Quotes about Lessons

Pearls of wisdom are better than necklaces of diamonds.

in this book I want to address a question that I think is commonly in the minds of Christian people when they read the Acts of the Apostles: what can we learn from these people who turned the world upside down in so short a space of time?

Hope" in this sense is not a feeling. It is a virtue. You have to practice it, like a difficult piece on the violin or a tricky shot at tennis. You practice the virtue of hope through worship and prayer, through invoking the One God, through reading and reimagining the scriptural story, and through consciously holding the unknown future within the unshakable divine promises. Saul had learned to do this. Paul the Apostle, much later, would have to learn the same lesson all over again.

It is that they learn to think of themselves as characters in the story of God and his people, whose earlier chapters set out characteristic lessons to be mastered by those who find themselves in the later chapters. But the overall point is this: they are in the same story, not a different story which happens to be parallel to another earlier one.

Running taught me valuable lessons. In cross-country competition, training counted more than intrinsic ability, and I could compensate for a lack of natural aptitude with diligence and discipline. I applied this in everything I did. Even as a student, I saw many young men who had great natural ability, but who did not have the self-discipline and patience to build on their endowment.

When we learn the wrong lessons of history, evil is reinforced rather than restrained- particularly when we use the injuries of the past to serve the interests of the future and ignore the injustices of the present.

One generation shall commend your works to another" (v. 4).

and that you may tell your children and grandchildren how severely I dealt with the Egyptians when I performed miraculous signs among them, so that all of you may know that I am the LORD.”

Remember the days of old; consider the years long past. Ask your father, and he will tell you, your elders, and they will inform you.

if only to teach warfare to the subsequent generations of Israel, especially to those who had not known it formerly:

Please inquire of past generations and consider the discoveries of their fathers.

that we have heard and known and our fathers have relayed to us.