If you find yourself loving any pleasure more than your prayers, any book better than the Bible, any house better than the house of the Lord, any table better than the Lord's table, any persons better than Christ, or any indulgence better than the hope of heaven – be alarmed.
Interpretation
Prioritize spiritual devotion over worldly pleasures.
This quote by Thomas Guthrie emphasizes the importance of maintaining spiritual focus and devotion in a world filled with distractions and temptations. It warns that if one starts valuing earthly pleasures and possessions above their prayers, religious texts, communal worship, or deeper connections with Christ, it is a cause for concern, suggesting a misalignment of priorities that could lead to spiritual decline.
In practice
This quote can be shared during a sermon to encourage parishioners to focus on their spiritual lives.
It is not with a rush and a spring that we are to reach Christ's character, and attain to perfect saintship; but step by step, foot by foot, hand over hand, we are slowly and often painfully to mount the ladder that rests on earth, and rises to heaven.
The average is that which no person quite ever is.
Enlightenment is like everyday consciousness but two inches above the ground.
Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where's the harm? September 11th changed all that.
You couldn't be more wrong," I said. "You are buying into the cross-stitched sentiments of your parents' throw pillows. You're arguing that the fragile, rare thing is beautiful simply because it is fragile and rare. But that's a lie, and you know it." "You're a hard person to comfort," Augustus said. "Easy comfort isn't comforting," I said.
Much as we deplore our condition in life, nothing would make us more satisfied with it than the changing of places, for a few days, with our neighbors.
Nothing is easier than to admit in words the truth of the universal struggle for life, or more difficult--at least I have found it so--than constantly to bear this conclusion in mind.
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