This is my church. It is composed of people just like me. It will be friendly if I am. It will do a great work if I work. It will make generous gifts to many causes if I am generous. It will bring others into its fellowship if I bring them. Its seats will be filled if I fill them. It will be a church of loyalty and love, of faith and service. If I who make it what it is, am filled with these, Therefore, with God’s help, I dedicate myself to the task of being all these things I want my church to be.
Dedication
Former college and pro basketball star Ed Macauley use to conduct summer basketball camps. At these camps he would stress the importance of giving your all by telling the campers: “Just remember that if you’re not working at your game to the utmost of your ability, there will be someone out there somewhere with equal ability who will be working to the utmost of his ability. And one day you’ll play each other, and he’ll have the advantage.”
Source: Beyond Talent, John Maxwell
Submitted by the homiletics class of West Coast Baptist College
D. L. Moody wrote the following words next to Isaiah 6:8 in his Bible: “I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. What I can do, I ought to do, and what I ought to do, by the grace of God I will do.”
Isaiah 6:8: “Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me.”
Source: One Thousand and One Thoughts from My Library, Dwight Lyman Moody
Kreisler, the famous violinist, said, “Narrow is the road that leads to the life of a violinist. Hour after hour, day after day, and week after week, for years, I lived with my violin. There were so many things that I wanted to do that I had to leave undone; there were so many places I wanted to go that I had to miss if I was to master the violin.”
Source: Zondervan 2011 Pastor’s Annual, T. T. Crabtree
Submitted by the homiletics class of West Coast Baptist College
Timothy Stackpole was a New York Firefighter, who was severely burned in a 1998 fire. After he recovered, he returned to the force despite the advice of some friends and family and the fact that he could retire comfortably.
He was a great fire fighter and passionate about his work and was soon promoted to captain. Timothy was one of the fire fighters that ran into the second tower to try to save some people. When he did, it collapsed and took his life. He knew his calling—to save people. The Holy Spirit has called us to a life of service. We should live for Him.
Ten days after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, residents of North Platte, Nebraska heard a rumor that soldiers from their town, part of the Nebraska National Guard Company D, would be coming through on a troop train on their way to the West Coast. About five hundred people showed up at the train depot with food, gifts, letters, and love to give the boys.
When the pilot of a giant airliner is speeding down the runway, there is a certain point where he cannot decide to remain on the ground. When he crosses that line, he is committed to the air, or the plane crashes disastrously. The pilot cannot change his mind when the plane is two-thirds of the way down the runway.
Many Christians have never left the ground spiritually. They have been sitting there for years and years gunning their engines.
Submitted by the homiletics class of West Coast Baptist College
Fifty people who were over ninety-five years old were asked one question: “If you could live your life over again, what would you do differently?” Many different answers were given, but three answers were seen repeatedly. They were: If I had to do it over again, I would . . .
1. Reflect more.
2. Risk more.
3. Do more things that would live on after I am dead.
Source: Who Switched the Price Tags?, Tony Campolo
Submitted by the homiletics class of West Coast Baptist College
When D.L. Moody was just starting in the ministry, he heard a preacher make this statement, “the world has yet to see what God can do with one man fully surrendered to Him.” Moody that night said, “By God’s grace, I’ll be that man!”
Source: Living Beyond Your Capacity, Paul Chappell
Submitted by the homiletics class of West Coast Baptist College
A young man was eager to grow in His Christian life. He got a piece of paper and made a list of all the things he would do for God. He wrote down the things he would give up, the places he would go to minister and the areas of ministry he would enter. He was excited. He took that list to the church and put it on the altar.
He thought he would feel joy, but instead he felt empty. So he went home and started adding to his list. He wrote down more things he would do and wouldn’t do. He took the longer list and put it on the altar, but still he felt nothing.
There is a marker on a rock near the top of Mount Washington, marking the spot where a woman climber lay down and died. She was so close to the top that she could almost hit it with a stone. A hundred steps more and she would have reached the shelter she sought, but she did not know this. Disheartened by the storm, beaten in body and distressed in spirit, she was at the end of her courage. She could not see a step ahead, so she lay down and died one hundred steps from her goal.
The story is told of a man who was asked, “Are you a believer in the Christian religion?”
“Oh, certainly!”
“You are a member of some church, then, I suppose?”
“Member of a church? No, indeed. Why should I be a member of a church? It is quite unnecessary; the dying thief wasn’t a member of a church, and he went to Heaven.”
“But of course you have been baptized; you know the command—”
“Been baptized? Oh, no; that is another needless ceremony! I am as safe as the dying thief was, and he never was baptized.”
Bertoldo de Giovanni is a name even the most enthusiastic lover of art is unlikely to recognize. He was the pupil of Donatello, the greatest sculptor of his time, and he was the teacher of Michelangelo, the greatest sculptor of all time.
A woman rushed up to famed violinist Fritz Kreisler after a concert and cried: “I’d give my life to play as beautifully as you do.” Kreisler replied, “I did.”
Source: Bits and Pieces
Submitted by the homiletics class of West Coast Baptist College
William McPherson was the superintendent for a stone quarry when a blast severely injured him. He lost his eyesight and both hands in the explosion. He was determined to read the Bible, and learned to read raised letters with the tip of his tongue. It is said that he read through the Bible four times in this manner.
Source: Annual Report of the American Bible Society, Volume 97
Sir Isaac Newton:
The Baptists are the only known body of Christians that has not symbolized with the Church of Rome.—The First Church, J. T. Mann
Mosheim (Lutheran):
Before the rise of Luther and Calvin, there lay secreted in
almost all the countries of Europe persons who adhered tenaciously to the
principles of modern Dutch Baptists.—The Baptist Spirit, Isaac J. Van Ness, William D. Nowlin
The story is told of a woman who had finished shopping and returned to her car. She found four men inside the car. She dropped her shopping bags, drew a handgun, and screamed, “I have a gun, and I know how to use it! Get out of the car.”
Those men did not wait for a second invitation; they got out and ran like crazy. The woman, somewhat shaken, loaded her shopping bags and then got into the car. But no matter how she tried, she could not get her key into the ignition. Then it dawned on her: her car was parked four or five spaces away!
David Livingstone, pioneer missionary to Africa, received a letter saying, “Have you found a good road to where you are? If so, we want to know how to send other men to join you.”
Livingstone replied, “If you have men who will come only if there is a good road, I do not want them. I want those who will come if there is no road at all.”
Source: The Speaker’s Quote Book, Roy B. Zuck
Two frogs fell into a tub of cream. One looked at the high sides of the tub which were too difficult to crawl over and said, “It is hopeless.” So he resigned himself to death, relaxed, and sank to the bottom. The other one determined to keep swimming as long as he could. “Something might happen,” he said. He kept kicking and churning, and finally he found himself on a solid platform of butter and jumped to safety.
Source: Nelson’s Complete Book of Stories, Illustrations & Quotes, Robert Morgan
When Adoniram Judson was lying in a jail in Burma with thirty-two pounds of chains on his ankles which were tied to a bamboo pole, another prisoner asked, “Dr. Judson, what about the prospect of the conversion of the heathen?”
Judson replied, “The prospects are just as bright as the promises of God.”