Spiritual Life class notes for Oct 21

“All your love, your stretching out, your hope, your thirst, God is creating in you so that (God) may fill you….God is on the inside of the longing.”
Maria Boulding Quoted in Soul Feast p. 31

When God breaks in…a new generosity emerges, one that is joyous, spontaneous and free… A new stewardship that cares deeply for all of Gods created order, including the earth and its fullness – people, animals and things.” Edward J. Farrell . 105 in Habits

When we let go of money we are letting go of part of ourselves and part of our security. But this is precisely why it is important to do it. It is one way to obey Jesus' command to deny ourselves… . When we give money we are releasing a little more of our egocentric selves and a little more of our false security… . Giving frees us to care. It produces an air of expectancy as we anticipate what God will lead us to give. It makes life with God an adventure in the world, and that is worth living for and giving for.  Richard J. Foster, The Challenge of the Disciplined Life

It is more blessed to give than to receive, but then it is also more blessed to be able to do without than to have to have.
Soren Kierkegaard's Journals and Papers

Money often costs too much.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

For those who want to save their life--cling to it, try to protect it--will lose it; and those who lose their life--who give away themselves--will find life.

Billy Graham:
If a person gets his attitude toward money straight, it will help straighten out almost every other area in his life.

Make all you can,
save all you can,
give all you can.
- John Wesley

But, here's the thing: Jesus' essential message seems to be that the joyful life, the fulfilled life, is a life of generous self-donation.