In the modern Christian attempt to take a stand as Christ did, and maybe for others, win the approval of the world, the Christian will often think that it consists of targeting and demoralizing fellow Christians and only fellow Christians. It is one thing to stand against religious hypocrisy when one sees it, but it is another to go on snorting at anything or anyone who might seem 'too Christian' to us. The irony is that by doing this we are further advocating hypocrisy and 'half-hearted Christians'.

I think the skin revolution for women, I will call it, really all started with Mariah Carey. Madonna was pretty risqué too, but she was pretty much always known as a "bad girl." Mariah was a good girl, supposedly Christian, turning very bad, in the late 90's. So then, all the other little girls and teens and women across America thought it would be ok for them to "come out" too essentially, or flaunt whatever they had. Modesty went completely out the window for many women, starting in the late 90's.

Something snapped into my thinking then. Told is something that has been, something that is, and something that will be. Told was a noun and a verb. He was an active author. He was Told, he is Told, and he will be Told forever. Only we were in a time frame—contained as Words of a book. Time was his invented concept to display his answer to the problem of Luman. Time is what allowed something to be told—Told. I felt a rapid surge of excitement. “We can’t make anything more worth telling than him.

the rest of the guardians are all checking out the explosion," I realised. Pieces began coming together-including Lissa's lack of surprise over the commotion. "Oh no. You had Christian blow up ancient Moroi artifacts." "Of course not," said Eddie. He seemed shocked that I would have suggested such an atrocity. "Other fire users would be able to tell if he did." "Well, that's something," I said. I should have had more faith in their sanity. Or maybe not. "We used C4," explained Mikhail. "Where on earth did you-

The Flight of Providence To do what is right, we tryAgainst the odds, we tryYou are not like us, they sayStand downWe fight, and only God knowsFor our right to existFor the truthWe are manifest for this hourWe will not be silentYou are not like us, they sayStand downWe fight, and only God knowsFor our right to tryFor our right to knowWe are the human raceWe will not be silentYou are not like us, they sayStand downWe fight, and only God knowsFor the truthFor our futureWe are brilliant shades of lightWe cannot be contained

Here's the real secret: you can fulfill the commands of the Bible better by falling in love with God than by trying to obey him. It's not that your obedience isn't significant or relevant; it's simply not the center of the wheel. No, the hub of your life is your relationship with God. Your behavior and obedience radiate like spokes from the center of your life and allow you to roll forward. When you try to make your eternal behavior the hub on which you turn, you get stuck. Forward motion must be fueled by love.

To deny the existence of God would be to close your eyes to the beauty around you, to close your ears to the symphony of nature, to close your nostrils to the scents wafting on the breeze, to close your mouth to the delicacies of nourishment, to close your hands to the feel of luxury, to close your mind to the ability to think, and to close your heart to the only love that can penetrate the depths of the soul. For in Him all things consist, in Him we live, and move, and have our being, and without Him we cannot help but be fools.

The man who has God for his treasure has all things in One. Many ordinary treasures may be denied him, or if he is allowed to have them, the enjoyment of them will be so tempered that they will never be necessary to his happiness. Or if he must see them go, one after one, he will scarcely feel a sense of loss, for having the Source of all things he has in One all satisfaction, all pleasure, all delight. Whatever he may lose he has actually lost nothing, for he now has it all in One, and he has it purely, legitimately and forever.

Far be it from me to slow down two badass supermodels on a mission, but we have a problem," a male voice said wryly.I could see Christian out of the corner of my eye as we turned, his stance and movements almost synchronized to my own. We shared a look, our expressions almost identically similar, with arched brows and half-smiles."What's the problem?" I called out, scanning the faces to see who had spoken."You're a badass supermodel," Christian muttered under his breath at the same time, taking the mature approach, as usual.

If I marry: He must be so tall that when he is on his knees, as one has said he reaches all the way to heaven. His shoulders must be broad enough to bear the burden of a family. His lips must be strong enough to smile, firm enough to say no, and tender enough to kiss. Love must be so deep that it takes its stand in Christ and so wide that it takes the whole lost world in. He must be active enough to save souls. He must be big enough to be gentle and great enough to be thoughtful. His arms must be strong enough to carry a little child.

Galatians 5:22-23 describes the fruit of the Spirit, which is "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control." Notice the verse does not say the "fruits" of the Spirit, but fruit. The fruit, or result, of the Spirit working in our lives is that we become not just some but all of these things: more loving, more patient, more faithful, and so forth. This verse is not a to-do list for us to work through, but a description of the transformation that occurs when God's Spirit begins to work in us.

I felt the fangs against my neck and knew I was going to die. It was horrible. I wanted to live so, so badly...but this was how it would end. With my last moments, I started to yell at Christian to run, but then the Strigoi above my suddenly lit up like a torch. He jerked back, and I rolled out from underneath him.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I turned to Christian, who was crouched on the ground. "Wow," I said, helping him up. Obviously, he was the one who had saved me. "No shit," he said. "Didn't know I had that much power.

Growing up is a process that never ends. It isn't a point you attain so you can say, Hooray, I'm grown up. Some people never grow up. And nobody ever finishes growing. Or shouldn't. If you stop you might as well quit. What I have to tell you is that it never gets any easier. It goes right on being rough forever. But nothing that's easy is worth anything. You ought to have learned that by now. What happens as you keep on growing is that all of a sudden you realize that it's more exciting and beautiful than scary and awful.

As a teenager, I began to question the Great Christian Sorting System. My gay friends in high school were kind and funny and loved me, so I suspected that my church had placed them in the wrong category... Injustices in the world needed to be addressed and not ignored. Christians weren't good; people who fought for peace and justice were good. I had been lied to, and in my anger at being lied to about the containers, I left the church. But it turns out, I hadn't actually escaped the sorting system. I had just changed the labels.

There’s a beautiful poem at the beginning of a collection of books we call the Bible. In that poem, it is written: "Then God said, ‘Let us make man.’” God then recognized that it was not good for man to be alone. We can all agree on that one, I think. Loneliness is one of the most excruciating pains that the human heart, or any heart, has to go through.What did God do about it?What was His remedy?What was His answer?He created marriage. He didn’t create dating, He didn’t create courting - He created marriage.