Postmode

A few gems I found:

If God had a refrigerator, your picture would be on it.

You’re on Heaven’s most-wanted list.

Be as good a person as your pet believes you are.

Don’t give up! Moses was once a basket case!

Source:  Guardian Unlimited via Danette Lucarini-Ward

From Spurgeon’s Lectures To My Students:

Martin Luther was wont to smite with his fist at such a rate that they show, at Eisenbach, a board - I think a three-inch board - which he broke while hammering at a text. The truth of the legend has been doubted, for it has been asserted that those delicate hands, which could play so charmingly upon the guitar, could hardly have been treated so roughly; but if the hand be an index of its owner’s character, we can well believe it, for strength and tenderness were marvelously combined in Luther. There was much delicacy and sensitiveness about Luther’s mind, yet these never diminished but rather increased, its tremendous energy. It is by no means difficult to believe that he could smash up a plank, from the style in which he struck out at the Pope; and yet we can well imagine that he would touch the strings of his guitar with a maiden’s hand; even as David could play skillfully upon the harp, and yet a bow of steel was broken by his arms.

Remarkable are the forms which pulpits have assumed according to the freaks of human fancy and folly. Twenty years ago they had probably reached their very worst. What could have been their design and intent it would be hard to conjecture. A deep wooden pulpit of the old sort might well remind a minister of his mortality, for it is nothing but a coffin set on end: but on what rational ground do we bury our pastors alive?

…it is certain that ministers may lose the aid of the Holy Ghost. Each man here may lose it. You shall not perish as believers, for everlasting life is in you; but you may perish as ministers, and be no more heard of as witnesses for the Lord. Should this happen it will not be without a cause. The Spirit claims a sovereignty like that of the wind which bloweth where it listeth; but let us never dream that sovereignty and capriciousness are the same thing. The blessed Spirit acts as He wills, but He always acts justly, wisely, and with motive and reason. At times He gives or withholds His blessing, for reasons connected with ourselves. Mark the course of a river like the Thames; how it winds and twists according to its own sweet will: yet there is a reason for every bend and curve: the geologist studying the soil and marking the conformation of the rock, sees a reason why the river’s bed diverges to the right or to the left: and so, though the Spirit of God blesses one preacher more than another, and the reason cannot be such that any man could congratulate himself upon his own goodness, yet there are certain things about Christian ministers which God blesses, and certain other things which hinder success. The Spirit of God falls like the dew, in mystery and power, but it is in the spiritual world as in the natural: certain substances are wet with the celestial moisture while others are always dry. Is there not a cause? The wind blows where it lists; but if we desire to feel a stiff breeze we must go out to sea, or climb the hills. The Spirit of God has His favoured places for displaying His might. He is typified by a dove, and the dove has its chosen haunts: to the rivers of waters, to the peaceful and quiet places, the dove resorts; we meet it not upon the battlefield, neither does it alight on carrion. There are thing congruous to the Spirit and things contrary to His mind. The Spirit of God is compared to light, and light can shine where it wills, but some bodies are opaque, while others are transparent; and so there are men through whom God the Holy Ghost can shine, and there are others through whom His brightness never appears. Thus, then, it can be shown that the Holy Ghost, though He be the “free Spirit” of God, is by no means capricious in His operations.
- Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “The Holy Spirit in Connection with our Ministry”, Lectures To My Students

Fancy this: a person reading the Bible intelligently.

In the verses that follow [1 Corinthians 6:15-18] Paul mentions that we are the Temple of the Holy Spirit.  That phrase, lifted out of context, has been used to urge Christians to refrain from refined sugar, sedentary lifestyles, and, of course, big stinky cigars.  But Paul says specifically that he is only talking about sexual sin here.  Other sins are outside the body, but fornication is not.  This would include chopping a finger off with an axe.  Poor stewardship, bad idea, and all that, but it is not a defilement of the Temple.  That is accomplished through fornication.
- Doug Wilson, Fidelity