#john fischer

How we think is fundamental to who we are and what we do. To a large extent, the world will cooperate with what we think about it. If we think the world is our enemy, that Satan is hiding out for us behind every bush, that secular humanists are conspiring to influence our children and take over our country, and that everything we believe in and hold dear is threatened by the culture around us, well the – it is.

We’ve all seen these guys in airports, train stations and downtown next to the newsstand. Their workplace usually consists of two or three elevated chairs on a platform so they can work at a comfortable level. The most upscale stations have plush leather-covered stuffed chairs and brass stands for your feet that put your shoes out where the shiner can work around them easily. Shining shoes is a servant’s position that bears images of a happy-go-lucky soul, snapping his polishing cloth over shiny wing tips while cracking jokes or singing along with the radio.

“Unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” Matthew 5:20

Ever feel frustrated because you hear messages about getting closer to God and you definitely desire this for yourself, but you are inundated with so much to do already that this only makes you feel guilty because you are too busy for God? I think we all feel this at one time or another.

I have a good friend whose daughter has a fantastic singing voice and is sailing through a bunch of open doors in the music business in L.A. and Hollywood. It has thrown her, as a Christian, into a largely non-Christian world, and my friend called me today to record his appreciation for the things I have been discussing here lately in regards to our purpose-driven mission as Christians in the world.

— John Constable (1776 - 1837) in "Life and Letters of John Constable" by Charles Robert Leslie (Chapman and Hall, 1896). Quote is found in a letter that Constable wrote to his friend and fellow artist John Fisher in 1821. In the letter, Constable is discussing his views on landscape painting, and he argues that the artist should not be afraid to paint ugly things, because the right use of light, shade, and perspective can make even the most ordinary object beautiful. (via Alive on All Channels)