Selflessness

Now discontent nibbled at him - not painfully, but constantly. Where does discontent start? You are warm enough, but you shiver. You are fed, yet hunger gnaws you. You have been loved, but your yearning wanders in new fields… "What have I contributed in the Great Ledger? What am I worth?" And this isn't vanity or ambition. Men seem to be born with a debt they can never pay no matter how hard they try… Man owes something to man. If he ignores the debt it poisons him, and if he tries to make payments the debt only increases, and the quality of his gift is the measure of the man.

To love someone is not first of all to do things for them, but to reveal to them their beauty and value, to say to them through our attitude: “You are beautiful. You are important. I trust you. You can trust yourself.”

Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not.

After All this time The Sun never says to the Earth, “You owe me.” Look What happens With a love like that. It lights the Whole Sky.

Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as you ever can.

There is a great man who makes every man feel small. But the real great man is the man who makes every man feel great.

Why do we not observe how the benevolence of Christians to strangers...has done the most to advance their cause? For it is disgraceful that...the impious Galileans [Christians] support not only their poor but ours as well, while everyone is able to see that our own people lack aid from us!

We must at all times remember what intellectuals habitually forget: that people matter more than concepts and must come first. The worst of all despotisms is the heartless tyranny of ideas.

Love never claims, it ever gives.

‘Is it?…is it?’ I whispered to my guide. ‘Not at all,’ said he. ‘It’s someone ye’ll never have heard of. Her name on Earth was Sarah Smith and she lived at Golders Green.’ ‘She seems to be…well, a person of particular importance?’ ‘Aye. She is one of the great ones. Ye have heard that fame in this country and fame on Earth are two quite different things.’ ‘And who are these gigantic people…look! They’re like emeralds…who are dancing and throwing flowers before her?’ ‘Haven’t ye read your Milton? A thousand liveried angels lackey her .’ ‘And who are all these young men and women on each side?’ ‘They are her sons and daughters.’ ‘She must have had a very large family, Sir.’ ‘Every young man or boy that met her became her son— even if it was only the boy that brought the meat to her back door. Every girl that met her was her daughter.’ ‘Isn’t that a bit hard on their own parents?’ ‘No. There are those that steal other people’s children. But her motherhood was of a different kind. Those on whom it fell went back to their natural parents loving them more. Few men looked on her without becoming, in a certain fashion, her lovers. But it was the kind of love that made them not less true, but truer, to their own wives.’ C.S.

JFK-Phx Quotes: The were three words in Greek which covered most kind of love (Eros = sexual love, storge = family affection, Philia = friendship) but the NT word for 'love' or 'charity' is Agape, which has hardly any use in classical Gk.--I.e., it is a new word for a new thing. It is obvious that it cannot mean 'an involuntary sentiment.' we all say God is wise, and habitually argue as if He were a fool! How could He be commanding the involuntary? Agape is best seen, i think, in the words 'love your neighbors as yourself', i.e. By an act of will, aim at your neighbor's good in  the same way you aim at your own.

I always knew that you do great things I didn't ever want to slow you down I was there when you learned to use your wings And I saw you leave the ground The time spent in your sweet arms Was the best time that I've known Maybe the reason I was here at all was to see you carry on Don't you know I still remember How once I was someone to you Girl your were meant for something better Doesn't matter anymore what you think of me Just proud to be part of your history

Brennan Manning’s book entitled, “Ragamuffin Gospel.” In it he describes a rather solemn scene between a surgical physician and a young couple. The book reads: I stand by the bed where a young woman lies, her face postoperative, her mouth twisted in palsy, somewhat clownish. A tiny twig of the facial nerve, the one to the muscles of her mouth, had been severed. She will be this way from now on. I had followed with religious fervor the curve of her flesh; nevertheless, to remove the tumor in her cheek, I had to cut the little nerve. Her young husband is in the room. He stands on the opposite side of the bed and together they seem to dwell in the evening lamplight, isolated from me, the moment is a private one. Who are they, I ask myself? He and this wry mouth I have made, who gaze at each other so generously, so lovingly. The young woman speaks. ''Will my mouth always be like this?' she asks. "Yes, I say, it will. It is because the nerve was cut." She nods and is silent. But the young man smiles. “I like it,” he says, “It’s kind of cute. All at once I know who he is. I understand and I lower my gaze. One is not bold in an encounter with a God moment. Unmindful, he bends to kiss her crooked mouth and I am so close I can see how he twists his own lips to accommodate to hers, to show her that their kiss still works.”

These impious Galileans (Christians) not only feed their own, but ours also; welcoming them with their agape, they attract them, as children are attracted with cakes… Whilst the pagan priests neglect the poor, the hated Galileans devote themselves to works of charity, and by a display of false compassion have established and given effect to their pernicious errors. Such practice is common among them, and causes contempt for our gods.

And if your light goes out, I ache to be that spark, To reignite, you’ll never, Have to feel in the dark.

They don’t just love you. They love loving you. Tattoos on the heart

The psychology is complex. Even as rowers must subsume their often fierce sense of independence and self-reliance, at the same time they must hold true to their individuality, their unique capabilities as oarsmen or oarswomen or, for that matter, as human beings. Even if they could, few rowing coaches would simply clone their biggest, strongest, smartest, and most capable rowers. Crew races are not won by clones. They are won by crews, and great crews are carefully balanced blends of both physical abilities and personality types. In physical terms, for instance, one rower’s arms might be longer than another’s, but the latter might have a stronger back than the former. Neither is necessarily a better or more valuable oarsman than the other; both the long arms and the strong back are assets to the boat. But if they are to row well together, each of these oarsmen must adjust to the needs and capabilities of the other. Each must be prepared to compromise something in the way of optimizing his stroke for the overall benefit of the boat—the shorter-armed man reaching a little farther, the longer-armed man foreshortening his reach just a bit—so that both men’s oars remain parallel and both blades enter and exit the water at precisely the same moment. This highly refined coordination and cooperation must be multiplied out across eight individuals of varying statures and physiques to make the most of each individual’s strengths. Only in this way can the capabilities that come with diversity—lighter, more technical rowers in the bow and stronger, heavier pullers in the middle of the boat, for instance—be turned to advantage rather than disadvantage.

All were merged into one smoothly working machine; they were, in fact, a poem of motion, a symphony of swinging blades.

What mattered more than how hard a man rowed was how well everything he did in the boat harmonized with what the other fellows were doing. And a man couldn’t harmonize with his crewmates unless he opened his heart to them. He had to care about his crew.

Perhaps the seeds of redemption lay not just in perseverance, hard work, and rugged individualism. Perhaps they lay in something more fundamental—the simple notion of everyone pitching in and pulling together.

They were now representatives of something much larger than themselves - a way of life, a shared set of values. Liberty was perhaps the most fundamental of those values. But the things that held them together - trust in each other, mutual respsect, humility, fair play, watching out for one another - those were also part of what America meant to all of them.

He suggested that Joe think of a well-rowed race as a symphony, and himself as just one player in the orchestra. If one fellow in an orchestra was playing out of tune, or playing at a different tempo, the whole piece would naturally be ruined. That’s the way it was with rowing. What mattered more than how hard a man rowed was how well everything he did in the boat harmonized with what the other fellows were doing.

The trick would be to find which few of them had the potential for raw power, the nearly superhuman stamina, the indomitable willpower, and the intellectual capacity necessary to master the details of technique. And which of them, coupled improbably with all those other qualities, had the most important one: the ability to disregard his own ambitions, to throw his ego over the gunwales, to leave it swirling in the wake of his shell, and to pull, not just for himself, not just for glory, but for the other boys in the boat.

The challenges they had faced together had taught them humility—the need to subsume their individual egos for the sake of the boat as a whole—and humility was the common gateway through which they were able now to come together and begin to do what they had not been able to do before. •

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered; Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, they may accuse you of being selfish, ulterior motives; Be kind anyway. If you are successful you will win some false friends and true enemies; Succeed anyway. If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; Be honest and frank anyway. What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; Build anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; Be happy anyway. The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow; Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough; Give the world the best you've got anyway. You see, in the end, it is between you and God; It was never between you and them anyway.

A moralistic mindset sees ‘the world’ as a profane place that we should have as little to do with as possible. The secular mindset makes work into almost a form of self-salvation, a way to prove yourself and amass wealth or achievement.The gospel leads us to integrate our faith with our work, to turn our vocation into a way to serve others rather than ourselves, and to reshape our job with the priorities of God’s kingdom.

There's a difference between us. You think the people of this country exist to provide you with position. I think your position exists to provide those people with freedom. And I go to make sure that they have it.

For it is true we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don't know what part of ourselves to give or, more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so it those we live with and should know who elude us. But we can still love them - we can love completely without complete understanding.

If I slip into the place that can be filled by Christ alone, making myself the first necessity to a soul instead of leading it to fasten upon Him, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

Love begins when the needs of someone else become more important than your own.

Many years later it occurred to Sonja to ask him about all that. When Ove at last told her, she shook her head both long and hard. “So while I was sleeping you sneaked out and helped people in need . . . and mended their fences? People can say whatever they like about you, Ove. But you’re the strangest superhero I ever heard about.” Chapter 23. A Man Who Was Ove and a Bus That Never Got There

If simple folk are free from care and fear, simple they will be, and we must be secret to keep them so. That has been the task of my kindred, while the years have lengthened and the grass has grown.

But nay: the praise of the praiseworthy is above all rewards. Yet there was naught in this to praise. I had no lure or desire to do other than I have done.’

I will say this: the rule of no realm is mine, neither of Gondor nor any other, great or small. But all worthy things that are in peril as the world now stands, those are my care. And for my part, I shall not wholly fail of my task, though Gondor should perish, if anything passes through this night that can still grow fair or bear fruit and flower again in days to come. For I also am a steward. Did you not know?’

‘A little people, but of great worth are the Shire-folk,’ said Halbarad. ‘Little do they know of our long labour for the safekeeping of their borders, and yet I grudge it not.’

It must often be so, Sam, when things are in danger: some one has to give them up, lose them, so that others may keep them.

Teach them the quiet verbs of kindness, to live beyond themselves. Urge them toward excellence, drive them toward gentleness, pull them deep into yourself, pull them upward toward manhood, but softly like an angel arranging clouds. Let your spirit move through them softly.