The proof of spiritual maturity is not how pure you are but awareness of your impurity. That very awareness opens the door to grace.
Philip YanceyRead
Someone asked the Swiss physician & author Paul Tournier how he helped his patients get rid of their fears. He replied, 'I don't. Everything that's worthwhile in life is scary. Choosing a school, choosing a career, getting married, having kids--all those things are scary. If it is not fearful, it is not worthwhile.'
Interpretation
Embracing fear is essential for meaningful experiences in life.
This quote highlights the idea that many significant life choices come with fear and uncertainty. It suggests that confronting and accepting these fears is a crucial part of pursuing meaningful experiences, as the most worthwhile endeavors often involve risk and challenge.
In practice
In a motivational speech about overcoming fears in career choices.
The proof of spiritual maturity is not how pure you are but awareness of your impurity. That very awareness opens the door to grace.
If my activism, however well-motivated, drives out love, then I have misunderstood Jesus’ gospel. I am stuck with law, not the gospel of grace.
In the stories of extravagant grace given to us by Jesus, there are no loopholes disqualifying us from God's love.
Parents learn the uses of power and its limits. They can insist on certain outward behavior but cannot change inner attitudes. They can require obedience but not goodness - and certainly not love.
Prayer is to the skeptic a delusion, a waste of time. To the believer it represents perhaps the most important use of time.
We grow up hungry for love, and in ways so deep as to remain unexpressed we long for our Maker to love us.
You are also the physician who must watch over yourself. But in the course of every illness there are many days in which the physician can do nothing but wait.
Give me a smart idiot over a stupid genius any day.
Forgiveness is a process of giving up the old for something new. Old experiences and memories that we hold on to in anger, resentment, shame, or guilt cloud our spirit mind. The truth is, everything that has happened had to happen. It was a growth experience. There was something you needed to know or learn. If you stay angry, hurt, afraid, ashamed, or guilty, you miss the lesson. You will be stuck in a cloud of pain.
My son, by all means desist from kicking the venerable and enlightened Vizier: for as a costly jewel retains its value even if hidden in a dung-hill, so old age and discretion are to be respected even in the vile persons of our subjects. Desist therefore, and tell us what you desire and propose.
The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.
Understand this law and you will then know, beyond room for the slightest doubt, that you are constantly punishing yourself for every wrong you commit and rewarding yourself for every act of constructive conduct in which you indulge.
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