A Quiet Simple Life | Sallie Borrink

For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 6:23

A Quiet Simple Life

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Sallie Borrink

Quotes To Live By


Much of our difficulty as seeking Christians stems from our unwillingness to take God as He is and adjust our lives accordingly. We insist upon trying to modify Him and bring Him nearer to our own image.
A. W. Tozer

Right is right, even if everyone is against it, and wrong is wrong, even if everyone is for it.
William Penn

An open mind is good. So is an open window. But you still put a screen on it to keep the bugs out.
Unknown

Don’t confuse fame with success. Madonna is one and Helen Keller is the other.
Erma Bombeck

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Quotes From The PBS Series “Frontier House”


This past weekend my husband and I escaped from the heat by watching one of our favorite mini-series, Frontier House. I took the time write down several of my favorite quotes from the show so I could post them here.

If you’ve never watched it, I highly encourage you to do so. It’s fascinating on several different levels. And, in my opinion, the only one of the “house” reproduction-type shows worth watching.

Frontier House Quotes

These are quotes from during the training time and while they were on the actual project.

The thing that’s amazing is how… really a twenty-first century woman isn’t preoccupied with her covering up her body, but she is very preoccupied with putting on the makeup and putting on a mask to hide behind…
Gordon Clune

Four foot by about twelve or fifteen foot. It wouldn’t even fit the books in our house.
Mark Glenn, speaking of their Prairie Schooner wagon

Neighboring is a lost art in our society. We’re such a mobile culture, it’s rare to really get to know your neighbors or invest any great deal of energy into the art of neighboring.
Nate Brooks

I feel like I’m growing up a lot here because like before like if I was in Temecula or California or wherever I used to live like I wouldn’t do anything. I would just sit on my butt and watch TV and I was just a lazy person. But like now that I’m actually doing work I feel like a better person. Like you know I’m actually doing something to help other people.
Tracy Clune

Quotes From After Returning Home

The following quotes are reflections made by the people about two months after they returned to normal life.

In modern life there’s almost too much to choose from so I’m not really sure what to do… We could do anything. We could get a Masters in anything and recreate ourselves and become anything, make any amount of money, have any amount of kids. It’s overwhelming. You know, I’m not sure exactly which one to pick.
Kristen Brooks

You’re a man or a woman working hard in the twenty-first century and your kids don’t know what it is that you do. It’s seamless. They’re isolated from it. And that’s sad… I realized that more so than ever since I’ve been back. But in five months in 1883 I got more satisfaction, more accomplishment, more appreciation than I did my entire career beforehand.
Gordon Clune

I think the year 2001 is kind of boring. Every day I always say I’m bored and my parents get mad at me for it. But there’s nothing to do. There’s just nothing to do here. You get kind of tired of going to the mall every day. And you get kind of tired of doing nothing all day.
Tracy Clune

The twenty-first century you’re bored because there’s so many things. It’s like you have so much stuff that you’re just bored of all of it. In 1883 you have such little stuff that it was like special to you when your mom would buy you stuff and things just for you.
Logan Patton

It’s an unnatural life that the twenty-first century offers us. I think there’s just too much. There’s too much stimulus. The pace and the noise and the…florescent lighting… It’s a bit overwhelming… Your principles, your ideals, your morals… they’re all for sale. I think there’s a lot of problems that we’re just not admitting.
Mark Glenn

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Just Because You Can, It Doesn’t Mean You Should


I mentioned yesterday that my husband and I frequently say to each other, “Just because you can, it doesn’t mean you should.” We remind each other of this because:

  • We are the type of people who find a lot of things interesting and could have more “hobbies” than there is time in the day.
  • We are the type of people who are tempted to believe that if we can think it and have the ability to do it, we should be able to do it now.
  • We live in a culture that is obsessed with doing more and more – maximizing every opportunity.
  • There is pressure to be afraid that if you say no to “this” particular opportunity it might “ruin” your life.
  • There are always people in life who think they know what everyone else should or should not be doing and they are frequently vocal about it.

It can be a challenge in this day and age with so much stimuli all around us to truly determine what is of God and what is just background noise.

Constantly Reinvent Yourself

One of the best parts of the PBS series Frontier House was the interviews they did with the participants after they returned to normal life. I remember Kristen Brooks (the young woman who got married during the experience) saying something about the fact that we live at a time where you can constantly reinvent yourself. She could go back to school and get another degree, enter a new field, move to a new place, etc. She and her husband aren’t tied down by family or financial limitations. It gave me the impression that they were actually kind of overwhelmed by their regular life and its myriad choices. After living for months in a simple (but not easy) lifestyle, they realized how overwhelming the seemingly endless choices of modern life can be.

My husband and I have been purchasing the Little House on the Prairie DVDs as they have come out and we’ve enjoyed watching them. We’ve frequently discussed how simple their lives were during that time. It was not an easy life – there is a difference between simple and easy. Maybe basic is a better word than simple. Life was about surviving and trying to get a little ahead so their lives were not cluttered with excessive consumerism and endless possibilities to go, go, go and do, do, do. But how many of us have watched them listening to Pa play the fiddle or Ma mending while rocking in front of the fire, sighed, and wished for a little bit of that life?

I am a realistic person and I don’t want to romanticize the past. Despite my Little House in the Big Woods Fantasy, I have no interest in going back to a Little House lifestyle. I like my indoor plumbing, hot water heater, washer and dryer, AC, supermarket, wireless internet, and Sleep Number Bed. I also like raspberries in January, ready-made clothing, not having to work in the field beside my husband, and minimally invasive surgical procedures.

I have a good life and I know it.

We Can, But Should We?

But I can’t help but wonder at times what the great people of the past would say about our world and the overabundance of choices we have today. What would Thomas Jefferson, Martin Luther, Augustine, George Washington, Abigail Adams, and others like them say about the lives we live? Lives of being overextended financially, emotionally, physically, and relationally?

Just because we can take out a home equity line of credit, doesn’t mean we should.

Just because we can physically get our three children to three after school programs per day doesn’t mean we should.

Just because we can afford to upgrade our car/home/TV/vacation/etc. doesn’t mean we should.

It takes a lot of discernment to live in this day and age and to make choices when life is so complicated. Saying yes to one thing means saying no to many other opportunities. Saying no to certain choices means possibly alienating yourself from people who thought you should have said yes. Saying no to something risks making you look “weird” to your neighbor/friend/family member/church member who doesn’t understand what motivates you to make the choices you are making.

On the other hand, saying yes to something that God has clearly put on your heart means finding out what exciting events will unfold from that willingness to be obedient to God’s leading.

The key is in knowing the difference.

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Quotes About The Power Of God


The One who made the world and who upholds all things by the word of His power, is the One who keeps His saints.
–Oswald Chambers

It is he who made the earth by his power, who established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding stretched out the heavens.
–Jeremiah 51:15

The Bible says that God created the world “by the breath of His mouth.” Meditate for a moment on the word ‘creation,’ and see what a supernatural word it is. No philosopher ever thought of it, no expounder of natural history every imagined such a word. We can understand ‘evolution’ and ’emanation,’ but we simply do not know what ‘creation’ means. There is only one Being Who knows, and that is God Himself, and the Bible says that God created the heavens and the earth.
–Oswald Chambers

I Sing the Mighty Power of God
I sing the mighty power of God, that made the mountains rise,
That spread the flowing seas abroad, and built the lofty skies.
I sing the wisdom that ordained the sun to rule the day;
The moon shines full at God’s command, and all the stars obey.

I sing the goodness of the Lord, who filled the earth with food,
Who formed the creatures through the Word, and then pronounced them good.
Lord, how Thy wonders are displayed, wher’er I turn my eye,
If I survey the ground I tread, or gaze upon the sky.

There’s not a plant or flower below, but makes Thy glories known,
And clouds arise, and tempests blow, by order from Thy throne;
While all that borrows life from Thee is ever in Thy care;
And everywhere that we can be, Thou, God art present there.

God will never have more power than He has now; if He could have, He would cease to be God.
–Oswald Chambers

Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.
–Revelation 4:11

Scriptures from ESV

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