A home is a kingdom of it's own in the midst of the world, a stronghold amid life's storms and stresses, a refuge, even a sanctuary.
Dietrich BonhoefferRead
How can God entrust great things to one who will not thankfully receive from Him the little things?
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of gratitude for small blessings as a prerequisite for receiving greater gifts or responsibilities.
In this quote, Dietrich Bonhoeffer suggests that one's ability to handle and appreciate minor blessings is critical before being given larger responsibilities or opportunities. It implies that gratitude and humility in receiving even small favors are essential qualities that prepare individuals for greater tasks entrusted to them, relating to spiritual, personal, or professional growth.
In practice
This quote could be used in a motivational speech to encourage people to appreciate the small things in life.
A home is a kingdom of it's own in the midst of the world, a stronghold amid life's storms and stresses, a refuge, even a sanctuary.
In normal life we hardly realize how much more we receive than we give, and life cannot be rich without such gratitude. It is so easy to overestimate the importance of our own achievements compared with what we owe to the help of others.
Sometimes we just need a firm kick in the pants. An unsmiling expectation that if we mean all these wonderful things we talk about and sing about, then letβs see something to prove it.
It is God's earth out of which man is taken. From it he has his body. His body belongs to his essential being. Man's body is not his prison, his shell his exterior, but man himself. Man does not "have" a body; he does not "have" a soul; rather he "is" body and soul. Man in the beginning is really his body. He is one. He is his body, as Christ is completely his body, as the Church is the body of Christ
...And then, just when everything is bearing down on us to such an extent that we can scarcely withstand it, the Christmas message comes to tell us that all our ideas are wrong, and that what we take to be evil and dark is really good and light because it comes from God. Our eyes are at fault, that is all.
Anyone who thinks that his time is too valuable to spend keeping quiet will eventually have no time for God and his brother, but only for himself and for his own follies.
In the East they say suffering is avoidable and not necessary. Life is bliss! You know why? This is because wisdom, yoga and meditation are ways to avoid suffering which has not yet come.
Economists have allowed themselves to walk into a trap where we say we can forecast, but no serious economist thinks we can. You don't expect dentists to be able to forecast how many teeth you'll have when you're 80. You expect them to give good advice and fix problems.
If you put your hand into a fire, does anyone have to tell you to move it? Do you have to decide? No: When your hand starts to burn, it moves. You donβt have to direct it; the hand moves itself. In the same way, once you understand, through inquiry, that an untrue thought causes suffering, you move away from it.
You'll never get anywhere unless you're independent of the good and bad opinion of others. Be fearless.
It is madness to make fortune the mistress of events, because by herself she is nothing and is ruled by prudence.
So why do I write, torturing myself to put it down? Because in spite of myself I've learned some things. Without the possibility of action, all knowledge comes to one labeled "file and forget," and I can neither file nor forget. Nor will certain ideas forget me; they keep filing away at my lethargy, my complacency. Why should I be the one to dream this nightmare?
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