western world we have an interesting combination of an overdeveloped sense of rights and an overdeveloped ego. When the two are mixed together, they form an extremely harmful formula known as U4; Unfulfilled, Unhappy, Unsatisfied, & Unbearable.
At times, I don’t understand while I’m alive, or why I wake up each day, how I breathe, and many other taken for granted intricacies, but I do know that one day I will not wake up. Death, however it is, is not a mystery. Life is the mystery. Life is sacred. Life is to be reverenced in all it’s forms.
Not everyone with his eyes closed is asleep, and not everyone with her eyes open can see. If you do not listen, you will never hear.
The clouds do not need to open and have lightening strike for God to speak. We need to develop the extra sense that allows us to hear God’s voice in the gentle whispers of the afternoon breeze.
To hear His voice you must be willing to change and obey His words. To achieve the necessary frame of mind and heart, we must recognize that God is good and that He calls us to do what is best. His challenge to change is much more than just that. His challenge to change is really a call to growth and to fulfillment. Fulfillment for a person is not merely a place or a destination; it is a path. You Journeying while on the path is fulfilling, whereas standing still on the path is devastatingly depressing!
When you stand still, you reject “the struggle” and you refuse to change and grow. Simultaneously you reject fulfillment, happiness, the dance for joy, and everything else, that is eternally for your good, and for His glory.
“The flower within you that wants to bloom is your soul. The Divine Gardener wishes to work the ground. The Divine Gardener wishes to water the ground. He wishes to pull out the weeds and place the flower where it can get just the right amount of sunlight.
Listen to the voice of the Divine Gardener. Remember, when He points out your faults and failings, He is hoeing the earth of your soul and pulling out the weeds. Some parts of the gardening process are painful, but the pain gives birth to new life. Allow Him to direct you, to call you forth, to move you, remembering that He wants to place you where you will get just the right amount of sunlight. Listen. Listen. Listen.”
God is your father. He is a loving father with wonderful plans for his children. Regardless of the greatest plan you can put together for yourself with the greatest power of your imagination, His plan is better, greater, more exciting, and by far, the most rewarding. Believe in His plan. Ask him to reveal His plan to you.
Sometime soon, when the Spirit calls you to listen to His Word, you practical seekers of His Plan, open and read Galations Chapters 5 & 6 from the KJV or NKJV. Then lastly, read and study from the paraphrased Message Version, sitting back with pencil and paper, and prayerfully listen.
Blessings.
UP NEXT: No idea. Honestly.
