Sometimes you have to hear the logic of the logical exercising their role as "cautioneers" and naysayers and acknowledge that the safest and most reasonable thing to do is one thing and then, do the opposite because our loyalty is to the law of love and the Lord of love.

We can do the thing that protects and preserves us or we can follow Jesus. It is not a criticism of those who warn us or disrespect to reject their warnings.

We already know that this path has danger when we choose it.

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You came without an ax to grind; you did not tow the party line."

"The world can't stand what it cannot own." - Rich Mullins

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How can I ever thank you?" gushed a woman to
Clarence Darrow, after he had solved her legal troubles. "My
dear woman," Darrow replied, "ever since the Phoenicians invented money,
there has been only one answer to that question."

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"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure." – J. Danforth Quayle

"If we don't risk, we face the certainty of failure" – Tom Sims

In fact, if we fail, we run the risk of success.

It just shows to go you, even garbled speech can go somewhere!

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Since you are now awake, it is time to resume dreaming.

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You just cannot comment on everything in the news. If you did, you would do nothing else. News feeds would lead you around by the nose in desert of mission drift.

Note to self. Pay attention to last tweet.

Resist.

Sometimes I will let you have the last word because sequence is of no consequence.

Besides, I am not trying to win every dispute. God will sort it out.

There is a distinct possibility I might be wrong about a few things …. from time to time.

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We are addicted to fixing blame assuming that every inconvenience and discomfort we experience is someone's fault.

I would (but am not) be interested in public service (or might have been at another stage of life) if it did not involve attacking opponents or bragging about myself. We have good ones who do neither, but it is hard.

We can and should criticize systems, ideas, policies, choices, and power itself. The challenge is to find and encourage what is best in flawed people.

I guess it requires more prayer than I do.

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If I were president and pardoned a turkey, someone would call it nepotism.

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"The restoration of the church will surely come only from a new kind of monasticism which will have nothing in common with the old but a life of uncompromising adherence to the Sermon on the Mount in imitation of Christ." – Dietrich Bonhoeffer

 

Thanksgiving is coming. It is not too early to begin to prepare.

The Prayer of Thanksgiving (by Walter Rauschenbusch, 1861–1918)

"For the wide sky and the blessed sun,
For the salt sea and the running water,
For the everlasting hills
And the never-resting winds,
For trees and the common grass underfoot.
We thank you for our senses
By which we hear the songs of birds,
And see the splendor of the summer fields,
And taste of the autumn fruits,
And rejoice in the feel of the snow,
And smell the breath of the spring.
Grant us a heart wide open to all this beauty;
And save our souls from being so blind
That we pass unseeing
When even the common thornbush
Is aflame with your glory,
O God our creator,
Who lives and reigns for ever and ever." 

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Why are there interstate highways in Hawaii?

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An 95 year old man was lying in bed dying. The doctor said he had minutes to live. His first and only wife was by his bedside to hear his dying words and comfort him.

He began to speak.

"Honey, do you remember how when we got married, I was a cheerful, handsome, wealthy man? But soon after we were married, I lost all my money on bad investments. Never-the-less, you stayed with me the whole time."

"Then my first business went bankrupt, and we lost everything we had. You didn't leave me. You were right by my side the whole time."

"And now I've had a long sickness, which has used up all our savings. I'm a wrinkled, grouchy. old, poverty-stricken, dying man."

"You're still by my side!"

"So with my dying breath, I just want to say three little words to you:

(With his dying breath)

(PAUSE — LONG PAUSE)

"Honey, YOU'RE BAD LUCK!"

…. But I am sure glad you are here!

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I am going to check out what pithy things others are saying today … Maybe a flood or maybe a trickle.

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I wrote a letter to myself and forgot to sign it. I also forgot to put a stamp on it; so it came back. I guess what goes around comes around.

This could be a poem if laid out differently ….

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I am really a work in progress. Most of the advice I give is mostly a reminder and advice to ME!

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Do not assume from my tweets on encouragement that I answer every unknown number call. I just try, when I do, to take the opportunity for fun, encouragement, or education and I have had some good experiences.

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I am not sure this stream has made it to the ocean, but I think it has played out.

 

And … I trust that I am: