Faithware Passages

“To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.” - St. Thomas Aquinas

“Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body what ye shall put on.” Matthew 6:25

Jesus sums up common-sense carefulness in a disciple as infidelity. If we have received the Spirit of God, He will press through and say - Now where does God come in in this relationship, in this mapped out holiday, in these new books? He always presses the point until we learn to make Him our first consideration. Whenever we put other things first, there is confusion.

“Take no thought . . .” don’t take the pressure of forethought upon yourself. It is not only wrong to worry, it is infidelity, because worrying means that we do not think that God can look after the practical details of our lives, and it is never any thing else that worries us. Have you ever noticed what Jesus said would choke the word He puts in? The devil? No, the cares of this world. It is the little worries always. I will not trust where I cannot see, that is where infidelity begins. The only cure for infidelity is obedience to the Spirit.

The great word of Jesus to His disciples is abandon.

–Oswald Chambers

Since you cannot do good to all, you are to pay special attention to those who, by the accidents of time, or place, or circumstances, are brought into closer connection with you.
- St. Augustine of Hippo

Where spiritual values are neglected, there also are neglected moral and mental values. For these are only adequately attended where there are spiritual resources and respects. Moral decline, with political corruption, wars and wrong is the price a people pays for its neglect of its spiritual health. A nation cannot grow in its moral life, where it is starving its spiritual part. Spiritual values are not to be discounted. For where they are, man shuts his life off from helpful resources and short-circuits his life’s potential. Spiritual values and their resources can help a person do what he could never do on his own. Too few realize this. Spiritual values are often what holds life together. For where life comes to hard circumstances, it finds the mental and physical parts exhausted. Then the spiritual reserves are called on to fortify and to pull life together and lead it through the crisis. (C.Neil Strait)

If you don’t need the Gospel more than the people you’re sharing it with, you ought not be sharing it with them.
—Dan Allender

Faith is a vital ingredient in life. Without faith live becomes boring and fearful. Boring because where there is no faith there is no hope for a better tomorrow. And fearful because life without faith sees only the worst and anticipates only failure.

Faith is the link that bridges the failures in life to the successes. One only goes from failure to better things as he travels the way of faith.

Faith is needed if life is to reach the summit and escape the lowlands. Too many settle for the back lands when faith waits to show them the sunrise.

That life that thinks of better things, and a better life, must allow faith to ignite its dreams and kindle its hope. Then will life be set upon a grand and exciting journey.

The man who journeys without faith misses the exciting surprises that might have been his, had he appropriated faith and ventured forth in hope.

Faith allows a person to venture into life with anticipation that each tomorrow will reveal a chapter of hope and each day will unfold a part of life’s dream. Without a faith, hopes and dreams are not possible. — C Neil Strait

BLESSED are they who understand my faltering step and palsied hand.

BLESSED are they who know that my ears today must strain to catch the things they say.

BLESSED are they who seem to know that my eyes are dim and my wits are slow.

BLESSED are they who looked away when coffee spilled at the table today.

BLESSED are they with a cheery smile who stop to chat for a little while.

BLESSED are they who never say, “You’ve told that story twice today.”

BLESSED are they who know the ways to bring back memories of yesterdays.

BLESSED are they who make it known that I’m loved, respected and not alone.

BLESSED are they who know I’m at a loss to find the strength to carry the Cross.

BLESSED are they who ease the days on my journey Home in loving ways.

by Esther Mary Walker

“When you say a situation or a person is hopeless, you are slamming the door in the face of God.”–Charles l. Allen

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won’t feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” Nelson Mandela in his 1994 inaugural speech

“At the end of life we will not be judged by how many diplomas we have received. How much money we have made. How many great things we have done. We will be judged by - ‘I was hungry and you gave me to eat. I was naked and you clothed me. I was homeless and you took me in.’” -Mother Teresa