The Four Doors

The Four Doors by Richard Paul Evans

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


One of my favorite authors is Richard Paul Evans. In this book The Four Doors he shares his thoughts from talks he has given around the world mostly to school aged children. The book is divided into five parts: the first part is the foundation and the over four are the doors. I have labeled them such in the quotes below. He has included quotes from several of the books he has written. I trust the quotes below will challenge you!

Foundations
The most important story we will ever write in life is our own – not with ink, but with our choices. ~Richard Paul Evans (from The Gift)

Everything can be taken from man but one thing: the last of human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. ~Dr. Viktor E. Frankl, Holocaust survivor.

We are not an accident of God or nature. The universe is demonstrably purposeful, and there’s a purpose for our being here on earth. The experiences we have have come to us for our spiritual growth and evolution. Simply stated, earth is a school – a divine educational process custom-fit to each of us. ~Richard Paul Evans

We are all in motion. Always. Those who are not climbing toward something are descending toward nothing. ~Richard Paul Evans (from Miles to Go)

We grow or diminish spiritually as we move closer to light or darkness, love or hate, forgiveness or resentment, peace or anguish. The fact that we are changing is a given. How we change is in direct correlation to our choices and the power and exercise of our free will. ~Richard Paul Evans

Every revolution was first a thought in one man’s mind. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Man’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions. ~Oliver Wendell Holmes


Door One: Believe There’s A Reason You Were Born
Almost without exception, history’s greatest achievers held a highly developed sense of personal mission. Nearly every one of them believed that their life had a purpose – that they had something of importance to share with the world. ~Richard Paul Evans

There are specific moments in each life given us to influence our life paths – a cosmic pull of a lever that switches the tracks beneath us. History abounds in such “accidents.” If such providence is evident in the lives of the great, then why not the rest of us? ~Richard Paul Evans

If you figure out your purpose, figure out your passion. For your passion will lead you right into your purpose. ~ T.D. Jakes

None of us will ever accomplish anything excellent or commanding except when he listens to this whisper, which is heard by him alone. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

The mystery of human existence lies not in just staying alive, but in finding something to live for. ~Fyodor Dostoyevsky


Door Two: Free Yourself From Limitation
Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand. ~Albert Einstein

The success of our lives is more determined by our imagination than our circumstances. ~ Richard Paul Evans (from The Road to Grace)

We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better. ~J.K. Rowling

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world … We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. ~Marianne Williamson

Fame and greatness are not the same thing. There are great people in this world – people of great accomplishment and service to humanity – who are not famous. There are scores of famous people who are not great. In most cases, true greatness is a silent and lonely affair, unaccompanied by the trumpeted fanfare of acclaim. ~ Richard Paul Evans

To be of value to others is a far greater ambition than the vain hope for the world’s fleeting applause and fickle admiration. ~ Richard Paul Evans

We can spend our days bemoaning our losses, or we can grow from them. Ultimately, the choice is ours. We can be victims of circumstances or masters of our own fate, but make no mistake … we cannot be both. ~ Richard Paul Evans (from The Walk)

Life’s greatest gifts often come wrapped in adversity. ~ Richard Paul Evans (from Finding Noel)

In many cases, we do not succeed in spite of our challenges and difficulties, but precisely because of them. ~ Richard Paul Evans

During our time in Italy, I became friends with a local winemaker. On one occasion, I said to him, “Chianti must have very fertile soil to produce such famous grapes.” His reply surprised me. “No,” he said. “We have terrible soil. Good grapes do not grow in good soil.”

I did some research on this. It turns out that grapes are lazy. If the soil they grow in is too fertile, the grapes do not need to extend their roots deeply, which results in mediocre grapes that are used to make cheap table wine.

Because the soil in Chianti is poor, the grapevines develop large, intricate root systems that stretch deep into the ground, extracting not only what they need to survive but many other nutrients and minerals as well. The result is a sweet, delicious grape.

The metaphor is obvious and thought-provoking. A biologist once said to me, “I have noticed that in nature things with easy lives tend to die young.” ~ Richard Paul Evans

“We (Richard Paul Evans’s physician and other doctors) have been conducting a rather interesting study. We’ve surveyed more than a thousand people struggling with different handicaps. We asked them this question, ‘If I had a pill that could take away your handicap, but will make you lose everything you have gained from your adversity, would you take the pill?’” He looked me in the eyes. “Guess how many people would have taken the pill?”

I was thinking of a number in the ninety percent range but answered, “Seventy-five percent?” He shook his head. “Let me ask you this: Would you take the pill?” [Richard has Tourette’s]

I thought a moment, then said, “No.”

He smiled. “Neither would anyone else. No one has taken the pill.” ~Richard Paul Evans

Always, always remember that adversity is not a detour. It is part of the path.

You will encounter obstacles. You will make mistakes. Be grateful for both. Your obstacles and mistakes will be your greatest teachers. And the only way to not make mistakes in this life is to do nothing, which is the biggest mistake of all.

Your challenges, if you let them, will become your greatest allies. Mountains can crush or raise you, depending on which side of the mountain you choose to stand on. All history bears out that the great, those who have changed the world, have all suffered great challenges. And, more times than not, it’s precisely those challenges that, in God’s time, lead to triumph.

Abhor victimhood. Denounce entitlement. Neither are gifts, rather cages to damn the soul. Everyone who has walked this earth is a victim of injustice. Everyone.

Most of all, do not be too quick to denounce your sufferings. The difficult road you are called to walk may, in fact, be your only path to success. ~Richard Paul Evans (from A Winter Dream)

Everyone has problems. It’s how we choose to deal with our problems that matters. Some people choose to be whiners – some choose to be winners. Some choose to be victims – some choose to be victors. ~Richard Paul Evans

The greatest shackles we wear in this life are those forged of our own fears. ~Richard Paul Evans (from The Looking Glass)

When the media criticized him for his failure to create the incandescent lightbulb by the deadline he had publicly announced, Edison responded, “I have no failed. I’ve just found ten thousand ways that won’t work.” ~Richard Paul Evans

Thomas J. Watson, the chairman and CEO of IBM, said, “Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really, Double your rate of failure.” ~Richard Paul Evans

Scottish author Samuel Smiles said, “It is a mistake to suppose that men succeed through success; they much oftener succeed through failures. Precept, study, advice, and example could never have taught them so well as failure has done.” ~Richard Paul Evans


Door Three: Magnify Your Life
Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure. ~Helen Keller

You miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take. ~Wayne Gretzky

We rarely regret our failed attempts, but we nearly always regret the ones we don’t take. ~Richard Paul Evans

To work hard is to work with directed passion toward accomplishing an objective, not just punching a clock. It means to give and do more than is expected of you. ~Richard Paul Evans

Thomas Jefferson said, “I’m a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.” ~Richard Paul Evans

I know you’ve heard it a thousand times before. But it’s true – hard work pays off. If you want to be good, you have to practice, practice, practice. If you don’t love something, then don’t do it. ~Ray Bradbury

Without passion we are doomed to mediocrity. ~Richard Paul Evans (from The Locket)


Door Four: Develop a Love-Centered Map
Love is the ultimate and highest goal to which man can aspire. ~Viktor E. Frankl

Without love, infants die. Emotionally, so do adults. With love, our health improves, both physically and emotionally. ~Richard Paul Evans

I will greet this day with love in my heart. For this is the greatest secret of success in all ventures. ~Og Mandino

Service is love made visible. ~Stephen Colbert

Love is what love does. ~Richard Paul Evans

We love those whom we serve. ~Richard Paul Evans

Love, for the sake of love, will always be enough. And if our lives are but a single flash in the dark hollow of eternity, then, if, but for the briefest of moments, we shine – then how brilliantly our light has burned. And as the starlight knows no boundary of space or time, so, too, our illumination will shine forth throughout all eternity, for darkness has no power to quell such light. And this is a lesson we must all learn and take to heart – that all light is eternal and all love is light. And it must forever be so. ~Richard Paul Evans (from The Letter)

I recommend this book to everyone who like to be motivated to do their best!

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Lincoln on Leadership: Executive Strategies for Tough Times

Lincoln on Leadership: Executive Strategies for Tough Times by Donald T. Phillips

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Lincoln is my far not my favorite President, but this little book about his leadership is excellent. It has some reminders for me and also gave me a few new things to think about. I trust the quotes below will me as helpful to you as they were to me.

He (President Lincoln) is, in fact, the only U. S. president to hold a patent (for a method to make grounded boats more buoyant).

Lincoln stood six feet, four inches, our tallest president.

The first Republican president, elected by a minority of the popular vote, he was a Washington outsider.

His cardinal mistake is that he isolates himself, and allows nobody to see him; and about which he does not know what is going on in the very matter he is dealing with. – – Lincoln’s reason for relieving Gen. John C. Fremont from his command in Missouri (September 9, 1861)

During his four years as president Abraham Lincoln spent most of his time among the troops.

Leading is primarily paying attention.

If subordinates, or people in general, know that they genuinely have easy access to their leader, they’ll tend to view the leader in a more positive, trustworthy light.

All leaders must seek and require access to reliable and up-to-date information.

By entering your subordinate’s environment – – by establishing frequent human contact – – you create a sense of commitment, collaboration, and community. You also gain access to vital information necessary to make effective decisions.

Simply spending time together and getting to know one’s subordinates can overcome mountains of personal differences and hard feelings.

If you stay in touch with the people who comprise the foundation, you’re more likely to gain an advantage that helps you to win the war against stiff competition. It’s the people who are closest to the consumer and the product who know how to win. And, almost always, they will want to offer their ideas.

Delegate responsibility and authority by empowering people to act on their own.

On issues that affect your entire organization, conduct full and frequent consultations with the heads of your various departments.

A good leader avoids issuing orders, preferring to request, imply, or make suggestions.

The architecture of leadership, all the theories and guidelines, falls apart without honesty and integrity. It’s the keystone that holds an organization together. Tom Peters reported in his research that the best, most aggressive, and successful organizations were the ones that stressed integrity and trust. “Managers do things right. Leaders do the right thing,” wrote Bennis and Nanus.

Trust, honesty, and integrity are exceedingly important qualities because they so strongly affect followers. Most individuals need to trust others, especially their boss. Subordinates must perceive their leader as a consistently fair person if they’re to engage in the kind of innovative risk-taking that brings a company rewards.

Followers in virtually every organization respond better to you, and will more easily be led by, a leader who consistently displays kindness and empathy than one who is associated with vindictiveness or animosity.

Business associates or subordinates, realize that a leader is not given to spite and pettiness, they will be more willing to openly seek him out. This will, in turn, makes the leader more effective.

Always keep in mind that once a subordinate is destroyed he ceases to contribute to the organization.

It would not hurt you much if, once in a while, you could manage to let things slip, unbeknownst- like.

Remember that truth is generally the best vindication against slander.

Do the very best you know how – – the very best you can – – and keep doing so until the end.

Corporate leaders of the future will have to provide employee security while also encouraging an environment for risk taking. At times it will seem like walking a delicate tightrope. But, in reality, it is nothing more than the simple understanding that each person, and each situation, is different it should be handled uniquely, in some cases with completely opposite styles. In many ways, mastering paradox is nothing more than having good common sense.

The best, most decisive leaders are those who have a set purpose and self-confidence to accomplish that objective.

An entire organization is never wisely sacrificed to avoid losing one or two small parts.

Frequently, getting people together can avoid distracted thinking that tends to build on people’s misgivings and apprehensions about others and their departments.

Always give credit where credit was due and, conversely, to accept responsibility when things went wrong.

If leaders of this - if they praise good work and encourage more of the same - then eventually they will be able to relax and let their subordinates do most of the work. And all the leader will have to do is guide them in the proper direction.

Let disputing parties work out their differences by bringing them together and guiding their dialogue.

Always let your subordinates know that the honor will be all theirs if they succeed and the blame will be yours if they fail.

Write letters to your subordinates making the personal acknowledgment that they were right and you were wrong.

When your subordinates come up with good ideas, let them go ahead and try. But monitor their progress.

The greatest credit should be given to those in your organization who rendered the hardest work.

Establishing goals and gaining their acceptance from subordinates is crucial for effective leadership. Goals unify people, motivate them, and focus their talent and energy.

Recent studies in leadership have noted that effective leaders are "reliable and tirelessly persistent" and that they are "the most results oriented people in the world."

Set specific short-term goals that can be focused on with intent and immediacy by subordinates.

Leave nothing for tomorrow, which can be done today.

Choose as your chief subordinates those people who crave responsibility and take risks.

Give your follow worse all the support you can, and act on the presumption that they will do the best they can with what you give them.

Coach and counsel a new executive so that he or she may get off on the right foot. Remember you want him to succeed.

An often overlooked component of leadership is this ability to learn from people and experiences, from successes and failures. The best leaders never stop learning. They possess a special capacity to be taught by those with whom they come into contact. In essence, this ongoing accumulation of knowledge prepares the organization for change.

A leader’s ability to develop innovative ideas and ask for people’s help in implementing them may seem to be obvious keys to success. But the sad fact is that too many of today’s leaders resign themselves to the limits imposed on them by flawed systems rather than rethinking those systems. This seems especially true in America as opposed to Japan, where innovation is a way of life.

Don't lose confidence in your people when they fail.

If you never try, you’ll never succeed.

Remember that the best leaders never stop learning.

Surround your self with people who really know their business and avoid “yes” men.

Remember that there will be times when you should simply not speak. Say to your listeners: “Kindly let me be silent.”

Try not to make mistakes when you speak publicly. Everything you say is intently heard. If you make a mistake it doesn't merely affect you but the organization as well.

Every leader must realize that the power to motivate followers resides almost solely in the ability to communicate effectively. In most business organizations, private conversation is much more important than public speaking.

When you meet with an individual, try not to part with any unpleasant impression on either side.

Speak in simple and familiar strains with people, without any pretension of superiority. Leave people with the feeling that they’ve known you all their lives.

Don't forget that humor is a major component of your ability to persuade people.

Effective visions and organizational mission statement can't be forced upon the masses. Rather, they must be set in motion by means of persuasion.

Moreover, truly accepted visions foster innovation, risk-taking, empowerment, and delegation. If the working troops understand what is expected of them, what the organization is trying to accomplish, then it becomes possible to make important decisions on lower levels, thereby creating a climate in which results in progress continually occur.

All leaders should remind subordinates why their organization was formed in the first place. Lincoln called on the past, related it to the present, and then used them both to provide a link to the future.

Provide a clear, concise statement of the direction of your organization, and justify the actions you take.

Everywhere you go, and every conceivable opportunity, reaffirm, reassert, and remind everyone of the basic principles upon which your organization was founded.

When effecting renewal, call on the past, relate it to the present, and then use them both to provide a link to the future.


I recommend this book to anyone who is a leader!


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The Prince Warriors

The Prince Warriors by Priscilla Shirer

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book was sent to me by the publisher to review. It is a book written for preteens/teens. It is written in a format similiar to <1>Chronicles of Narnia. The author, Priscilla Shirer is an exc ellen writer and speaker. She is well known for acting in the movie War Room, speaking at Woman rallies, speaking about prayer, and being Tony Evans daughter. I've have read a couple of her books on prayer and they are excellent. This book is no different. Even though it is written for preteen/teen boys everyone can take away Biblical truths from the book. The focus of the book is on the Armor of God! on the book of the book is the following "... the first book in Priscilla Shirer's epic new fiction trilogy, brings to life the invisible struggle ensuing in the spiritual realm. Filled with heart-stopping adventure, captivating humor, and intriguing mystery, this book promises to be an action-packed page turner that you won't want to end." could not agree more.

I teach at an advanced/gifted school and know the types of books my students read. This is one of those types of books. If you have a young person that likes to read this is an excellent book for him!

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The Question That Never Goes Away

The Question That Never Goes Away by Philip Yancey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book by one of my favorite authors is excellent. If you have ever suffered or you are in the midst of suffering I highly recommend this book. It will challenge you and bring comfort to your heart. I trust you will enjoy the quotes below.

Faith, I’ve concluded, means believing in advance what will only make sense in reverse.

Virtually every passage on suffering in the New Testament deflects the emphasis from cause to response. Although we cannot grasp the master plan of the universe, which allows for so much evil in pain (the Why? question), we can nevertheless respond in two important ways. First, we can find meaning in the midst of suffering. Second, we can offer real and practical help to those in need. In his book The Problem of Pain C. S. Lewis wrote, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” I hesitate to disagree with Lewis, yet that image makes me uncomfortable. It calls to mind a football coach on the sideline yelling at his players through a bullhorn, and some readers may infer from the metaphor that God dishes out something to get our attention. I don’t think Lewis intended such an inference, and for that reason I would change the image from megaphone to hearing aid. When suffering strikes, it gives us, the afflicted ones, an opportunity to turn up the volume and attend to crucial messages that we might otherwise ignore.

Were it possible, we might look beyond the reach of our knowing… Then perhaps we would endure our griefs with even greater trust than our joys. For they are the moments when something new has entered into us, something unfamiliar. … Everything within us steps back; a silence ensues, and something new … stands in the center and is silent. ~Rainer Maria Rilke

"Despair is suffering without meaning," he wrote; and "everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms – – to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances." – Victor Frankl

A University researching pain recruited volunteers to test how long they could keep their feet in buckets of freezing water. They observed that when a companion was allowed in the room, the volunteer could endure the cold twice as long as those who suffered alone. “The presence of another caring person doubles the amount of pain person can endure,” the researchers concluded. All too often our pain-denying, death-denying culture does just the opposite: we put suffering people in hospitals and nursing homes, isolating them from normal human contact. Two out of three people die in such institutions, often alone. Every survey shows that a person who is connected with a caring community heals faster and better. Known “enemies of recovery” such as stress, guilt, anger, anxiety, and loneliness are best defeated by a compassionate community.

For whatever reason, God has chosen to respond to the human predicament not by waving a magic wand to make evil and suffering disappear but by absorbing it in person. “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us,” wrote John in the prologue to his Gospel. In the face of suffering, words do not suffice. We need something more: the Word made flesh, actual living proof that God has not abandoned us. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it, “Only a suffering God can help.”

Eugene Peterson’s The Message translates the verse in John as “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood.” What kind of neighborhood to Jesus move into? To answer that question requires a brief history lesson. A succession of great empires tramp through the territory of Israel as if wiping their feet on the vaunted promised land. After the Syrians and Babylonians came the Persians, who were in turn defeated by Alexander the Great. When Alexander died, a series of successors carved up his territory, the most infamous being Antiochus IV Epiphanies, the Jews iconic villain until Hitler.

Frustrated by military defeats elsewhere, Antiochus began waging war against the Jewish religion. He transformed the temple of God into a worship center for Zeus and proclaimed himself God incarnate. He forced young boys to undergo reverse circumcision operations and flogged an aged priest to death for refusing to eat pork. In one of his most notorious acts, he sacrifice and unclean pig on the altar in the Most Holy Place, smearing its blood around the temple sanctuary.

Antiochus’s actions so incensed the Jews that they rose up in an armed revolt led by the Maccabean’s, a triumph commemorated in the Jewish holiday Hanukkah. Their victory was short-lived. Before long, Roman legions marched into Palestine to quash the rebellion and appointed Herod their "King of the Jews." After the Roman conquest, nearly the entire land lay in ruins. Herod was sickly and approaching seventy when he heard rumors of a new king born in Bethlehem, and soon howls of grief from the families of slain infants drowned out the angels’ stirring chorus of “Glory to God... and on earth peace.”

This, then, was the neighborhood Jesus moved into: a sinister place with a somber past and a fearful future.

“When God seems absent, sometimes it’s up to us to show his presence,” he told me. Often the world only knows the truth of Immanuel, “God with us,” because of his followers.

“People said they grew more during seasons of loss, pain, and crisis then they did at any other time.” We discover the value of suffering only by suffering – – not as part of God’s original or ultimate plan for us, but as a redemptive transformation takes place in the midst of trial.

“This is not the worst thing to ever happen! Cancer is so limited. It cannot cripple love, shatter hope, corrode faith, eat away peace, destroy confidence, kill friendship, shut out memories, silence courage, quench the Spirit or lessen in the power of Jesus.” ~Margaret, a Scottish woman suffering with throat cancer

"Affliction is the best book in my library," said Martin Luther. … pain redeemed impresses me more than pain removed. We are concerned with how things turn out; God seems more concerned with how we turn out.

“You can protest against the evil in the world only if you believe in a Good God," Volf also said. “Otherwise the protest doesn’t make sense.”

“I believe that God can and will generate good out of everything, even out of the worst evil. For that, he needs people who allow that everything that happens fits into a pattern for good.

I believe that God will give us each state of emergency as much power of resistance as we need. But he will not give in advance, so that we do not rely on ourselves but on Him alone. Through such faith all anxiety concerning the future should be overcome.

I believe that even our mistakes and failings are not in vain, and that it is not more difficult for God to cope with these as with our assumed good deeds.

I believe that God is not a timeless fate, but that he waits for and responds to honest prayers and responsible action." ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Death, said Bonhoeffer, is the supreme festival on the road to freedom.

… that the issue is not whether I agree with someone but rather how I treat someone with whom I profoundly disagree. We Christians are called to use the “weapons of grace,” which means treating even our opponents with love and respect.

I yearn for the church to compete just as hard in conveying what Paul calls the “incomparable riches” of God’s grace. Often, it seems, we’re perceived more as guilt dispensers than as grace dispensers.

God, help me to see others not as my enemies or as ungodly but rather as thirsty people. And give me the courage and compassion to offer your Living Water, which alone quenches deep thirst. ~Henri Nouwen

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The Remarkable Ronald Reagan: Cowboy and Commander in Chief

The Remarkable Ronald Reagan: Cowboy and Commander in Chief by Susan Allen

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


A wonderful book about President Ronald Reagan written for preschoolers. The words and illustrations are outstanding. Susan Allen the author is the former Governor of Virginia's wife. Her illustrator is artist, Leslie Harrington. The book is a warm tell about President Reagan. It has a little history about the President and names many of the good things he accomplished while in office. The back has a timeline and a list of quotes which I have included in this review. Even as an adult I really enjoyed reading this book. I trust you will enjoy the quotes below:

“You can be too big for God to use, but you cannot be too small.”

"Within the covers of the Bible are all the answers for all of the problems man face."

Highlights from a Life Well-Lived

• February 6, 1911
Ronald Wilson Reagan is born in Tampico, Illinois, to John (Jack) and Nellie Reagan.

• 1920
After years of moving from town to town, the Reagan family settles in Dixon, Illinois.

• 1924
Reagan enters Dixon’s Northside High School.

• 1926
Reagan spends the first of seven summers working as a lifeguard in Lowell Park on the Rock River.

• Fall 1928 – Spring 1932
Reagan attends Eureka College near Peoria Illinois. Graduating with a dual degree in sociology and economics, he excelled as an actor, student leader, and football player.

• 1932
Within six weeks of graduation, Reagan begins his career as a radio sports announcer at WOC radio in Davenport, Iowa.

• April 29, 1937
He enlists as a private in the Army Enlisted Reserve, and is assigned to serve with the 322nd Calvary Regiment at Des Moines, Iowa.

• 1937
Reagan signs a seven-year acting contract with Warner Brothers.

• June 8, 1937
He accepts an Officer’s Commission and is appointed as a second lieutenant with the 323rd Calvary Regiment in Los Angeles, California.

• January 26, 1940
Reagan marries actress Jane Wyman.

• January for 1941
Their daughter Maureen is born.

• April 19, 1942
Reagan is ordered into active military duty following the Pearl Harbor attacks.

• March 1945
Their son Michael is adopted.

• March 10, 1947
Reagan is elected president of the Screen Actors Guild.

• June 6, 1948
Reagan and Jane Wyman divorce

• March 4, 1952
He marries Nancy Davis.

• October 22, 1952
Their daughter Patricia (Patty) is born.

• May 28, 1958
Their son Ronald Prescott (Ron) is born.

• October 27, 1964
Reagan delivers his “A Time for Choosing” speech on national television in support Barry Goldwater for president and becomes known as a national political figure.

• January 1, 1966
Reagan announces his candidacy for governor of California with promises to reduce the waste in government.

• November 8, 1966
Reagan is elected by almost one million votes more than his opponent, incumbent Democratic Governor Edmund G. (“Pat”) Brown.

• January 3, 1967
Reagan is sworn in as governor of California.

• August 5, 1968
Reagan announces his candidacy for the presidential nomination but loses the primary to Richard Nixon.

• 1970
Reagan wins reelection as governor.

• January 18, 1973
Reagan submits a $9.258 billion budget with a $1.1 billion surplus and gives taxpayers a rebate

• November 13, 1974
Ronald and Nancy Reagan purchase Rancho de Cielo.

• November 20, 1975
Reagan runs for president again. This time he loses the primary race to the then current president Gerald Ford. Ford goes on to lose the election to Democrat Jimmy Carter.

• July 17, 1980
Reagan accepts the Republican nomination for president.

• January 20, 1981
Reagan is sworn in as the 40th president of United States.

• March 30, 1981
Reagan is shot by John Hinckley Junior outside a Washington hotel. The bullet missed his heart by less than an inch, lodging in his long and causing it to collapse.

• August 13, 1981
He signs the Economic Recovery Act at Rancho del Cielo.

• September 1981
Reagan appoints the first female Supreme Court justice, Sandra Day O’Connor.

• January 29, 1984
Reagan formally announces he will seek reelection.

• November 4, 1984
Reagan defeats his Democratic opponent Walter Mondale in a landslide. Reagan carries 49 states -- 525 electoral votes to Mondale’s 10, and 59 percent of the popular vote.

• January 20, 1985
Reagan is sworn in for a second term. At 73 years of age, he is the oldest president ever to take office.

• January 15, 1986
Reagan signs of legislation making the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. a national holiday to be celebrated on the third Monday of January.

• January 28, 1986
The U.S. space shuttle Challenger explodes only seventy-three seconds after so takeoff. All six astronauts and the first civilian to go to space (teacher Christa McAuliffe) perish.

• June 12, 1987
Reagan challenges Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall.

• December 8, 1987
Reagan and Gorbachev signed the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF treaty)-- a landmark agreement to eliminate an entire class of nuclear weapons .

• January 14, 1989
In his farewell address, Reagan states: “They called it the Reagan revolution. Well, I’ll accept that, but for me it’s always seemed more like the great rediscovery, a rediscovery of our values and our common sense.”

• January 20, 1989
George Bush is inaugurated; Ronald and Nancy Reagan fly to California. Reagan leaves office with the highest approval rating of any president since Franklin Roosevelt.

• November 4, 1991
The Reagan library and museum, located in Simi Valley, California, is dedicated.

• 1993
Reagan is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

• November 5, 1994
Reagan address is a letter to the American people in which he discloses that he is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. He no longer appears in public.

• June 5, 2004
Ronald Reagan dies peacefully at his home in California. At age 93, he lived longer than any president in American history.


President Reagan wrote more than ten thousand letters over his lifetime. Many, of course, we're to important world leaders, loving family, and friends. Reagan especially enjoyed corresponding with children – – both to hearing your ideas and to encourage them.
Following are examples of some of the letters he sent and received from children:

President Ronald Reagan had an ongoing correspondence with a seven-year-old boy named Rudolph Lee-Hines. At the time Rudolph attended the Congress Heights Elementary School in Washington, D.C.; he received 175 letters from the president over a period of five years.

April 9, 1984
“You… mentioned reading and that is good. Rudolph, if you get in the habit of reading stories for pleasure you will never be lonely. Sometimes I worry that TV is going to rob young people of the great pleasure there is in a good book."

After President Reagan was shot, a second grader named Peter Sweeney from Riverside School and Rockville Centre sent the following note to the president:

“I hope you get well quick or you might have to make a speech in your pajamas.

P.S. If you have to make a speech in your pajamas, I warned you.”

-----------------------------------------------
Feb. 15

Dear Sandy

Will you please tell your teacher and your classmates how very much I appreciate all their good wishes and kind thoughts. It is wonderful to know that young people like all of you with so much to keep you busy could still find time to hold out your hand in friendship to someone far away.

I hope you'll believe me when I say that my decision to enter the political race was because I want so much to help preserve this wonderful country for you and the Skipper and all young Americans. There are so many things to be thankful for in America, so many things that must not be lost; our right to go to different churches, have our own ideas on government, choose our friends and what kind of work we’ll do when we finally finished our school days.

If some of us help keep this for you I know you'll keep it for other young people when you grow up.

Again thanks

Ronald Reagan

Important Things Ronald Reagan Said

They called him the “Great Communicator” because somehow he always seemed to know just the right thing to say. Some of his most famous quotes were . . .

Sometimes Funny . . .

“I’ve often said there’s nothing better for the inside of a man then the outside of a horse.”(which he got from Winston Churchill)

"A hippie is someone who looks like Tarzan, walks like Jane, and smells like Cheetah."

“I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of national emergency, even if I’m in a cabinet meeting.”

“I hope you’re all Republicans.” (two surgeons as he entered the operating room following his assassination attempt)

“I want you to know I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponents youth and inexperience.”(to Walter Mondale at a debate)

“But there are advantages to being elected president. The day after I was elected, I had my high school grades classified Top Secret.”

“The nine most dangerous words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

Sometimes Wise . . .

“Whatever else history may say about me when I’m gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears . . .”

“We can’t help everyone, but everyone can help someone.”

“The American dream is not that everyman must be level with every other man. The American dream is that every man must be free to become whatever God intends he should become.”

“We must reject the idea that every time a law’s broken, society is guilty rather than a lawbreaker. It’s time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions.”

“All great change in America begins at the dinner table.”

“I hope we have once again reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: as government expands, liberty contracts.”

"Governments first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives."

“A people free to choose will always choose peace.”

Sometimes Profound . . .

“You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into 1000 years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we justified her brief moment here. We did all that could be done.”

"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction."

“If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.”

"Let us resolve tonight that young Americans will always . . . find there a city of hope in a country that is free. And let us resolve they will say of our day and our generation that we did keep the faith with our God, that we did act ‘worthy of ourselves,’ that we did protect and pass on lovingly that shining city on a hill.”

“There is no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn’t mind who gets the credit.” –Words of wisdom from Ronald Reagan

For More Information

To find out more about the Rancho del Cielo, go online The Reagan Ranch

To find out more about the life and times of Ronald Reagan, go online to the Ronald Reagan Foundation and Library.




"A Time For Choosing"

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Aimee Copeland speech at Georgia Gwinnett College

Wonderful, inspiring, challenging speech!

The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard

The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life's Hard by Kara Tippetts

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This book is about Kara life, battler, and beauty of battling cancer. This is one of the best books I have ever read about someone battling cancer. She gives much insight on a Christian's life living in a "hard" place. As you read the quotes below, please know Kara is now in Heaven worshipping her Savior!

I trust the quotes below (many from authors she read) will be a blessing to you:

It is a honed art, as well as a spiritual discipline, to be able to step back for the details and see how her own stories are woven into a much bigger one…God’s story. ~Joni Eareckson Tada

Kara and I both recognize the vulnerability and transparency are so necessary and communicating a powerful story. But we also know that our testimonies won’t really reach ---or even change--- the life of the reader. Only the Word of God can do that. Which is why I so appreciate The Hardest Peace. It is filled with snippets of songs and slices of encouraging scriptures that in express the story of God and his purpose in our pain. Kara has a way of reminding us that God’s reasons are perfect and that our Savior, intimately acquainted with grief and suffering, is constantly pleading our case before heaven’s throne. What could be more comforting than that? ~Joni Eareckson Tada

My child, the troubles and temptations of your life are beginning and maybe many, but you can overcome and outlive them all if you learn to feel the strength and tenderness of your Heavenly Father. ~Lisa May Alcott, Little Women

If I am going to see myself clearly, I need you to hold the mirror of God’s Word in front of me. ~Paul David Tripp, Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hand

This is indeed the deepest comfort – – to be accepted by God, totally forgiven, and then by grace to forgive the deepest wounds and hurts. ~Rosa Marie Miller, From Fear To Freedom

The work of restoration cannot begin until our problem is fully faced. ~Dan Allender

We are not the author of our story. We are the characters.

Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and trouble is to school and intelligence and make it a soul? ~John Keats

When we lay the soil of our hard lives open to the rain of grace and let joy penetrate our cracked and dry places, let joy soak into our broken skin and deep crevices, life grows. How can this not be the best thing for this world? For us? The clouds open when we mouth thanks. ~Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts

If the honesty with which I tell my story where the limitation of His strength, well, I would be screwed. But imagine if He were intimately involved in my story, which He is. Imagine if He showed Himself in my hard, which He did, and what if the hard of my story is the beautiful redemption of my today? Could suffering then take on a different hue? Could the coloring of the hard not be so dark, so hateful and gloomy? The well-meaning emails that admonish the way I speak about my story caused me to wonder at the depth of grace that can be understood without the presence of God in the midst of our suffering. If our hard is the absence of a good God, and how can anyone walk in faith?

Time is a relentless river. It rages on, a respecter of no one. And this, this is the only way to slow time: When I fully enter time’s swift current, enter into the current moment with the weight of all my attention, I slow the torrent with the weight of me all here. ~Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts Devotional

Your story is a good story. In the grief, pain, and hope, the Author has a plan. It may feel like a desperate breaking of your very hard, but suffering is not the absence of God or good. In our culture the call often seems to be winning, being the best, most beautiful, most successful, but what if that isn’t the good story? How has suffering made your story richer? How has it shaped your story?

Il faut souffrir pour etre belle. You must suffer in order to be beautiful.

“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo. “So do I said Gandalf, “and so do all who lived to see such times. But this is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” ~J. R. R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Jason recently said in a sermon, “We want suffering to be like pregnancy – – we have a season, and it’s over, and there is a tidy moral to the story.” I've come to sense that isn't what faith is at all. What if there is never an end? What if the story never improves and the test continue to break our hearts? Is God still good? How does our story of love change when we look head-on at my absence from this life? How do you live realistically when you feel like your moments are fading, fleeting, too momentary? How do you fight for normal in the midst of the crushing daily news of more hard? How do you see cope without forgetting reality? How do we wrap our children and our love story and continue to live intentionally getting salty tears in the baked ziti? How do we share the story being written for us with our children while we try to protect their childhood? Bald can lead to such beauty. But it is never, ever pretty.

Marriage is an illustration, a living illustration of our marriage to Jesus. Marriage is a reminder, a shadow, a picture of what is to come. When a marriage is based on Jesus, based on love, on grace, on the goodness of God in relationship, all who come in contact with that marriage will go away blessed, richer, nourished. Marriage is to be the place of freedom to deeply know God’s goodness, mercy, forgiveness, and grace. It is to point us to the ultimate Goodness, Mercy, Forgiveness, and Grace that is to come. Is the ultimate “now and not yet” in living.

Yet, while we are comforted by knowing this, let us not rest contented with a weak faith, but ask, like the Apostles, to have it increased. However feeble our face may be, If it be real faith in Christ, we shall reach heaven at last, but shall not honor our Master much on our pilgrimage, neither shall we abound in joy and peace. If, then, you would live to Christ’s glory, and be happy in His service, seek to be filled with the Spirit of adoption more and more completely, tell perfect love cast out fear. ~Charles Spurgeon, Morning by Morning

But because I believe God’s plans for me are better than what I could plan for myself, rather than run away from the path he has set before me, I want to run toward it. I don’t want to try to change God’s mind – – his thoughts are perfect. I want to think his thoughts. I don’t want to change God’s timing – – his timing is perfect. I want the grace to except his timing I don’t want to change God’s plan – – his plan is perfect. I want to embrace his plan and see how he is glorified through it. I want to submit. ~Nancy Guthrie, Holding onto Hope

Give me the courage to stand the pain to get the grace. ~Flannery O’Connor, A Prayer Journal

There is no occasion when meals should become totally unimportant. Meals can be very small indeed, very inexpensive, short time staking in the midst of a big push of work, but they should be always more than just food. ~Edith Schaeffer, Hidden Art

Then the Shepherd smiled more comfortably than ever before, laid both hands on her head and said, “Be strong, yea, be strong and fear not.” Then He continued, “Much- Afraid, don’t ever allow yourself to begin trying to picture what it will be like. Believe Me, when you get to the places which you dread you will find that they are as different as possible from what you have imagined, just as was the case when you were actually ascending the precipice. I must warn you that I see your enemies lurking among the trees ahead, and if you ever let Craven Fear begin painting a picture on the scene of your imagination, you will walk with fear and trembling and agony, where no fear is.” ~Hannah Hurnard, Hinds’ Feet on High Places

Trusting God when the miracle does not come, when the urgent prayer gets no answer, when there is only darkness – – this is the kind of faith God values perhaps most of all. This is the kind of faith that can be developed and displayed in the midst of difficult circumstances. This is the kind of faith that cannot be shaken because it is a result of having been shaken. ~Nancy Guthrie, Holding onto Hope

For the Christian, death is not the end of adventure but a doorway from a world where dreams and adventures shrink to a world where dreams and adventures forever expand. ~Wayne Triplett, Heaven Is Waiting

Interestingly enough, the most – asked question in the Bible – – from Genesis to Revelation – – is “How long, O Lord, how long?” And the most repeated command from God is “Do not fear” or “Do not be afraid.” The people of God consistently cry out for relief, and the God of love bids us trust him. ~Scotty Smith, Objects of His Affection

In Heaven everyone and everything is lovable, but as the Lord Jesus said, “if you love them which love you, what reward have ye?” (Matthew 5:46). In Heaven everyone loves everyone else, and in hell no one loves anyone. But on earth we are in a perfect environment for learning how to love as God loves: to abandon ourselves to loving apparently unlovely people who reminded us that in many ways we are still very unlovely ourselves. ~Hannah Hernard, Hinds Feet on High Places

The sweetest thing in all my life has been loving – – to reach the Mountain, to find the place were all the beauty came from… my country, the place where I ought to have been born. Do you think it all meant nothing, all the longing? The longing for home? For indeed it now feels not like going, but like going back. ~C. S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces

God’s purposes in present grief may not be fully known in a week, in a year, or even in this lifetime. Indeed, some of God’s purposes will not even be known when believers die and go to be with the Lord. Some will only be discovered at the day of final judgment when the Lord reveals the secrets of all hearts and commends with special honor those who trusted him in hardship even though they could not see the reason for it: they trusted him simply because he was their God and they knew him to be worthy of trust. It is in times when the reason for hardship cannot be seen that trust in God alone seems to be most pure and precious in His sight. Such faith He will not forget, but will store up as a jewel of great value and beauty to be displayed and delighted in on the day of judgment. ~Wayne Grudem, The First Epistle of Peter

Each one of us here today will at one time in our lives look upon a loved one who is in need and ask the same question: We are willing to help, Lord, but what, if anything, is needed? For it is true we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don’t know what part of ourselves to give or, more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so it is those we live with and should know who elude us. But we can still love them – – we can love completely without complete understanding. ~Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It and Over Stories

I recommend to anyone who is suffering through hardships or knows someone that is.

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Here is link to her blog, she wrote it as she was going through the struggle and now that she is in Heaven her family members continue a beautiful tribute to her by writing in her blog!

Here is the tribute to Kara's life!