Tuesday, September 23, 2025 Like a Bird, Like a Leaf

More quotes to ponder…

When I rise up
let me rise up joyful
like a bird.
When I fall,
let me fall without regret
like a leaf.
Wendell Berry

The summer has been splendid,
but it has lasted long enough.
This morning, I viewed the falling leaves
with cheerfulness.
A.A. Milne

Don’t ever imagine that anything is too small to pray about.
If it concerns you, it concerns God.
Elisabeth Elliot

O bed! O bed! O delicious bed!
That heaven on earth to weary head!
Thomas Hood

I wonder many times that a child of God
should ever have a sad heart,
considering what their Lord
is preparing for them.
Samuel Rutherford

O blog! O blog! O deleting blog! …in the morning

Tuesday, September 16, 2025 Weighty Goodness

I’ve been going through a dry spell with my own writing, but I can still share things that others have written or said that are worth note. Take heed and be of good cheer, friends.

“All the paths of the Lord are lovingkindness.” Psalm 25:1
So your path with its unexplained sorrow, and mine with its unexplained sharp flints and briers, and both with their unexpected perplexity of guidance, their sheer mystery, are just lovingkindness, nothing else.
Amy Carmichael

Glory is the weighty goodness of a thing being and doing what it was made by God to be and do.
Brian Sauve, Haunted Cosmos p. 173

Prayer is the surest remedy against the devil and besetting sin. That sin will never stand firm which is heartily prayed against.
J.C. Ryle

It’s not the load that breaks you down.
It’s the way you carry it.
C.S. Lewis

And in honor of Charlie Kirk:

When you stop having a human connection with someone you disagree with, it becomes a lot easier to want to commit violence against that group. What we as a culture have to get back to is being able to have reasonable disagreement where violence is not an option.

You can tell a lot about a man based on the enemies you earn.

I want to be remembered for the courage of my faith.

Charlie Kirk

That’s the way I’ll remember him. Rest in peace, my brother in Christ.

I’ll probably delete this in the morning…

Tuesday, September 9, 2025 A Bouquet of Quotes

Have you been hankering for a harvest of quotes to put in your vase? Here ya go!

If you look to the world, you’ll be distressed,
If you look within, you’ll be depressed,
If you look to God, you’ll be at rest.
Corrie Ten Boom

That’s a keeper, isn’t it?

An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered.
An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered.
GK Chesterton

Think about that the next time you have a flat tire.

We need to hear the gospel every day
because we forget it every day.
Martin Luther

Amen to that!

ChatGPT creates the illusion of intelligent thought,
but there’s actually nothing going on under the hood.
Grace Snell, World Magazine August 2025

Don’t forget that.

Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
Mary Oliver

Too simple? Give it a try!

This post wasn’t astonishing enough, so it will probably get deleted in the morning.

Tuesday, August 26, 2025 Be The Smile of God

The first glimpses of fall weather have come: a slight chill in the air, the buzz saw sounds of the cicadas, a few green leaves giving way to red, flowers starting to say farewell… The glory of summer must now defer to the glory of autumn.

On that note, here are a few quotes for you to read and savor:

Faith may dance because Christ sings;
and we may come in the choir
and lift our hoarse and rough voices,
and chirp and sing,
and shout for joy with our Lord Jesus.
Samuel Rutherford

Often, the sweeter the first fruit of a habit,
the more bitter are its later fruits.
Frederic Bastiat, French Economist

How many things have I that others lack?
Can I bring my heart into a quiet, contented frame
to lack what others have?
Jeremiah Burroughs

The way God creates unity
is by making everyone different.
Daniel Ralph

The lesson for fathers (and mothers):
Be the smile of God to your children.
Joe Rigney

Lord, deliver me from the urge to open my mouth
when I should shut it.
Elisabeth Elliot

Enjoy these beautiful days, friends.

I’ll probably say farewell to this post in the morning.

Tuesday, August 19, 2025 Books Are People

Quotes for pondering:

Oh, the temptations that men of discontented spirits are subject to! The Devil loves to fish in troubled waters.
Jeremiah Burroughs

The optimist sees the opportunity in every danger;
the pessimist sees the danger in every opportunity.
Winston Churchill

If a man thinks ill of you, do not be angry with him;
for you are worse than he thinks you to be.
Charles Spurgeon

To forgive is to set a prisoner free
and to discover the prisoner was you.
Corrie Ten Boom

You don’t have to give up your intellect to trust the Bible.
You have to give up your pride.
R.C. Sproul

“Books are people,” smiled Miss Marks, “In every book worth reading, the author is there to meet you, to establish contact with you. He takes you into his confidence and reveals his thoughts to you.”
D.E. Stevenson, The Four Graces page 10

Read that last quote and then consider how the Bible fits the description…

I’ll be throwing this post into troubled waters in the morning.

Tuesday, August 12, 2025 Truth on the Battlefield

Some quotes to feed you this week:

I write to discover what I know.
I write because I don’t know what I think until I read what I say.
Flannery O’Connor

This is so true about my writing as well. Good old FOC!

To study and not think is a waste.
To think and not study is dangerous.
Confucius

If Truth is on the battlefield,
let her and Falsehood grapple;
Who ever knew Truth put to worse
in a free and open encounter.
John Milton

All that is gold does not glitter
Not all those that wander are lost.
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

JRR Tolkien

For to know a man’s library is,
in some measure,
to know his mind.
Geraldine Brooks

Not all blog posts that glitter are gold and some must wither in the morning.

Tuesday, July 8, 2025 Imagine the Fonts

Half the world is composed of people
who have something to say and can’t, and the other half who have nothing to say and keep on saying it.
Robert Frost

I can’t imagine a man really enjoying a book
and only reading it once.
C.S. Lewis

Vulgarity is no substitute for wit.
Violet Grantham, Downton Abbey

Confidence is silent.
Insecurities are LOUD.
Unknown

The world does not read the Bible,
The world reads Christians.
Charles Spurgeon

If we trust, we do not worry.
If we worry, we do not trust.
Amy Carmichael

Rats, I picked out a bunch of nifty fonts for those quotes, but apparently WordPress does not support them. You’ll just have to imagine them.

Feel free to share quotes you enjoy in the comments.

I’ll probably realize I have nothing to say and keep on saying it in the morning.

Tuesday, May 13, 2025 Voices from the Commonplace Book

To see the Law by Christ fulfill’d
And hear his pard’ning voice;
changes a slave into a child,
and duty into choice.
William Cowper (1731-1800)

The world is a window through which we espy heav’n.
To look at the world and see only the world
is like looking at a window
instead of looking through the window
to see what’s beyond it.
Joe Rigney, The Things of Earth

I believe in God like I believe in the sun,
not only because I see him,
but because by him
I see everything else.
C.S. Lewis

Hold us in quiet through the age-long minutes
while Thou art quiet and the wind is shrill.
Can the boat sink while Thou, dear Lord, art in it?
Can the heart faint that waiteth on Thy will?
Hold us in quiet.
Amy Carmichael

Seeing someone read a book you love
is like hearing a book recommend a person
instead of the other way around.
Unknown

Deleting, defeating, depleting…thus it goes…in the morning.

Tuesday, April 15, 2025 A Room Without Books…

Quotes from the Commonplace Book

A room without books is like a body without a soul.
Cicero

Let be known that we have enough book-filled rooms to ensoul our whole house.

Christian contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God‘s wise and fatherly disposal in every condition.
Jeremiah Burroughs

And this side of heaven, reality will often feel like grief. Something is wrong. Deeply wrong.
Reality itself is a puzzle with no solution in the box.
The missing pieces to the puzzle aren’t here.
…Artwork routinely comes out of the puzzle of grief, perhaps not great grief – like the loss of a loved one – but the normal every day, grief of finding yourself living in a world that you know in your bones has gone very, very wrong.
S. D. Morgan

I will sing to the Lord,
because he has dealt bountifully with me.
King David, Psalm 13:6

God is the source of all our blessings – He is the ocean of blessings. Creatures are but the hands which distribute his charity through a needy world.
Samuel Davies

And now, for a random photo:

A yard in Minnesota without a snow shovel
is like a rain without an umbrella
(You may quote me on this)

A blog without an ending is deleted in the morning.

Tuesday, April 1, 2025 No Fooling!

That’s right – there are no April Fool’s pranks associated with this blog. You’re welcome.

Quotes from the Commonplace Book:

If a book is well written,
I always find it too short.
Jane Austen

God has promised to supply all our needs.
What we don’t have now,
we don’t need now.
Elisabeth Elliot

This is every cook’s opinion
No savory dish without an onion,
But lest your kissing should be spoil’d,
Your onions must be thoroughly boil’d.
Polish cookbook

There are many heads lying on Christ’s bosom,
but there is room for yours among the rest.
It is our heaven to lay many weights and burdens on Christ.
Lay all your loads and your weights by faith upon Christ.
Ease yourself, and let Him bear all.
He can,
He does,
He will bear you.
Samuel Rutherford

I know worrying works,
because none of the stuff I worried about
ever happened.
Will Rogers

That photo has been languishing in my blog photos file for quite some time now. Time to let it out.

I’ll be deletin’ this in the morning, no foolin’. Maybe.

Tuesday, March 18, 2025 Weather Whiplash, Quotable Quotes

We’ve got a blizzard headed our way tomorrow. Does anyone besides me remember reading about how Pa Ingalls got stuck in a blizzard on his way back from Mankato? He had to dig himself a little cave in the snow for protection and ended up eating all the candy he’d bought to bring home to the kids. I think of that sometimes when I’m sitting in my nice home drinking hot chocolate while the storm rages outside.

It’s a balmy 52 degrees today, and with a blizzard coming tomorrow, I’m inclined to agree with a friend of mine who said, “March is full of weather whiplash.” Indeed! When I got on the weather app for more information, I also found this important news:

So at least there’s that. I sort of feel like no matter how nice it is in March in Minnesota, the mosquito risk ought to be placed at ZERO. But there might be an exceptionally hardy breed of mosquitos out there that burst out of the starting gate when it gets up to 50 degrees. The chance of those mosquitos living through a blizzard though is ZERO. Equilibrium restored.

Quotes from the Commonplace Book

You wouldn’t worry so much about what others think of you
if you realized how seldom they do.
Eleanor Roosevelt

Masculinity is the glad assumption of sacrificial responsibility.
Femininity is the warm response to sacrificial responsibility.
Douglas Wilson

Duties are ours.
Events are the Lord’s.
Samuel Rutherford

Wherever you are, be all there. Live to the hilt every situation you believe to the be the will of God.
Jim Elliot

This is what the incarnation is all about – the author of the story becoming not just a character, but a human character. In this narrative, God is the storyteller and the main character. He is the bard and the hero. He authors the fairy tale and then comes to kill the dragon and get the girl.
Joe Rigney in the book Things of Earth

The risk of deleting this is low, but never zero.