Sublime

This book gives wonderful advice on putting perspective on life’s bumps and bruises. The Christian life brings suffering, pain and even persecution. Yet the believer never suffers alone. The presence of Christ Jesus brings joy even in the midst of suffering. Read Philippians to see some of the many ways God shows himself faithful in hard times.

Paul almost single-handedly spread Christianity throughout the Roman Empire. His secret was a focused life. He said, “I am focusing all my energies on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead.”14

If you fail to fulfill your God-given mission on earth, you will have wasted the life God gave you.

We cannot be truly productive unless all our activity stems from love for God and the acknowledgment that he is sovereign over all our plans.

In my own life I have noticed that God tests my faith through problems, tests my hope by how I handle possessions, and tests my love through people.

The goal is to see people restored to being what God created them to be: people who understand that they are created in the image of God with the gifts, abilities, and capacity to make decisions and to effect change in the world around them; and people who steward their lives, communities, resources, and relationships in order to bring glory to

a life of doing good for others is actually the most exciting life, for God calls us to find ways of doing good with a sense of creativity, competence, and adventure.