1.
Uselessness of worry
WORRYING about your hard work does not make
the work any easier, and it only makes you
less strong and courageous for doing it. WORRYING
about some misfortune that you cannot help
makes the misfortune no less and only renders
its endurance harder. Thus far even common
sense goes. The religion goes further, and
assures us that even the hard things, the
obstacles and the hindrances, become blessings
if we meet them in faith, stepping stones
upward, disciplinary experiences in which
we grow ever into nobler, stronger life.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
2. ON LOOKING FOR SLIGHTS
We must look to ourselves and take heed how
we receive the acts ,the words, and the manners
to others . If we are proud, and are always
on the watch for slights and unfriendly hints
and little hurts, we can find plenty of them.
We need, therefore, to cultivate the spirit
of humility in all our intercourse with others.
We need to learn patience, forbearance, longsuffering,
meekness, and forgiveness; in a world, love-
love that thinketh no evil. Then we shall
never be suspicious, never be exacting, never
demand for our “rights”. We shall
endure even intended wrongs patiently, sweetly,
with true meekness.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
3. MAKING PERFECT WORK
“Trifles make perfection”, replied
the artist to one who asked him why he spent
so much time in giving the little finishing
touches to his statue. There can be no perfection
in any kind of workmanship unless attention
is paid to the minutest details, the merest
trifles of construction or finishing. One
smallest flaw or incompleteness left in the
work, in any part of it, leaves a blemish
on the finished endeavor. Life is like a mosaic,
and each smallest stone must be polished and
set with greatest care or the piece will not
at last be prefect. One whose daily life is
careless is always weak in character. But
one, who habitually walks in right paths,
no matter how small and apparently trifling
the things may be, grows strong and noble.
Trifles make perfection.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
4. True success
Full hands at the end of a life do
not always tell of true success. Earthy failure
is of times higher success in God’s
eyes than what men regards as success. Scars
of wounds gotten in conflict and strife with
sin are more splendid marks of honors, when
the hands are held up before God, than diamonds
and gold and crowns gained by yielding in
life conflicts. Strive to get your hands filled
with the invisible things of God’s heavenly
kingdom. Fight the battle of life heroically,
and never mind the scars. Better have wounded
and empty hands that are clean than hands
that are full and yet are stained with sin.Quote
fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller, D.D.
5. The safest place The safest place in all
this world is ever the place of duty. God’s
wings are over it. God’s place guards
it. It is said that at the center of the cyclone
there is a spot where there is almost perfect
calm. A leaf there is scarcely stirred, and
a baby would lie there unharmed. So at the
center of every great peril in the life is
a spot of holy calm where even the feeblest
would not be harmed. It is the place of duty,
of obedience, of doing of God’s will.
He who stays there amid peril and trial is
perfectly safe. No storm smites him; no plague
comes nigh his dwelling. The way of duty is
always a place of absolute safety. None of
sin’s ways are safe.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
6. What
we owe to Friendship
We
do not know much we owe to our true and pure
friends- how much they add to our joy, what
they do toward the formation and the adornment
and enrichment of our character. We know not
what touches, delicate and beautiful, on the
canvas of our soul there will be forever,
which the fingers of a friend have left there.
There will be silver thread in every life-web
when finished, woven into the fabric by the
pure friendship of many days. How important
that only the true, the worthy, those with
clean hands and good lives, be taken as friends!
For an evil companionship will put stained
and soiled threads into the web.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
7. The moral power of “YES”
It is important that we learn to say YES when
yes is the true answer. To all invitations
upward to truer, deeper, richer, nobler life
we should instantly answer YES. All calls
to duty, to holy service, to noble deeds,
to heroic battle, we should meet with glad
YES. While we instantly shut our hearts against
all that is impure and unholy, all thoughts
that would tarnish or stain or blight, we
should open them just as quickly to all thoughts
that are pure and true and honest and just
and lovely.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
8. Choice of Friends
We should choose friends whom we
can take into every part of our life, into
every closest communion, into every holy joy
of our heart, into every consecration and
service, in to every hope, and between whom
and us there shall never be a point at which
we shall not be in sympathy. We ought to accept
only the friendship that will bring blessing
to our lives, that will enrich our character,
that will stimulate us to better and holier
things, that will weave threads of silver
and gold into our web of life, whose every
influence will be a lasting benediction.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
9.Silence that is golden
It is easy for one to poison a person’s
mind concerning another. There is measureless
ruin wrought in this world by the slanderer.
Characters are blackened, friendships are
destroyed, jealousies are aroused, homes are
torn up, and hearts are broken. Let us never
take up an evil report and give it wing on
breath of ours. Let us never whisper an evil
thing of another. We know not where it may
end, to what it may grow, what ruin it may
work. Words once spoken can never be gotten
back again. We had better learn to keep the
door of our lips locked and say no evil ever
of anyone. This is a silence we shall never
regret.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
10.
Growing through Habits
One whose life is always weak; but
one who habitually walks in the paths of uprightness
and obedience grows strong in character. Exercise
develops all the powers of his being. Doing
well continually adds to one’s capacity
for doing well. Victorious in trial or trouble
puts ever-new strength in to the heart. The
habit of faith in the darkness prepares for
stronger faith. Habits of obedience make one
immovable in one’s loyalty to duty.
We can never over – estimate the importance
of life’s habits; they lead our growth
of character in whatever way they tend.
Quote
fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller, D.D.
11. Fault- Finding It is
strange how oblivious we can be of our own
faults and of the blemishes in our own character,
and how clearly we can see the faults and
blemishes of other people. Finding so much
wrong in others is not a flattering indication
of what our hearts contain. We ought to be
very quite and modest in criticizing others,
for in most cases we are just telling the
world what our own faults are. Before we turn
our microscopes on others to search out the
unbeautiful things in them, we had better
look in our mirrors to see whether or not
we are free ourselves from the blemishes we
would reprove in our neighbour. There is a
wise bit of Scripture which bids us get clear
of the beams in our own eyes, that we may
see to pick the motes out of the eyes of others.
Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R. Miller,
D.D.
12. Our Clumsy Hand
Most of us are awkward in doing most
loving deeds. We must learn to be patient,
therefore, with people’s awkwardness
and clumsiness. Their hearts may be gentler
than their minds. Do not misinterpret their
actions, finding enmity where purest love
is, indifference where affection is warmest,
slights where honour was meant. Away with
your petty suspicions! Be patient even with
people’s faults. Let us train ourselves
to find the best always of people and their
actions, and to find some beauty in every
thing. Quote fromIn Green PasturesBy, J.R.
Miller, D.D.
Little Writers
