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Earnestness
Indifference
”In Germany
they first came for the
Communists
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist; then they came
for the Jews
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for
the Trade Unionists
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics
and I didn’t speak up because I was a
Protestant. The they came for me-and by that time no one was left to speak up”—
Martin Niemoller
German pastor
Motivation
The story has
been told about a frog who fell in a large pothole and couldn’t get out. Even
his friends couldn’t get him to muster enough strength to jump out of the deep
pothole. They gave him up to his fate. But the next day they saw him bounding
around just fine. Somehow he had made it out
and so they asked him how he did
it
adding
“We thought you couldn’t get out.” The frog replied
“I couldn’t
but a truck came along and I had to.”
Motivation
In his book Dedication
and Leadership (South Bend
Univ. of Notre Dame Press
1966)
on why
Communism has more apparent success than Christianity in reaching out to new
areas
Douglas Hyde said: “If
on the other hand
the majority of members
from
the leaders down
are characterized by their single-minded devotion to the cause
if it is quite clear that the majority are giving until it hurts… then those
who consider joining will assume that this is what will be expected of them. If
they nonetheless make the decision to join they will come already conditioned
to sacrifice till it hurts.”
Motivation
Dr. Frederik
Herzberg
writing in the Harvard Business Review
concluded from his research
that six factors must be present to keep people highly motivated about
sustained responsibility:
1.Achievement
2.Recognition
3.The task itself
4.Responsibility
5.Advancement
6.
Indifference
Dante once said
“The hottest places
in hell are reserved for those who remain neutral in a time of great moral
crisis.” ── Michael P. Green《Illustrations for Biblical
Preaching》
Kitty Genovese was the
young woman who was murdered in a New York residential section while at least
38 neighbors watched from their windows. During the course of the 30-minute
assault
no one even telephoned the police. Studies have uncovered some
surprising facts about these people. Interviews revealed that they were not
totally indifferent as many had suspected. The main reason nobody did anything
was that each person thought someone else would take the initiative to get
help.
Source Unknown.
Halford Lucock says
"I was impressed several years ago when I read the Eugene Ormandy
dislocated a shoulder while directing the Philadelphia Orchestra. I do not know
what they were playing
but he was giving all of himself to it! And I have
asked myself sadly
'Did I ever dislocate anything
even a
necktie?'"
Progress Magazine
December 31
1992.
When he was pastor for the
Methodist church in Scarborough
William Sangster had an eccentric member who
tried to be a zealous Christian. Unfortunately
the man was mentally deficient
and usually did the wrong thing. While working as a barber the man lathered up
a customer for a shave
came at him with the poised razor
and asked
"Are
you prepared to meet your God?" The frightened man fled with the lather on
his face!
W. Wiersbe
Wycliffe
Handbook of Preaching & Preachers
p. 215.