He Speaks in the Silence

A month or two ago I discovered this blog: He Speaks in the Silence

It’s written, for the most part, by the wife of the pastor that began my church. She has so much wisdom, is down to earth, and fun to read. Here are some quotes from a recent post on forgiving:

“The only way for the ‘forgive-and forget mentality’ to be practiced is through radical denial, deception, or pretense.”It is not possible for us to forget, only to choose to “not remember” over and over again.

You have an enemy who works with the offenses of others to smother us with untruth. Satan cannot stand our reflection of God’s beauty. He will use the hurts of others to try to convince us that we are ugly and awful and less-than. We need to separate those enemy-fed lies from what actually happened.

Forgiveness does not require years and years of professional counseling. It is not a process as much as it is a heroic act of our wills. The process part is the sluggish following of our feelings to catch up with what we choose to do with our wills.

the.HOPE.of.a.PESSIMIST

My brilliant, passionate, wise husband has started a BLOG! Check it out and maybe you’ll start to understand why I like him so much!

god

God defined by God:

‘The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and fourth generation.’

{exodus 34.6-7}

God’s writing

‘Don’t you think it’s rather nice to think that we’re in a book that God’s writing? If I were writing a book, I might make mistakes. But God knows how to make the story end just right–in the way that’s best for us.’

‘Do you really believe that, Mother?’ Peter asked quietly.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I do believe it–almost always–except when I’m so sad that I can’t believe anything. But even when I don’t believe it, I know it’s true–and I try to believe it.’

Edith Nesbit
The Railway Children

how to write according to Lewis

1. Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn’t mean anything else.

2. Always prefer the plain direct word to the long, vague one. Don’t implement promises, but keep them.

3. Never use abstract nouns when concrete ones will do. If you mean “More people died” don’t say “Mortality rose.”

4. In writing, don’t use adjectives which merely tell us how you want us to feel about the thing you are describing. I mean, instead of telling us a thing was “terrible,” describe it so that we’ll be terrified. Don’t say it was “delightful”; make ussay “delightful” when we’ve read the description. You see, all those words (horrifying, wonderful, hideous, exquisite) are only like saying to your readers “Please will you do my job for me.”

5. Don’t use words too big for the subject. Don’t say “infinitely” when you mean “very”; otherwise you’ll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite.

~C. S. Lewis, Letters to Children

grace:

the lavish, opulent, raw, untamed, scandalous blessing of God  unearned, undeserved, illogical, disproportionate blessing of God – poured out through Christ, over every facet of your life; and the living presence of the Creator God deep inside you, poured out through the Spirit, in a flood of euphoric joy, transcendent peace, and limitless power, to be and do, and live up to God’s calling in your life.

John Mark Comer

 

hosea

“Come, let us return to the Lord;

for he has torn us, that he may heal us;

he has struck us down, and he will bind us up.

After two days he will revive us;

on the third day he will raise us up,

that we may live before him.

Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord;

his going out is sure as the dawn;

he will come to us as the showers,

as the spring rains that water the earth.”

hosea 6.1-3

Lewis

“I think I can understand that feeling about a housewife’s work being like that of Sisyphus* (who was the stone rolling gentleman). But it is surely in reality the most important work in the world. What do ships, railways, miners, cars, government etc exist for except that people may be fed, warmed, and safe in their own homes? As Dr. Johnson said, “To be happy at home is the end of all human endeavour”. (1st to be happy to prepare for being happy in our own real home hereafter: 2nd in the meantime to be happy in our houses.) We wage war in order to have peace, we work in order to have leisure, we produce food in order to eat it. So your job is the one for which all others exist…”

C.S. Lewis

from Letter of C.S. Lewis

 

*Sisyphus was the king of Greek Mythology who was given as punishment the task of rolling a large stone up a hill only to have it fall down again.