1905
We are to live in the world pouring into it the fragrance of the love of Christ. There is a legend which says that when Jesus arose and walked out from the tomb in the garden white lilies blossomed where he stepped, so that wherever he went there was beauty and fragrance. So should it be wherever we go, if we are Christ's. We are not to shut ourselves indoors, but are to go out into the world to carry blessing and good among its many needs.
Live for To-day
We are writing with a diamond on a rock. We are writing the Rock of Remembrance with invisible ink. We are accumulating for the future. What we do is done forever. The thoughts we think, the words we speak, the kindly and unkindly acts of daily life, we must face them again. Take heed, therefore. Live for eternity. And the way to live for eternity is to concentrate all the energies of life upon the discharge of present duty. Therefore, live for to-day. — D. J. Burrell, D. D.
Showing posts with label flowers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label flowers. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Thursday, June 14, 2007
The Danger of Charity — Completely Pauperized
1910
Albert W. Hebbard, New York's charity expert, said at a recent dinner:
"The great danger of charity is its pauperizing effect. This effect must be avoided, or the recipients will all become Jack Hanches.
"Jack Hanch, on the score of bad health never worked, and the pastor of the Methodist church, a man whose heart sometimes outran his head, sent the idler and his family weekly gifts of food and clothing — supported the whole crew, in fact.
"A church visitor, after listening to Jack's complaints one day, said:
" 'Yes, of course, you have had bad health, we know that; but one thing at least you ought to be thankful for, and that is our pastor's kindness in sending you all this bread and meat and jelly and blankets and so on. Don't you think it is good of him to look after you so well?"
" 'Good of him?' said Jack, impatiently. 'Why, what's he for?' "
Contented Heart Brings Cheer
This world is only a place of pilgrimage, but after all there is a good deal of cheer on the journey, if it is made with a contented heart. — Henry Van Dyke.
The Unlucky Mandrake
From time immemorial the mandrake has been associated with enchantments, and has ever been believed to be one of the most powerful charms of witches. Mr. Conway in a paper on "Mystic Trees and Flowers," states that "by popular superstitions in some places it is said to be perpetually watched over by Satan, and if it be pulled up at certain holy times and with certain invocations, the evil spirit will appear to do the bidding of the petitioner." (See Genesis 30:14ff).
Albert W. Hebbard, New York's charity expert, said at a recent dinner:
"The great danger of charity is its pauperizing effect. This effect must be avoided, or the recipients will all become Jack Hanches.
"Jack Hanch, on the score of bad health never worked, and the pastor of the Methodist church, a man whose heart sometimes outran his head, sent the idler and his family weekly gifts of food and clothing — supported the whole crew, in fact.
"A church visitor, after listening to Jack's complaints one day, said:
" 'Yes, of course, you have had bad health, we know that; but one thing at least you ought to be thankful for, and that is our pastor's kindness in sending you all this bread and meat and jelly and blankets and so on. Don't you think it is good of him to look after you so well?"
" 'Good of him?' said Jack, impatiently. 'Why, what's he for?' "
Contented Heart Brings Cheer
This world is only a place of pilgrimage, but after all there is a good deal of cheer on the journey, if it is made with a contented heart. — Henry Van Dyke.
The Unlucky Mandrake
From time immemorial the mandrake has been associated with enchantments, and has ever been believed to be one of the most powerful charms of witches. Mr. Conway in a paper on "Mystic Trees and Flowers," states that "by popular superstitions in some places it is said to be perpetually watched over by Satan, and if it be pulled up at certain holy times and with certain invocations, the evil spirit will appear to do the bidding of the petitioner." (See Genesis 30:14ff).
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Things To Learn in Life
1907
Learn to laugh. A good laugh is better than medicine.
Learn to attend strictly to your own business — a very important point.
Learn how to tell a story. A well-told story is as welcome as a sunbeam in a sick room.
Learn to stop grumbling. If you cannot see any good in this world keep the bad to yourself.
Learn to keep your own troubles to yourself. The world is too busy to care for your ills and sorrows.
Learn to greet your friends with a smile. They carry too many frowns in their own hearts to be bothered with any of yours.
Learn to hide your aches and pains under a pleasant smile. No one wants to know if you have the toothache or headache.
Bread and Lilies
The Chinese have a saying: "If you have two loaves of bread, sell one and buy a lily. It is not the body alone that needs to be fed. Mind, heart and soul grow hungry, and many a time they are famishing when the larder is full. There are homes where the lilies are entirely crowded out by loaves, where there is no room for beauty or enjoyment, or even for love, to grow, because of the mad scramble after wealth. Fewer loaves and more lilies — less of the rush after material good, and more time for the gracious and beautiful things God has placed within reach of us all — would make happier and nobler lives.
Learn to laugh. A good laugh is better than medicine.
Learn to attend strictly to your own business — a very important point.
Learn how to tell a story. A well-told story is as welcome as a sunbeam in a sick room.
Learn to stop grumbling. If you cannot see any good in this world keep the bad to yourself.
Learn to keep your own troubles to yourself. The world is too busy to care for your ills and sorrows.
Learn to greet your friends with a smile. They carry too many frowns in their own hearts to be bothered with any of yours.
Learn to hide your aches and pains under a pleasant smile. No one wants to know if you have the toothache or headache.
Bread and Lilies
The Chinese have a saying: "If you have two loaves of bread, sell one and buy a lily. It is not the body alone that needs to be fed. Mind, heart and soul grow hungry, and many a time they are famishing when the larder is full. There are homes where the lilies are entirely crowded out by loaves, where there is no room for beauty or enjoyment, or even for love, to grow, because of the mad scramble after wealth. Fewer loaves and more lilies — less of the rush after material good, and more time for the gracious and beautiful things God has placed within reach of us all — would make happier and nobler lives.
Monday, May 7, 2007
The First Easter
1917
Rosily dawned the day in the far east. On the shore the cool waves broke gently, fluttering foamy drops on the yellow sand. Away from the rocky stretches of green, lilies bloomed slender and tall, while with cups curving to catch the errant little breeze which carried their sweetness beyond the hills. In the stony crevices wild flowers glinted out from dew wet leaves. Half hidden by pale lily blooms, a dark stone guarded the entrance to a cave among the rocks.
Early in the dawning Sabbath glow, two women, gentle voiced and sorrowing, came slowly down a flowered path, bearing in their arms perfumed napkins and precious spices in carved boxes. They were clad in flowing gray garments, and their heads were bent in meek weeping.
As they drew nearer to the lily sentineled tomb, the one who walked ahead raised her eyes, dark with pain, to the open doorway, and quick wonder lighted their depths, and she turned, whispering: "Ah! Mary Magdalene, the stone already is rolled away. He hath done this thing."
With eager steps they left the growing day and entered the darkened sepulcher. But as they went they saw two angels seated at the tomb, two men with strong, glorified faces and glad, bright eyes, and their robes were bright as if the sunlight were shining through. The two Marys paused, startled, awed by the great light.
Then the mother of Christ knelt low and wept but a voice thrillingly tender called to her saying, "Woman, why weepest thou?"
And she lifted her eyes at the words and answered softly, "Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him."
But the voice came again, glad and full of rejoicing: "Fear not ye, for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified He is not here, for he is risen!"
Wondering, the mother gazed, her starry eyes searching the brightened sepulcher. Then she rose and walked with Mary Magdalene from the place.
Descending the path in the golden sunlight, her gray robes brushed against the uplifted flowers, dew flecked, wondrous sweet. Stooping, she bent her head to the shining lilies "Live," she murmured, "as expression of the divine beauty of the Son of Man, as examples of his wondrous mercy and boundless love and as the symbol of his resurrection. Henceforth you shall be the flower of purity and spiritual beauty of the holy Easter day, of the great new life which floods the earth through the power of the Son of God." — Patricia Gray in Philadelphia North American.
Rosily dawned the day in the far east. On the shore the cool waves broke gently, fluttering foamy drops on the yellow sand. Away from the rocky stretches of green, lilies bloomed slender and tall, while with cups curving to catch the errant little breeze which carried their sweetness beyond the hills. In the stony crevices wild flowers glinted out from dew wet leaves. Half hidden by pale lily blooms, a dark stone guarded the entrance to a cave among the rocks.
Early in the dawning Sabbath glow, two women, gentle voiced and sorrowing, came slowly down a flowered path, bearing in their arms perfumed napkins and precious spices in carved boxes. They were clad in flowing gray garments, and their heads were bent in meek weeping.
As they drew nearer to the lily sentineled tomb, the one who walked ahead raised her eyes, dark with pain, to the open doorway, and quick wonder lighted their depths, and she turned, whispering: "Ah! Mary Magdalene, the stone already is rolled away. He hath done this thing."
With eager steps they left the growing day and entered the darkened sepulcher. But as they went they saw two angels seated at the tomb, two men with strong, glorified faces and glad, bright eyes, and their robes were bright as if the sunlight were shining through. The two Marys paused, startled, awed by the great light.
Then the mother of Christ knelt low and wept but a voice thrillingly tender called to her saying, "Woman, why weepest thou?"
And she lifted her eyes at the words and answered softly, "Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him."
But the voice came again, glad and full of rejoicing: "Fear not ye, for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified He is not here, for he is risen!"
Wondering, the mother gazed, her starry eyes searching the brightened sepulcher. Then she rose and walked with Mary Magdalene from the place.
Descending the path in the golden sunlight, her gray robes brushed against the uplifted flowers, dew flecked, wondrous sweet. Stooping, she bent her head to the shining lilies "Live," she murmured, "as expression of the divine beauty of the Son of Man, as examples of his wondrous mercy and boundless love and as the symbol of his resurrection. Henceforth you shall be the flower of purity and spiritual beauty of the holy Easter day, of the great new life which floods the earth through the power of the Son of God." — Patricia Gray in Philadelphia North American.
What We See in Easter
1917
We see in Easter not merely a memorial of a long gone past, but a witness to the truth that the grave is always empty, that the living are never to be sought among the dead and that a divine presence ever walks the earth, the companion now, as then, of those whose eager questioning needs answer and whose earnest but perhaps almost despairing hope needs inspiration which only He can give, says the Rev. Dr. Lyman Abbott.
Flowers in The Churches
Easter is essentially Christ's day. And Christ loved beautiful, simple, reverent things. For that reason, keep your churches simple, beautiful and reverent. Christ would not have enjoyed tight bunches of flowers with their poor little stems all choked up. He would have wanted them to be loosely, gracefully, happily placed. Christ would not have loved the rare orchids and the hot-house palms better than the field daises and the nodding daffodils and the shy arbutus.
Trim your churches with an eye to color and a sense of grouping, and, above all, the spirit of love in your heart.
And your church home, blessed by God's flowers, cannot fail to be beautiful and simple and reverent. — Margaret E. Sangster, in the Christian Herald.
We see in Easter not merely a memorial of a long gone past, but a witness to the truth that the grave is always empty, that the living are never to be sought among the dead and that a divine presence ever walks the earth, the companion now, as then, of those whose eager questioning needs answer and whose earnest but perhaps almost despairing hope needs inspiration which only He can give, says the Rev. Dr. Lyman Abbott.
Flowers in The Churches
Easter is essentially Christ's day. And Christ loved beautiful, simple, reverent things. For that reason, keep your churches simple, beautiful and reverent. Christ would not have enjoyed tight bunches of flowers with their poor little stems all choked up. He would have wanted them to be loosely, gracefully, happily placed. Christ would not have loved the rare orchids and the hot-house palms better than the field daises and the nodding daffodils and the shy arbutus.
Trim your churches with an eye to color and a sense of grouping, and, above all, the spirit of love in your heart.
And your church home, blessed by God's flowers, cannot fail to be beautiful and simple and reverent. — Margaret E. Sangster, in the Christian Herald.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
Easter — Greater Profusion of Flowers This Year Than Usual
Pittsburgh, 1889
Easter Eggs and Flowers
Greater Profusion of the Latter Than Usual
Many Churches Will be Tastefully Decorated To-Morrow — Florists Have Their Hands Full With Order for Bouquets.
Easter, the goddess of spring, has been extremely kind to her children this year. She has chased away Jack Frost with his lingering touches of icy coldness that blast the early flowers. Old Sol's beams have searched out the sleeping bulbs and roots and awakened them from their slumbers. At the voice of Easter they have burst forth in abundance with all the beauties of a new birth, an emblem of the resurrection of Christ.
It is to the Germans that we owe the beautiful custom of giving flowers at Easter-tide, and their first general application as an emblem of the resurrection. To-morrow the two cities and their suburbs will observe the custom as has been rarely done before. The day will be a feast of flowers as well as eggs.
Owing to the mild winter the market is full of flowers, and the florists have been busy for months back preparing to fill their orders. Flowers are more reasonable in price than for some years at Easter-tide, and owing to this fact, many will invest in floral offerings this year that have not done so heretofore. Many of the churches will be prettily decorated to-morrow, and judging from the numerous orders for bouquets, many a fair damsel will wear beautiful emblems of Easter morn.
Easter flowers include all flowers that bloom at this particular season, but queen among them all the Easter lily retains its place. Following in its train come the other lilies of various species, the lily of the valley and the common wood lily. The latter will be a specialty in the Easter market.
The narcissus and the hyacinth will each have its place among the flowers of Easter. Among the specialties forced by some of the florists are the cypripedium spectabile and cypripedium barbatum, two species of orchids. Several other novelties are on the market for fastidious buyers. The florists' stores will doubtless present a busy scene to-day.
—The Pittsburgh Post, Pittsburgh, PA, April 20, 1889, page 2.
Easter Eggs and Flowers
Greater Profusion of the Latter Than Usual
Many Churches Will be Tastefully Decorated To-Morrow — Florists Have Their Hands Full With Order for Bouquets.
Easter, the goddess of spring, has been extremely kind to her children this year. She has chased away Jack Frost with his lingering touches of icy coldness that blast the early flowers. Old Sol's beams have searched out the sleeping bulbs and roots and awakened them from their slumbers. At the voice of Easter they have burst forth in abundance with all the beauties of a new birth, an emblem of the resurrection of Christ.
It is to the Germans that we owe the beautiful custom of giving flowers at Easter-tide, and their first general application as an emblem of the resurrection. To-morrow the two cities and their suburbs will observe the custom as has been rarely done before. The day will be a feast of flowers as well as eggs.
Owing to the mild winter the market is full of flowers, and the florists have been busy for months back preparing to fill their orders. Flowers are more reasonable in price than for some years at Easter-tide, and owing to this fact, many will invest in floral offerings this year that have not done so heretofore. Many of the churches will be prettily decorated to-morrow, and judging from the numerous orders for bouquets, many a fair damsel will wear beautiful emblems of Easter morn.
Easter flowers include all flowers that bloom at this particular season, but queen among them all the Easter lily retains its place. Following in its train come the other lilies of various species, the lily of the valley and the common wood lily. The latter will be a specialty in the Easter market.
The narcissus and the hyacinth will each have its place among the flowers of Easter. Among the specialties forced by some of the florists are the cypripedium spectabile and cypripedium barbatum, two species of orchids. Several other novelties are on the market for fastidious buyers. The florists' stores will doubtless present a busy scene to-day.
—The Pittsburgh Post, Pittsburgh, PA, April 20, 1889, page 2.
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