Illustration results for deuteronomy 8

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In a speech made in 1863, Abraham Lincoln said, "We have been the receipients of the choicest bounties of heaven; we have been preserved these many years in peace and prospertiy; we have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us."

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I am told that when President Bush was governor of Texas he had to deal with a lot of conflict. According to the sources I heard on the news one night in December (I tried to check this our with different sources and was unable to confirm it.) He came into office with a legislature that was in the opposite party. Early in his term he met with the opposition leader of the legislative branch with the hopes of building a cooperative coalition for the future.

The meeting was a failure. There was no trust and no agreement. There was plenty of conflict.

At the end of the session as Bush got up to leave he suddenly reached over and grabbed the opposition boss with both hands on his neck and gave him a big kiss on the cheek.

The man was completely stunned. He got red faced and stammered "What did you do THAT for!".

Bush said, "If I can’t get your cooperation and help, I’m at least going to get a kiss!"

The opposition leader broke up laughing and that was the beginning of friendship and the end of conflict.

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The Taj Mahal is one of the most beautiful and costly tombs ever built, but there is something fascinating about its beginnings. In 1629, when the favorite wife of Indian ruler Shah Jahan died, he ordered that a magnificent tomb be built as a memorial for her. The shah placed his wife’s casket in the middle of a parcel of land, and construction of the temple literally began around it. But several years into the venture, the Shah’s grief gave way to a passion for the project. One day while he was surveying the sight, he reportedly stumbled over a wooden box, and he had some workers throw it out. It was months before he realized that his wife’s casket had been destroyed. The original purpose for the memorial became lost in the details of construction.

Dr. James Dobson, Coming Home, Timeless Wisdom for Families, (Tynadale House Pub., Wheaton; 1998), 122.

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THE IMPORTANCE OF GRATITUDE

A few years ago Dr. Nick Stinnett of the University of Nebraska conducted a group of studies called the "Family Strengths Research Project." Stinnett and his researchers identified six qualities that make for strong families. The first quality and one of the most important to be found in strong families was the quality of appreciation. Families that are strong are strong in part, Dr. Stinnett concludes, because family members express to each other their appreciation for what the other members DO and for who they ARE.

In a similar study another researcher looked into the effect of praise in the workplace. His study showed that the ratio of praise to criticism in the workplace needs to be four to one before employees feel that there is a balance - that there must be four times as much praise as there is criticism before they feel good about their work and about the environment they work in.

SOURCE: Rev. Richard J. Fairchild ,"Gratitude - A Necessary Attitude" www.rockies.net/~spirit/sermons/c-thansesn.html
From a sermon by Ed Vasicek, Greedy for Good Times, 11/22/2010