Editor: Richard (Dick) Innes
Published by: ACTS International
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"Success is more a function of consistent common sense than it is of genius." – An Wang
"There is a law in psychology that if you form a picture in your mind of what you would like to be, and you keep and hold that picture there long enough, you will soon become exactly as you have been thinking." – William James
"Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things I am tempted to think there are no little things." – Bruce Barton
"Before you can inspire with emotion, you must be swamped with it yourself. Before you can move their tears, your own must flow. To convince them, you must yourself believe." – Winston Churchill
"Failure is the opportunity to begin again, more intelligently." – Henry Ford
"In looking for people to hire, look for three qualities: integrity, intelligence and energy. But if they don't have the first, the other two will kill you." – Warren Buffet
"Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed and in such desperate enterprise? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away." – Henry David Thoreau, 1817-1862
I have read how a Chicago bank once asked for a letter of recommendation on a young Bostonian being considered for employment. The Boston investment house could not say enough about the young man. His father, they wrote, was a Cabot; his mother was a Lowell. Further back was a happy blend of Saltonstalls, Peabodys, and other of Boston's first families. His recommendation was given without hesitation. Several days later, the Chicago bank sent a note saying the information supplied was altogether inadequate. It read: "We are not contemplating using the young man for breeding purposes. Just for work."
The story is told of some African workers who were hired to carry pieces of heavy equipment on their backs to a remote post in the interior of Africa. After several days of marching, one day they refused to pick up their burdens and go any further. They sat by the side of the road turning a deaf ear to the appeals of the man in charge.
Exasperated, the leader of the expedition asked them: "But why you don't want to go on?"
One of the workers replied: "Sir, we are waiting for our souls to catch up with our bodies."
If you've ever seen pelicans in action, you know they're great fishermen, or fisher-birds, I guess. These pelicans were hanging out near a fleet of fishing boats. The fishermen on the boats would pull into the little harbor, and clean the fish right on the spot, throwing the heads and the rest into the water. The pelicans picked up on this, and began eating the leftovers without having to go out fishing. And if you're a pelican, that's good eating.
So for weeks, they just sat by the harbor and waited for the fishing boats to come in. After a while, the fishermen found out they could sell the fish waste, and so they stopped chucking it into the water. The pelicans were caught unprepared. They continued to sit and wait for the fishing boats to come in and throw free food in the water. And they grew thinner and thinner and seemed able to do nothing about their situation.
Wildlife officials came to check out what was going on, and concluded that the pelicans had forgotten how to fish. So what they did was to bring pelicans in from another area to join the flock and teach the starving birds how to fish again.
I frequently address people who are highly successful. They're at the top of their field and often have all the comforts that wealth can afford. Most of them truly seem to enjoy their success.
So, in a way, it surprises me how deeply many of them respond when I talk about the difference between success and significance. Invariably, I see knowing nods when I describe Alfred Nobel's disillusionment when he read his own obituary that was printed by mistake after his brother died. Although it was complimentary, describing him as a brilliant chemist who made a fortune as the inventor of dynamite, he was struck by how hollow and inconsequential his accomplishments seemed as the summation of one's life. Determined to leave a more worthy legacy, he established the Nobel Prizes to acknowledge great human achievements.
Mr. Nobel realized there's a transitory quality to success, but immortality in significance. A life devoted to attaining personal goals can be admirable and satisfying, but it can be enormously enriched when we use our talents and time to improve the lives of others.
In his book, Living a Life That Matters, Harold S. Kushner wrote, "Our souls are not hungry for fame, comfort, wealth, or power. Our souls are hungry for meaning, for the sense that we have figured out how to live so that our lives matter, so that the world will be at least a little bit different for our having passed through it."
If we realize this before it's too late, we're less likely to dishonor our families and the legacy of our lives with dishonesty or selfishness. Success just isn't enough.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
I read the following story about how on one Sunday morning a usually long-winded pastor preached his shortest, but one of his most effective sermons ever.
He said, "My sermon this morning has three points.
"First, over three million people in the world today are homeless.
"Second, most of you don't give a d_ _ _.
"And third, it is a shame that more of you are upset by the fact that I said the word, 'd_ _ _', than by the fact that over three-million people are homeless."
I've heard that a well-known preacher did a similar thing when speaking about the tragedy of abortion in this country, only the four-letter word he used was even stronger!
Seriously, I'm not condoning preachers using these words, but how sad it is that so many of us will get considerably more upset over someone using a bad word than we do about people being homeless, about the problem of abortion, human trafficking, not to mention the lost going to hell.
Jesus said, "Woe upon you, Pharisees, and you other religious leaders—hypocrites! For you tithe down to the last mint leaf in your garden, but ignore the important things—justice and mercy and faith. Yes, you should tithe, but you shouldn't leave the more important things undone. Blind guides! You strain out a gnat and swallow a camel" (Matthew 23:23-24, TLB).
Suggested prayer: "Dear God, please help me not to be guilty of straining out gnats and swallowing camels, and help me to be concerned about the things in life that truly matter. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus' name. Amen."
NOTE: Case in point ... when I sent this article out as a Daily Encounter one subscriber was irate at me over my use of "d_ _ _" used to illustrate the point I was making.
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Oprah Winfrey: "Books were my pass to personal freedom. I learned to read at age three, and soon discovered there was a whole world to conquer that went beyond our farm in Mississippi." – Oprah Winfrey
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Books by Dick Innes, Editor of Weekend Encounter You Can't Fly With a Broken Wing How to Mend a Broken Heart I Hate Witnessing—A Handbook for Effective Christian
Communications
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