Foundational Missions

February 26, 2013February 26, 2013

Professional Christianity

“The Church was a family in Jerusalem, became an institution in Rome, a political tool in Europe & a business in the USA. SAD!” – Rick Warren

A professional is the citizen of a corporation, not the citizen of a family, as it appears to me.

So what do I mean by professional Christianity? It's like, “If you really are called by God, you should be ministering for a living, right?” After all, significant spiritual contribution is reserved for those who are professionals, aka those who are “in the ministry.”

Continue reading “Professional Christianity”

February 18, 2013March 10, 2013

Loving God with Your Strength

The link below will send you to a message that has impacted my life significantly. I want to encourage you to go there and give it a look and/or listen.

You can get the notes, download the MP3, or watch the video….. lot's of options.

Loving God with All Our Strength

Specifically, this message helped me understand fasting in a new way that has helped me establish a routine of fasting over the past several years. But there is much more also contained in the material.

Hope it blesses you the way it has me.

January 21, 2013March 31, 2013

Reflections on Culture and Culture Change

Understanding culture and it's influence is very important in our times, especially as we encounter diverse people and people groups. While this is especially valuable in our interactions with people from other nations / ethnic groups, it can be equally valuable much closer to home. Everyone has had a unique group of experiences and inputs that have helped shape who they are. This is true on the individual level, as well as the group level, regardless of size, regardless of location. Continue reading “Reflections on Culture and Culture Change”

January 6, 2013March 31, 2013

2013 – The Year of Promise!?!

For some reason it seems that we want to perpetually attach themes to years around this time. I wonder if anyone goes back and compares the year to the theme that was prominent, or if they just forget about it and go on theming the future? And we like a theme that is bright, big, promising and so forth. Nobody wants to hear any half steps toward the positive in prognostications! Let's make it big and bold guys, okay?

I know that some of the things I have forecast in certain years have been hard to see in the exit interview of the year I pinned them to. Probably is pretty common thing, but that doesn't make it good. I think it does us good to be honest when comparing predictions to what actually happened, instead of trying to save face or spin things. And we can also benefit from other perspectives and input, even if it is contrary. We could benefit from some honesty in our times, and acceptance of responsibility for things we have gotten wrong or misunderstood. Humility is refreshing. We learn by contrasting expectations with what actually happened, so don't stop, and don't fail to examine.

Continue reading “2013 – The Year of Promise!?!”

Ernest Hemingway

Before you act, listen.

Before you react, think.

Before you spend, earn.

Before you criticize, wait.

Before you pray, forgive.

Before you quit, try.

Rudeness is a weak man's imitation of strength.

Eric Hoffer

Leadership requires two things: A version of the world that does not yet exist and the ability to communicate it

Simon Sinek

Leadership begins in the moment when someone else's flourishing is as important to you as your own.

Henri Nouwen

The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence; it is to act with yesterday's logic.

Drucker

Personal attachment to the Lord Jesus and to His perspective is the one thing that must not be overlooked. In missionary work the great danger is that God's call will be replaced by the needs of the people, to the point that human sympathy for those needs will absolutely overwhelm the meaning of being sent by Jesus

Oswald Chambers

The key to the missionary's work is the authority of Jesus Christ, not the needs of the lost.

Oswald Chambers

The key to the missionary's work is the authority of Jesus Christ, not the needs of the lost.

Oswald Chambers

For the saint, direction and guidance come from God Himself, not some measure of that saint's usefulness. It is the work that God does through us that counts, not what we do for Him.

Oswald Chambers

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.

Mark Twain

Leadership requires two things: 'A version of the world that does not yet exist and the ability to communicate it.

Simon Sinek

Our tendency today is to put the emphasis on service. Beware of the people who make their request for help on the basis of someone's usefulness. If you make usefulness the test, then Jesus Christ was the greatest failure who ever lived.

Oswald Chambers

Leadership begins in the moment when someone else's flourishing is as important to you as your own.

Henri Nouwen

Oswald Chambers

The key to the missionary's work is the authority of Jesus Christ, not the needs of the lost.

Oswald Chambers

Mark Twain

Leadership requires two things: 'A version of the world that does not yet exist and the ability to communicate it.

Simon Sinek

Leadership begins in the moment when someone else's flourishing is as important to you as your own.

Henri Nouwen

When clarity is needed, nothing else will do.

N Scott McClelland

Leadership is meant to make strength productive.

N Scott McClelland

Leadership is defined by results, not attributes.

Drucker

Knowledge has to be improved, challenged, and increased constantly, or it vanishes.

Peter F. Drucker

this is not for children or small adults....

N Scott McClelland

Making good decisions is a crucial skill at every level.

Drucker

Rank does not confer privilege or give power. It imposes responsibility.

Drucker

Refuse to be average. Let your heart soar as high as it will.

AW Tozer

We are not diplomats but prophets, and our message is not a compromise but an ultimatum.

Tozer

To be right with God has often meant to be in trouble with men.

Tozer

Faith, as Paul saw it, was a living, flaming thing leading to surrender and obedience to the commandments of Christ.

Tozer

Approach life with purpose, or (a lesser) one will be provided for you.

Michael Barrett

For the eyes of the LORD move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His.

One of the the main purposes (and results) of getting closer to the Lord is becoming more and more like Him.

Scott McClelland

In our own minds we might be quite mature, but God sees us all as children in need.

N Scott McClelland

There is a widespread conviction that Christianity cannot survive in anything like its present form

Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom

The institutions of man are temporary, but what God does lasts forever.

Scott McClelland

Feed your mind the light of Heaven! (avoiding the elaborate schemes of this age to make perversity attractive)....

N Scott McClelland

What animates your life'

All truth passes thru 3 stages; 1st - ridiculed 2nd - violently opposed 3rd - taken as being self-evident.

Arthur Schopenhauer

If nothing is at stake then all viewpoints have an equal chance of being true.

do not destroy

For God was pleased to live in Christ and through him God reconciled everything to Himself.... by means of Christ's blood on the cross.

His Reign Draws Near.

N Scott McClelland

How will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation' After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was' http://read.ly/Heb2.3.NASB

Man is fascinating, even in a fallen state. How much more as the bearer of the glory of God'!

N Scott McClelland

Spiritual authority is the most dangerous of occupations.

N Scott McClelland

What is it about us that makes us receive the encouragement personally and think the challenges are for someone else'

The responsible always bear the weight of the irresponsible.

N Scott McClelland

Remember that lost time does not return.

Thomas a Kempis

An humble knowledge of thyself is a surer way to God than a deep search after learning.

Thomas a Kempis

At the Day of Judgment, we shall not be asked what we have read, but what we have done.

Thomas a Kempis

How quickly passes away the glory of this world.

Thomas a Kempis

Purity and simplicity are the two wings with which man soars above the earth and all temporary nature.

Thomas a Kempis

If thou wilt receive profit, read with humility, simplicity and faith, and seek not at any time the fame of being learned.

Thomas a Kempis

If, however, you seek Jesus in all things, you will surely find Him

Thomas a Kempis

Where there is no vision, the people perish.

Solomon

In humility, Jesus disguises Himself. How well do we know Him' Sadly, He often passes unnoticed, or as a well intentioned fool.

N Scott McClelland

The gospel of Jesus Christ is the most important enterprise.

N Scott McClelland

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of them who bring good news.....

Isaiah

We are all missionaries. Wherever we go, we either bring people nearer to Christ, or we repel them from Christ.

Eric Liddell

I believe that God made me for a purpose, but He also made me fast. When I run, I feel His pleasure.

Eric Liddell

Insecurity produces the need to dominate.

John Dawson

If the Master is glorified, the servant should be satisfied.

John Dawson

As for me, may I never boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of that cross, my interest in this world has been crucified, and the world's interest in me has also died.

Paul

We will never have more affection or passion for God than we understand He has for us.

Mike Bickle

We will never be more committed to God than our understanding of His commitment to us.

Mike Bickle

Our significance, as Christians, does not come from the approval of men, but from the approval of God.

Francis Frangipane

Dare to follow Jesus away from the crowd.

N Scott McClelland

Dear brothers, it is better to listen much, speak little, and don't react.

James

The grace for character transformation is a love relationship.

John Dawson

Time is short, and souls are precious.

Jorge Parrott

Parts exist in contemplation of the whole.

Drucker

In the knowledge economy everyone is a volunteer, but we have trained our managers to manage conscripts.

Drucker

Evangelism is telling people to believe in Jesus; missions is telling people there's a Jesus to believe in.'

George Murray via Vince Corcoran

In the practical art of war, the best thing of all is to take the enemy's country whole and intact; to shatter and destroy it is not so good. Sun Tzu's Art of War

ss. 3.1: Attack by Stratagem

An executive is a person who makes their decisions in contemplation of the effects such decisions will have on the entire organization.

Peter Drucker

The higher the calling, the more difficult the ascent.

N Scott McClelland

In humility, in simplicity, go forward.

Scott McClelland

A good bit of the animation surrounding 'social networking' only reaffirms the fact that we expect our identity, answers, meaning to be found in other people.

Scott McClelland

The path to a supernatural lifestyle is: In private you cry out to God, in public you take risk

Bill Johnson

Most Christians repent enough to be forgiven but not enough to see the Kingdom.

Bill Johnson

You can't release a word that changes history until it has changed you.

Bill Johnson

All great, earth shaking events have been brought about by the spoken word.

Adolf Hitler, 1924

Long-term commitment to new learning and new philosophy is required of any management that seeks transformation. The timid and the fainthearted, and the people that expect quick results, are doomed to disappointment.

W Edwards Deming

Massive training is required to instill the courage to break with tradition.

W Edwards Deming

In so many ways, we are still looking for independent legitimacy, just like our forbears at the tower of Babel.... to make a name for ourselves.

Scott McClelland

Your signature, Jesus, is humility. If we cannot recognize this, we will miss most of what You are doing.

Scott McClelland

How do we continue to walk in humility after we begin to see results and fruit from our obedience'

Scott McClelland

To the defiance of the spirit of the age, we must realize that commerce is not the essence of life.

N Scott McClelland

What if the ministry in our times is like the priesthood was in Martin Luther's time'

Scott McClelland

The time between when we sense or know something and when it takes place is given to us to for preparation.

Scott McClelland

Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and turns into a racket.

Eric Hoffer

It is not your business to succeed, but to do right; when you have done so, the rest lies with God.

CS Lewis

Contrary to everything your TV tells you, products can never deliver joy, no matter how refined. Cast off the gospel of commerce!

N Scott McClelland

Most political sermons teach the congregation nothing, except what newspapers are taken at the rectory.

CS Lewis

For if the bugle produces an indistinct sound, who will prepare himself for battle'

1Cor14:8

To live your life, in God's will, nothing compares. To live out God's will; obscurity, assurances, uncertainties and reward. Few so live.

Scott McClelland

God is displeased when any man thinks he can go it alone.

Tony Hedrick

Empty promises, from empty hearts to empty wallets.

N Scott McClelland

If this century proves one thing, it is the futility of politics

Drucker

Prosperity knits a man to the World. He feels he's finding his place in it, while really it is finding its place in him.

CS Lewis

The kingdoms of this world are unified in opposition, to defy the Lord's influence over them b/c they see it as bondage and imprisonment

Ps2

If we don't find grace in Your sight, then all of our labors will come to nothing.

Scott McClelland

Do the lives we are living reveal that we are prepared for the ultimate times that are approaching us'

Scott McClelland

In this life a cross, and in the next a crown!

N Scott McClelland

Somewhere we have come to believe that good leadership requires a safe distance from those we are called to lead.

Henri Nouwen

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.

Abraham Lincoln

Expect great things from God; attempt great things for God.

William Carey

Then the Spirit of the Lord took possession of Gideon. He blew a ram's horn as a call to arms...

Judges 6:34

My nourishment comes from doing the will of God, who sent me, and from finishing his work.

Jesus

The bankruptcy of the West is that it judges quality of life in purely natural / commercial terms.

N Scott McClelland

Lord Jesus, help us to see life more in a sense of what it is meant to be!

The height of the conflict between darkness and light rises.

Scott McClelland

Religion is what you are left with when the Spirit leaves the building.

Bono

We are all bit players in a story authored by the Father; & do not write the story, they live, and act, and serve at the direction of the Father; playing different roles, we all have one focus; we are servants.

No one is willing to be led farther than he can see.

Thomas a Kempis

We must meet the uncertainties of this world with the certainties of the world to come.

Tozer

Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.

Robert Louis Stevenson

For every child of God defeats this evil world, and we achieve this victory through our faith.

1John5:4

The market' has a major role to play on the dark side in the end times.

N Scott McClelland

In life, as in business, making good decisions is a crucial skill at every level of responsibility.

Expanding on Drucker

God weighs the love with which a man acts rather than the deed itself.

Thomas a Kempis

Do you borrow your legitimacy, or do you have your own'

Scott McClelland

Let all things be loved for the sake of Jesus, but Jesus for His own sake.

Thomas a Kempis

They who love Jesus for His own sake, and not for the sake of comfort for themselves, bless Him in every trial and anguish of heart, no less than in the greatest joy.

Thomas a Kempis

You can have a lot to live on and still have nothing to live for.

Rick Warren

God made you so He could love you.

Rick Warren

To give someone a blessing is the most significant affirmation we can offer.

Henri Nouwen

Then I observed that most people are motivated to success because they envy their neighbors.

Solomon

Unless you assume a God, the question of life's purpose is meaningless.

Bertrand Russell, atheist

Jesus is the centerpiece of all that we believe.

Hebrews 3, The Message

To preach the gospel'not with wisdom and eloquence, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.

Paul

Affirmation without discipline is the beginning of delusion.

Jim Rohn

Either you run the day or the day runs you.

Jim Rohn

Failure is simply a few errors in judgment, repeated every day.

Jim Rohn

Don't just read the easy stuff. You may be entertained by it, but you will never grow from it.

Jim Rohn

Make measurable progress in reasonable time.

Jim Rohn

Much of what is being espoused as relationship-based Christianity is referring to a relationship with someone's position or organization. By this we are being robbed.

N Scott McClelland

True spiritual wisdom is imparted in words taught by the Spirit, not by human wisdom.

Paul

Many of those who are called to do something new have become content to fight with what is instead.

N Scott McClelland

If God makes all the decisions for you then you have nothing to give an account for at the end of your days.

Eric Johnson

The time of celebrity Christian leaders is passing away.

N Scott McClelland

Ministry is supposed to come out of who we are, not what we can do through our spiritual gifts.

Bill Johnson

The closer you live to God, the smaller everything else appears.

Rick Warren

Not that we think we're qualified to do anything on our own. Our qualification comes from God. He has enabled us....

Paul

The Christian life is about ascending levels of obedience, with growing levels of risk, so much so that in full maturity, we can say, with Jesus, not my will but Yours be done Father, even to the point of death.

Scott McClelland

I must preach the kingdom of God to the other cities also, for I was sent for this purpose.

Jesus

I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world

Jesus

Lord, help us to know the simplicity of dependence.

Yuri Nosenko

Wisdom is vindicated by all her children.

Jesus

No learning is complete without a test.

N Scott McClelland

A great quote is the highest form of literature, needing no context to liberate a life, save a soul, or direct a destiny.

Rick Warren

During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.

George Orwell

Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes... but no plans.

Peter Drucker

For spiritual nature, like bodily nature, will be served; deny it food and it will gobble poison.

CS Lewis

Friendship with God is reserved for those who reverence Him.

Proverbs

For spiritual nature, like bodily nature, will be served; deny it food and it will gobble poison.

CS Lewis

Avoid comparisons, resist exaggerations, and seek only God's commendation.

Paul

If my life is fruitless, it doesn't matter who praises me, and if my life is fruitful, it doesn't matter who criticizes me.

John Bunyan

Anyone can be a servant. All it requires is character.

Rick Warren

You can tell what they are by what they do.

Jesus

If you wait for perfect conditions, you will never get anything done.

When Christ shows up again on this earth, you'll show up too, the real you, the glorious you. Meanwhile, be content with obscurity.

Paul

You can't truly rest until every area in your life rests in God.

AW Tozer

Fallen man is not simply an imperfect creature who needs improvement: he is a rebel who must lay down his arms.

CS Lewis

Talent is a real killer.... because there are a lot of forces in the world looking for a voice, and they don't mind destroying their hosts.

Scott McClelland

Sometimes the only people you're going to find on the narrow path are you and God. Keep going anyway.

Joyce Meyer

If you would persevere in seeking perfection, you must consider yourself a pilgrim, an exile on earth.

Thomas a Kempis

Friendship with God is reserved for those who reverence Him. With them alone He shares the secrets of His promises.

Psalms

If you make disciples you always get the church. But if you make a church you rarely get disciples.

Mike Breen

The wisdom of the sensible is to understand his way......

Solomon

You have come to serve, not to rule.

thomas a kempis

Your grace is sustaining our lives / life itself. Surrounded by it, without realizing it, we continue on as if nothing were steadying us.

N Scott McClelland

Fiddling while Rome Burns' - meaning to occupy oneself with unimportant matters and neglect priorities during a crisis.

The God who fits in a box isn't the God & Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

AW Tozer

Pain is God's megaphone.

CS Lewis

Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it.

Unknown

God's promises are invitations, not gaurantees.

Mike Bickle

The first reaction of an organization whose theory is becoming obsolete is almost always a defensive one.

Drucker

When idols have territory in our hearts, we don't see them as idols, but as divine influences.

1voice

We are all weak and broken people, but often we are out of touch with our neediness.

Scott McClelland

If you don't have a system for building people up and sending them out, you're just building a crowd.

Rick Warren

One road leads home, and a thousand roads lead into the wilderness.

CS Lewis

Jesus said that they joined in their father's sins by memorializing the martyred prophets but not living by their example. Let's watch out!

N Scott McClelland

We don't determine whats relevant for others, we discover it (instead) by being present...

Ron Graves

Most of life's 'gifts' come wrapped in struggle paper

Ron Graves

Most of life's 'gifts' come wrapped in struggle paper; relationship is about keeping the aspect of 'celebration' a part of this phenomenon...

Ron Graves

Any cost of selfishness is greatly exaggerated

Ron Graves

When we find folks 'needing' to be right about something, 9 times outta 10 there's a hurt beneath it.

Ron Graves

Grace allows others to come to their own conclusions

Ron Graves

We are by the nature of our calling actually 'agents of change'....

Ron Graves

Do you wish to be great' Then begin by being. Do you desire to construct a vast and lofty fabric' Think first about the foundations of humility. The higher your structure is to be, the deeper must be its foundation.

Augustine

The best leaders are not those with the most followers, but those who leave the best leaders behind them.

Neil Cole

Live in response to the Father, not in reaction to the darkness.

Bill Johnson

You do not have because you do not ask.

James

You do not have because you do not ask.

James

Our vision for tomorrow determines how we will live today.

Dale Rumble

We are living in a time of restoration as Christ is restored to His rightful place in the church.

Dale Rumble

For many individuals professional training means power. But the minister, who disrobes to wash the feet of his friends,is powerless...

Henri Nouwen

One of the ways God measures our spiritual maturity is in the quality of our relationships.

Rick Warren

At some point along the timeline of your life, you'll have to decide to be recorded in earthly history books, or in God's book of life.

Scott McClelland

You never know how strong God's love for yours until it's all you need.

Jeff Gibson

We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking,only to learn that it is God who is shaking them.

Charles C. West

It is the way we react to circumstances that determines our feelings.

Dale Carnegie

Spiritual gifts are like utensils. Christ is the substance. When eating a meal I don't give 2 much attention to spoons/forks. But the food.

Frank Viola

God took the worst thing that man could do to His Son, and transformed it into the best thing He could do for man.

Anonymous

The essence of surrender is getting out of God's way so that He can do in us what He wants to do through us.

Tozer

The success of love is in the loving.

Mother Teresa

Love is the root of missions. Sacrifice is the fruit of missions.

Roderick Davis

The evidence we are serving the people we lead is the ability to celebrate their leaving as much as we celebrated their arrival

Aaron Walsh

No one is capable of coming to me on his own. You get to me only as a gift from the Father.

Jesus

Apologizing does not always mean that you were wrong, it just means you value your relationships more than your ego.

Fight For Life

If a man does not know to what port he is steering, no wind is favorable to him.

Seneca

For since our friendship with God was restored by the death of his Son while we were still his enemies, we will certainly be saved through the life of his Son.

Paul, from Romans 5

Don't love money; be satisfied with what you have. For God has said, 'I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.'

Hebrews 13:5

The missionary task is not just simply another thing the church should be doing, but rather it's primary and most important task.

John R. Mott

Decide upon your major definite purpose in life and then organize all your activities around it.

Brian Tracy

Humility is the ultimate standard of greatness in the Kingdom of God.

Mike Bickle

The people who had epic faith in history didn't have epic faith as a goal. #obedience

N Scott McClelland

Salvation is free... Discipleship costs everything!

Billy Graham

The only way to grow leaders is to let them lead.

Rick Warren

Don't take the Lord's patience as endorsement for your sin. He is giving you time to repent.

Mike Bickle

The Church was a family in Jerusalem, became an institution in Rome, a political tool in Europe & a business in the USA. SAD!

Rick Warren

There is nothing worse than a gift that is not employed.

Matt Peterson

The season when the earth has sorrows like a woman in labor is the season when the church takes child birth classes. Prepare!

Kirk Bennett

Small people, casual remarks, and little things very often shape our lives more powerfully than the deliberate, solemn advice of great people in critical moments.

Winston Churchill

Disaster speaks for itself. Opportunity often requires an advocate.

Alan Axelrod

There are no closed doors for the gospel. You can go anywhere if you are willing to go and never come back.

Brother Andrew

You belong to God. Your life will be different because of this.

N Scott McClelland

Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.

Francis Chan

All roads lead to the judgment seat of Christ.

Keith Green

The modern organization must be a destabilizer; it must be organized for innovation.

Drucker

The way we do church meetings makes church meetings the point of what we are doing. This isn't what Jesus & His martyrs died to give us.

N Scott McClelland

Go means a change of location!

Loren Cunningham

Allow Him to be the source of all your dreams, joys, and delights, and be careful to go and obey what He has said.

Oswald Chambers

I thought it reasonable that I should seek the work where the work was the most abundant and the workers fewest.

Scottish missionary James Gilmour

Every experience God gives us, every person he puts into our lives, is the perfect preparation for a future only He can see.

Corrie Ten Boom

Spiritual maturity is a gradual, progressive development that will take the rest of your life.

Rick Warren

Self righteous = being irritated with other's weakness.

N Scott McClelland

Impartation is not what we come to give but what we come to participate in...

N Scott McClelland

The first missionaries went out because they were running for their lives.

Bill Johnson

All that we call human history--money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery--[is] the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.

C.S. Lewis

True religion confronts earth with heaven and brings eternity to bear upon time.

AW Tozer

I feel I shall be buried for a time, hidden away in obscurity; then suddenly I shall flame out, do my work, and be gone.

Oswald Chambers

In a calm sea, every man is a captain.

Hemingway

There must be a beginning of any great matter, but the continuing unto the end until it be thoroughly finished yields the true glory.

Sir Francis Drake

Many might have attained to wisdom, had they not thought they had already attained it.

Seneca

Only the secure are humble.

GK Chesterton

I am motivated by doing a really good job at what ever I am doing, but I prefer to multiply my impact on society through a group of people.

John Thain

The apple seed is an apple orchard in disguise.

TD Jakes

The Church can't be a religious theater where paid men perform for the religious amusement of the people who pay them.

AW Tozer

To make a change, don't lead the masses. Lead the leaders.

Robert Kiyosaki

Without the cross, we're just a pious NGO, not the Church.

Pope Francis

The spirit of Christ is the spirit of missions. The nearer we get to Him, the more intensely missionary we become.

Henry Martyn

Ah, well, I am a great and sublime fool. But then I am God's fool, and all His work must be contemplated with respect.

Mark Twain

Dear children, keep away from anything that might take God's place in your hearts.

1John5

Why do we teach our young people the gospel of fundraising instead of the gospel of Jesus Christ'

N Scott McClelland

There are three essentials to leadership: humility, clarity and courage.

Fuchan Yuan

You have to be vulnerable to create art. Art is difficult if you're defensive.

Donald Miller

The only meaningful definition of a 'generalist' is a specialist who can relate his own small area to the universe of knowledge.

Peter Drucker

If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.

African proverb

Without individuals, nothing happens; without institutions, nothing survives.

Talleyrand

The day a company (or ministry) begins to be run for the benefit of the insiders, and not the benefit of the customers (those outside itself), is the day that the institution begins to die.

Drucker (with paraphrase)

..Christ-centered heroism does not need to be noticed or publicized.

Os Guinness

One repays a teacher badly if one always remains a pupil only.

Nietzsche

Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off the goal.

Henry Ford

We actually slander and dishonor God by our very eagerness to serve Him without knowing Him.

Oswald Chambers

The opportunity of a lifetime must be seized within the lifetime of the opportunity.

Leonard Ravenhill

What is to give light must first endure burning.

Viktor Frankl

Instead of desiring to see larger growing churches, we should desire to see larger growing Christians.

Rich Mullins

God is more interested in the size of your heart, than the size of your ministry.

Mike Bickle

Everybody thinks of changing humanity and nobody thinks of changing himself.

Leo Tolstoy

We must place upon our theology the demand that it work.

Francis Frangipane

God is more interested in your future and your relationships than you are.

Billy Graham

Our seeking God will lead us to identify with the work He has given us to do.

Norm Lewis

All leaders are learners. The moment you stop learning, you stop leading.

Rick Warren

When we pray 'Thy Kingdom come' do we realize that, simultaneously, we are asking for our self-centered kingdoms to go'

Francis Frangipane

There is no sin your not capable of given the right circumstances. Show me your friends, I'll show you your future.

Peter Haas

God cannot give us more than we can ask or imagine if we keep asking and imagining.

Maggie Ross

Action expresses priorities.

Mahatma Gandhi

Life is like a 10-speed bike. Most of us have gears we never use.

Charles Schulz

An obsession with growth has eclipsed our concern for sustainability, justice and human dignity. But people are not disposable ' the value of life lies outside economic development.

Vandana Shiva

Men who refuse to worship the true God [instead] worship themselves with tender devotion.

AW Tozer

A leader must not only manage results but expectations.

Rudy Giuliani

Anonymity is the essence of humility.

Edwin Louis Cole

A person is qualified to be responsible for success to the degree they are willing to be responsible for failure.

Edwin Louis Cole

Men, families and nations are not great by the virtue of their wealth but by the wealth of their virtue.

Edwin Louis Cole

The main reason we're on this earth is to learn to love.

Bob Jones

Did you learn to love'

Bob Jones

We grow small trying to be great.

E. Stanley Jones

Victorious living does not mean freedom from temptation, nor does it mean freedom from mistakes.

E. Stanley Jones

At the cross God wrapped his heart in flesh and blood and let it be nailed to the cross for our redemption.

E. Stanley Jones

Whatever our creed, we stand with admiration before the sublime character of Jesus.

E. Stanley Jones

You cannot fight hard unless you believe you are fighting to win.

Teddy Roosevelt

The greatest danger for us all is not that our goals are too high and we miss them, but that they are too low and we reach them.

Michelangelo

Faith is the least self-regarding of the virtues. It is by its very nature scarcely conscious of its own existence. Like the eye which sees everything in front of it and never sees itself, faith is occupied with the Object upon which it rests and pays no attention to itself at all.

AW Tozer

You can have a lot to live for no matter how much you have to live on.

Inspired by Rick Warren

You only have authority over the storm you can sleep in.

Bill Johnson

On every level of life, from housework to heights of prayer, in all judgment and efforts to get things done, hurry and impatience are sure marks of the amateur.

Evelyn Underhill

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.

Albert Einstein

Jesus revealed a new paradigm for greatness. We are to focus on being great in His sight rather than in the sight of men.

Mike Bickle

Integrity means you have one united life.

N Scott McClelland

Give and it shall be given to you applies to every area of life... and it's not just an encouragement, it's a guarantee!

Scott McClelland

One of the first things that man begins to do when he feels or experiences a little success is to build monuments to himself.

Scott McClelland

Of all the insidious pretenders to the throne, the self life may well be the most determined.

Scott McClelland

Champions are men in whom courage has become visible.

Edwin Louis Cole

No blabbermouth gets to sit next to the throne.

Rick Joyner

Teach us to number our days carefully so that we may develop wisdom in our hearts.

Moses

Often, the first thing a person does with a little success is begin to construct monuments to themselves.

N Scott McClelland

Christianity should be an obsession with the person of Jesus Christ, not an obsession with principles trying to make life work.

David Haines

Vital Christianity has 3 pillars: 'inner life of devotion, outer life of service, intellectual life of clear, rational thinking.

Elton Trueblood (via Gary R. Collins)

If you are serious about becoming like Christ, He is going to put you in circumstances where your only true choice is to become like Him.

Francis Frangipane

Holy living consists in doing God's work with a smile.

Mother Teresa

Once you see the mold, you understand the Jell-O.

Jenna Miller

Just as man cannot live without dreams, he cannot live without hope. If dreams reflect the past, hope summons the future.

Elie Wiesel

The weak can never forgive. 'Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.

Gandhi

Jesus was the temple to end all temples, the priest to end all priests, and the sacrifice to end all sacrifices.

Timothy Keller

Every person, religious or not, is worshipping something to get their worth.'

Timothy Keller

God wants me to love real people, not ideal people.

Rick Warren

Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.

Amy Muranko Gahan

The first job of leadership is to love people. Leadership without love is manipulation.

Rick Warren Rick Warren

People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader leads, and the boss drives.

Theodore Roosevelt

You can't go back to the ole' swimming hole.

Tony Hedrick's Dad

Ask not 'How can I achieve'' but 'What can I contribute''

Drucker

We are life long students of the ways of God; trouble starts when we think we have graduated.

John Paul Jackson

Faith removes the mountains which unbelief creates.

Reinhard Bonnke

A good leader leads the people from above them. A great leader leads the people from within them.

M.D. Arnold'

The purpose of talk is making decisions not more talking.

Dan Rockwell

It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare. It is because we do not dare that things are difficult.

Seneca

If leadership is about people why are you so focused on projects.

Dan Rockwell

Idealism' is the enemy of growth, a source of condemnation and exhaustion.

David Harwood

It is foolish to buy things you don't need, with money you don't have, to impress people you don't like. 'Rick Warren

Rick Warren

The measure of an education is that you acquire some idea of the extent of your ignorance

Excerpt From: Mansfield. 'The Miracle of the Kurds.' Worthy Publishing. iBooks.
This material may be protected by copyright.

Check out this book on the iBooks Store: https://itun.es/us/6wNo2.l

Christopher Hitchens

We must face the deficiency of our own love for others rather than being preoccupied with the deficiency of people's love towards us.

Candyce Hogan

If our goals eclipse our 'relationships we have the wrong goals.

David Harwood

There are three effects of nearness to Jesus: humility, happiness, holiness.

Charles Spurgeon

The secret to getting ahead is getting started.

Mark Twain

Education without action is entertainment.

Chris Lytle

True creativity is born out of God's desire to reveal His mysteries.

Ray Hughes

To know and not to do is not to know.

Chris Lytle

Most of the evil in this world is done by people with good intentions.

T.S. Eliot

The easiest and most productive way to encourage others is to lead by example.

Kimberly Kay Foote

The ability to summon positive emotions during periods of intense stress lies at the heart of effective leadership.

Jim Loehr

Make some choices that don't make sense unless you will be raised from the dead.

John Piper

Life is about making an impact, not making an income.

Kevin Kruse

If you scorn the fellowship of the brethren, you reject the call of Jesus Christ, and thus your solitude can only be hurtful to you. (from Life Together)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

A belief is only as strong as the action it produces.

Eric Smallridge

We don't need meetings that don't meet needs...

Tozer

It is not what a man does that determines whether his work is sacred or secular, it is why he does it.

AW Tozer

If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

If today's church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Whenever the Lord said He would be with someone, it meant that they had just been given an impossible assignment.

Bill Johnson

Everyone is living a lifestyle of worship....but not everyone knows what they are worshipping.

Jenna Coller

We live in a moment of history where change is so speeded up that we begin to see the present only when it is already disappearing...

Ronald David Laing

Change isn't change unless something changes!

Bill Corum

The height of spiritual wisdom is submission to Jesus Christ. This is a great paradox, "Those who humbles themselves will be exalted..."

Therefore, the less of me and the more of Him, the wiser I am. That is how simpletons are sages in God's kingdom. - Seth Wingate

Seth Wingate

[E]very time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different than it was before... (Full quote here: )

CS Lewis on Decisions

When it comes down to it, the quality of your life is determined by the quality of your relationships.

Danny Silk

Culture is the sum of examples you set, the incentives you create, and the behaviors you reward: it's what nudges people to act in ways you'd be proud of.

Laura Weidman Powers

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.

A Schopenhauer

In the beginning the church was a fellowship of men and women centering on the living Christ. Then the church moved to Greece, where it became a philosophy. Then it moved to Rome, where it became an institution. Next, it moved to Europe, where it became a culture. And, finally, it moved to America, where it became an enterprise. #clarity

Richard Halverson, former Chaplain of the United States Senate

"True 'holiness' is when you leave every person more alive than when you found them." - Bible in One Year 2019, Day 300

Holiness - via Kate Mc

Action beats intention when intention does not act.

Action

A word fitly spoken and in due season is like apples of gold in settings of silver. - Proverbs 25

A Word Fitly Spoken

We have to stop confusing economic value and human value.

Andrew Yang

The church that can't worship must be entertained. And men who can't lead a church to worship must provide the entertainment - AW Tozer

Tozer

Trust, once broken, will always show cracks

Scott McClelland

If you're not paying, you're the product, not the customer....

Seth Godin

So much of our content in Christianity today is highly polished, but minimally dangerous.

Scott McClelland

Don't talk about your dreams with people who want to protect you from heartache...

Seth Godin

A man can fail many times, but he is not a failure until he begins to blame someone else.

John Burroughs

'The fashion now is to tolerate anything lest we gain the reputation of being intolerant. The tender-minded saints cannot bear to see Agag slain, so they choose rather to sacrifice the health of the Church for years to come by sparing error and evil; and this they do in the name of Christian love.''

' The Life of A.W. Tozer: In Pursuit of God by James L. Snyder
https://a.co/aYS48Ay

Tozer (written over 50 years ago)

Everything rises and falls on leadership. - John Maxwell

John Maxwell

We should not be so focused on avoiding what we don't want to do that we fail to do what we should.

Scott McClelland

Your position never gives you the right to command. It only imposes on you the duty of so living your life that others can receive your orders without being humiliated.

Dag Hammarskjold

Like the Party of Circumcision before them, many today take no responsibility for your life but only want to add you to their group so they can brag about their numbers.

Scott McClelland

We have so hopelessly ceded our humanity that for the modest handouts of today we are ready to surrender up all principles, our soul, all the labors of our ancestors, all the prospects of our descendants'anything to avoid disrupting our meager existence.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

If someone offers you an opportunity to humble yourself, or if you find one on your own, take it.

Scott McClelland

Victory begins with the name of Jesus on our lips; but it will not be consummated until the nature of Jesus is in our hearts.

Francis Frangipane

Leaders are dealers in hope.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Like gravity at a great distance, time's closing in on us is deceptively distant. But close it will.

Scott McClelland

Self promotion is not the yoke of Christ, who made Himself nothing.

Scott McClelland

If we don't remember we are on a mission, our lives turn to dust or idol worship...

A lot of money management is being done, not from a standpoint of 'good stewardship', but for a standpoint of affection.

Scott McClelland

The space between "difficult" and "impossible" is where all greatness lies.

Mark Sidney Frazer III

Nothing discloses real character like the use of power. It's easy for the weak to be gentle. Most people can bear adversity. But if you wish to know what a man really is, give him power. This is the supreme test. It is the glory of Lincoln that, having almost absolute power, he never abused it, except on the side of mercy.

Robert G. Ingresoll

What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.

Tozer

The major heresy of the Western churches is that they have largely turned the very meaning of faith into its exact opposite. True faith involves not knowing and even not needing to know, but we made faith demanding to know and insisting that we do know!

Richard Rohr

I consider that the chief dangers which confront the coming century will be religion without the Holy Ghost, Christianity without Christ, forgiveness without repentance, salvation without regeneration, politics without God, and heaven without hell.

William Booth

Memory is the mother of all wisdom.

Aeschylus

I've been invited to many places that I wasn't welcome when I got there... #so_true

Bob Goff

Manhood and Christlikeness are synonymous.

Edwin Louis Cole

Grace never seems fair until you need some. '(Everybody Always Book, Page 205)

Bob Goff

We are not building God's kingdom. He is building His kingdom, and we are praying for the privilege of being involved.

Francis Schaeffer

There is a societal push for conformity in all ways.

Allen Francis

The future is already here it's just unevenly distributed

William Gibson

Often change is sold as progress when no progress comes from the change.'#misleaders

N Scott McClelland

Spouting off before listening to the facts is both shameful and foolish.

Proverbs 18:13 NLT

We must meet the uncertainties of this world with the certainty of the world to come...' #ThanksTozer

Tozer

Those who are successful overcome their fears and take action. Those who aren't submit to their fears and live with regrets.

Jay Z

Rudeness is a weak man's imitation of strength.

Eric Hoffer

The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page.

Saint Augustine

The most confident critics are generally those who know the least about the matter criticized.

Ulysses S Grant

Nowhere in our modern world is the radical deterioration of symbols more startlingly seen than in the de-sanctification 'of sexuality. 'People are looking for sex without love, for love without marriage, for marriage without responsibility.

Elisabeth Elliot, The Mark of a Man

It appears that a poet in history is divine, but a poet in the next room is a joke.

Max Eastman

Trust, once broken, will always show cracks.

N Scott McClelland

The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page

Saint Augustine

The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision. - Moses Maimonides, Jewish philosopher, jurist and physician (1135-1204)

Moses Maimonides

A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.

Mark Twain

Seemingly inherent in all deception is the avarice for converts.

N Scott McClelland

Interpreting the past by the present leads to overreactions, deceptions, and self in the name of righteousness (comparative righteousness).' This is a current tool of deceiving spirits which are getting significant results.

N Scott McClelland

When we mistakenly think we know how to be in a team and what we really know is how to be in charge, we do damage to ourselves and others, especially in the area of (potential) collaboration. 'In this place of deception, our leadership grows at the expense of the minimizing of other leaders, especially those who are emerging.

N Scott McClelland

The promise of 'change' when sold as 'progress' is a deception when no progress results from the change, and is often used as a stalling technique, or to postpone the inevitable by those whose credibility is being threatened or is at risk.

Change

Deception offers poison repackaged as nourishment.

Deception

Deception causes us to distrust and not to recognize the Lord's hand in our trouble. You are reaching out to us, trying to help us, but we respond to You as if You are our enemy, a threat.

Deception

No learning is complete without a test.

N Scott McClelland

The law makes hellions of us all.

N Scott McClelland

God will not have His work made manifest by cowards.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Pain is never out of season if you go shopping for it.

Timothy Ferriss

Life, shrinks, or expands in proportion to one's courage.

Anais Nin

Pride is a destroyer; it blinds you from real vision and puts delusion in it's place.'

N Scott McClelland

Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.

Henry Ford

What you seek is seeking you.

Rumi

Education without action is entertainment.

Chris Lytle

If you can dream and not make dreams your master.... You will be a man, my son!'

Rudyard Kipling

The first'reaction of an organization whose theory is becoming obsolete is almost always a defensive one.

Drucker

For the simplicity on this side of complexity, I wouldn't give you a fig. But for the simplicity on the other side of complexity, for that I would give you anything I have.

Oliver Wendell Holmes

Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.

Eleanor Roosevelt

This is the way

This is the author

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