6 Quotes From “The Cell’s Design” (and a cool infographic too)

The Cell's DesignThe Cell’s Design by Fazale Rana, a distinguished biochemist, is an amazing apologetic for an intelligent designer of our universe: A Creator. You can read my full book review by clicking here. Below are a few quotes I wanted to pass along, and a graphic I created based on Rana’s findings.

“This elegance, evident in virtually all aspects of the cell’s chemistry, carries profound philosophical and theological significance that prompts questions about the origin, purpose, and meaning of life. Though I once embraced the evolutionary paradigm, its inadequate explanations for the origin of life coupled with the sophistication and complexity of the cell’s chemical systems convinced me as a biochemistry graduate student that a Creator must exist.”

“Richard Dawkins, an outspoken atheist, acknowledges that ‘biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.’”

“An event, system, or object is intentionally produced by a designer, then it will (1) be contingent, (2) be complex, and (3) display an independently specified pattern. … Three questions are used to determine if an event, system, or object stems from the activity of an intelligent agent. Can it be explained as a consequence of the laws of nature (necessity)? If yes, then it is not designed. If no, then can it be explained as a consequence of chance (contingent)? If yes, then it is not designed. If no, then does it display a specified pattern (specification)? If no, then it is not designed. If yes, then it must be the product of an intelligent designer.”

Intelligent design flowchart

(Click image for a larger view, or click here to download a PDF version → Intelligent design flowchart)

“These advances indicate that life’s bare essentials extend far beyond the number of proteins that must simultaneously occur for life to exist. Life’s minimum complexity also requires organization of these gene products within the cell.”

“It is superastro-nomically improbable for the essential gene set to emerge simultaneously through natural means alone. If left up to an evolutionary process, not enough resources or time exist throughout the universe’s history to generate life in its simplest form.”

“Instead of resembling a preschooler’s messy fingerpainting, the interior of the simplest cell is best described as a carefully planned and marvelously executed work of art—one that masterfully carries out life’s most basic processes in living color. Disrupting this arrangement is often lethal.”

The Cell’s Design (book review)

The Cell's DesignAfter my years in the medical science field, I’m still fascinated by the findings and operations of the many disciplines of science. I used to engage in frequent debates with my fellow students who believed our world was a result of chance and mutation spread over billions of years. But I always found it so astronomically improbable that such beautiful intricacies could result from chance. In The Cell’s Design biochemist Fazale Rana delves even deeper into the cell’s inner workings to make a powerful case for intelligent design.

Time and time again Rana shows us where there is such high-level, picture-perfect designs and operations at the smallest levels of the cell. Wherever scientists used to think, “This is as much design as we can expect, anything lower than this will be random,” they are now discovering unexpected and perfect designs.

This book is definitely not “layman” reading, but is geared for those with a working knowledge of scientific vocabulary and principles. But if you want to dive into it, you will find the results of the research to be absolutely astounding. And I think you will also find the case for a Intelligent Creator to be harder to refute. 

This quote is not in The Cell’s Design, but I think it accurately captures the essence of Rana’s findings—

“There is something in the nature of things which the mind of man, which reason, which human power cannot effect, and certainly that which produces this must be better than man. What can this be but God? … The celestial order and the beauty of the universe compel me to admit that there is some excellent and eternal Being, who deserves the respect and homage of men.” —Cicero

8 Quotes From “Promotion”

PromotionPromotion by Rick Renner is a book to help both ministry and for-profit business organizations make better personnel decisions. You can read my full book review by clicking here. The following are a few quotes I highlighted.

“When choosing people for promotion, it’s important to understand that nothing is more important to God in the life of a leader then his heart. The heart takes first place over gifts, talents, education, and everything else.” 

“A person who is satisfied with little will never achieve much. On the other hand, a person who has a desire for excellence will never be satisfied with a low level performance in his or her life.”

“Any person who does just the required minimum should never be considered for leadership. … So be very careful not to over-spiritualize the selection process when choosing leaders. Don’t ignore telltale signs in a candidates natural life that alert you to a lack of desire.” 

“It’s normal for people to occasionally misunderstand. But when staff members misunderstand their leader’s instructions 99% of the time, something is wrong with the way that leader is communicating with those under his authority. His followers cannot be wrong all the time.”

“You should not look for a candidate free of problems, but for one who knows how to turn to God and manage life’s challenges according to Scripture.”

“Never forget that when you’re a leader, the most important pulpit you’ll ever possess is the testimony of your own personal life.”

“You’re never going to find a perfect person. … So never forget to let mercy triumphs over judgment. But if your peace is disturbed because of things you see occurring in a potential leader’s life, don’t ignore what is bothering you. Pay attention to what your spirit is telling you. Perhaps he or she is the right leader, but it isn’t the right time yet. It’s better to be slow and sure then to move forward without the inner conviction that you’re on the right track.”

“You may have a more visible position than others do during this earthly life, but your value to God for eternity is no different than anyone else in His Body.”

17 Quotes From “Smith Wigglesworth On Prayer, Power, And Miracles”

Prayer, Power & MiraclesI highlighted more quotes from Smith Wigglesworth On Prayer, Power, And Miracles than I can possibly share here. But I hope these few quotes will help whet your appetite to buy this book. If you’d like to read my review of this book, please click here.

“God can so fill a man with His Spirit that he can laugh and believe in the face of a thousand difficulties.” 

“Real faith has perfect peace and joy and a shout at any time. It always sees the victory.”

“If you knew the value of it, you would praise God for trial more than for anything. It is the trial that is used to purify you; it is in the fiery furnace of affliction that God gets you in the place where He can use you. The person that has no trials and no difficulties is the person whom God dare not allow satan to touch, because he could not stand temptation; but Jesus will not allow any man to be tempted more than he is able to bear.” 

“God will do great things for us if we are prepared to receive them from Him. We are dull of comprehension because we let the cares of this world blind our eyes, but if we keep open to God, He has a greater plan for us in the future than we have seen or ever have dreamed about in the past. It is God’s delight to fulfill to us impossibilities because of His omnipotence, and when we reach the place where He alone has the right of way in all things, then all mists and misunderstandings will clear away.”

“The Bible is the Word of God: supernatural in origin, eternal in duration, inexpressible in valor, infinite in scope, regenerative in power, infallible in authority, universal in interest, personal in application, inspired in totality. Read it through, write it down, pray it in, work it out, and then pass it on. Truly it is the Word of God. It brings into man the personality of God; it changes the man until he becomes the epistle of God. It transforms his mind, changes his character, takes him on from grace to grace, and gives him an inheritance in the Spirit. God comes in, dwells in, walks in, talks through, and sups with him.”

“Beloved, if you read the Scriptures you will never find anything about the easy time. All the glories come out of hard times. And if you are really reconstructed it will be in a hard time, it won’t be in a singing meeting, but at a time when you think all things are dried up, when you think there is no hope for you, and you have passed everything, then that is the time that God makes the man, when tried by fire, that God purges you, takes the dross away, and brings forth the pure gold. Only melted gold is minted. Only moistened clay receives the mold. Only softened wax receives the seal. Only broken, contrite hearts receive the mark as the Potter turns us on His wheel, shaped and burnt to take and keep the heavenly mold, the stamp of God’s pure gold.”

“We must be taken out of the ordinary. We must be brought into the extraordinary. We must live in a glorious position, over the flesh and the devil, and everything of the world. God has ordained us, clothed us within, and manifested upon us His glory that we may be the sons with promise, of Son-likeness to Him.”

“Oh, this baptism of the Holy Spirit is an inward presence of the personality of God, which lifts, prays, takes hold, lives in, with a tranquility of peace and power that rests and says, ‘It is all right.’ God answers prayer because the Holy Spirit prays and your advocate is Jesus, and the Father the Judge of all. There He is. Is it possible for any prayer to be missed on those lines?”

“God has something better for you than you have ever had in the past. Come out into all the fullness of faith and power and life and victory that He is willing to provide, as you forget the things of the past, and press right on for the prize of His calling in Christ Jesus.” 

“There is nothing impossible with God. All the impossibility is with us when we measure God by the limitations of our unbelief.”

“It is as we feed on the Word and meditate on the message it contains, that the Spirit of God can vitalize that which we have received, and bring forth through us the word of knowledge that will be as full of power and life as when He, the Spirit of God, moved upon holy men of old and gave them these inspired Scriptures.”

“The trouble is that we do not have the power of God in a full manifestation because of our finite thoughts, but as we go on and let God have His way, there is no limit to what our limitless God will do in response to a limitless faith. But you will never get anywhere except you are in constant pursuit of all the power of God.”

“Jesus said, ‘Be not afraid, only believe’ (Mark 5:36). He speaks the word just in time! Jesus is never behind time. When the tumult is the worst, the pain the most severe, the cancer gripping the body, then the word comes, ‘Only believe.’ When everything seems as though it will fail, and is practically hopeless, the Word of God comes to us, ‘Only believe.’”

“Faith is a divine act, faith is God in the soul. God operates by His Son, and transforms the natural into the supernatural. Faith is active, never dormant; faith lays hold, faith is the hand of God, faith is the power of God, faith never fears, faith lives amid the greatest conflict, faith is always active, faith moves even things that cannot be moved. God fills us with His divine power, and sin is dethroned.”

“There is nothing small about our God, and when we understand God we will find out that there ought not to be anything small about us. We must have an enlargement of our conception of God, then we will know that we have come to a place where all things are possible, for our God is an omnipotent God for impossible positions.”

“We have a big God. We have a wonderful Jesus. We have a glorious Comforter. God’s canopy is over you and will cover you at all times, preserving you from evil. Under His wings shalt thou trust. The Word of God is living and powerful and in its treasures you will find eternal life. If you dare trust this wonderful Lord, the Lord of life, you will find in Him everything you need.”

“There are evil powers, but Jesus is greater than all evil powers. There are tremendous diseases, but Jesus is healer. There is no case too hard for Him. The Lion of Judah shall break every chain. He came to relieve the oppressed and to set the captive free. He came to bring redemption, to make us as perfect as man was before the fall.”

Smith Wigglesworth On Prayer, Power, And Miracles (book review)

Prayer, Power & MiraclesWhenever I need a booster shot of faith, or a challenge to believe God for even greater things, or just a unabashed reminder of the power of the Scriptures, I pick up a book by Smith Wigglesworth. By the time I got done reading Smith Wigglesworth On Prayer, Power, And Miracles compiled by Roberts Liardon I was totally fired up!

This book is a collection of sermons delivered by Wigglesworth and articles he authored for various Pentecostal publications. Every one of the chapters is simply saturated in Scripture and the anointing of the Holy Spirit! Each of the articles made we want to dig into the Bible more, believe God for more, and crave the empowerment of the Spirit more!

If you are tired of humdrum church-as-usual, or if you are ready for your faith to be stretched like it’s never been stretched before, pick up a copy of this book and strap yourself in. I promise that you will not think about the things of God the same after these messages have worked their way into your heart.

Promotion (book review)

PromotionFinding the right person to promote in your organization can be one of the most crucial decisions a leader has to make. It’s hard enough when the organization is a profit-driven one, but the stakes get elevated when a faith-based ministry is considering the eternal ramifications of its success. A book chock-full of helpful advice for making the right personnel decisions is Promotion by Rick Renner.

Rick is a successful pastor and ministry leader. He shares through his personal examples—both successful and not so successful—the principles he has learned. He is quick to point out that these principles are not because some people are more valuable than others, but because some people are ready for more responsibility and others are not. His list of promotion principles will help you, regardless of the type of organization you lead.

I found the scriptural principles Rick shared to be right on target, though I thought he tried to put too fine of a point on a few of them. In other words, some of his ideals are so high that hardly anyone may quality for promotion. I also found some of his personal stories to be a bit too much personal back-patting for my taste. Despite those two personal observations, I still found the material helpful.

A big thanks to my brother-in-love for putting this book in my hands.

15 Quotes From “Mansfield’s Book Of Manly Men”

Mansfield's Book Of Manly MenFrankly, fellas, there are just way too many passages I highlighted to share them all here, but I did want to give you a taste of some of the manly wisdom in Mansfield’s Book Of Manly Men. You can read my full book review by clicking here, but I suggest every red-blooded male who wants to be a manly man go get this book! You’ll be reading a lot more from me in the next few weeks that is inspired from this book.

“What makes a man a warrior is his willingness to place himself between what he holds dear and anything that threatens it. Honor is the chief motivator for the warrior. Dishonor is unthinkable. He does the right thing without expectation of reward because honor is an intrinsic value that, when manifested in one’s life, provides its own rewards.” —William Boykin

“By words like manly and manhood, I don’t mean the kind of behavior we see in the fake masculinity that surrounds us today. There’s nothing manly about a guy downing booze until he throws up in the street. There’s nothing manly about cruising for women like some predatory beast and then devouring them for pleasure before casting them aside. There’s nothing manly about making a child but then running like a coward before that child is born. There’s nothing manly about dominating a woman or treating her like a servant or leaving her with burdens that aren’t rightly hers. To think these actions make up true manhood is like thinking the average ‘gentleman’s club’ is actually for gentlemen. It’s not. Instead, it is a Palace of Perpetual Adolescence where incomplete males go to get on the cheap what they don’t have the guts to fight for righteously and make their own. … I am talking about the kind of manhood that makes a family whole, a woman safe, a child confident, and a community strong.” —Stephen Mansfield

“All it takes for a contagious manly culture to form is for one genuine man to live out genuine manhood. It creates a model, something for other men to feed upon and pattern themselves after. It also gives other genuine men a vital connection that sustains and extends who they are.” —Stephen Mansfield

“A man cannot fulfill his purpose if he is living for applause, approval, and affirmation in this world.” —Stephen Mansfield

“If a man does not have an ideal and try to live up to it, then he becomes a mean, base and sordid creature, no matter how successful.” —Theodore Roosevelt, in a letter to his son Kermit 

“Honorable men refuse to wallow in the small and the bitter. Honorable men refused to hate life because something once went wrong. Honorable men don’t build monuments to their disappointments, nor do they let others brand into them and curse them to their destruction. Honorable men seek out the highest definition of their lives, the nobler meaning granted by heritage, by their ancestors’ dreams and their parents’ hopes. Honorable man cry out to God until curses are broken and a grander purpose is achieved. Honorable man don’t settle for lives of regret.” —Stephen Mansfield

“Nothing great will ever be achieved without great men, and men are great only if they are determined to be so. For glory gives herself only to those who have always dreamed of her.” —Charles de Gaulle

“True friends stand in harm’s way for each other. True friends take the hits for one another. … Genuine men stand with their friends and look on the scars that result has signs of manly honor.” —Stephen Mansfield

“Weak men assume what they need to know will seek them out. Men of great character and drive search out the knowledge they need.” —Stephen Mansfield

“For a man to become a great man, he will have to defeat the force of bitterness in his life. No one escapes it. There is enough offense and hardship in the world to assure that all of us will be wounded and betrayed, all of us will have opportunity to drink the sweet-tasting poison of bitterness against those who have wronged us. The art of surviving untainted is to learn the art of forgiveness.” —Stephen Mansfield

“The question we all face is not whether or not we have defects. We do. Everyone of us. The question is whether we are capable of envisioning a life defined by forces greater than the weight of our flaws. The moment we can—the moment we can envision a life beyond mere compromise with our deformities—that is the moment we take the first steps toward weighty lives. Manly men know themselves, work to understand their God-ordained uniqueness and their unique brand of damage, and accept they will always be a work in progress, always be a one-man construction project that is never quite finished in this life. They don’t despair. They don’t settle. They don’t expect perfection of themselves. They understand that destiny is in the hand of God. They also understand that these destinies are fashioned in a man’s struggle against the enemies of his soul.” —Stephen Mansfield

“Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.” —Martin Luther King Jr.

“Virtue is a state of war, and to live in it we have always to combat with ourselves.” —Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“Adversity toughens manhood, and the characteristic of the good or the great man is not that he has been exempt from the evils of life, but that he has surmounted them.” —Patrick Henry

“The man, whom I called deserving the name, is one whose thoughts and exertions are for others rather than himself.” —Walter Scott

Mansfield’s Book Of Manly Men (book review)

Mansfield's Book Of Manly MenIn my experience, men today aren’t allowed to be true men, manly men. I’m sure there are a lot of reasons why (but that’s another subject for another time), but for those men who are yearning to be the manly men that God has created them to be, Mansfield’s Book Of Manly Men by Stephen Mansfield will make you jump up and growl!

Men are wired by God in a unique way that makes them, well, men. When men embrace their God-implanted uniqueness they become manly men (which is another way of saying God-honoring men) who are better husbands, fathers, friends, and citizens. Stephen Mansfield quickly outlines his four maxims for manly men, and then shares a list of manly qualities to which all manly men should strive.

Each of these manly qualities are introduced by the life story of a manly man from history’s pages. Mansfield presents these men in all their manliness, including both their strengths and weaknesses; there are no perfect men, but there are many real men from which Mansfield allows us to learn. These manly qualities also come with some real in-your-face challenges of how to assess the growth of that quality in a man’s life.

In the foreword, written by retired Lt. General William G. Boykin (himself a true manly man), is this challenge: “This book is a must read for every American male. We must restore the understanding of what it means to be a manly man. The nation’s future depends on getting back to the fundamentals of being men of courage and values.” I couldn’t have said it any better!

I am a Thomas Nelson book reviewer.

19 Quotes From “If Ye Shall Ask”

If Ye Shall AskA challenging and educational look at prayer from the unique perspective of Oswald Chambers is If Ye Shall Ask. You can read my book review of this book and another book on prayer Chambers wrote by clicking here. These are some of the quotes that I especially liked from this book.

“Prayer is not an interruption to personal ambition, and no man who is busy has time to pray. What will suffer is the life of God in him, which is nourished not by food but by prayer.”

“The purpose of prayer is to reveal the Presence of God, equally present at all times and in every condition.”

“Our Lord in His teaching regarding prayer never once referred to unanswered prayer; He said God always answers prayer.” 

“As long as we are self-sufficient and complacent, we don’t need to ask God for anything, we don’t want Him; it is only when we know we are powerless that we are prepared to listen to Jesus Christ and to do what He says.”

“If prayer is not easy, we are wrong; if prayer is an effort, we are out of it.” 

“If once we accept the Lord Jesus Christ and the dominion of His Lordship, then nothing happens by chance, because we know that God is ordering and engineering circumstances.”

“A thing is worth just what it costs. Prayer is not what it cost us, but what it cost God to enable us to pray. It cost God so much that a little child can pray. It cost God Almighty so much that anyone can pray.” 

“It is not a prayer that is strenuous, but the overcoming of our own laziness.”

“We must be in continual practice so that when we find ourselves in a tight place we are perfectly fit to meet the emergency.” 

“There is no such thing as a holiday for the beating of your heart. If there is, the grave comes next. And there is no such thing as a moral or spiritual holiday. If we attempt to take a holiday, the next time we want to pray it is a struggle because the enemy has gained a victory all around, darkness has come down and spiritual wickedness in high places has enfolded us. If we have to fight, it is because we have disobeyed; we ought to be more than conquerors.”

“God’s silences are His answers.”

“Can it be said of us that Jesus so loved us that He stayed where He was because He knew we had a capacity to stand a bigger revelation?”

“Some prayers are followed by silence because they are wrong, others because they are bigger than we can understand.” 

“Jesus Christ does not make monks and nuns, He makes men and women fit for the world as it is (see John 17:15).”

“God does not expect us to work for Him, but to work with Him.” 

“God will not leave us alone until we are one with Him, because Jesus has prayed that we may be.”

“A Christian’s duty is not to himself or to others, but to Christ. We think of prayer as a preparation for work, or a calm after having done work, whereas prayer is the essential work. It is the supreme activity of everything that is noblest in our personality.”

“As long as we get from God everything we ask for, we never get to know Him, we look upon Him as a blessing-machine, that has nothing to do with God’s character or with our characters. … Then why pray? To get to know the Father.”

“All other fields have the glorious but risky snare of publicity; prayer has not.”

Knocking At Heaven’s Door & If Ye Shall Ask (book reviews)

If Ye Shall AskOswald Chambers challenges me like few authors do. He so plainly states how Scripture should be applied to my daily life that it often makes me squirm. In these two books about prayer: If Ye Shall Ask and Knocking At Heaven’s Door my prayer life is challenged.

In the preface to the first edition of If Ye Shall Ask in 1937, Oswald Chambers’ friend John Skidmore said that Chambers addressed “most of our difficulties concerning prayer.” And truly, Chambers makes it clear that most of our understandings about prayer are really misunderstandings which have been shaped by culture. So Chambers makes a strong case that we get back to exactly what Jesus said about prayer.

Chambers wrote, “Jesus Christ does not make monks and nuns, He makes men and women fit for the world as it is (see John 17:5).” Chambers makes sure that all of our prayer life is grounded on Scripture, not on what others have told us about prayer, to prepare us to live out God’s plan for our lives everyday.

Then in Knocking At Heaven’s Door we get a chance to see Oswald Chambers practice what he preaches. This book is a collection of prayers from his personal journals, which his wife compiled. Reading Chambers’ prayers we see that he believed and prayed just like he taught. A true treasure!

If you want to grow in your prayer life, these books will launch your forward.