Life on Planet Earth on Gates

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Adapted From Psalm 24 (ESV)

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 24:7-9

Lift up your heads, O gates! And be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord, strong and mighty, the Lord, mighty in battle! Lift up your hea...

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Adapted from Psalm 100 (WEB)

Author

Allen Thompson

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 100:null

LEADER: Shout for joy to the Lord, all you lands! Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before his presence with singing. ALL: Know that the Lord, he is God. It is he who made us, and we are his. We are...

liturgy

Adapted from Psalm 100 (ESV)

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 100:null

Leader: Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth! People: Serve the Lord with gladness! Leader: Come into his presence with singing! People: Know that the Lord, he is God! Leader: It is ...

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The Difference Between You and Bill Gates

Author

Andy Stanley

Keywords

Financially speaking, the difference between you and Bill Gates is smaller than the difference between you and the average person living outside the U.S. To most people, your bank accounts look virtua...

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Put Your Hand into the Hand of God

Author

The Pastor's Workshop

Keywords

King George V of Britain, who was king during the tumultuous years of World War I, shared a New Year’s card with his friends that featured a drawing of an open gate. Below the image, he included thi...

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You’ve Brought Pavement?

Author

Ben Witherington III

Keywords

Perhaps you’ve heard the humorous story about a man who was about to die so he liquidated all his assets, turning them into gold bricks. He required his family to pack the bricks in two suitcases and ...

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A Walled City

Author

Arthur McKinsey

Keywords

If you think of a problem as being like a medieval walled city, then a lot of people will attack it head-on, like a battering ram. They will storm the gates and try to smash through the defenses with ...

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The Poison Garden

Author

The Pastor's Workshop

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 2:8-9; 3:1-7, Deuteronomy 30:19-20, 2 Kings 4:38-41, John 12:24, Romans 6:23, Psalm 1:3-4

In the north of England, there's a beautiful garden. It's full of delicate wildflowers, extravagant blossoms, verdant climbing vines, and tumbling water features. Like so many gems of English ...

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A Grand Gesture

Author

Source Unknown

Keywords

Scripture

2 Timothy 1:7, 1 Samuel 17:, Proverbs 31:8-9, Ephesians 6:10-11, Psalm 27:1, Joshua 1:9

A man appears before the pearly gates. “Have you ever done anything of particular merit?” St. Peter asks. “Well, I can think of one thing….” the man offers. “Once I came upon a gang of high-testoster...

liturgy

Adapted from Psalm 107

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 107:null

O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, those he redeemed from trouble and gathered in from the lands, from the east...

liturgy

Kindness flows from you, Lord, pure and

Author

Gregory of Nyssa

Scripture

Romans 5:8-11, Genesis 3:8-21, Isaiah 61:10, Ephesians 2:13-14, Revelation 22:14, Hebrews 10:19-22

Kindness flows from you, Lord, pure and continual. You had cast us off, as was only just, but mercifully you forgave us; you hated us and you were reconciled to us, you cursed us and you blessed us; y...

liturgy

Adapted from Psalm 122, Isaiah 2:3, Psalm 122:2, Isaiah 2:5

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 122:null, Isaiah 2:3, Psalm 122:2, Isaiah 2:5

I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the house of the Lord!” Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, that we may learn God’s ways and walk in God’s paths. Our feet are standin...

Quote

Author

Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Keywords

Give me great sinners to make great saints! They are glorious raw material for Grace to work upon and when you do get them saved, they will shake the very gates of Hell!

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The Dreaded Dullness

Author

David Foster Wallace

Keywords

Loneliness

In his novel, The Pale King , David Foster Wallace discusses the issue of boredom, or, as he puts it, dullness: . . . Maybe it’s because dullness is intrinsically painful; maybe that’s where ph...

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When Scandals Become Blasé

Author

Jonathan K. Dodson

Keywords

Scripture

Hebrews 13:4, Matthew 18:6-10

In his thoughtful book, Our Good Crisis: Overcoming Moral Chaos with the Beatitudes , Jonathan K. Dodson describes what has become a reality of modern-day life-scandals happen every day, and no-one...

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What Home are You Preparing For?

Author

Billy Graham

Keywords

I wonder. What home are you preparing for? Some people spend their lives building ultimate dream homes so they can enjoy their twilight years. Some find themselves exchanging their bank accounts for r...

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Keeping Time

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Did you know that the first group of people to use clocks were Christian monks? Monks desired the ability to pray around a rigorous and exact prayer schedule. Benedict of Nursia, the great architect o...

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Frozen in Greed

Author

Clovis G. Chappell

Keywords

In his book Feminine Faces, Clovis Chappell wrote that when the Roman city of Pompeii was being excavated, the body of a woman was found mummified by the volcanic ashes of Mount Vesuvius. Her position...

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Holding on to Earth

Author

John Shea

Keywords

Scripture

Matthew 19:29, Revelation 21:1-2, 1 Corinthians 2:9, Hebrews 11:16, Philippians 3:20, John 14:2-3, Matthew 6:19-21

There once lived a peasant in Crete who deeply loved his life. He enjoyed tilling the soil, feeling the warm sun on his naked back as he worked the fields, and feeling the soil under his feet. He love...

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Moving Forward With Your Life

Author

Ray Pritchard

Keywords

Scripture

Matthew 6:14-15, Ephesians 4:31-32, Colossians 3:13, Philippians 3:13-14, Isaiah 43:18-19

After the Civil War, in an incident recounted by Charles Flood in Lee: The Last Years, Robert E. Lee visited a woman who took him to the remains of a grand old tree in front of her home. There she cri...

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Dreaded Dullness

Author

David Foster Wallace

Keywords

Boredom

Scripture

Matthew 13:22, Philippians 4:8, Proverbs 4:23, Luke 10:41-42, Isaiah 30:15

In his novel, The Pale King , David Foster Wallace discusses the issue of boredom, or, as he puts it, dullness: . . . Maybe it’s because dullness is intrinsically painful; maybe that’s where phrase...

Quote

Author

David Foster Wallace

Keywords

To me, at least in retrospect, the really interesting question is why dullness proves to be such a powerful impediment to attention. Why we recoil from the dull. Maybe it’s because dullness is intrins...

Quote

Author

Bill Gates

Keywords

I agree with people like Richard Dawkins that mankind felt the need for creation myths. Before we really began to understand disease and the weather and things like that, we sought false explanations ...

Quote

Author

Bill Gates

Keywords

Scripture

Proverbs 16:18, 1 Corinthians 10:12, Jeremiah 9:23-24, Matthew 23:12, James 4:6

Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.

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A 12 Million Dollar Education

Author

Andy Cook

Keywords

Scripture

Romans 8:28, Matthew 25:21, Proverbs 27:17, Colossians 3:23-24, Galatians 6:1, James 1:5, Luke 16:10

Tom Watson, Sr., is the man who founded IBM. You can imagine the money, the investments, the experiments, this man, and his multi-billion dollar company have made through the years. Once, years ago, w...

liturgy

O Giver of every good and perfect gift,

Author

Chip Hardwick

Keywords

Scripture

James 1:17

O Giver of every good and perfect gift, we confess that we are poor stewards of your bounty. You give us time, but we waste it. You give us life, but we use it to glorify ourselves. You give us wealth...

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Author

Francis Quarles

Keywords

He that gives all, though but little gives much; because God looks not to the quantity of the gift, but to the quality of the givers.

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The Great Wall of China & The Desire for Safety

Author

The Pastor's Workshop

Keywords

Scripture

Proverbs 4:23, 1 Samuel 15:22, Matthew 7:24-27, 1 Corinthians 3:11, Psalm 127:1

The Great Wall of China was an immense and costly project, built with tremendous effort and resources, designed to provide security and protection. Yet, within a few years of its completion, it was br...

Quote

Author

Jim Elliot

Keywords

He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.

Quote

Author

Robert Frost

Keywords

Scripture

Proverbs 18:19, Ecclesiastes 4:9-12, Micah 6:8, Galatians 3:28, Psalm 133:1

Before I built a wall I’d ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offence.

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