“The woods were my Ritalin. Nature calmed me, focused me, and yet excited my senses.”
-Richard Louv
Posted by: jakinnan | October 19, 2012
Natural Attention
Posted in Nature Writer Quotes | Tags: art, beauty, books, conservation, earth, enviroment, God, life, literature, local, love, mountains, nature, personal, photography, salvation, spirituality, travel
Posted by: jakinnan | October 19, 2012
Paradise Lost
Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.'”
“You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. (Genesis 3:1-6)
Evil was lurking in that Garden. The mighty angel had once been glorious as well, more glorious than we. He was, if you recall, captain of the Lord’s armies, beautiful and powerful beyond compare. But he rebelled against his Creator, led a great battle against the forces of heaven, and was cast down. Banished but not destroyed, he waited in the shadows for an opportunity to take his revenge.
You must understand: the Evil One hates God, hates anything that reminds him of the glory of God . . . wherever it exists. Unable to overthrow the Mighty One, he turned his sights on those who bore his image.
Satan came into the Garden and whispered to Adam and Eve-and in them, to all of us-“You cannot trust the heart of God . . . he’s holding out on you . . . you’ve got to take matters under your control.” He sowed the seed of mistrust in our hearts; he tempted us to seize control.
It’s the same lie he is using in your life today, by the way: “Trusting God is way too risky. You’re far too vulnerable. Rewrite the Story. Give yourself a better part. Arrange for your own happiness. Disregard him.”
-John Eldredge, Epic, 54-55
Posted in Ransomed Heart | Tags: art, beauty, books, flowers, God, Jesus Christ, John Eldredge, life, literature, love, mountains, nature, personal, photography, Ransomed Heart, salvation, survival
Posted by: jakinnan | October 19, 2012
10/19/2012 Scripture
Imitate God, therefore, in everything you do, because you are his dear children. Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us[a] and offered himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.
-Ephesians 5:1-2 NLT
Posted in Daily Scriptures | Tags: beauty, Bible, Christianity, faith, God, Jesus Christ, life, love, nature, personal, photography, salvation, spirituality, travel
Posted by: jakinnan | October 18, 2012
Please Stop…and Look
“If, then, I were asked for the most important advice I could give, that which I considered to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.”
-Leo Tolstoy
Picture Credit: Jon Kolbensen
Posted in Nature Writer Quotes | Tags: art, beauty, books, conservation, earth, enviroment, God, life, local, nature, personal, photography, poetry, spirituality, travel
Posted by: jakinnan | October 18, 2012
Honor Wounds
You will be wounded. Just because this battle is spiritual doesn’t mean it’s not real; it is, and the wounds a man can take are in some ways more ugly than those that come in a firefight. To lose a leg is nothing compared to losing heart; to be crippled by shrapnel need not destroy your soul, but to be crippled by shame and guilt may. You will be wounded by the Enemy. He knows the wounds of your past, and he will try to wound you again in the same place. But these wounds are different; these are honor-wounds.
Blaine was showing me his scars the other night at the dinner table. “This one is where Samuel threw a rock and hit me in the forehead. And this one is from the Tetons when I fell into that sharp log. I can’t remember what this one was from; oh, here’s a good one-this one is from when I fell into the pond while chasing Luke. This one is a really old one when I burned my leg on the stove camping.” He’s proud of his scars; they are badges of honor to a boy . . . and to a man. We have no equivalent now for a Purple Heart of spiritual warfare, but we will. One of the noblest moments that await us will come at the wedding feast of the Lamb. Our Lord will rise and begin to call those forward who were wounded in battle for his name’s sake and they will be honored, their courage rewarded. I think of Henry V’s line to his men,
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian . . .
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars, And say, “These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.”
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day; then shall our names . . .
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember’d.
-John Eldredge, Wild at heart, 176-77
Picture Credit: James Appleton
Posted in Ransomed Heart | Tags: beauty, books, Christianity, faith, God, Jesus Christ, John Eldredge, life, local, nature, personal, photography, Ransomed Heart, salvation, survival, travel
Posted by: jakinnan | October 18, 2012
10/18/2012 Scripture
We are confident of all this because of our great trust in God through Christ. It is not that we think we are qualified to do anything on our own. Our qualification comes from God. He has enabled us to be ministers of his new covenant. This is a covenant not of written laws, but of the Spirit. The old written covenant ends in death; but under the new covenant, the Spirit gives life.
-2 Corinthians 3:4-6
Picture Credit: James Appleton
Posted in Daily Scriptures | Tags: beauty, Bible, Christianity, faith, God, Jesus Christ, life, love, nature, personal, photography, salvation, spirituality
Posted by: jakinnan | October 17, 2012
True Love
“The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us.”
-CS Lewis
Picture Credit: Scott Crocker
Posted in Ideas & Input | Tags: art, beauty, books, Christianity, CS Lewis, God, Jesus Christ, life, literature, love, nature, personal, photography, salvation, spirituality, travel
Posted by: jakinnan | October 17, 2012
Natural Pace
“It is always the simple things that change our lives. And these things never happen when you are looking for them to happen. Life will reveal answers at the pace life wishes to do so. You feel like running, but life is on a stroll. This is how God does things.”
-Donald Miller
Picture Credit: James Appleton
Posted in Nature Writer Quotes | Tags: art, beauty, books, conservation, earth, enviroment, God, life, local, love, nature, personal, photography, poetry, salvation, spirituality, survival, travel
Posted by: jakinnan | October 17, 2012
As Good as it Gets?
If for all practical purposes we believe that this life is our best shot at happiness, if this is as good as it gets, we will live as desperate, demanding, and eventually despairing men and women. We will place on this world a burden it was never intended to bear. We will try to find a way to sneak back into the Garden and when that fails, as it always does, our heart fails as well. If truth be told, most of us live as though this life is our only hope.
In his wonderful book The Eclipse of Heaven, A. J. Conyers put it quite simply: “We live in a world no longer under heaven.” All the crises of the human soul flow from there. All our addictions and depressions, the rage that simmers just beneath the surface of our Christian facade, and the deadness that characterizes so much of our lives has a common root: We think this is as good as it gets. Take away the hope of arrival and our journey becomes the Battan death march. The best human life is unspeakably sad. Even if we manage to escape some of the bigger tragedies (and few of us do), life rarely matches our expectations. When we do get a taste of what we really long for, it never lasts. Every vacation eventually comes to an end. Friends move away. Our careers don’t quite pan out. Sadly, we feel guilty about our disappointment, as though we ought to be more grateful.
Of course we’re disappointed-we’re made for so much more. “He has also set eternity in the hearts” (Eccl. 3:11). Our longing for heaven whispers to us in our disappointments and screams through our agony. “If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy,” C. S. Lewis wrote, “the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.”
-John Eldredge, The Sacred Romance, 179-80
Picture Credit: James Appleton
Posted in Ransomed Heart | Tags: art, beauty, books, Christianity, CS Lewis, faith, God, Jesus Christ, John Eldredge, life, mountains, nature, personal, photography, Ransomed Heart, salvation
Posted by: jakinnan | October 17, 2012
10/17/2012 Scripture
Are we beginning to praise ourselves again? Are we like others, who need to bring you letters of recommendation, or who ask you to write such letters on their behalf? Surely not! The only letter of recommendation we need is you yourselves. Your lives are a letter written in our hearts; everyone can read it and recognize our good work among you. Clearly, you are a letter from Christ showing the result of our ministry among you. This “letter” is written not with pen and ink, but with the Spirit of the living God. It is carved not on tablets of stone, but on human hearts.
-2 Corinthians 3:1-3 NLT
Posted in Daily Scriptures | Tags: beauty, Bible, Christianity, faith, God, Jesus Christ, life, love, mountains, nature, personal, photography, salvation
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