10/10/13

From Gary.... Me and You


Looking DOWN at a rainbow; now, there is a new one for me!!!  I guess it is probably not that uncommon, given that we have airplanes; it is just I never thought about it before.  Now, God gave the rainbow as the symbol of a covenant (of blessing) with Noah (and by extension- all of us) and every time I see one in the sky, I think of God making that covenant.  But, you know, this is a communication that has two sides to it.  We look up and remember- God looks down and remembers.  It is a two way street.  We are not in this life alone- God is there and for me I think that I should consider God's viewpoint of our relationship more often.  Putting all of this together makes sense to me by linking the picture and the verses I have listed below.

Genesis, Chapter 9
  8  God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying,  9 “As for me, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your offspring after you,  10 and with every living creature that is with you: the birds, the livestock, and every animal of the earth with you, of all that go out of the ship, even every animal of the earth.  11 I will establish my covenant with you: All flesh will not be cut off any more by the waters of the flood, neither will there ever again be a flood to destroy the earth.”  12 God said, “This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:  13 I set my rainbow in the cloud, and it will be a sign of a covenant between me and the earth.  14 When I bring a cloud over the earth, that the rainbow will be seen in the cloud,  15 and I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh, and the waters will no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.  16 The rainbow will be in the cloud. I will look at it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.”  17 God said to Noah, “This is the token of the covenant which I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.” 

Matthew, Chapter 7
7  “Ask, and it will be given you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened for you.   8  For everyone who asks receives. He who seeks finds. To him who knocks it will be opened.   9  Or who is there among you, who, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone?   10  Or if he asks for a fish, who will give him a serpent?   11  If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!  12  Therefore whatever you desire for men to do to you, you shall also do to them; for this is the law and the prophets. 

  13  “Enter in by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter in by it.   14  How  narrow is the gate, and restricted is the way that leads to life! Few are those who find it. 

  15  “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravening wolves.   16  By their fruits you will know them. Do you gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles?   17  Even so, every good tree produces good fruit; but the corrupt tree produces evil fruit.  18  A good tree can’t produce evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree produce good fruit.   19  Every tree that doesn’t grow good fruit is cut down, and thrown into the fire.   20  Therefore by their fruits you will know them.   21  Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven; but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.   22  Many will tell me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, in your name cast out demons, and in your name do many mighty works?’   23  Then I will tell them, ‘I never knew you. Depart from me, you who work iniquity.’ 

  24  “Everyone therefore who hears these words of mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man, who built his house on a rock.   25  The rain came down, the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat on that house; and it didn’t fall, for it was founded on the rock.   26  Everyone who hears these words of mine, and doesn’t do them will be like a foolish man, who built his house on the sand.  27  The rain came down, the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat on that house; and it fell—and great was its fall.”

Noah went through a lot and he did it WITH GOD!!!  They had a relationship.  For Christians, the same concept holds true with Jesus.  His way of living becomes ours; his thoughts as well.  If not, well, when the "floods" come, our house will go- SPLAT!!! Honestly, Jesus asks us to do some difficult things- such as loving your enemies, but what HE had to do in order to bless us is in the order of a different galaxy. 

In the book of Acts, chapter 1,  we read:
9  When he had said these things, as they were looking, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight.  10 While they were looking steadfastly into the sky as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white clothing,  11 who also said, “You men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who was received up from you into the sky will come back in the same way as you saw him going into the sky.”

Since Jesus ascended into heaven... I wonder how often HE LOOKS AT RAINBOWS???  You know, this putting myself in Jesus' shoes thing, just might be useful after all!!!!!

From Ben Fronczek... Encouragement From the Lord – Acts 18




Encouragement From the Lord – Acts 18


 (Acts 18:1-11)
What does ‘Throwing in a towel’ symbolize?  – Giving up, quitting. Getting so discouraged we just can’t go on any further. I suppose all of us some time or another feel like throwing in the proverbial towel. We get depressed, or want to give up and quit. Some of us can’t wait for Jesus to return and take us home. Sometime I just wish that I’d go to sleep some night and  wake up in Heaven. Did you ever feel like that? Like: “There’s no use. Life is too hard. The harder I try, worse things get.   I just feel like I’m spinning my wheels and getting nowhere.”  Daily stresses, and problems at work, at home, sometimes can seem like such a grind, and so repetitive, like a Chinese water torture!

I know this is true for 2 reasons:
I talk to many of you who’ve been there. And I’ve been there myself…. More than once! Sometimes God’s people need a spiritual pick me up, a 2nd wind…

Even heroes of old; Examples:
 
• Moses – The Greatest leader, hand-picked by God!  He spoke to God face to face, yet in Numbers 11:15 he said to God, “put me to death” The Israelites and their complaining  were driving him over the edge.

• Elijah – Greatest prophet of OT. He willingly challenged the idolatry of his day/called fire down from heaven/won a face-off with the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah. Yet in I Kings 19:4 after it was all over he runs with fear from Jezebel, and after sitting down under a broom tree he asked God if he could just die, he said, “I’ve had enough Lord, … take my life!”

• Job – We talk about his patience and faith, and he was truly a great man…he had a great beginning and a great ending, but in-between, when he lost everything, he wished he had not been born, He cursed the very day he was born. (Job 3)

• Jonah – He wanted God to kill him to take his life. He was spiritually depressed and was not even happy for the 120,000 souls that just got saved in Nineveh!  (Jonah 4)

And then we come to Paul in Acts 18. Here we find him on his 2nd missionary journey, coming from Athens to Corinth. I can’t help but believe he was experiencing a low time in his life. We know that because in I Cor. 2:3 Paul writes of that time: “I came to you in weakness and in fear, and with much trembling”  In other words: “I was wreck.”

-Fatigue probably consumed him after his 53 mile walk.

-He was alone. He had left his friends Timothy and Silas back in Berea.

-He was probably out of money and needed to work, he was glad he found fellow a tent maker (v. 3)

-He probably had a sense of failure. He didn’t really have much success in Athens. Some even accused him of being a “babbler.”

-He was probably a bit frustrated and over whelmed, leaving a city of idolatry and was heading for one of the most sinful cities in the world, Corinth.   It hosted the Temple of Aphrodite, the goddess of sex, and it was said that a thousand priestesses prostituted their bodies in the name of religion!

By this point on this trip he had been beaten and jailed at Philippi, persecuted at Thessalonica and Berea, ridiculed in Athens, and now he was in Corinth and had to deal with all the smut.  So he starts preaching Jesus in the local synagogue. And what happens,   the Jews get him so upset  he literally shakes out his cloths  in protest to them and said, “You blood be on your own heads.”  By now he was probably at a low point in his ministry even though his friends Timothy and Silas finally caught up with him.  He was now angry at the Jews and I’m sure a bit disappointed. But then the Lord came to Paul and showed him that this was not the time to throw in the towel!

Let me read to you this story -  Read Acts 18:1-11 “After this, Paul left Athens and went to Corinth. There he met a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. Paul went to see them, and because he was a tent-maker as they were, he stayed and worked with them. Every Sabbath he reasoned in the synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks.
When Silas and Timothy came from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself exclusively to preaching, testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ.  But when the Jews opposed Paul and became abusive, he shook out his clothes in protest and said to them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am clear of my responsibility. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.”
Then Paul left the synagogue and went next door to the house of Titius Justus, a worshiper of God. Crispus, the synagogue ruler, and his entire household believed in the Lord; and many of the Corinthians who heard him believed and were baptized.
One night the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision: “Do not be afraid; keep on speaking, do not be silent. For I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city.” So Paul stayed for a year and a half, teaching them the word of God.”
In this section the Lord reminds Paul and us of a few things that should encourage him and us:

1. The Lord is presence  In vss. 9-10 the Lord tells Paul,  “Don’t’ be afraid, for I am with you…….”

• As a matter of fact, He is present in times of loneliness
In Heb. 13:5-7, The Lord reminded His people by saying, “I will never leave you, never will I forsake you.”  And so His people will say with confidence, “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can a man do to me?”
At His birth that is what His name “Emmanuel”   meant, -  “God with us”
And before Jesus ascended, after giving the Great commission, one of the last things that Jesus told His disciples was, “Lo, I am with you always”
People may let you down, abandon you even hurt you. Your best friend may stab you in the back, but our Lord said, “I will never leave you.”  We may not see Him with these eyes or hear Him with these ears but He is a friend that sticks closer to us than anyone else.   We are never truly alone.

• He is also with us in the valley when we are lower than we’ve ever been.
When defeat comes /discouragement/sickness/ financial reversal/heartaches/family problems…remember that the God of the mountain is still God in the valley! 
Story: A little boy went home after school very sad & told mom about Billy, his best friend, who had been absent for 3 days, he had found out today why when he returned to class…his daddy died, and when he told us, he cried and just laid my head flat on his desk. Mom asked “what did you do?” He said, I didn’t know what to do, so I just laid my head on my desk and cried, too! (that’s the kind of Savior we have!)
In John. 11:35-36 do you remember what Jesus did when he saw Lazarus’ family crying at his grave even though He knew He was going to raise him from the dead; even though He knew things were going to get better? Jesus cried right along with them.
Our Lord is there in the valley with you when you’re down in the deepest pit!  Don’t forget that!

• He’s Even with us In death     In Ps. 23 David said, “yea, tho’ I walk thru the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil…for thou art with me!”
So the Lord encourages Paul by letting him know, ‘It’s too soon to quit!’ We have the promise of His presence!

2. The 2nd thing the Lord lets Paul know besides the fact that he is not alone is,  God going to protect him.   v. 10 says “Do not be afraid, keep on speaking, do not be silent for I am with you and no one is going to attack and harm you” .…not that he wouldn’t be hurt,  he just wouldn’t be harmed there in Corinth!
Later, some would kill the apostle Paul, but not until he was able to say, “I have finished my course.”   They killed the Lord Jesus, but not before He said, “It is finished!” God has a purpose for your life. (Probably more than you realize) And if you choose to, you can live it out, fearlessly…Though there may be persecution, trials and hardships…until your work here is done, until God’s purpose for you is complete, He is not going to let any real harm come to you.  Nothing is going to happen to you without the Lord’s permission. So He tells Paul, ‘don’t quit yet. It’s too soon to throw in the towel there in Corinth!
Someone once said, “Ahead of us He’s our guide, behind us He’s our guard, under us are His everlasting arms, and above us, if we’ll look up, He’s ever-present with us in a cloud of glory!”

3. The 3rd thing we see is God’s insight and potential  
The 3rd thing the Lord tells Paul in vs. 10 is, “I have many people in this city”  How could God say that? So far there were no more than a handful of Christians in Corinth! The Lord didn’t just see the perverts of this city. He also saw those whose heart were ready to turn to Him. Years later when the church was much bigger,  

Paul writes to the Corinthians saying this in I Cor. 6: 9 “Don’t you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Don’t fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols, or commit adultery, or are male prostitutes, or practice homosexuality, or are thieves, or greedy people, or drunkards, or are abusive, or cheat people—none of these will inherit the Kingdom of God. Some of you were once like that. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. “ NLT
Over and over Paul was comforted by God’s love and compassion. I believe the conscious reality of God’s love and compassion encouraged him and gave him the 2nd wind he needed. 

Read 2 Cor. 1:3-5  “All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is our merciful Father and the source of all comfort. He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us. For the more we suffer for Christ, the more God will shower us with his comfort through Christ.” NLT

Over and over God tries to get us see that He loves us but for some reason many of us just don’t give ourselves fully to Him and His love. We are distracted by other things in this world which we think will give us what we think we need to make us feel happy.

Illustration: Let me tell a little story in closing. I hope in hearing it you will see how much God loves you and me. And I hope that it will give you comfort, and strength and a second wind when you are down. “In a particular neighborhood some children grew up together, played together as is quite common in most neighborhoods across the world. In this particular neighborhood a little girl by the name of Sally and a little boy by the name of Billy were neighbors and were good friends throughout the early years of their life. Being the same age they both entered school at the same time and even had some of the same classes together. Sally was quite pretty, slim with blue eyes and wavy strawberry blond hair She had a sweet yet outgoing personality, she liked sports and eventually joined the cheerleading and track teams at school. Billy was a little different. He was quite and fairly common looking. He wasn’t very tall and at times he got a little pudgy around the middle. He wasn’t so much into school team sports, rather he gravitated more towards nature. He like fishing, hiking, boating and camping. Though they were friends and neighbors for as long as they could remember, as they entered puberty, junior high and then later high school, Billy started feeling a little different towards Sally. What started as child-like friendship eventually grew into feelings of love and concern for his little friend next door who had now developed into a beautiful young woman.  They still talked and teased one another, but it wasn’t until their freshman year in HS that Billy mustered up the courage to tell Sally how he really felt about her. He told her that he loved her, it was something that she already knew, and he told her that he wanted to be more than just the neighbor friend next door. Now Sally like Billy, they had been friends all their life, and she told him that in a way she did love him, but not the way he wanted, rather, it was more like love one would have for a brother. Billy was humble. He did not get angry or try to make her feel guilty, though inside he did feel sad because he knew that he love her like no other. Every now and then, maybe twice a year when they were alone and had a chance to talk he repeatedly let her know that he still loved her in a way that did not put her on a guilt trip. He would even watch out for her, protect her and her reputation at school behind the scene. He would leave little gifts for her now and then, and even  some affectionate notes teasing her in a friendly way. But Sally had busied herself  with new friends, activities, sports cheerleading, track, parties, football players, clothes and boys with nice cars. But despite all the changes Billy kept a close watch on her and loved her from a distance. One day unexpectedly, during a track meet, Sally collapsed on the field and lost consciousness. She was rushed to the local hospital and what the doctors found shook her mom and dad to the core. Sally had a major heart defect which was non repairable. Sally’s heart was so bad that they told her mom and dad that if they did not find another heart soon, she would not recover. He told them they had put in an emergency request to the donated organ banks around the country for another heart. Billy was devastated. This sweet young lady that he loved all his life was at the brink of death and almost lost to him. The next day the doctor came to Sally and her parents with good news, the organ transplant bank called about a heart and delivered it to the hospital. That same day she was rushed to the O-R and they put the new heart in Sally with much success. And all the parents could do was weep every time they saw her because they thought they were going to lose their little girl.
I wasn’t until a couple of weeks later when she was well on the road to  recovery that Sally found out why her parents continued to weep so much when they saw her. That is until she found out whose heart was beating inside her giving her life. That’s when she began to weep. It was Billy’s. Billy was  distraught when he learned that his beloved was going to die if she didn’t get a heart. After hearing that there were none available for her anywhere, he went home, he went into the bathroom, he wrote a letter, called 911, and then proceeded to cut his wrist very deep and then put his hand it in the tub. Not long after an ambulance and the rescue crews arrived at his house and there was a lot of confusion. They found him not to long after he passed away with a note pinned to his shirt, with a smile on his face.

The note read,
“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. John 15:13   
Mom, dad, please don’t be mad because I did this. Please make sure they give Sally my heart.  I gave it to her a long time ago.                                       
With no regrets, Billy

P.S. Sally, do not be up set with me for doing this. Just remember that I love you and that as long as you live, I will be with you always and give you a renewed strength with every beat of this heart.

As I thought about this story, I could not help but think about our Lord and what He has done for us. Our entire life, from the time we were conceived, He has loved us. He has let us know this of over and over and over again in many different ways sending us messages, gifts and blessings wanting us to draw closer to Him. Like Sally we are distracted  by so many other people and things of this world.  Some of these people and things have hurt us. But also like Sally we have an incurable disease that is going to destroy us, and that disease is called sin.  And what did our Lord do? Like Billy, He made the ultimate sacrifice, He freely gave His life on that cross to save us. A true expression of love. But unlike Billy, Jesus rose again to become Lord over all. And then He planted His very Spirit in us as we rise out of the watery grave of baptism so that we can be born anew and so that He will be ever present in us to help us, give us strength and comfort us. As he reminded Paul in Corinth, He said, ‘I will be with you always, when you are lonely, when you are depress, when you feel like no one else understands or cares, I am with you and I love you and no one can separate me from you. So hold on. Be of good cheer, Hold your head up, take courage. We are yoked together, when you are burdened, let Me carry the load. I don’t know about you but when I wake up and realize how much I am loved, and that God has a special purpose for my life, and that He is going to help me and protect me, that helps me get out of my frump and leave my own pity party behind. It lets me know that God doesn’t want we to throw in the towel because he still want me to use that towel for something.


For more lessons click on the following link: http://granvillenychurchofchrist.org/?page_id=566

From Jim McGuiggan... Columbus and the wreck of the Royal Charter

Columbus and the wreck of the Royal Charter




In Philippians 4:8-9 (AV) Paul says: "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. Those things, which ye have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do: and the God of peace shall be with you."
"Think" on these things, he said.
"Do" these things, he said. 

Think on these things
He says "think" on these things but he does more than that. He uses a present imperative. It isn't a suggestion about a once-in-a-blue-moon occurrence; it's a call to a continuing custom.
He says "do" these things. Again, it's a present imperative and is rightly rendered by modern versions with something like "practice". "Keep on doing," what you have seen and heard, the NRSV offers.
He isn't snarling at or bossing them, but there's an intensity about Paul (isn't there?) even when he's being warm and protective. His imperatives here aren't mere suggestions or "pretty good advice;" they're a word from God coming from a servant of Christ who cares deeply for the people he speaks to.
But "think" on these things—is that not a weak sort of thing for a man like him to say? He was all go, all action and scorched halfway across his world, shaking off the friendly hands that for his own good would have held him back, leaving pints of blood on the streets they chased him through and beat him senseless on. A man like that tells Christians to "think"?
We would only think this strange if we underestimated thinking and meditation. Paul commends people to God and the word of his grace which is able to build them up and give them an inheritance among God's people (Acts 20:32) and in deeply troubled times those who feared God gathered together and spoke of the noble and honourable and God wrote their names down in a book (Malachi 3:16).
The entire book of Psalms opens by drawing a distinction between the wicked and the righteous. The difference in this case is the difference in the kind of things that are on their minds. "Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly…But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night." This man doesn't shape his life in light of ungodly counsel and as a result he is richly blessed (Psalm 1:1-3). And in 119:97 the writer, too filled to be silent, burst out with this, "O how I love your law! I mediate on it all day long." And does it do anything for him? The entire 176 verses are one long song of praise to God for the richness of his word and what thinking about it does for him.
If we think Paul urges his Philippian brothers and sisters to reflect on abstract truths like "honour" or "justice" or "honesty" we're missing the mark. He's too distinctively Christian for that. Paul sees everything as gaining its meaning and worth only in relation to Jesus (compare Philippians 2:1-11 and his own imaging of Jesus in 3:3-11 where he thinks and acts as Jesus did in 2:5-8). When he urges them to think about goodness and purity and honour he is urging them to think as Christians.
It's clear, then, that those among us who minister the word should give God's people something to "think" about. There's a richness in our Message that simply begs to be unearthed.
I came across an unfriendly book reviewer once who wrote of an author's offering, "Professor X has written his book again." I wonder what he would write of my teaching/preaching, of our teaching/preaching.
People must think, they must envision and dream. Their thoughts should be greater than their present capacities. They should be helped to see as well as hear the word of the Lord. There is a great cloud of witnesses (Hebrews 12:1) they should be able to see and they should be helped to imagine the cosmic gathering of glory into which they have been called (Hebrews 12:22-24). Seeing and dreaming shape life and change the world while defying the present powers.
Columbus is speaking to the royal minister of finance, pleading for funds to enable him to follow his dream but the accountant is too practical a man to be impressed. Visions and dreams are too flimsy, they lack substance and spider's webs carry no weight. Columbus takes him to a window and asks him what he sees when he looks down. He saw buildings, streets, cathedrals, commercial centres and courts of justice—but tangible and fully visible. "They once were dreams and only because someone dreamed them can you now see them," the dreamer told him.
"Think on these things," said Paul. 

Those things...do
We must leave ourselves open to new visions and dreams; we must go looking for new truths and new truth about old truths (compare Mathew 13:52). But we're to live and while thinking is an essential part of living there is no fullness of life if what we think does not affect how we relate to others in life. Do what you think and have learned and seen, he says. There is a place for meditation and enlarging of our vision and understanding, but truth is for doing and dreams are for following.
This is what Longfellow was getting at in his poem called The Legend Beautiful.
In his chamber all alone,
Kneeling on the floor of stone,
Prayed the Monk in deep contrition
For his sins of indecision,
Prayed for greater self-denial
In temptation and in trial;
It was noonday by the dial,
And the Monk was all alone.
Suddenly, as if it lightened,
An unwonted splendor brightened
All within him and without him
In that narrow cell of stone;
And he saw the Blessed Vision
Of our Lord, with light Elysian
Like a vesture wrapped about him,
Like a garment round him thrown.
The little monk, lost in rapture and adoration, can hardly believe that Jesus would be willing to show himself to one as unworthy as him. His joy knows no bounds; but in the middle of it all he heard the bells ringing, calling the poor and needy to come and get their daily ration of bread. The one they were to get their food from was the one who at that very moment, his soul filled with ecstasy, had the Lord himself as a guest.
Should he go or should he stay? He told himself it might be an insult to his divine Guest but the truth was he was so uplifted in his soul he didn't want to leave; didn't want to break the spell. Afraid that if he left he would discover Jesus gone when he returned he nevertheless knew in his heart that he needed to go so, reluctantly, he bows and leaves Jesus there alone in the little cell and went to see the very familiar faces

At the gate the poor were waiting,
Looking through the iron grating,_
With that terror in the eye
That is only seen in those
Who amid their wants and woes
Hear the sound of doors that close,
And of feet that pass them by;
He served them knowing that the One whose vision he had rejoiced in earlier had said, "If you do it to them, you do it to me." Still, he hurried back hoping against hope.
But he paused with awe-struck feeling
At the threshold of his door,
For the Vision still was standing
As he left it there before,
When the convent bell appalling,
From its belfry calling, calling,
Summoned him to feed the poor.
Through the long hour intervening
It had waited his return,
And he felt his bosom burn,
Comprehending all the meaning,
When the Blessed Vision said,
"Hadst thou stayed, I must have fled!"

If you had stayed I would have fled.
People are surer of God when they see Christian dreamers and thinkers rise from their meditation to involve themselves in the lives of people all around them. Charles Dickens immortalised the work done by a preacher who served a little church right down on the coast of Wales. An Australian clipper, The Royal Charter went aground on 25th October, 1859 in a fierce storm as it headed to Liverpool. By far the greatest number of the many dead was taken care of by Stephen Roos Hughes whose health was broken in his heroic service (he died a couple of years later, in 1862). In The Uncommercial Traveller Dickens, in the light of Hughes' cheerful spirit that was completely free of bravado, said, "Convocations, Conferences, Diocesan Epistles, and the like, will do a great deal for Religion, I dare say, and Heaven send they may! but I doubt if they will ever do their Master's service half so well, in all the time they last, as the Heavens have seen it done in this bleak spot upon the rugged coast of Wales."
Only a few days ago I received a note from a gracious and hurting young woman who heard a preacher tell the truth that those who minister the word need not spend all their time visiting hospitals. She said she completely agreed with that but she felt the need to go to the preacher "to tell him how much of a comfort it was for us to have our preacher Dave come to the hospital and pray with us when Greg's grandpa died."
These things…do.

©2004 Jim McGuiggan. All materials are free to be copied and used as long as money is not being made.

Many thanks to brother Ed Healy, for allowing me to post from his website, the abiding word.com.