Links & Quotes

link quote

“Building the Church is the Lord Jesus’ primary agenda before He returns. However, for many of the followers of Christ, working to build the Church is just another thing on their ‘to-do list’ which they may or may not get to during the course of any given week. We can become so distracted by work, family, diversions, and avocations that we have precious little time or strength left for the work Jesus is most interested in pursuing. So, as long as the devil can distract us from the work of building Christ’s Church, he doesn’t need to employ more spectacular or drastic measures.” —T.M. Moore

“‘Why has sex become man’s chief stumbling block?’ But has it? Or is it only the most recognizable of the stumbling blocks? I mean, we can mistake pride for a good conscience, and cruelty for zeal, and idleness for the peace of God et cetera. But when lust is upon us, then, owing to the obvious physical symptoms, we can’t pretend it is anything else. Is it perhaps only the least disguisable of our dangers.” —C.S. Lewis

“The mystery of sanctification is that the perfections of Jesus Christ are imparted to us, not gradually, but instantly, when by faith we enter into the realization that Christ is made unto us sanctification. … It is not power to live like Jesus; it is Christ living in us, and it is His life that is seen.” —Oswald Chambers

“Even while we kill and punish we must try to feel about the enemy as we feel about ourselves—to wish that he were not bad, to hope that he may, in this world or another, be cured: in fact, to wish his good. That is what is meant in the Bible by loving him: wishing his good, not feeling fond of him nor saying he is nice when he is not.” —C.S. Lewis

7 Quotes And A Helpful Memory Tool From “A Brilliant Mind”

A Brilliant MindIn his latest book, Dr. Frank Minrith tells us about a vital link between our vocabulary, and the growth in the human brain. It’s really quite fascinating! Check out my review of A Brilliant Mind by clicking here. Below are a few quotes from this book I wanted to share with you, along with a helpful list for increasing your memorization capacity.

“Only 3,500 words separate the culturally literate from others.”

“The average adult probably has a vocabulary of thirty to sixty thousand words. The highly literate may extend to one hundred thousand words. Yet the English language has well over one million words. Moving above the thirty-thousand-word range will greatly enhance our communication skills.”

“Many other tests since Dr. Johnson O’Connor’s have confirmed the correlation between career success and vocabulary knowledge.”

“Neuroplasticity simply means that the brain is capable of being molded: it can change and develop more connections between its many nerve cells so that, to a degree, it can even develop more cells. Neurogenesis is a similar term; it means that the brain is capable of growth and development. … You can increase the number of synapses in your brain by memorizing words. The more words you memorize, the more you can memorize because of the increase in neural synapses.”

“K. Warner Schaie, who investigated cognitive decline, found that the risk of cognitive decline could be reduced by three factors: higher education, extensive reading, and being married to a spouse with high cognitive status.” 

“We are, to a degree, what we repeatedly take into our brains. As we begin to expand our mental capacity through memorization, the brain chemistry is rearranged and memory is stored. Not only do we gain greater memory capability, but our brains actually change and improve. It is as if we program the brain with new software, and therefore we can respond to life around us in a healthier manner.”

Eight memory techniques:

  1. Review
  2. Employ visualization
  3. Use exaggeration
  4. Utilize association—synonyms, antonyms, subordination, relationships, etc.
  5. Use classification
  6. Command yourself—“When you direct the brain to do a task, it releases powerful chemicals in the direction requested. These chemicals are so powerful that if one hundred people with major medical depression—documented by a medical PET scan—are given a placebo, 33 percent will respond and their PET scan often returns to normal.” 
  7. Learn prefixes, suffixes, and roots
  8. See the origins in foreign words