Excerpts: Me Before You -Jojo Moyes

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‘Hey, Clark,’ he said. ‘Tell me something good.’

I stared out of the window at the bright-blue

Swiss sky and I told him a story of two people.

Two people who shouldn’t have met, and who

didn’t like each other much when they did, but

who found they were the only two people in the

world who could possibly have understood each

other. And I told him of the adventures they had,

the places they had gone, and the things I had

seen that I had never expected to. I conjured for

him electric skies and iridescent seas and evenings

full of laughter and silly jokes. I drew a

world for him, a world far from a Swiss industrial

estate, a world in which he was still somehow

the person he had wanted to be. I drew the world

he had created for me, full of wonder and possibility.

I let him know a hurt had been mended in a

way that he couldn’t have known, and for that

alone there would always be a piece of me indebted

to him. 

Excerpts: The Greatest Thing In The World and Other Addresses (Henry Drummond)

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"The people who influence you are people who believe in you."

"Nothing that happens in the world happens by chance. God is a God of order. Everything is arranged upon definite principles, and never at random."

"We say we exchange words when we meet; what we exchange is souls."

"There are some men and some women in whose company we are always at our best."

"Yesterday you thought mostly about yourself. Today the poor will meet you, and you will feed them. The helpless, the tempted, the sad, will throng about you, and each you will befriend. Where were all these people yesterday? Where they are today, you did not see them. It is in reflected light that the poor are seen. But your soul today is not at the ordinary angle."

"In looking at the mirror one does not see the mirror, or think of it, but only of what it reflects. For a mirror never calls the attention of itself—except when there are flaws in it."

"Begin with His Words. Words can scarcely ever be long impersonal. Christ himself was a Word, a word made Flesh. Make His words flesh; do them, live them, and you must live Christ."

"There are fifty other arguments for miracles, but none so good as that you have seen them. Perhaps you are one yourself."

"Make Christ your most constant companion.. Be more under His influence than under any other influence."

Excerpts: Life to the Max (Max Lucado)

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"Jesus understands. When you tell God that you'ved reach your limit, He knows what you mean. When you shake your head at impossible deadlines, He shakes His too. When your plans are interrupted by people who have other plans, He nods in empathy.
He has been there. He knows how you feel."

"Oh Lord, what an amazing opportunity You have spread out before me—a chance to make a difference for You in a desperately hurting world. Help me to see the needs You want me to see, to react in a way that honors You, and to bless others by serving them gladly with practical expressions of Your love."

"The fear-filled cannot love deeply."

"Life makes sense when we accept our place. The gift of pleasures, the purpose of problems—all for Him. The God-centered life works. And it rescues us from a life that doesn't."

"When God gives an assignment, He also gives the skill. Study your skills, then, to reveal your assignment."

"God endows us gifts so we can make Him known. Period."

"Behold, the most surprising ingredient of a great day: self-denial." 

The Spectrum of Love

Excerpted from Henry Drummond's The Greatest Thing
In The World & Other Addresses

1. Patience. This is the normal attitude of love; Love passive, Love waiting to begin; not in a hurry; calm; ready to do it's work when the summons comes, but meantime wearing the ornament of meek and quiet spirit. Love suffers long; beareth all things; believeth all things; hopeth all things. For love understands, and therefore waits.

2. Kindness. Love active. Have you ever noticed how much of Christ's life was spent in doing kind things? Run over it with that in view, and you will find that He spent a great proportion of His time simply in making people happy, in doing good turns to people.

3. Generosity. Whenever you attempt a good work you will find other men doing the same kind of work, and probably doing it better. Envy them not.

4. Humility — to put a seal upon your lips and forget what you have done. After you have been kind, after Love has stolen forth into the world and done its beautiful work, go back into the shade again and say nothing about it. Love hides even from itself. Love waives even self satisfaction.

5. Courtesy. Love cannot behave itself unseemly. You can put the most untutored persons into the highest society, and if they have a reservior of Love in their heart they will not behave themselves unseemly.

6. Unselfishness. Because there is no greatness in things. Things cannot be great. The only greatness is unselfish love.
The most obvious lesson in Christ's teaching is that there is no happiness in having and getting anything, but only in giving.

7. Good temper
We must go to the source, and change the inmost nature, and the angry humors will die away of themselves.
Souls are made sweet not by taking the acid fluids out, but by putting something in —a great Love, a new Spirit, the Spirit od Christ.

8. Guilelessness
Love "thinketh no evil," imputes no motive, sees the bright side, puts the best construction on every action.

9. Sincerity
...for he who loves will love Truth not less than men.
He will accept only what is real; he will strive to get at facts; he will search for Truth with a humble and unbiased mind, and cherish whatever he finds at any sacrifice.

"Because He loved us, we love, we love everybody. Our heart is slowly changed."

Happy Valentines day! Be blessed! 

Excerpt: The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto

Photo Credit: harpercollins.com

"Everyone joins a band in this life.

You are born into your first one. Your mother plays the lead. She shares the stage with your father and siblings. Or perhaps your father is absent, an empty stool under a spotlight. But he is still a founding member, and if he surfaces one day, you will have to make room for him.

As life goes on, you will join other bands, some through friendship, some through romance, some through neighborhoods, school, an army. Maybe you will all dress the same, or laugh at your own private vocabulary. Maybe you will flop on couches backstage, or share a boardroom table, or crowd around a galley inside a ship. But in each band you join, you will play a distinct part, and it will affect you as much as you affect it."