For now, here are some notable quotations that troubled my heart and what God has been speaking to me about recently. Not only do some of them hit close to "home" (physically, emotionally), but they all scream: "This world needs a Savior".
The "Verbatim" section in the October 12, 2009 edition of Time magazine:
'More Czechs believe in infomercials on television than they do in religion.'
DOMINIK JUN, filmmaker, after Pope Benedict XVI used a Sept. 28 speech in the Czech Republic to urge secular Czechs to rejoin the church
'It was never going to be easy.'
DAN PFEIFFER, White House deputy communications director, acknowledging that the Obama Administration may not be able to fulfill its promise to close the U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay by Jan. 22
'I am the happiest man in the world. I just climbed a beautiful mountain.'
CLIFTON MALONEY, husband of New York Representative Carolyn Maloney, after summiting Cho Oyu, the sixth tallest mountain in the world, on Sept. 25. The 71-year-old avid outdoorsman, who was said to be in excellent health, was found dead the following morning
'This is a very noble way to destroy the enemies of Islam. This is not suicide.'
DANI PERMANA, an 18-year-old high school graduate from Indonesia, speaking in a newly released video that identifies him as one of the suicide bombers responsible for the July 17 attacks on two Jakarta hotels that killed seven people and wounded dozens
'It's just devastating, like the wrath of God.'
VINCENT IULI, a villager in American Samoa, after an 8.3-magnitude earthquake on Sept. 29 triggered a tsunami that swept away whole towns on the Pacific islands of Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga, killing at least 100 people
'I thought it would make me happy.'
MARK DREIER, a disgraced financier currently serving 20 years in prison for fraud, on why he hatched a $380 million Ponzi scheme that ran for four years beginning in 2004
'It's not a huge shift.'
EILEEN O'NEILL, president and general manager of cable network TLC, downplaying Jon Gosselin's decision to leave the reality show Jon & Kate Plus 8, which followed the Gosselins' lives as they raised eight young children. The couple announced their separation in June; a new version of the show, retitled Kate Plus Eight, will premiere Nov. 2
What are people looking for in their lives? A sense of purpose? A sense of peace and fulfillment? Something that will make them feel good, even for a moment, before looking for the next happy moment? Or maybe some people have stopped looking altogether.
I'm learning there is tremendous hope in God - He restores all things. I ask myself, why do I what I do? My reason and purpose must be fueled by a discontentment with the status quo and a hope for something better in Jesus. A genuine hope that is not distilled by my own expectations, but seeing people and myself as new creations in need of grace every waking moment of the day.
An 18-year old who is willing to martyr himself in the name of radical Islam, right here in Indonesia, is not just "another terrorist" incident. Accepting "losses" is unacceptable. That is not the language of love and obedience. Jesus preached that the angels in heaven rejoice over one sinner who repents rather than ninety-nine righteous people getting into heaven. 1>99. He came to seek and save the lost. He charged his followers to carry on his work.
In view of "all that's going on" in this world, instead of looking at the sheer massive impossibility of the situation, I need to find hope in just one thing. One Savior. One soul at a time. One day at a time.
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