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At a
missionary station the question was asked, "Do we
possess anything that we have not received of God?"
A little girl five-years of age answered immediately, "Yes, sir.
Sin."
At the battle of Crecy in 1346, when King Edward III of England defeated
Philip, King of France, the King Edward's son led a portion of the attack.
Thinking himself very hotly pressed in the midst of the combat, the prince sent
word to his father to send him some reinforcements at once or he would be
flanked by the enemy. The king, who had been watching the progress of the fight
from a neighboring hilltop, sent down word as follows: "Tell my son that I
am too good a general not to know when he needs help and too kind a father not
to send it when I see the need of doing so." The historian tells us that,
reassured by this promise, the prince fought nobly. Later, he put the motto:
"Ich Dien," "I serve," upon his crest. This motto is on the
Prince of Wale's escutcheon to this day. --J. L. Nye
God, the Father is too good a General not to know what His soldiers need,
and He is too kind a Father not to send them the supply of their needs when they
are needed. Thus, He is ever worthy of our trust and of our service. --D. V.
M.
In a certain community in England, someone had been stealing
sheep. The forces of the law were
unable to apprehend the thief. A
certain farmer was brought before the judge and accused of
being the thief, but he established his innocence of any connection with
the offense, beyond the shadow of a doubt.
Thereupon the judge said, "You are an innocent man, but someone has
been stealing sheep. I must show to
this community what the law would do to a sheep thief." Then the judge
committed the innocent man to a period of incarceration, "to uphold public
justice." But what justice!
-- Cited by James O. Buswell, Systematic
Theology of the Christian Religion, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1963)
A new driver for an interstate trucking company found the long
cross-country trips extremely tiring. But
he noticed that the older driver who traveled with him seemed to thrive on the
road. He always looked as fresh at
the end of the ride as he did at the start.
So one day the young man asked the older one what his secret was.
"It's all in your attitude," he replied.
"While you went to work this morning, I went for a ride in the
country." Your focus will determine whether life is work or a ride in
the country. - Charles Lowery, SBC
Life, June/July 1997 "Rise
and Shine" p. 23
Dr. Victor Frankl, the bold, courageous Jew who became a prisoner
during the Holocaust, endured years of indignity and humiliation by the Nazis
before he was finally liberated. At
the beginning of his ordeal, he was marched into a Gestapo courtroom. His captors had taken away his home and family, his cherished
freedom, his possessions, even his watch and wedding ring.
They had shaved his head and stripped his clothing off his body.
There he stood before the German high command, under the glaring lights
being interrogated and falsely accused. He
was destitute, a helpless pawn in the hands of brutal, prejudiced, sadistic men.
He had nothing. No, that isn't true. He
suddenly realized there was one thing no one could ever take from him - just
one. Do you know what is was?
Dr. Frankl realized he still had the power to choose his own attitude.
No matter what anyone would ever do to him, regardless of what the future
held for him, the attitude choice was his to make.
Bitterness or forgiveness. To
give up or to go on. Hatred or
hope. Determination to endure or the paralysis of self-pity.
It boiled down to "Frankl . . . one string!" - Dale E.
Galloway, Dream a New Dream (Wheaton,
IL: Tyndale House, 1975) 59
Major F.J. Harold Kushner, an army medical officer held by the
Vietcong for over five years, cites an example of death because of an
attitudinal failure. In a
fascinating article in New York Magazine
this tragic yet true account is included:
Among the prisoners in Kushner's POW camp was a tough young marine,
twenty-four years old, who had already survived two years of prison-camp life in
relatively good health. Part of the
reason for this was that the camp commander had promised to release the man if
he cooperated. Since this
had been done before with others, the marine turned into a model POW and
the leader of the camp's thought-reform group.
As time passed he gradually realized that his captors had lied to him.
When the full realization of this took hold he became a zombie.
He refused to do all work, rejected all offers of food and encouragement,
and simply lay on his cot sucking his thumb.
In a matter of weeks he was dead. 1
Caught in the vice grip of lost hope, life became too much for the
once-tough marine to handle. When
that last string snapped, there was nothing left.
1.
Douglas Colligan, "That Helpless Feeling: The Dangers of
Stress," New York, 14 July, 1975,
28.
- Charles R. Swindoll, Man to Man
(Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996) 64-65
Robert Wise, pastor of Our Lord's Church in Oklahoma City,
mentions an experience that encouraged him to be real.
I had a friend who use to call me on the phone on Monday mornings.
I'd pick up the phone and this minister would say, "Hello, this is
God. I have a gift for you today.
I want to give you the gift of failing.
Today you do not have to succeed. I
grant that to you." Then he
would hang up. I would sit there
for 10 minutes, staring at the wall.
The first time I couldn't believe it. It
was really the gospel. God's love
means it's even okay to fail. You
don't have to be the greatest thing in the world. you can just be you. - Charles R. Swindoll, Strengthening Your Grip (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1982) 22
Authorities now know that
approximately one person in sixteen who ever takes a social drink will become an
alcoholic! How many of you would
get on an airplane if before it took off you knew there was a 1 out of 16 chance
that it would crash and destroy your life.
Actually, the odds for a commercial airliner crashing are closer to 1 out
of 1,000,000; but even with those odds some people will not fly.
Yet many of these same people will take a drink! - Zig Ziglar
When Athenians gathered in 399
B.C. to sit in judgment over the 70-year-old self-proclaimed gadfly, Socrates,
what they heard was not a plea for forgiveness, but a proud, dignified
accusation of the verdict. Socrates declared that what he deserved was not the
death sentence, but rather a reward for attempting to force his fellow citizens
to face truth, justice and beauty. In words that would inspire for centuries
thereafter, Socrates refused to stoop to a genuine defense of his actions and
what he saw as begging for forgiveness and life. He dismissed such an option
with the words, "The difficulty, my friends, is not to avoid death, but to
avoid unrighteousness." -- Source: Julian Geran Pilon, Executive
Director of the National Forum Foundation.
The River Jordan flows southward through the Holy Land.
For the most part it is neither beautiful nor peaceful.
It's 25 percent mud and plunges downhill at a furious pace, falling nine
feet per mile.
The 158-mile river begins in the snows of Mount Herman at a point 260
feet above sea level. By the time
it empties into the Dead Sea, at a point 1,287 feet below sea level, the water
has reached the lowest point on earth.
Ironically, the river that has inspired thousands of hymns sung by
millions the world over, and on whose banks the words were uttered that
influenced the course of mankind, today serves as a barrier for thirty miles for
the hostile nations of Israel and Syria.
Amid the unbeautiful, sometimes furious river, east of Jericho, there is
a lovely bend called Makhadet-Al-Hijla, or the Ford of the Partridge. It's a place of great beauty, shaded by willows and
eucalyptus trees, much as it was in New Testament times.
Here, according to tradition, Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist.
How symbolic. The place of
our baptism is a spot of beauty and peace amid a furious flowing river of hate
and strife. When Jesus was
confronted by those who sought to take Him, He "went away again beyond
Jordan into the place where John at first baptized; and there he abode"
John 10:40.
Whether at this location on the Jordan, or another, Jesus found refuge
from the trials of life, at the place of His baptism.
And we can, too. When
difficulties seem more than we can bear, going back to our baptismal experience
puts it all in perspective.
-- Jack Gulledge, Ideas and
Illustrations for Inspirational Talks, (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1986),
10-11
Baseball player Bret Butler who, suffering from cancer told the
story about his daughter.
He said that she came up to him one day after he had found out that he
had cancer with compassion. She
told him, "Daddy, I prayed to Jesus that he would give me your
cancer." Bret asked, "Why
did you do that for?" She
replied, "Because, daddy, I can handle the pain better than watching you in
pain." -- Taken from 20/20
television program July 18, 1997
Bearing fruit is essential to Christian discipleship.
A life well lived is a more effective witness than words well said.
Benjamin Franklin learned that plaster sown in the fields would make
things grow. He told his neighbors, but they did not believe him and they
argued with him trying to prove that plaster could be of no use at all to grass
or grain.
After a little while he allowed the matter to drop and said no more about
it. But he went into the field early the next spring and sowed
some grain. Close by the path,
where men would walk, he traced some letters with his finger and put plaster
into them and then sowed his seed in the field.
After a week or two the seed sprang up.
His neighbors, as they passed that way, were very much surprised to see,
in brighter green than all the rest of the field, the writing in large letters,
"This has been plastered." Benjamin
Franklin did not need to argue with his neighbors any more about the benefit of
plaster for the fields. For as the
season went on and the grain grew, these bright green letters just rose up above
all the rest until they were a kind of relief-plate in the field -- "This
has been plastered."
"By your fruits shall all men know that you are my disciples."
"Beatitudes for Married
Couples"
Blessed are the
husband and wife who continue to be affectionate, considerate and loving after
the wedding bells have stopped ringing.
Blessed are the
husband and wife who are as polite and courteous to one another as they are to
their friends.
Blessed are they
who have a sense of humor, their marriage shall be much brighter.
Blessed are the
parents who abstain from alcohol (I would add "tobacco, and drugs"),
their children will surely follow their example.
Blessed are they
who are faithful to each other and mutually helpful.
God will surely guide them.
Blessed are the
husband and wife who thank God for good things which come to them.
They shall receive both good things and thankful children.
Blessed are the
parents who recognize their children as gifts from God, their home shall be
filled with love.
Blessed are those
mates who make their home a place "where seldom is heard a discouraging
word". They shall inspire
others to do likewise.
Blessed are the
parents who attend and support their church.
Their children shall develop a strong faith.
Blessed is the
couple who are good stewards of all God's gifts, their children will bless them
and follow their example.
Blessed are all
those whose lives are a testimony of faith in God, they shall be the channels
through which God's kingdom will come on earth.
Surely goodness
and mercy shall follow them all the days of their lives and they shall dwell in
the house of the Lord forever.
From "The Christian Builder," May 24, 1985. Topics: Saul; David; Judas; Pulpit Committees; See
Also: 1 Samuel 15:10; 1 Samuel 16:7
Beyond Knowing The Bible, We
Should Know Christ
Some years ago at a drawing-room function, one of England's leading
actors was asked to recite for the pleasure of his fellow guests. He consented
and asked if there was anything special that his audience would like to hear.
After a moment's pause, an old clergyman present said: "Could you, sir,
recite to us the Twenty-third Psalm?" A strange look passed over the
actor's face; he paused for a moment, and then said: "I can, and I will,
upon one condition; and that is that after I have recited it, you, my friend,
will do the same." "I," said the clergyman, in
surprise. "But I am not an elocutionist. However, you wish it, I
will do so."
Impressively, the great actor began the psalm. His voice and his
intonation were perfect. He held his audience spellbound; and as he finished, a
great burst of applause broke from the guests.
Then, as it died away, the old clergyman arose and
began the psalm. His voice was not remarkable; his intonation was not
faultless. When he had finished, no sound of applause broke the silence, but
there was not a dry eye in the room, and many heads were bowed.
Then the actor rose to his feet again. His voice shook as he laid his
hand upon the shoulder of the old clergyman and said: "I reached your eyes
and ears, my friends; he reached your hearts. The difference is just this: I
know the Twenty-third Psalm, but he knows the Shepherd." --The War Cry
In the midst of the enlightenment, when deism was spreading
rapidly, Voltaire proclaimed that within 25 years the Bible would be forgotten
and Christianity would be a thing of the past.
40 years after his death in 1778, the Bible and other Christian
literature were being printed in what had once been Voltaire's very own home!
Mortimer J. Adler, in How to
Read a Book, has observed that the one time people read for all they are
worth is when they are in love and are reading a love letter.
They read every word three ways. They
read between the lines and in the margins.
They read the whole in terms of the parts, and each part in terms of the
whole. They grow sensitive to
context and ambiguity, to the order of phrases, and the weight of sentences.
They may even take the punctuation into account.
Then, if never before or after, they read carefully and in depth.
So should believers read the "love letter" that the Eternal
Lover of our souls has given to us so that we may better know him and his
purposes.
In an interview, Billy Graham was asked this question: "If
you had to live your life over again, what would you do differently."
His answer: "One of my great regrets is that I have not studied
enough. I wish I had studied more and preached less.
People have pressured me into speaking to groups when I should have been
studying and preparing. Donald
Barnhouse said that if he knew the Lord was coming in three years, he would
spend two of them studying and one preaching.
I'm trying to make it up." - Christianity
Today, September 12, 1977, p. 19
Billions of people were
scattered on a great plain before God's throne. Some of the groups near the
front talked heatedly--not with cringing shame, but with belligerence. "How
can God judge us?" said one. "What does He know about suffering?"
snapped a brunette. She jerked back a tattooed number from a Nazi concentration
camp. "We endured terror, beatings, torture, death!" In another group
a black man lowered his collar. "What about this?" he demanded,
showing an ugly rope burn. "Lynched for no crime but being black! We have
suffocated in slave ships, been wrenched from loved ones, toiled till death gave
release." Far out across the plain were hundreds of such groups. Each had a
complaint against God for the evil and suffering He permitted in His world. How
lucky God was to live in heaven where there was no weeping, no fear, no hunger,
no hatred! Indeed, what did God know about what man had been forced to endure in
this world? "After all, God leads a pretty sheltered life," they said.
So each group sent out a leader, chosen because he had suffered the most. There
was a Jew, a black, an untouchable from India, an illegitimate, a victim of
Hiroshima, and one from a Siberian slave camp. In the center of the plain they
consulted with each other. At last they were ready to present their case. It was
rather simple: before God would be qualified to be their judge, He must endure
what they had endured. Their decision was that God should be sentenced to live
on earth--as a man!
But because He was
God, they set certain safeguards to be sure He could not use His divine powers
to help Himself; Let Him be born a Jew. Let the legitimacy of his birth be in
doubt so that no one would really know who his Father was. Let Him champion a
cause so just, but so radical, that it brings down upon Him the hate,
condemnation and opposition of every established authority against him. Let Him
be betrayed by friends. Let Him be indicted on false charges, tried before a
prejudiced jury and convicted by a cowardly judge. Let Him see what it is like
to be horribly alone, to be completely abandoned by every living thing. Let Him
be tortured and let Him die! Let it be a humiliating death.
As each leader
pronounced his portion of the sentence, loud murmurs of approval went up from
the great throngs of people. But when the last had finished pronouncing
sentence, there was a long silence. No one uttered another word. No one moved.
For suddenly they all knew . . . God had already served His sentence.
Source: Illustrations Unlimited, James S. Hewett, ed. P. 302
Blame never affirms, it
assaults. Blame never restores, it wounds. Blame never solves, it complicates.
Blame never unites, it separates. Blame never smiles, it frowns. Blame never
forgives, it rejects. Blame never forgets, it remembers. Blame never builds, it
destroys. - Charles R. Swindoll, Man
to Man (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996) 69
For many years in the marketplace of Rotterdam, Holland, stood an
old corner house known as "the house of a thousand terrors." In the sixteenth century King Philip II of Spain ruled over
Holland. In his hatred of the
Dutch, he tortured, maimed, imprisoned, and exiled thousands. When the people rose up in defiance, he sent a Spanish army
under the Duke of Alva to put down the rebellion.
The city of Rotterdam held out valiantly for some while, then finally
fell before the Spanish army. The
victors went from house to house, ferreting out the citizens, then slaying them
wholesale in their houses. In one
house a group of men, women, and children huddled together, a thousand terrors
gripping their hearts as the Spanish soldiers approached.
Suddenly a young man had an idea. Taking
a young goat belonging to the premises, he killed it, then with a broom swept
its blood under the door of the house. Then
they waited breathlessly, as footsteps approached.
Soon the Spaniards were battering at the door. Then they heard one of them say. "Look at the blood
running under the door. Come away,
men, the work here is already done!"
A little later the army withdrew, allowing a band of thankful
people to emerge, safe and sound. They
lived because a goat had died.
British anthropologist John D.
Unwin conducted an in depth study of eighty civilizations that have come and
gone over a period of some four thousand years. He discovered that a common
thread ran through all of them. In each instance, they started out with a
conservative mind-set with strong moral values and a heavy emphasis on family.
Over a period of time, the conservative mind-set became more and more liberal,
moral values declined, and the family suffered. In each instance, as the family
deteriorated, the civilization itself started to come apart; and in All eighty
cases the fall of the Nation was related to the fall of the family. In most
cases, that civilization fell within one generation of the fall of the family
unit. SO GOES THE HOME, SO GOES THE NATION!!! -Zig Zeiglar
Bumper-sticker:
"When I die, I want to go peacefully, and in my sleep, like
my grandfather...... and not screaming and yelling like the passengers in his
car..."
"By trying we can easily
learn to endure adversity - another man's I mean." -- Mark Twain
Cancer is limited.
It cannot cripple love,
It cannot corrode faith,
It cannot eat away at peace,
It cannot destroy confidence,
It cannot kill friendship,
It cannot shut out memories,
It cannot silence courage,
It cannot invade the soul,
It cannot reduce eternal life,
It cannot quench the Spirit,
It cannot lessen the power of the resurrection.
Charles L. Allen in The Miracle of Love writes of a fisherman
friend who told him that one never needs a top for his crab basket. If one of
the crabs starts to climb up the sides of the basket, the other crabs will reach
up and pull it back down. Some people are a lot like crabs.
Chippie the parakeet never saw
it coming. One second he was
peacefully perched in his cage. The
next he was sucked in, washed up, and blown over.
The problems began
when Chippie's owner decided to clean Chippie’s cage with a vacuum cleaner.
She removed the attachment from the end of the hose and stuck it in the
cage. The phone rang, and she turned to pick it up.
She'd barely said "hello" when "sssopp!" Chippie got
sucked in.
The bird owner
gasped, put down the phone, turned off the vacuum, and opened the bag.
There was Chippie -- still alive, but stunned. Since the bird was covered
with dust and soot, she grabbed him and raced to the bathroom, turned on the
faucet, and held Chippie under the running water.
Then, realizing that Chippie was soaked and shivering, she did what any
compassionate bird owner would do ... she reached for the hair dryer and blasted
the pet with hot air.
Poor Chippie never
knew what hit him. A few days
after the trauma, the reporter who'd initially written about the event contact
Chippie's owner to see how the bird was recovering. "Well,"
she replied, "Chippie
doesn't sing much anymore -- he just sits and stares." -- from In the
Eye of the Storm by Max Lucado. Word 1991 p 11.
Christmas Bells
I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, goodwill to men!
I thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, goodwill to men!
And in despair I bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said;
"For hate is strong, and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, goodwill to men."
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep;
God is not dead, nor doth He sleep.
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail,
With peace on earth, goodwill to men!"
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Columnist L. M. Boyd recently described the amazing good fortune of a man
named Jack Wurm. In 1949, Mr. Wurm
was broke and out of a job. One day he was walking along a San Francisco beach
when he came across a bottle with a piece of paper in it. As he read the note,
he discovered that it was the last will and testament of Daisy Singer Alexander,
heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune.
The note read, "To avoid confusion, I leave my entire estate to the
lucky person who finds this bottle and to my attorney, Barry Cohen, share and
share alike." According to
Boyd, the courts accepted the theory that the heiress had written the note 12
years earlier, and had thrown the bottle into the Thames River in London, from
where it had drifted across the oceans to the feet of a penniless and jobless
Jack Wurm. His chance discovery netted him over 6 million dollars in cash and
Singer stock.
How would you like
to have been making Mr. Wurm's footprints on that San Francisco beach?
What a find! And yet 6
million dollars doesn't even begin to compare with our spiritual inheritance!
(Christ to not will His eternal riches through such whims and chance! They only
inherit His wealth who meet His conditions and who thereby become the sons and
daughters of God. --Duane V. Maxey)
Corrie Ten Boom in The Hiding Place relates an incident which
taught her this principle. She and
her sister, Betsy, had just been transferred to the worst German prison camp
they had seen yet, Ravensbruck. Upon
entering the barracks, they found them extremely overcrowded and flea-infested.
Their Scripture reading that morning in 1 Thessalonians had reminded them
to rejoice always, pray constantly, and give thanks in all circumstances. Betsy told Corrie to stop and thank the Lord for every detail
of their new living quarters. Corrie
at first flatly refused to give thanks for the fleas, but Betsy persisted. She
finally succumbed. During the
months spent at that camp, they were surprised to find how openly they could
hold Bible study and prayer meetings without guard interference.
It was several months later when they learned that the guards would not
enter the barracks because of the fleas. --Corrie Ten Boom
Corrie Ten Boom shares this true story in her book, "The
Hiding Place": It was a church
service in Munich that I saw him, the former S. S. man who had stood guard at
the shower room door in the processing center at Ravensbruck.
He was the first of our actual jailers that I had seen since that time.
And suddenly it was all there -- the roomful of mocking men, the heaps of
clothing, Betsie's pain-blanched face.
He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing.
"How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein," he said. "To
think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away!"
His hand was thrust out to shake mine.
And I, who had preached so often to the people in Bloemendaal the need to
forgive, kept my hand at my side. Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled
through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus
Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more?
Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.
I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand.
I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or
charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him.
Give me Your forgiveness. As I took his hand the most incredible thing
happened.
From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to
pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that
almost overwhelmed me. And so I
discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that
the world's healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He
gives, along with the command, the love itself.
David Livingstone tells how he
was chased up a small tree and tormented by lions. He said the tree was so small
that he was barely out of reach of the lions. He said they would stand on their
back feet and roar and shake the little tree, and that he could feel the hot
breath of the lions as they sought him. "But," he states, "I had
a good night and felt happier and safer in that little tree besieged by lions,
in the jungles of Africa, in the will of God, than I would have been out of the
will of God in England."
There is one safe and happy place, and that is in the will of God. --
William Moses Tidwell, "Pointed Illustrations."
A little boy is gone to school
one day and while he is gone, his cat gets killed. His mother is very concerned
about how he will take the news. Upon his arrival home, she explains the tragedy
and tries to console the boy saying, "But don't worry, the cat is in heaven
with God now."
To which the boy replied, "What's God gonna do with a dead cat?"
Dear God,
So far today I've done all right.
I haven't gossiped.
I haven't lost my temper.
I haven't been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish or overindulgent.
I'm very thankful for that.
But in a few minutes, God, I'm going to get out of bed;
And from then on I'm probably going to need a lot more help.
Amen.
Death is the shadow that hangs over human life.
It is the judgment. It is
God's evaluation of your life and mine. Though
impossible to do so, we are constantly attempting to escape the fact of death.
The late William Randolph Hearst forbade anyone to use the word death
in his presence. What a contrast to
Philip II, King of Macedon and father of Alexander the Great, who commissioned a
servant to come into his presence daily and solemnly announce, "Remember,
Philip, thou must die." -- G. Curtis Jones, 1000
Illustrations for Preaching and Teaching, (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1986)
100
DIARY OF AN UNBORN CHILD
OCTOBER 5 - Today
my life began. My parents do not
know it yet, I am as small as a seed of an apple, but it is I already. And I am
to be a girl. I shall have blond hair and blue eyes.
Just about everything is settled though, even the fact that I shall love
flowers.
OCTOBER 19 - Some
say that I am not a real person yet, that only my mother exists. But I am a real
person, just as a small crumb of bread is yet truly bread.
My mother is. And I am.
OCTOBER 23 - My
mouth is just beginning to open now. Just think, in a year or so I shall be laughing and later
talking. I know what my first word
will be: MAMA.
OCTOBER 25 - My
heart began to beat today all by itself. From
now on it shall gently beat for the rest of my life without ever stopping to
rest! And after many years it will tire. It
will stop, and then I shall die.
NOVEMBER 2 - I am
growing a bit every day. My arms
and legs are beginning to take shape. But I have to wait a long time yet before
those little legs will raise me to my mother's arms, before these little arms
will be able to gather flowers and embrace my father.
NOVEMBER 12 - Tiny
fingers are beginning to form on my hands. Funny how small they are!
I'll be able to stroke my mother's hair with them.
NOVEMBER 20 - It
wasn't until today that the doctor told mom that I am living here under her
heart. Oh, how happy she must be!
Are you happy, mom?
NOVEMBER 25 - My
mom and dad are probably thinking about a name for me. But they don't even know
that I am a little girl. I want to
be called Kathy. I am getting so
big already.
DECEMBER 10 - My
hair is growing. It is smooth and
bright and shiny. I wonder what
kind of hair mom has.
DECEMBER 13 - I am
just about able to see. It is dark
around me. When mom brings me into the world it will be full of sunshine and
flowers. But what I want more than anything is to see my mom.
How do you look, mom?
DECEMBER 24 - I
wonder if mom hears the whispering of my heart? Some children come into the
world a little sick. But my heart
is strong and healthy. It beats so
evenly: tup-tup, tup-tup. You'll
have a healthy little daughter, mom!
DECEMBER 28 -
Today my mother killed me.
During the 1940's a survey was
taken of school teachers that asked "What are the 7 leading discipline
problems facing teachers today?" The
results were as follows:
Talking
Chewing Gum
Making Noise
Running In The
Halls
Getting Out Of
Place In Line
Wearing Improper
Clothing
Not Putting Paper
In The Waste Basket
The same questions
were asked teachers during the 1980's with these responses:
Drug Abuse
Alcohol Abuse
Pregnancy
Suicide
Rape
Assault/burglary
Arson
- Omega-Letter, June, 1991
Do you ever play the game "how far"?
Its rules are really simple - you fill up your gas tank and then drive to
see how far you can go before you fill up again.
You watch the gauge nervously as it falls closer and closer to big E.
What about you spiritual gas tank - do you play "how far" with
it, too, trying to see how far you can get on a single fill-up? |