This is from The Strong Family by Charles Swindoll
Benjamin West, a British artist, tells how he first became aware of his artistic skills. One day his mother went out, leaving him in charge of his little sister, Sally. In his mother’s absence, he discovered some bottles of colored ink and to amuse her, he began to paint Sally’s portrait. In doing so, he made quite a mess of things….spilled numerous ink splotches here and there. When his mother returned, she saw the mess, but said nothing about it. She deliberately looked beyond all that as she picked up the piece of paper. Smiling, she exclaimed, “Why, it’s Sally!” She then stooped and kissed her son. From that time on, Benjamin West would say, “My mother’s kiss made me a painter.” “God gave the talent, but a very secure and wise mother gave the gift of wings.”
Proverbs 30:18-19
There are three things which are too wonderful for me, four which I do not understand: the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of the serpent on a rock, the way of a ship in the middle of the sea, and the way of a man with a maid.
God’s laws and commandments are there because He loves us and He wants what is best for us. He gives us rules for our benefit.
Just like any loving parent, God gives us boundaries for our own good. Indulgent parents, who let their children do anything they want, raise kids with serious problems. You see it all the time. Children without boundaries are unstable. They get out of control. And they feel out of control. They misbehave without consequences, so they believe there are no consequences for breaking the rules. Parents who allow children to not follow rules that exist for their protection don’t do any favors for their children. People generally don’t like children like that and don’t want to be around them. And such children sense that they are not liked and that affects their personality. They develop less than optimal behavior, which leads to more rejection. This happens all because a parent does not love their children enough to give them rules with a requirement to obey them.
All children need to know what boundaries are in order to survive and do well in life. We are God’s kids, and we, too, need boundaries in order to survive and do well. Without God’s Word, we will be influenced by the anti-Christ formed relativism of ht world more than the God created revelation of the Holy Spirit.
In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also. Psalm 95:4 (KJV)
One morning while a prisoner at Ravensbruck, Corrie ten Boom awoke with a bad cold. Back in her homeland, with a hankie to use for blowing her nose, she would have easily adjusted to the infirmity. But in the concentration camp, without so much as a hankie, she felt she could not bear her cold and runny nose.
‘Well, why don’t you pray for a hankie?” suggested her sister, Betsie.
Corrie wanted to laugh. There they were imprisoned in a camp where thousands of people each week were being executed or put through unbearable suffering. “And Betsie suggests I pray for a hankie!” she thought. “If I were to pray for anything, it would be for something big not something little like that.”
Betsie, however, immediately and simply prayed: “Father, in the name of Jesus I now pray for a hankie for Corrie, because she has a bad cold.”
Corrie shook her head and walked away. A short while later she was standing by the window of her barracks when she heard someone call her name. Looking out, she spotted a friend and fellow prisoner who worked in the camp’s hospital approaching her.
“Here you are”, the woman said to Corrie in a matter-of-fact tone as she extended a small package to her. “Take it. I bring you a little present.”
Corrie could hardly believe her eyes when she opened the small parcel–it contained a handkerchief!” “How did you know?” she queried. “Did Betsie tell you? Did you know I had a cold?”
The woman shrugged, then revealed, “I know nothing. I was busy sewing handkerchiefs out of an old piece of sheet, and there was a voice in my heart saying, “Take a hankie to Corrie ten Boom.” So, there is your gift, from God.”
O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. Psalm 95:1 (KJV)
This is from the book No Man Is An Island by Thomas Merton
Hence I do not find in myself the power to be happy merely by doing what I like. On the contrary, if I do nothing except what pleases my own fancy I will be miserable almost all the time. This would never be so if my will had not been created to use its own freedom in the love of others.
There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, as an error which proceedeth from the ruler: Ecclesiastes 10:5 (KJV)
If ever human loves was tender, and self-sacrificing, and devoted; if ever it could bear and forbear; if ever it could suffer gladly of its loved ones; if ever it was willing to pour itself out in a lavish abandonment for the comfort or pleasure of its objects; the infinitely more is Divine love tender, and self-sacrificing, and devoted, and glad to bear and forbear, and to suffer, and to the tenderest love you know of , the deepest you have ever felt, and the strongest that has ever been poured out upon you, and heap upon it all the love of all the loving human hearts in the world, and then multiply it by infinity, and you will being, perhaps, to have some faint glimpse of what the love of God is.
This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 1 John 1:5 (KJV)
Me: Well here is something for you to think about also.
My Father! What am I , that all
Thy mercies sweet like sunlight fall
So constant o’er my way?
That Thy great love should shelter me,
And guide my steps so tenderly
Through every changing day?
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; 1 John 1:1 (KJV)
It was hard to believe that one week earlier Ryan was at home with his younger brother, Jordan, watching cartoons and eating Popsicles while the two boys recovered from routine cases of chicken pox.
When one large pock behind Ryan’s ear turned red and began to swell, Cheryl and her husband, Jeff, weren’t too worried. But as the swelling continued, they realized something was terribly wrong. Within hours, Ryan’s neck had swollen so much that it pushed his head over against his left shoulder. What’s more, his temperature shot up to 105 degrees. Rushed by ambulance to Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis, Ryan’s condition worsened.
The infection was being caused by streptococcus bacteria, which had invaded one of Ryan’s chicken pox. At that point, the swelling had so severely twisted Ryan’s neck that doctors were afraid it would break and damage his spinal column. Believing the infection had entered Ryan’s bones, doctors wanted to operate so they could scrape the infection from Ryan’s vertebrae and insert pins to hold everything together. Still, they were certain Ryan would not survive the surgery. They also knew he would not survive without surgery. Concluding there was nothing left to do but wait, they fully expected Ryan to die from a broken neck.
Alone with Ryan in his hospital room, Cheryl wept over the realization that her son was dying. There had been another Ryan, years ago, but he’d died too. Ryan Updyke wasn’t actually Cheryl’s brother, but he might as well have been. The little boy had been just three years old–and Cheryl seven–when he became part of her family. The son of Cheryl’s mother’s best friend,a single mom who worked evenings, Ryan spent most afternoons and evenings at Cheryl’s home. When he was sixteen, Ryan was diagnosed with bone cancer. He died eighteen months later.
When Cheryl and Jeff married and had their first baby, they named him after the “little brother” Cheryl had loved and lost. Cheryl’s son didn’t know about the young man whose name he shared. She had been looking forward to telling him about the older Ryan one day. Now it seemed that day would never come. And yet it felt like hope was draining away with every passing hour.
Cheryl saw Jeff’s Bible lying on a nearby table. Picking it up, she read Psalm 91:11: “For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. “Sobbing, she began to pray. Through her tears, she prayed, “Lord, send four of Your angels to guard the four corners of this room. Watch over my son, protect him, comfort him if he’s in any pain, and guide him home to you if he’s not going to stay here with us.”
The following night, it was Cheryl’s turn to stay home with Jordan while Jeff spent the night by Ryan’s side. The next morning, Cheryl phoned Jeff. She could hardly utter the words “Good morning” before her husband said, “You need to get down here right away.”
When Cheryl walked into Ryan’s hospital room, he opened his eyes–mere slits in his still-swollen face–and called out, “Hi, Mommy!” Ryan’s doctor turned to Jeff and Cheryl and said, “Well things are turning around. Thank God we didn’t take him into surgery! Let’s just see how he does.” Ryan’s swelling continued to subside by the hour. He was still weak, but recovering quickly.
One day when he’d been home about a week, Cheryl said, “Ryan, you were so, so sick!” They talked about his stay in the hospital. She was thankful he remembered nothing from the first ten days when he was either in excruciating pain or unconscious.
“I prayed for you, Ryan,” his mother said. “I prayed for angels to watch over you and help you not feel bad.”
“Yeah, I know,” he answered.
She looked at him quizzically. “What do you mean, you know?”
“I know,” he said. “I saw the angels.”
Cheryl glanced at her son. “Really? Where were the angels, Ryan? What did they look like?”
Ryan said matter-of-factly, “They were standing in the corners of the room. And flying around too. There were mommy and daddy ones, and baby ones and grandma and grandpa ones. They were yellow and white and really pretty.”
Cheryl didn’t know what to think. She half-believed him. Then again, maybe through his coma, he’d heard her praying. “I had a dream too,” Ryan said as he hopped around the table. “About Jesus. We were planting stuff in a garden. He said I was a good boy and that He loved me.” She looked at her son in wonder. “That’s interesting. Anything else?” Ryan was getting fidgety now. He’d sat for too long and was ready to play.
He started skipping toward the door. Cheryl turned back to her mirror. But he stopped and said over his shoulder, “Oh yeah. Ryan says “Hi.”
1 John 4:13-15
By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.
This is from the book No Man Is an Island by Thomas Merton
To consider persons and events and situations only in the light of their effort upon myself is to live on the doorstep of hell. Selfishness is doomed to frustration, centered as it is upon a lie. To live exclusively for myself, I must make all things bend themselves to my will as if I were a god. But this is impossible. Is there any more cogent indication of my creaturehood than the insufficiency of my own will? For I cannot make the universe obey me. I cannot make other people conform to my own whims and fancies. I cannot make even my own body obey me. When I give it pleasure, it deceives my expectation and makes me suffer pain. When I give myself what I conceive to be freedom, I deceive myself and find that I am the prisoner of my own blindness and selfishness and insufficiency.
And it came to pass on the day that Moses had fully set up the tabernacle, and had anointed it, and sanctified it, and all the instruments thereof, both the altar and all the vessels thereof, and had anointed them, and sanctified them; Numbers 7:1 (KJV)
