Inspirational

Inspirational Stories / Scriptures / Quotes

Give Thanks

“Enter God’s gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise: give thanks to him and praise his name.”  Psalm 100:4

Throughout the Bible, we are commanded to be thankful.  A spirit of thanksgiving is one of the most distinctive marks of a Christian whose heart is attuned to the Lord.
First, we are to be thankful for the material blessings God gives us.  Some people are never satisfied with what they have, but what a difference it makes when we realize that everything we have has been given to us by God!
Second, thank God for the people in your life.  It is so easy to take them for granted or to complain or become angry because they don’t meet our every wish.  But we need to give thanks for our spouse, our children, our relatives, and our friends.  Most of all thank God for Christ and His love for you.
Third, thank God in the midst of trials and even persecution.  We draw back from difficulties, but not one of us is exempt from trouble.  Yet in the midst of trials we can thank God because we know He has promised to be with us and help us.
For the Christian, every day is Thanksgiving Day!

From Billy Graham, Hope for Each day for Thanksgiving Day


A Formula for Christian Living

Rejoice in the Lord always, I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things.


Victory in Jesus

“Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”   1 Cor. 15:57

Haydn, the great musician, was once asked why his church music was so cheerful.  He replied, “When I think upon God, my heart is so full of joy that the notes dance and leap, as it were, from my pen, and since God has given me a cheerful heart, it will be pardoned me that I serve Him with a cheerful spirit.”
Haydn had discovered the secret to lasting joy: “I think on God.”  Looking at our circumstances won’t bring us lasting joy  It may even make us depressed or angry.  But when we “think on God”, when we turn our minds and hearts to His power and His love for us, we can’t help but be joyful.  Paul said, “Set your minds on things above, not on things on the earth”.  Col. 3:2  Discouragement flees in the face of joy.

Every day brings battles and temptations.  But the strength we need for conquering them comes from Christ.  We can do like the little girl who said that when the devil came knocking with a temptation, she just sent Jesus to the door!

From Billy Graham’s daily devotional


A Christmas Thought For You

The Eyes That See
Jesus, Son of God who came to us as an infant, says that it is to the simple and childlike that revelation is made.  This is echoed in the opening chapters of St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, where he notes that the choice of God rests upon the unwise, the powerless, and the ill-born  Not the glamorous, photogenic celebrities who populate our media.
I would like to turn this proposition upside down.  Rather than affirming that spiritual wisdom is given to the otherwise unwise, I would suggest that having received the wisdom that comes from above tends to make people foolish-at least in the eyes of the world.  Consider St. Basil the Fool, to whom the cathedral within the Kremlin is dedicated.  He drew attention to his message by parading around naked during the bitter Russian winter.  Mad!  Consider St. Maximillian Kolbe, who at Auschwitz volunteered to starve to death in the place of another prisoner.  Mad!  Both of these men were fools in the eyes of the world, as were most of those we revere as saints.  When people have a glimpse (or more) of the beauty of the spiritual world, it reduces the relative value of everything that exists in space and time.  They see more.  So the choices they make, based on what us invisible to others, seems unreasonable.  If I see a dragon coming toward me, I run.  You who have your back turned, stay where you are and think I’m crazy.  
It is no surprise that  Christian values are countercultural.  I sometimes wish they were more so.

Fr. Michael Casey is an Australian well-known lecturer and author of many books on spirituality.