Morning Briefings

I need a sign to let me know you’re here, all of these lines are being crossed over the atmosphere. I want a reason for the way things have to be. I need a hand to help build up some kind of hope inside of me.

– Calling All Angels
Train

Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good life, by deeds done in humility that comes from wisdom.

– James 3:13
King James Version

Fortunate are those who take the first steps. Someday people will realize that men and women are capable of speaking the language of the angels–and that all of us are possessed of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and that we can perform miracles, cure, prophesy and understand.

– Paulo Coelho
By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept

Cash is what keeps the doors open and pays the bills. As my mother used to say, ‘Sales fixes everything.’

– Guy Kawasaki
Five most important lessons I’ve learned as an entrepreneur

God hates cheating in the marketplace; he loves it when business is aboveboard.

– Eugene H. Peterson on Proverbs 11:1
The Message

Being made in the image of God invests us with a portable spirituality center. No matter where we go, so long as we carry this core identity with us, we remain spiritually impervious to the ups and downs of external circumstances.

– Naomi H. Rosenblatt and Joshua Horwitz
Wrestling with Angels

Years later, he would say that when he decided to become a professional baseball player, it was the only time he’d done something just for the money, and that he’d never do something just for the money again. He would never let the market dictate the direction of his life. The funny thing about that, now he was running a poor major league baseball team, was that his job was almost entirely about the money; where to find it, how to spend it, whom to spend it on.

– Michael Lewis on Billy Beane
Moneyball

If our faith becomes lukewarm and has no expression, God can allow us to fall. God does not want evil but may impart grace and the call to be converted.

– Father Tadeusz Dajczer
The Gift of Faith

Pitiful is the person who is afraid of taking risks. Perhaps this person will never be disappointed or disillusioned; perhaps she won’t suffer the way people do when they have a dream to follow. But when they look back–and at some point everyone looks back–she will hear her heart saying, ‘What have you done with the miracles that God planted in your days? What have you done with the talents God bestowed on you?’

– Paulo Coelho
By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept

A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit.

– Matthew 7:18

As I went down in the river to pray, studying about that good old way, and who shall wear the starry crown, Good Lord, show me the way!

– Alison Krauss, Down to the River to Pray
from the Raising Sand concert tour with Robert Plant

Later, Dr. Reilly, who’d only been working with Donnie a short time, took a crack at one of the most difficult questions of all. ‘Was it a miracle?’ a reporter asked. Dr. Reilly responded to the reporter’s question by saying simply, ‘I can’t explain it any other way.’

– Rich Blake
The Day Donnie Herbert Woke Up: A True Story

He [John the Baptist] was preparing for accepting that even he, with Jerusalem at this feet, was dispensable. Handing over a job is not dying. It is the start of a new phase of living.

– Sacred Space

The sages say that the answer to the question, ‘Where does God live?’ is ‘Where you look for him.’

– Wendy Mogul
The Blessing of a Skinned Knee

He had been led to believe that business was of the world and that as he matured in his faith, Jeff would eventually be led to a higher calling, outside of business. Jeff recalls, ‘In many ways it left me feeling guilt that as a businessman, I was a second-class Christian.’ After much prayer and discussion with wise people, he discovered that his business was a higher calling and that it was his.

– Larry Julian
God is My CEO

Delta to Wire Its Fleet for Wi-Fi, Giving Travelers Internet and Email Access: For many, a long airplane flight across the country will no longer be an escape. Instead, road warriors may feel more compelled to answer email and stay in touch with colleagues and clients.

– Scott McCartney
The Wall Street Journal, August 5, 2008

Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them.

– Matthew 13:7

One day in a moment of great crisis, I came to understand the words of my [dying] father, ‘If I die, it will be glory; if I live, it will be grace.’ That faith was his evening star–the faith in a power greater than man.

– William O. Douglas
This I Believe

Christ learned about his mission while he was cutting wood and making chairs, beds and cabinets. He came as a carpenter to show us that–no matter what we do–everything can lead us to the experience of God’s love.

– Paulo Coelho
By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept

Coffee retail giant Starbucks Corp has said it will reduce its workforce by 1,000 employees and has restructured its executive leadership team.

– The Economic Times

Without emotion we are unable to sense risk; with emotion, we can’t control the fear that risk generates. Welcome to the human race!

– James Montier
Just One Thing