We have a granddaughter in Colorado who is a freshman in college. What a delight it is for her and her parents and siblings when she is able to go home. She is busy and doing well but truly enjoys those moments with family. In the next couple of months we will have both Thanksgiving and Christmas which brings fond memories and joyful times for many families.

The upcoming months, however, have brought fear to the lives of many people. An unbelievable number of people have voiced their concerns over their future and the future of our nation. God has blessed America and we can only pray that He will continue to bless us. However, He has told us not to be afraid and to keep focused upon Him. We don’t know what the future holds but we know He is in charge of it. When troubled times come as they will, He encourages us to ‘look up.’ He is the answer to all of our problems and fears.

“Many live in dread of what is coming. Why should we?

The unknown puts adventure into life. It gives us something

to sharpen our souls on. The unexpected around the corner

gives us a sense of anticipation and surprise. Thank God for

the unknown future. If we saw all good things which are

coming to us, we would sit down and degenerate.

If we saw all the evil things, we would be paralyzed.

How merciful God is to lift the curtain on today;

and as we get strength today to meet tomorrow,

then to lift the curtain on the morrow.

He is a considerate God.

By E. Stanley Jones, The World’s Best Bathroom Book (Honor Books c.2005) p.15

Someone once said, “A Christian home is earth’s sweetest picture of heaven.” One of the joys of my life was that my parents always looked forward to ‘going home.’ Home, for them, was Heaven. I was in the doctor’s office when my mother was given the news that she had cancer and there was nothing they could do for her. She looked stunned for a moment as her eminent death loomed upon the horizon. Then she turned to me with the most beautiful smile I have ever seen on a human being and with hands clasped and face joyful she exclaimed, “Oh, Marnie! I am going to have a glorious homecoming!” That is how she faced death – going home.

“A man may go to heaven without health, without wealth, without fame, without a great name, without learning, without culture, without friends, without ten thousand other things. But a man can never go to heaven without Christ!”

-Uncle Ben’s Quotebook (Harvest House c1976) p.185

Charlie Grier had the following in his file:

The Clock

The clock of life is wound but once,

And no man has the power

To tell just when the hands will stop

At late or early hour.

To lose one’s wealth is sad indeed,

To lose one’s health is more.

To lose one’s soul is such a loss

That no man can restore.

“39 people died while you read this short poem. Every hour 5,417 go to meet their Maker. You could have been among them. Sooner or later you will be. Are you ready?”

-author unknown

 

The beautiful thing when you do know Christ is that He gives us such tremendous assurance of Heaven! He promises in Jude 1:24-25 to bring us before His Father one day with exceeding joy and present us as righteous! Only God could do something like that! What a joy to know Him!

“I Will Go Straight To God”

by Jack Vinson, Kiangsu Province, China 1931

 

“The bandit told the missionary, “I’m going to kill you. Aren’t you afraid?”

Jack Vinson replied simply, “Kill me, if you wish. I will go straight to God.”

 

Jack Vinson’s courage inspired his friend E. H. Hamilton to write this poem:

 

Afraid? Of What?

To feel the spirit’s glad release?

To pass from pain to perfect peace,

The strife and strain of life to cease?

Afraid – of that?

 

Afraid? Of What?

Afraid to see the Savior’s face

To hear His welcome, and to trace

The glory gleam from wounds of grace?

Afraid – of that?

 

Afraid? Of What?

A flash, a crash, a pierced heart;

Darkness, light, O Heaven’s art!

A wound of His a counterpart!

Afraid – of that?

 

Afraid? Of What?

To do by death what life could not –

Baptize with blood a stony plot,

Till souls shall blossom from the spot?

Afraid – of that?

Jesus Freaks dc Talk and The Voice of the Martyrs (Albury Publ. C 1999) p.74-75

 

Since Yesterday

by Martha Snell Nicholson

 

Along the golden streets

A stranger walks tonight

With wonder in his heart –

Faith blossomed into sight.

 

He walks and stops and stares,

And walks and stares again.

Vistas of loveliness

Beyond the dreams of men.

 

He who once was weak,

And often shackled to a bed,

Now climbs eternal hills

With light and easy tread.

 

He has escaped at last

The cruel clutch of pain;

His lips shall never taste

Her bitter cup again.

 

O never call him dead,

This buoyant one and free,

Whose daily portion is

Delight and ecstasy!

 

He bows in speechless joy

Before the feet of Him

Whom, seeing not, he loved

While yet his sight was dim.

 

Along the golden streets

No stranger walks today,

But one who, long homesick,

Is home at last, to stay!

-Uncle Ben’s Quotebook (Harvest House c1976) p.194

 

“Pleasant words [are as] a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and health to the bones.”

Proverbs 16:24 KJV

How often have you heard the phrase, “If you can’t say something nice about someone, don’t say anything at all”? Someone also said, “It often shows a fine command of language to say nothing.” Proverbs 16:24 is particularly fascinating because we find that pleasant words will actually give healthy bones. Healthy bones is a interesting study in itself since the Bible refers to a number of things you can do to have healthy bones. Following God and doing things His way according to Proverbs 3 will give us healthy marrow for our bones. Isn’t that cool?

KINDNESS

‘Put on therefore . . . mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering.’ Col. 3:12”

“Kindness is love doing little things, things that seem scarcely worth doing, and yet which mean much to those for whom they are wrought. Kindness lends a hand when another is burdened. It speaks the cheerful word when a heart is discouraged…

“SPEAK KIND WORDS AND YOU WILL HEAR KIND ECHOES”

-Uncle Ben’s Quotebook p.209

This is a day and age in which sarcastic humor is the thing to do. The goal is to see how you can outdo your friend in friendly ‘digs’. I think we would do well, however, to be a little more cautious in this area and speak more pleasant words. I do not find any such friendly digs recorded as being said by Jesus but He certainly loved to laugh and have good clean fun. We all enjoy the friendly teasing and would miss it. We enjoy making fun of words.

REDNECK COMPUTER TERMS

• INTERNET: Where cafeteria workers put their hair.

• HACKER: Uncle Leroy after 32 years of smoking.

• FAX: What you lie about to the IRS.

• DISKETTE: Female disco dancer

• DIGITAL: Art of counting on your fingers

• CRASH: When you go to Junior’s party uninvited.

• TERMINAL: time to call the undertaker.

• CHIP: Pasture muffins you try not to step in.

• CACHE: Needed when you run out of food stamps

• BYTE: What your pit bull done to cousin Jethro

• BUG: the reason you gave for calling in sick.

• BAR CODE: Them’s the fight’n rules down at the local tavern.

• BACKUP: What you do when you run across a skunk in the woods.

• KEYBOARD: Where you hang the keys to the John Deere

• MAC: Big Bubbas favorite food

• DOWNLOAD: What you do to a truck full of firewood

• MEGAHERTZ: What happens when you drop a piece of wood while downloading

• MODEM: What you did when the grass and the weeds got too tall.

• MOUSE PAD: Where Mickey and Minnie live.

• NETWORK: Scoop’n up a big fish before it breaks the line.

• ON LINE: Where to stay when takin’ the sobriety test

• ROM: Where the Pope lives

• SCREEN: Helps keep the skeeters off the front porch

• SUPERCONDUCTOR: Amtrak’s employee of the year

• SCSI: What you call your week old underwear.

REDNECK MEDICAL TERMS

1. Benign: What you be after you be 8!

2. Bacteria: Back door to Cafeteria.

3. Barium: What doctor do when patients die.

4. Catscan: Searching for kitty.

5. Cauterize: Made eye contact with her.

6. Coma: Punctuation mark.

7. Enema: not a friend.

8. Fibular: a liar.

9. Important: Distinguished, well known.

10. Pelvis: Second cousin to Elvis.

11. Post Operative: The mailman.

Ken and I attended some Friday evening Jewish Sabots during the past year or two. This is a wonderful enlightening experience. I think the most delightful thing to me was the way the parents bless their children each week. What would happen if we spent more time as parents telling our children how proud we were because what they did was kind. Or we knew they could understand what we were trying to tell them because they are very smart. What would happen to our loved ones if we spoke pleasant words consistently?

Some very clever statements have been made that causes us to think.

• You don’t have to explain something you have not said.

• People with sharp tongues often end up by cutting his own throats.

• Hot words make cool friendships.

• A lot of things are opened by mistake, but none so often as the mouth.

• A lot of trouble in this world is caused by combining a narrow mind with a wide mouth.

• He who knows much knows how to hold his tongue.

Uncle Ben’s Quotebook p.274

WATCH YOUR WORDS

Keep a watch on your words, my children,

For words are wonderful things;

They are sweet, like the bee’s fresh honey;

Like bees, they have terrible stings;

They can bless like the warm glad sunshine

And brighten the lonely life;

They can cut in the strife of anger

Like an open, two-edged knife.

Let them pass through your lips unchallenged,

If their errand be true and kind –

If they come to support the weary,

To comfort and help the blind.

If a bitter, revengeful spirit

Prompt the words, let them be unsaid;

They may flash through the brain like lightning,

Or fall on the heart like lead.

Keep them back, if they’re cold and cruel,

Under bar, and lock, and seal;

The wounds they make, my children,

Are always slow to heal.

May Christ guard your lips, and ever,

>From the time of your early youth,

May the words you daily utter

Be the words of the beautiful truth.

-Selected (Inspiring Poems, Zondervan c.1970) p.35

A year or two before Ken and I moved to Deer River, my mom called me and very joyfully and excitedly told me that God had spoken to her. She said God spoke two words to her. “Trust Me” she said, “That is what He said to me. Just, ‘trust Me.’” She needed those words in the challenging days ahead but, oh, how she looked forward to meeting her Lord in the flesh for the first time! Sometimes we do not understand what is going on in our lives but we can experience God’s peace and joy when we trust Him through it all.

Chastening

by Grace E. Troy

I know not why His hand is laid,

In chastening on my life,

Nor why it is my little world

Is filled so full of strife.

I know not why, when faith looks up

And seeks for rest from pain,

That o’er my sky fresh clouds arise

And drench my path with rain.

I know not why my prayer so long

By Him has been denied:

Nor why, while others’ ships sail on,

Mine should in port abide.

But I do know that God is LOVE,

That He my burden shares,

And though I may not understand,

I know for me He cares.

I know the heights for which I long

Are often reached through pain,

I know the sheaves must needs be threshed

To yield the golden grain.

I know that, though He may remove

The friends on whom I lean,

‘Tis that I thus may learn to love

And trust the One unseen.

And, when at last I see His face

And know as I am known,

I will not care how rough the road

That led me to my home.

-Grace E. Troy, Osterhus Publishing House

A lot of people call me and it seems that everyone is more troubled in life than ever before. Everyone is concerned about the normal burdens but now there seems to be so much more. People are worried about the financial state of our nation as well as the upcoming election, plus accidents and illnesses and on and on we go.

GOD’S BANK AIN’T BUSTED YET!

The bank had closed, my earthly store had vanished from my hand;

I felt that there was no sadder one than I in all the land.

My washerwoman, too, had lost her little mite with mine.

And she was singing as she hung the clothes upon the line.

“How can you be so happy?” I asked, “Your loss don’t you regret?”

“Yes, ma’am, but what’s the use to fret? God’s bank ain’t busted yet!”

I felt my burden lighter grow; her faith I seemed to share;

In prayer I went to God’s great throne and laid my troubles there.

The sun burst from behind the clouds, in golden splendor set;

I thank God for her simple words: “God’s bank ain’t busted yet!”

And now I draw rich dividends, more than my hands can hold.

Of faith and love and hope and trust, and peace of mind untold.

I thank the Giver of it all, but still I can’t forget

My washerwoman’s simple words: “God’s bank ain’t busted yet!”

Oh, weary ones upon life’s road, when everything seems drear

And losses loom on every hand and skies seem not to clear,

Throw back your shoulders, lift your head and cease to chafe and fret,

Your dividend will be declared: “God’s bank ain’t busted yet!”

• Alice P. Moss (Poems for Sunshine and Shadow, Back to the Bible, c.1962) p.46-47

When we think life is rough, we should consider the first 12 Apostles and their fate. Let’s take a little look at history.

THE FATE OF THE APOSTLES

• St. Matthew suffered martyrdom by being slain with a sword at a distant city of Ethiopia

• St. Mark expired at Alexandria, after having been cruelly dragged through the streets of that city.

• St. Luke was hanged upon an olive tree in the classic land of Greece.

• St. John was put into a caldron of boiling oil, but escaped death in a miraculous manner, and was afterwards banished to Patmos.

• St. Peter was crucified at Rome with his head downward.

• St. James the Greater was beheaded at Jerusalem.

• St. James the Less was thrown from a lofty pinnacle of the temple, and then beaten to death with a fuller’s club.

• St. Philip was hanged up against a pillar at Heiropolis in Phrygia.

• St. Bartholomew was flayed alive.

• St. Andrew was bound to a cross, where he preached to his persecutors until he died.

• St. Thomas was run through the body with a lance at Coromandel in the East Indies.

• St. Jude was shot to death with arrows.

• St. Matthias was first stoned, and then beheaded.

• St. Barnabas of the Gentiles was stoned to death by the Jews at Salonica.

• St. Paul after various tortures and persecutions, was at length beheaded at Rome by the Emperor Nero.

• Uncle Ben’s Quotebook (Harvest House Publ. c.1976) p.150

When we get discouraged with the troubles and trials of life, we need to look up to our Savior and thank Him that we still live in a land where it is not against the law to be a Christian. He has so many promises that comfort us through trials but also the glorious future with Him one day. In the 21st chapter of Luke Jesus is telling about how hard it will be toward the end just before His return. He tells us to focus upon Heaven.

Luke 21:28 “And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.”