Prayer and action, therefore, can never be seen as contradictory or mutually exclusive. Prayer without action grows in powerless pietism, and action without prayer degenerates into questionable manipulation. If prayer leads us into a deeper unity with the compassionate Christ, it will always give rise to concrete acts of service. And if concrete acts of service do indeed lead us to a deeper solidarity with the poor, the hungry, the sick, the dying, and the oppressed, they will always give rise to prayer. In prayer we meet Christ, and in him all human suffering. In service we meet people, and in them the suffering Christ.
…Henri J. M. Nouwen (1932-1996), Compassion [1982]
Who is it that has helped you most? Has it not been those who believed in you? Perhaps there may be few such left. The light of expectation may have died out of the most friendly and hopeful eyes; and you yourself may have lost heart. Ah! but there is still One whose faith in you has never wavered. And how wonderful it is that that one should be Jesus Christ!… It was a wonderful dream God dreamed, Christ says, when He created you; it was a stately being that was in His mind when you were fashioned; and I can make you all He meant that you should be.
…A. J. Gossip (1873-1954), The Galilean Accent [1926]
Never do anything through strife, or emulation, or vainglory. Never do anything in order to excel other people, but in order to please God, and because it is His will that you should do everything in the best manner that you can.
…William Law (1686-1761), A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life [1728]
Meditation: All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
— 2 Timothy 3:16,17 (NIV)
If the [Incarnation] happened, it was the central event in the history of the Earth葉he very thing that the whole story has been about. Since it happened only once, it is by Hume’s standards infinitely improbable. But then, the whole history of the Earth has also happened only once: is it therefore incredible? Hence the difficulty, which weighs upon Christian and atheist alike, of estimating the probability of the Incarnation. It is like asking whether the existence of nature herself is intrinsically probable. That is why it is easier to argue, on historical grounds, that the Incarnation actually occurred than to show, on philosophical grounds, the probability of its occurrence.
