Category Archives: Books

Coffee and Devotions

 Come and have a cup of coffee with me and consider some thoughts…

I’ve got the gas stove burning

The coffee is brewing. Pick a Christmas cup for your “Joe”. I can also boil water for tea, you know…

I’ve got mine ready to go…

This morning I was reading from John Piper’s Taste and See and I found these thoughts something good to ponder. I’m not including the whole of meditation #5 but parts of it.

“If we would be wise people – people on the way to being “sages” – we must understand how our sinful human hearts and minds work. One profound biblical insight we need to embrace is that our heart exploits our mind to justify what the heart wants. That is, our deepest desires precede the rational functioning of our minds and incline the mind to perceive and think in a way that will make the desires look right. It is an illusion to think that our hearts are neutral and incline in accordance with cool, rational observation of truth. On the contrary, we feel powerful desires or fears in our hearts, and then our minds bend reality to justify the desires and fears….

….It is an old tale. From Cain (Genesis 4:9) to American presidents, truth has been sacrificed to desire, and the mind has been shrewdly employed by the darkened heart to shroud its passions. This is the point of Romans 12:18: They suppress the truth in unrighteousness.” Truth is held hostage by the unrighteous commitments of the heart. The unrighteous heart then employs the mind to distract and deceive. As Jesus says, “Everyone who does evil hates the Light” (John 3:20). Doing the evil we love makes us hostile to the light of truth which will expose the evil and rob us of its fleeting pleasures. In this condition the mind becomes a factory of half-truths, equivocations, sophistries, evasions, and lies – anything to protect the evil desires of the heart from exposure and destruction.

[sophistry -unsound or misleading but clever, plausible, and subtle argument or reasoning; sophism] [I added this definition because this was a new word to me]

We are all given to this. Our only hope is the transforming work of God in our hearts to free us from the bondage of a hardened heart that produces a futile mind.

….we should pray for God to change hearts so that they can see the beauty of truth and love it.

…Romans 6:17, “But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were commited.” Obedience came from the heart. Thanks be to God. And if thanks be to God, then let prayers be to God. He is our only hope – to escape our own delusions and deliver others.”

I hope you find these thoughts something good to ponder and learn from today. Go into this new day with truth and grace. Blessings…

Backwards WFMW ~ Favorite Fiction?

 

I love to read and I love books and I hope to visit some beautiful libraries before I die.

What is your all time favorite fiction work?

What is the best work of fiction you’ve read in the last 6 months?

Bonus: What is the best library you’ve ever been in or would like to see?

Bodlein Library in Oxford, England to inspire you. I hope to get back to Oxford on a day that Bodlein is open to the public.

 

“No man can be called friendless who has God and the companionship of good books.”  ~Elizabeth Barrett Browning

For more Backwards WFMW head on over to Rock’s in My Dryer….

Fall Book Reviews ~ Sayers and Piper

 

So I’m plugging away with our Fall Reading Challenge and have finished The Documents in the Case by Dorothy Sayers and Pierced by the Word by John Piper.

Documents in the Case is not one of the Peter Wimsey mysteries. It is also different in that the story is told through series of letters between the characters in the book. It took me a while to connect with this way of developing the characters and mystery story line. I did finally connect and again enjoyed Sayers’ expertise in character development and detail. Some of the detail was way over my head. She definitely writes an intellectual mystery that taxes my wee brain a lot! 

One of the quotes from this book that really affected me is this one ~

“He admires, but he won’t clap, which must be very discouraging”

Encouragement is a very important thing to me and this quote is so telling about the lack of verbal encouragement that can be so crushing in relationship. Is there someone you admire and you do not clap for? Consider verbalizing your admiration, encourage them. Be an encourager!

Pierced by the Word, I’m sorry to say that this particular Piper devotional did not live up to it’s title. I think whoever chose the title for this particular compilation of devotions was stretching it! I love Piper and I have several of his books that I’d read over again, but this isn’t one of them. Although several of the devotions had truth to share they fell short of being piercing for me. Yikes I feel like a traitor but there you have it…

Faithfulness and Holiness ~ Quote

I’m plugging away and still am behind others who are reading J.C. Ryle on Holiness but I am blessed in my slowness…

Here’s the latest quote I’d like to share that I found to be a rich encouragement. It’s from Chapter 4 ~ The Fight,

“A special faith in our Lord Jesus Christ’s person, work, and office, is the life, heart, and mainspring of the Christian soldier’s character.

He sees by faith an unseen Saviour, who loved him, gave Himself for him, paid his debts for him, bore his sins, carried his transgressions, rose again for him, and appears in heaven for him as his Advocate at the right hand of God. He sees Jesus, and clings to Him. Seeing this Saviour and trusting in Him, he feels peace and hope, and willingly does battle against the foes of his soul.

He sees his many sins – his weak heart, a tempting world, a busy devil; and if he looked only at them he might well despair. But he sees also a mighty Saviour, an interceding Saviour, a sympathizing Saviour – His blood, His righteousness, His everlasting priesthood – and he believes that all this is his own. He sees Jesus, and casts his whole weight on Him. Seeing Him he cheerfully fights on, with a full confidence that he will prove “more than conqueror through Him that loved him” (Rom. 8:37).

ht: Faithfulness and Holiness (The Witness of J.C. Ryle) ~ Ryle with an appreciation by J.I. Packer

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The Dean’s Watch ~ Elizabeth Goudge

 Woman to Woman is hosting a Book Review Theme today.

 

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I just finished the last page of this book and I’m so sad that the story has come to an end. Elizabeth Goudge is fast becoming my new favorite author. She has a great descriptive style. The same appreciation I have for George MacDonald and how he weaves a true loving relationship with God contrasted against a cold religious relationship is growing as deep for Goudge’s fiction. I love MacDonald’s Scottish Countryside settings and I love Goudge’s English countryside settings.

This story is built around the Dean of a Cathedral in an English City. Goudge develops the stories behind several characters within the city whose lives are touched and changed by the growing love of the Dean for his city and for them. I highly recommend this book to you. It can be hard to come by these books but start by checking your local library. I found this one at my library.

I published a quote from this book that you can read here.

To see more book reviews go to Seeds in My Garden and My Many Colored Days.

The Dean’s Watch ~ by Elizabeth Goudge

I’m not finished with this book yet but I wanted to share this quote from Chapter 7 ~ Miss Montague…

How much more friendly it is when you cannot see, thought Miss Montague, and how much closer we are to Him. Why should we always want a light? He chose darkness for us, darkness of the womb and of the stable, darkness in the garden, darkness on the cross and in the grave. Why do I demand certainty? That is not faith. Why do I want to understand? How can I understand this great web of sin and ugliness and love and suffering and joy and life and death when I don’t understand the little tangle of good and evil that is myself? I’ve enough to understand. I understand that He gave me light that I might turn to Him, for without light I could not have seen to turn. I have seen creation in His light. He shared His light with me that I, turned, might share with Him the darkness of His redemption. Why did I despair? What do I want? If it is Him I want He is here, not only love in light illuming all that He has made but love in darkness dying for it…And she said, I will learn to pray.”

I am so thankful for the bloggy world where I’ve been introduced to two new authors that I am enjoying so much and hadn’t been aware of before, Elizabeth Goudge and Dorothy Sayers. Yippee!!

Have a wonderful Monday walking in the Light…

Fall Into Reading ~

How exciting a new season of reading is here! I’m a little behind with my summer list so I’ll need to start my Fall reading with these and add a few more…

Leftovers from my Summer Reading…

Hood~ by Stephen Lawhead – “Like the forest itself, Hood is deep, dark and at times savagely brutal- yet full of enchantment and hope. Internationally acclaimed author S.R. Lawhead has created a lyrical rendering of a time-honored story that will lead you down strange pathways into another time and place.

The Documents in the Case ~ by Dorothy Sayers – “An intricate murder mystery.” “Each of the characters is revealed in a series of letters and statements which work up to a dramatic climax”

New for my Fall Reading List…

Faithfulness and Holiness, The Witness of J.C. Ryle ~ J. I. Packer/ J. C. Ryle – “With admiration for a life well-lived, beloved author J.I. Packer endeavors to introduce this great man of faith as a spiritual mentor to a new generation.”

Taste and See ~ John Piper – “…this devotional of contemporary meditations on biblical reality will whet your appetite for more of God himself and refresh you in your daily communion with Christ.”

Peace Like a River~ Leif Enger – “…a heroic quest, a tragedy, and a love story, in which ‘what could be unbelievable becomes extraordinary”

Pierced by the Word ~ John Piper – “31 meditations to awaken your faith”

The Tale of Beatrix Potter ~ Margaret Lane – “Few life stories are so intriguing as that of Beatrix Potter, artist and author, whose stories and pictures, which took the nurseries of Victorian England by storm, still have heart-lifting freshness and appeal”

The Dean’s Watch~ Elizabeth Goudge -“An English cathedral town in the mid-nineteenth century forms the background for the warm and gentle story of Isaac Peabody, an obscure clockmaker, and of Adam Ayscough, the brilliant, pious Dean of the cathedral, whose great love for his parishioners is stifled by his own unconquerable shyness.”

I was excited to find this Goudge book at the local library. It was the only one of her books on the shelf. I’ll need to read it first since it’s due in October. I’ve read two of her children’s books which I thoroughly enjoyed. Her descriptions are so wonderful.

Head on over to Callapiddar Days to see all the books you’ve never even heard of …

Holiness ~ J.C. Ryle ~ 1877

Well I’m behind others who are reading Holiness by J.C. Ryle in the blog world but that way I can glean from the book and their reviews and hopefully comprehend the book better. The full text of Ryle’s original work on Holiness is included in J. I. Packer’s book Faithfulness and Holiness. Here’s a quote from the book that I wanted to share from chapter 2 on Sin…

“In the next place, a right view of sin is one of the best antidotes to the overstrained theories of Perfection, of which we hear so much in these times. I shall say but little about this, and in saying it I trust I shall not give offence. If those who press on us perfection mean nothing more than an all-round consistency, and a careful attention to all the graces which make up the Christian character, reason would that we should not only bear with them, but agree with them entirely. By all means let us aim high. But if men really mean to tell us that here in this world a believer can attain to entire freedom from sin, live for years in unbroken and uninterrupted communion with God, and feel for months together not so much as one evil thought, I must honestly say that such an opinion appears to me very unscriptural. – I go even further. I say that the opinion is very dangerous to him that holds it, and very likely to depress, discourage, and keep back inquirers after salvation. I cannot find the slightest warrant in God’s Word for expecting such perfection as this while we are in the body. …Christ alone is without sin; and that all we, the rest, though baptized and born again in Christ, offend in many things;

…we do not love God so much as we are bound to do, with all our hearts, mind, and power; we do not fear God so much as we ought to do; we do not pray to God but with many and great imperfections. We give, forgive, believe, live, and hope imperfectly; we speak, think, and do imperfectly; we fight against the devil, the world, and the flesh imperfectly. Let us, therefore, not be ashamed to confess plainly our state of imperfections.”

James 5:16 ~ “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.”

I John 1:8-10 ~ “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.”

I am imperfect and I prove it many times a day but thanks be to God that He keeps leading me forward and He continues His work of sanctification on me.

I Sing a Song of the Saints of God ~ L. Scott, 1929

 I Sing a Song of the Saints of God

                  I sing a song of the saints of God
Patient and brave and true,
Who toiled and fought and lived and died
For the Lord they loved and knew.
And one was a doctor, and one was a queen,
And one was a shepherdess on the green,
They were all of them saints of God – and I mean,
God help me to be one too.

They love their Lord so dear, so dear,
And his love made them strong;
And they followed the right, for Jesus’ sake,
The whole of their good lives long.
And one was a soldier, and one was a priest,
And one was slain by a fierce wild beast:
And there’s not any reason – no, not the least-
Why I shouldn’t be one too.

They live not only in ages past,
There are hundreds of thousands still,
The world is bright with joyous saints
Who love to do Jesus’ will.
You can meet them in school, or in lanes, or at sea,
In church, or in trains, or in shops, or at tea,
for the saints of God are just folk like me,
and I mean to be one too.

L. Scott, 1929

ht: Jan Karon’s ~Mitford Cookbook & Kitchen Reader

ht: Brian Jacques ~The Redwall Cookbook