The Quotable Bill

No, not that Bill

I mean this Bill

"Collect as precious pearls the words of the wise and virtuous." 
       -El Amir Abdelkader

Over the years, I've been following that advice -- keeping a notebook in which I jot down striking lines I come across in my reading. As I dug into Bill's Barrel and began reading my father's sermons, I found myself reaching often for my notebook so I could record his words.

Words mattered to Bill Newcomer. When crafting his sermons, he worked hard to convey God's truth for his congregation in understandable and memorable terms. Thanks to that hard work and his commitment to his calling, there are many precious pearls of wisdom to discover in Bill's sermons. Here are some of my favorites:  

• "[T]he way to real personal strength - the kind that makes us winners even when to the world we look like losers - is not to be in control and to marshal all our resources[,] but rather to surrender ourselves to a Power outside, a Power who is trustworthy, a Power who is ultimate, a Power who asks us to act in ways that the world thinks are crazy."  

• "One of the truest Christian cliches I know is the one that says 'God doesn't have any grandchildren.' Indeed, God only has children who have worked out their own relationship directly with him in fear and trembling." 

• "Work done in the best possible way, with the best possible attitude, is a vital part of our worship of God."  

• "The conversion we need is a conversion from egotism, a new recognition that God is God and we are human." 

• "We must beware of thinking that our judgments are final, that our judgments are ultimate, that our judgments are God's judgments."  

• "The Church is not a restaurant, where you're not missed if you don't show up for dinner. The Church is a family, where there is an empty place at the table if you are not there."    

• "God doesn't want Bible-believing Christians; they are stuffy worshipers of a book -- a paper and ink God. God wants Bible-living Christians; these are people who truly believe because they act what they believe. These are the true worshipers of the Living God." 

• "Standing at the cross, all of us are absolutely equal. ... The cross may have been on a hill, but at the foot of the cross the ground is perfectly level. No one stands higher than anyone else there."