quote Archives - Pragmatic Compendium

Our words and actions, whether online or IRL, reveal something of our true beliefs and character.

Posted on April 19, 2020June 30, 2020 by Julie Stiles Mills

As often as I see it, I will never be desensitized to adult bullying.

It surprises me every time.

Especially when it comes from someone who knows the pain of being on the receiving end.

And the duplicity genuinely confuses me.

IRL kindness and then,

BAM.

Dehumanizing and cruel mocking.

SO. MANY. posts and comments about leaders that are flat out mean and hateful.

I’m reminded of a blog post I wrote back in 2018:

…duplicity was the unacknowledged elephant in the room when the internet-infused courage of this person deflated like a day old birthday balloon during real life interactions: what happens online, stays online.

Except, it doesn’t.

Our words and actions, regardless of whether they are online or IRL, reveal something of our true beliefs and our character:
“…surely what a man does when he is taken off his guard is the best evidence for what sort of a man he is? Surely what pops out before the man has time to put on a disguise is the truth? If there are rats in a cellar you are most likely to see them if you go in very suddenly. But the suddenness does not create the rats: it only prevents them from hiding. In the same way the suddenness of the provocation does not make me an ill-tempered man: it only shows me what an ill-tempered man I am. The rats are always there in the cellar, but if you go in shouting and noisily they will have taken cover before you switch on the light.” [emphasis added] #IreadthereforeIquote
C. S. Lewis

We’re in the middle of a global pandemic. This situation is incredibly complicated. I can’t imagine the stress of striving to make the best decisions in this no-win hornet’s nest while at the same time getting the $#!+ kicked out of me by both the media and hundreds of thousands of armchair commentators.

They have to be exhausted. And yet they continue to put themselves out there every day knowing they’re going to end up a target.

Again.

#seepeople and #edify because everyone is #justadifferentkindofbroken
#KindnessisContagious but so is #sarcasm and #criticism

#IreadthereforeIquote: Jason Boyett ~ faith isn’t the absence of doubt.

Posted on May 29, 2015October 22, 2016 by Julie Stiles Mills

the quote:

“…faith isn’t the absence of doubt. It’s believing and acting alongside your doubts…

…faith wouldn’t even exist if doubt were not also present, because the essence of faith was the leap taken in the face of uncertainty. Faith wasn’t a set of beliefs, or an ability to hold onto those beliefs without wavering. Faith was action – action taken right in the middle of your doubts.

If there were no uncertainty at all, a leap of faith wouldn’t even be necessary. You could just keep on walking.

from O Me of Little Faith: True Confessions of a Spiritual Weakling
by Jason Boyett

thoughts:

I used to think that doubt was evidence of a lack of faith.

Not so much anymore.

These days, I’d probably say I’m a bit of a “doubt snob.” By that, I mean that when I hear a Christian say they’ve never doubted God, I would wonder if:

1) they are lying. (let’s just get that one right out of the way)
2) they have forgotten. (kinda like childbirth. The memory of that kinda pain fades with time)
3) they haven’t actually thought things through. (see what I mean? “doubt snob”)

I’ve spent my life trying to figure things out. If God ever gave me a new name, it probably would have been “Madua” (in Hebrew, it means “why”…what is the reason…what is the cause). I’ll pull and follow a “why” thread as far as I possibly can go.

In all the question asking and thread following and reading and learning and studying I’ve done so far in my life, the one fact I know for sure:

Not everything can be known for sure.

What do I do with that?

Do I only take action if I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the action will result in success?
Do I only believe in God if I know, beyond a shadow of doubt, that He exists?

No one can prove, beyond a shadow of doubt, that God exists. I can’t prove that God answered a prayer. Or led me to a decision. Or provided an opportunity. Or equipped me for one of those opportunities.

So, again. What do I do with that?

In the absence of certainty, I choose to act or not act.

In faith.

Personally, I choose faith in God. I can have some faith in myself or in “the system” or in other people, but at some point, they’ve all let me down. I can have some faith in reason and science, but when you drill down to their root, neither can be employed to prove their own foundational claims without some core assumptions as their bedrock.

Assumption is a synonym for faith.

We all have faith in something. And we all act on our faith, in spite of our doubt.

#IreadthereforeIquote: Steve Fry ~ the desire to act independent of God

Posted on May 21, 2015May 24, 2015 by Julie Stiles Mills

the quote:

“I don’t know that Lucifer’s sin was rebellion in the full sense of the word. He did not seek to replace God or overthrow God. He simply sought to act independent of God…

the root sin of all sins is this desire to act independent of God.” (emphasis added)

from True Freedom: What Christian Submission and Authority Look Like

by Steve Fry

thoughts:

I don’t use the word “sin” much.

Not that I don’t believe it exists and that I’m prone to it.
I believe it does and I know that I am.
It’s just one of those words that has too many interpretations to be used effectively in casual conversation.

(I don’t use the word “Christian” so much either. Way, WAY too many interpretations of THAT word.)

In certain company, if I were to utter the word sin, I would find myself standing all alone holding my own personal (Jesus) Freak Flag, listening to crickets.

Because not many people want to talk about the word sin. But when you don’t talk about something, meaning begins to take on more and more personal connotations. Definitions aren’t globally understood and accepted when they’re formed and sequestered inside a vacuum of individual history and experience.

“Sin” can mean different things to different people. But my thought is that before the word sin means something to me, it means something.

When I think about the multitude of sins in my life, at the core of each and every one of those sins, I recognize a desire to choose for myself what is right and wrong rather than look to God and submit to His authority. That’s why Steve Fry’s statement: “the root sin of all sins is this desire to act independent of God.” hit home with me.

Regardless of the actual behavior, the choosing to decide for myself – to act independently of God – is rebellion.

Rebellion against God. It’s the heart of the nature of sin.

It’s not my actions alone which constitute sin and separate me from God. My actions are an expression of the state of my heart and my mind. And the state of my heart and mind are a reflection of the state of my relationship with Christ.

I can admit my dependence on God, live under His authority and experience abundant life in Christ.

Or I can act independent of God, choosing to rebel against His authority and separating myself from Him.

#IreadthereforeIquote: Brother Lawrence ~ on forgetting God

Posted on May 14, 2015October 11, 2016 by Julie Stiles Mills

the quote:

“That when he had failed in his duty,
he only confessed his fault,
saying to GOD,

I shall never do otherwise,
if You leave me to myself;

it is You who must hinder my falling,
and mend what is amiss. That after this,

he gave himself no further uneasiness about it.

from The Practice of the Presence of God
by Brother Lawrence

thoughts:

This is one of my all-time FAVORITE quotes. Let me paraphrase and give you an idea of how I process these words.

paraphrase: “I forget, I remember, I repent and I COME BACK.”
(don’t be freaking out about that word “repent.” I’ll get to it in a second.)

my interpretation:

“…when he had failed in his duty” means when I forget God.
And I will forget. I do forget. I fail to remember Him. Over and over and over again. When I first read this little book and began practicing the presence of God, my thought was, “I am SO gonna start doing this!” Less than 24 hours into this new way of living in relationship to God and I realized how difficult it was and how often I found myself just flat out forgetting – not only to practice God’s presence – but forgetting God altogether.

I quickly realized that practicing God’s presence wasn’t something I could just decide to do and then do it. I had to PRAY and ask God to “remind me to remember Him.” And I had to pray it multiple times per day. Some days, I had to pray, “Lord, please make me WANT to remember – bless me with a desire for You! I realized:

if my goal was to be aware of God’s presence in the minutiae of my life and
if my plan of action to achieve that goal was to “just do it” that
ON MY OWN, I would never achieve it with any kind of consistency.

EVER.

My goal had to be prayer –
first, a prayer for a desire to practice God’s presence and
second, the prayer “Lord, please, remind me to remember You. Relentlessly. Any and every way possible.”

The truth of the next part of this quote had hit home:

“I shall never do otherwise, if You leave me to myself”

God had quickly shown me that HE would be the one to “hinder my falling.” I would never be able to remember Him on my own.

And finally, the best part:

“after this, he gave himself no further uneasiness about it.”

I’m going to forget God. But when I remember and go back to practicing His presence, I’m not going to waste a minute of the time that could be spent with Him by beating myself up because I forgot Him AGAIN. When I do that, I’m punishing myself for something JESUS ALREADY DIED FOR.

I’ve repented. There’s no room or need for guilt. Guilt is different from repent. Guilt is a noun. Repent is a verb.

guilt: (noun) “a bad feeling caused by knowing or thinking that you have done something bad or wrong”

repent: (verb) “express sincere regret or remorse about one’s wrongdoing or sin.”

I need to remember and relentlessly claim the promise of Romans 8:1:

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,”

So, to paraphrase this quote from Brother Lawrence? “I forget, I remember, I repent and I COME BACK.”

ad nauseam

#IreadthereforeIquote: Philip Yancey ~ We can say anything to God.

Posted on May 8, 2015October 11, 2016 by Julie Stiles Mills

the quote:

“One bold message in the Book of Job is that
you can say anything to God.
Throw at him your grief, your anger, your doubt,
your bitterness, your betrayal, your disappointment

He can absorb them all.

As often as not,
spiritual giants of the Bible
are shown contending with God.
They prefer to go away limping,
like Jacob,
rather than to shut God out.”

from Disappointment With God
by Philip Yancey

thoughts:

When these words first sunk in, they were liberating for me.

I was taught that we should always be reverent toward God because, well…He’s GOD.

We make requests – respectfully.

And we thank Him.

No yelling or complaining or whining or blaming – that would be DISrespectful.

But I’ve realized my holding back in prayer was the equivalent of holding my hands over my face like a little kid playing hide and seek who thinks nobody can see him because his face is covered up.

There’s no authentic relationship when there’s holding back.

Telling God everything – expressing bitterness, revealing and exploring doubt and even angrily listing for Him all the reasons something isn’t fair – was strange at first.

But good.

Now?

I tell God everything I’m thinking and feeling. He can take it. Because He’s GOD. Besides, He already knows what I’m really thinking anyway. Sometimes even when I don’t. Sometimes I discover what I’m really thinking and feeling when I’m right in the middle of telling Him.

lessons from the book of Job: you can say anything to God

Posted on March 28, 2014October 11, 2016 by Julie Stiles Mills

“One bold message in the Book of Job is that you can say anything to God.

Throw at him your grief, your anger, your doubt, your bitterness, your betrayal, your disappointment— he can absorb them all.

As often as not, spiritual giants of the Bible are shown contending with God.
They prefer to go away limping, like Jacob, rather than to shut God out.

In this respect, the Bible prefigures a tenet of modern psychology: you can’t really deny your feelings or make them disappear, so you might as well express them. God can deal with every human response save one. He cannot abide the response I fall back on instinctively: an attempt to ignore him or treat him as though he does not exist.

That response never once occurred to Job.”

Philip Yancey
Disappointment with God: Three Questions No One Asks Aloud