Craig D. Lounsbrough Quotes - Page 10

When wisdom gives way to whimsy and ethics fall to excitement, it is highly likely that the ground beneath me will ‘give way’ and it is I who will ‘fall.

Love knows nothing of short hauls because it has committed itself for the long haul.

In many instances, the failures of my greatest schemes ultimately lead to the fulfillment of my greatest successes. Therefore, God will allow our most cherished dreams to perish so that we might turn and seek out His most cherished plans.

Christmas is everything that God would do, and nothing that we would imagine Him doing.

Although I regularly convince myself otherwise, because I aim at something doesn’t necessarily mean I have a target.

Men can dig wells, but they can’t create water.

One of the most terrifying questions of all might be, ‘Will I unleash myself to live before death unleashes me from the ability to be unleashed?’ And in retrospect, maybe it’s not the question that’s terrifying. Maybe what’s terrifying is the answer.

Christmas is God being relentless to the point that He would die in that relentlessness.

To pretend is to do nothing more than imagine life as something wonderful so that we don’t have to incur the pain that it takes to actually make life wonderful.

To be ignorant of the sacrifices of others that yielded the blessings I enjoy leaves me exchanging the reality of 'blessing' for the assumption of 'entitlement.' And once that happens, I will forfeit the reality of the former which will destroy the assumption of the latter. And in what terribly dark place will that now leave me?

Disappointment focuses on ‘what is not,’ and completely misses the far greater reality of ‘what now is.

The ‘fact’ of my actions frequently collide with the ‘fiction’ of my words. And at what point will I live what I say, so I will avoid what I do?

Happenstance is the myth of the simple mind, for it is the deliberate genius of God that what appears entirely disjointed always reveals itself to be stunningly seamless. And it is in reflecting on such stunning ingenuity that our faith becomes seamless.

To dream only of what is ‘possible’ is to be fooled into believing that one is dreaming in the first place.

We can breathe in the sweet scent of a tepid summer’s meadow after the kiss of a warm rain, and in the very same moment we can stand utterly breathless underneath the expanse of untold galaxies that breech the very edges of the universe itself. Such are the privileges we enjoy because of God’s unimaginable imagination.

Once I realize that the tune I’m whistling in my head is the theme that’s driving my heart, I suddenly realize that the most important question I can ask is, “What are the lyrics?

If I have found my journey to be a maddening tangle of wandering ‘rabbit-trails,’ a labyrinth of incessantly circular passages to nowhere and back, and a plethora of assorted ‘dead-ends’ fraudulently disguised as paths of great promise, it can only be because I have mindlessly exchanged God’s compass for mine. Therefore, it would appear that another exchange might be in order.

As I contemplate a relationship with God, I find that I’m afraid to ride on the coattails of the infinite. But what I fear more than that is spending my life in the coat closet.

My life is a series of invitations accepted and invitations rejected, and the place I now find myself is often a result of accepting the wrong invitations and rejecting the right ones.

Choosing a life of safety is safely choosing something other than life.

Dreams are ideas where the collar has been removed and the leash has been thrown away.

Can anything be called an achievement if it does not simultaneously enhance the life of someone other than the one who has done the achieving?

If I get up just one less time than the number of times I’ve been knocked down, I have done one of the most devastating things possible; I have halted my life at that very spot.

Love never lives on a one-way street, for it will always come back up the road bigger than how we had sent it down the road.

The only thing I have to wait for to change my life is my attitude.

Simply giving something ‘a shot’ is not giving something our ‘best,’ for our best is made up of as many ‘shots’ as it takes in order to be our best.

Sacrifice is a passion that unleashes everything away from us so that it can be drawn into everyone around us.

That which I cannot hold is that which I can treasure the most because it affords me no burden other than to enjoy it.

We want a fresh start only because we didn’t sufficiently care for the last fresh start.

The dark might be dark, but at least we don’t have to look at ourselves when we’re standing in it.

If we ignorantly act to solely serve our agenda, we’re simply slogging around in the egocentric and brackish backwaters of selfishness. Any response that comes out of that kind of cesspool will be vulgarly irresponsible.

Greed is the fast-track to poverty.

If I choose to take the pen from God and write the story of my life without Him, I better have plenty of erasers and a whole lot of white-out. Better yet, I should invest in a good shredder.

Today’s ashes are tomorrow’s soil.

Comfort is not a goal that I seek, rather it is a place that I hide.

What I would be quite wise to remember is that ‘pieces’ are not the end of what was, but the beginning of what is to be.

If I can’t quite figure out what an ego is, all I have to do is look for the thing that’s killing itself in the very act of feeding itself.

This is the wonder of Christmas, that in the solitary form of an impoverished infant God has handed me everything that I could never create so that I can be everything that I could never be.

In reality, is being sedentary a choice to run from our calling by not running after it?

My rather arrogant attitude deludes me into believing that my ability to understand something is the criteria for its legitimacy. And if there’s one thing in my life that I don’t understand yet I allow to be legitimate, thinking this way would most certainly be it.

To intentionally pass on opportunity is to intentionally pass on living.

We need to know that our limits do not define our limitations. And an empty tomb does exactly that.

In a relationship with God, our most secret places once thickly cloaked and meticulously hidden away now stand before us utterly and entirely exposed. And it may be that this dreaded fear is the single thing that keeps us an arm’s length from God, and forever a single step away from His blessings.

God emptied out that first tomb so that He could turn around and empty out me.

I am most thankful for what I don’t have, for had my life’s wish list been filled in the manner I had chosen I would be steeped in meaningless trinkets verses bathed in God’s treasures.

A label locks me into a definition that people use to control me. A vision graces me with an idea that serves to release me.

And so, it is always the case that the past is irreparably land-locked, and the future has yet to land. And here we are, living out our lives on the precariously thin line which separates the two.

If I am not touching a life, I am not touching life.

Too often we want to take stands to elevate us rather than elevate a cause.

Thankfulness is an attitude of possibilities, not an attitude of liabilities.

Is my faith so terribly pathetic that I have diminished God to the point that I doubt His ability to survive in the very world that He came to save? Indeed, I have done exactly that. And all I need to do to beat that mentality is to remember that a baby born in a manger with every disadvantage imaginable stills lives today.

In our frenzied attempts to catch up with life, we run right past it. Once we have run past it, what we are in reality attempting to catch is ourselves.

What I allow into my head finds its way to my heart, which is a porthole to my soul. Therefore, I might be wise to consider the state of my soul, and then walk this process backwards.

I pray that I am never so foolishly naive or roguishly pompous to think that I can be the captain of my own ship, for if God is not at the helm my ship will soon be at the bottom.

Apathy is giving up when we need to get up.

I must be ever so careful to remember that my pain is a precious salve that when used in the service of others can heal a thousand wounds and more. And I must likewise remember that if I do not use it as such, I have done nothing more than wound myself yet again.

Have we ever thought to consider that the need to be loved grows because of its absence, but that love also grows because of its presence? And does this not speak to the power of love?

Contradictions are the impossible chasms that create forever separations. God is the forever bridge that creates impossible reunions.

To embrace the message of Christmas is to throw off my hedonistic rebellion and bow before the chafing reality that I can't save myself, and in that very act to be suddenly taken aback in that I've stumbled upon the very freedom I've longed for in the very place I'd least expected it.

Abundant living is realizing that life is a privilege whether it’s adhering to our scripts or not.