One Road

"He used often to say there was only one Road; that it was like a great river: it's springs were at every doorstep and every path was it's tributary. 'It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door,' he used to say. 'You step into the Road, and if you don't keep your feet, there is no telling where you might be swept off to.'"
Frodo quoting Bilbo Baggins

The Lord of the Rings

When you step outside today, where will your path lead you?

Which paths will you follow? Those that are safe, secure and boring -- or will you go off the beaten path and do something new and different? Will you see the cross lying beside the road and pick it up, accepting your mandate, or will you leave it lying there, thinking that someone else needs to handle that chore?

Will you plant good seeds, anticipating the harvest?

What good deeds will you do today?

Purpose

"If you have a purpose in which you can believe, there's no end to the amount of things you can accomplish."

Marian Anderson

On this day in 1939, Marian Anderson, African-American opera singer, performed at the Lincoln Memorial. She couldn't sing at Constitution Hall because she was not white.

On January 7, 1955, Ms Anderson became the first Black American to sing at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York. According to Times magazine, here were seven curtain calls.

Modern American Poetry: About Marian Anderson and Her Lincoln Memorial Concert

http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/s_z/taggard/anderson.htm

The Glory of Christianity

"The glory of Christianity is to conquer by forgiveness."

William Blake

RIP Rev. King

"A man who won't die for something is not fit to live."
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

He was murdered while following his God-given belief that all men truly are created equal. Because of Rev. Dr. King and his fellow fighters in the battle for Civil Rights, we can live in the same neighborhoods, go to the same schools, eat in the same restaurants, even marry our Brother or Sister of Color. The battle is not over, but his participation ended on April 4, 1968.

RIP Rev. King. I know that the Lord welcomed you Home, saying "Well done, my child. Well done."

Crab Apple Seeds

"Every thought is a seed. If you plant crab apples, don't count on harvesting Golden Delicious."

Bill Meyer

Now that's a thought to keep close. If my life sucks, what is it I'm doing that makes it so bad? Is it my negative attitude, those crab apple seeds that I planted, that's leading to a harvest of sour, bitter apples?

Today is a good day to plant strawberries -- sweet, juicy and delicious -- and see what harvest I reap in return.

Missing a Day

"If you don't think every day is a good day, just try missing one."

Cavett Robert

Life is already too short, I don't have time to have bad days.

The Art of Peace

"One does not need buildings, money, power, or status to practice the Art of Peace. Heaven is right where you are standing, and that is the place to train."

Morihei Ueshiba

Stop looking for pie in the sky, bye and bye.

Start building your little piece of Heaven right where you are today.

Whether you live in the city or the country, a house or an apartment, the Lord is with you everywhere. Keep planning for the future, but start working toward it today, using what you already have to make your own Heaven on Earth.

Women's Equality

"Women hold up half the sky."

Mao Tse-Tung

I don't have to agree with Mao Tse-Tung's politics and policies to recognize the truth of his words.

Teamwork is the key to success.

The minute you think of a woman as less than yourself, the minute you disrespect the abilities and strengths of your grandmothers, mother, sister, daughter, then you're a failure in life.
Oh, you might think you're all good.
You're wrong.

Choose Change?

"Nothing external to you has any power over you."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Emerson was right, unless you determine to change yourself, nothing external can change you UNLESS you allow it. Only you can change what's inside yourself.

You were blessed with free will and then allowed to run with it.

Will you choose to change? Or will you remain in your own comfortable (or maybe uncomfortable) space. Will you set out to change your world?

According to His Will

"And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us."

1 John 5:14

The Bible

This is so often misinterpreted in church.

There is a teaching of "name it, claim it" that has NO basis in the Bible.

This verse tells us that if our prayer is ACCORDING TO HIS WILL, he hears us. It's very plain that just because we want a new car, a new job, a new house, that if it's not according to His will, we can ask until the world ends, and He's not going to answer that prayer. In fact, he's not going to hear it.

Every prayer is answered.

Silence is an answer.

Refuel

"I have to be alone very often. I'd be quite happy if I spent from Saturday night until Monday morning alone in my apartment. That's how I refuel."

Audrey Hepburn

Just because you're alone, it doesn't mean that you're lonely.

Everyone needs some "down time" and the busier your life is, the more you need quiet time where you can relax, read, listen to music or dance to the inner music that fuels the rhythm of your heart.

Cleverness

"Cleverness is not wisdom."

Euripides

Just because you're clever, quick-thinking and believe that you're smarter than everyone around you, it doesn't make you wise. Every teenager can claim those qualities, and yet teens have so, so much to learn.

Age and experience, leavened with plenty of mistakes, along with a willingness to learn -- now that makes you wise.

Eventually.

Psalms 1

Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.
Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.

Psalms 1:1-6

The Bible, King James Version

Do You Lack Ambition?

"Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition."

Timothy Leary

God's Trust

"I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much."
Mother Theresa

On Writing and the Great Spirit

"For me writing has become prayers that say, `Great Spirit, return to us our freedom, our land, and our lives. We are thankful for the present from which we learn how to be thankful for the past, and how to be hopeful for the future.'" Barney Bush, Shawnee

http://www.whitebison.org/

Women Are Deep

"Women are considered deep - why? Because one can never discover any bottom to them. Women are not even shallow."

Friedrich Nietzsche

Women's History Month

"If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to forment a rebellion and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation."
Abigail Adams

First Lady of the United States, 1776

About Changing Others

“Consider how hard it is to change yourself and you’ll understand what little chance you have in trying to change others.”

Jacob M. Braude

Allah and Peace

"I believe in the religion of Islam. I believe in Allah and peace."

Muhammad Ali

Respect Me

"I'm not concerned with your liking or disliking me... All I ask is that you respect me as a human being."

Jackie Robinson

Freedom

"Freedom is never given; it is won."

A. Philip Randolph

Starless Midnight

"I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality.... I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word."

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The American Tapestry

"The African-American experience is one of the most important threads in the American tapestry."

Bill Frist

A Minimum of Reason

"Racism is man's gravest threat to man - the maximum of hatred for a minimum of reason."

Abraham Joshua Heschel

On Slavery

"Enslave the liberty of but one human being and the liberties of the world are put in peril."

William Lloyd Garrison

On a Plantation

"You can be up to your boobies in white satin, with gardenias in your hair and no sugar cane for miles, but you can still be working on a plantation."

Billie Holiday

Defining Myself

"Defining myself, as opposed to being defined by others, is one of the most difficult challenges I face."

Carol Moseley-Braun

Starving Men

"Men can starve from a lack of self-realization as much as they can from a lack of bread."

Richard Wright

Shallow Understanding

"Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will."

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Letter From Birmingham City Jail