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Astrophysicists have found that there are over 60 criteria that are necessary for life on earth. For you to live. Life could not exist or form if any one of the following were true:
Earth’s rotation was slower, or faster
We were 2% closer or further from the sun.
Earth had a 1% change in sunlight.
Earth was smaller or larger
Taco Bell closed at 3 p.m.
The moon was smaller or larger
We had more than one moon
Earth’s crust was thinner or thicker
Pizza Hut only served thin crust
Oxygen/Nitrogen ratio was greater or less
Ozone layer was greater or less
This is not going to be a debate about creation or evolution, but I do want to share a quote from a well known pastor named Randy Croft:
Astrophysicists have found that there are over 60 criteria that are necessary for life on earth. For you and me to live. Life could not exist or form if any one of the following were true:
Earth’s rotation was slower or faster
We were 2% closer or further from the sun.
Earth had a 1% change in sunlight.
Earth was smaller or larger.
Taco Bell closed at 3 p.m.
The moon was smaller or larger.
We had more than one moon.
Earth’s crust was thinner or thicker.
Pizza Hut only served thin crust.
The Oxygen/Nitrogen ratio was greater or less.
Ozone layer was greater or less.
I adapted this story from a Patrick McManus tale: I don’t know about you but I have a worry box. I have this theory that people possess a certain capacity for worry, no more, no less. It’s as though a person has this little box that he feels compelled to keep filled with worries. When one worry disappears, he immediately replaces it with another worry, so the box is always full. He is never short of worries. If a new crop of worries comes in, the person sorts through the box for lesser worries and kicks them out, until he has enough room for the new worries. The lesser worries just lie around on the floor, until there is room in the box for them again, and then they are put back in. Their welcomed by the worries that have been in the box all the time: “Hi guys! Good to have you back. Boy, you should have seen the duds that just left. And they had the nerve to call themselves worries!”
I have a very large worry box. My wife is one of the major suppliers of worries.
“What did you do with the checkbook?” She asks me. The CHECKBOOK! Is that monster loose again? I imagine at that very moment an escaped convict is picking it up off the sidewalk. Maybe he will forge my name and deplete our checking account of every last penny and after he has exhausted all our funds buying dope, he will come to our house, because the address is on checks, and he and I will grapple with each other and he will pull a knife and . . . . . !
“Oh,” Teresa will say, “here’s the checkbook in my lab coat pocket. Silly me! Now what’s wrong with you?” “Nothing,” I say, booting out that worry out of my worry box, at least until the next time she asks, “What did you do with that checkbook?”
Her telephone technique is specifically designed to worry me too. The phone rings. She picks it up. “Hello . . . . Yes. . . . . . .NO!!!! [Me: One of the kids has done something bad.] Oh my!! How bad? [Me: It’s real bad. Otherwise the police wouldn’t be calling.] You just never expect these things to happen to you. [Me: I do.] When can we see him?” [Me: Only during visiting hours, when he will be wearing a full body cast.]
“So what is it now?” I ask, steeling myself to deal with the horrible emergency. “Dollar Bill’s Garage. Larry said that he fixed the car’s oil leak with a thirty-five-cent part. What’s funny is that to install it, he had to totally disassemble the car. Isn’t that amazing, just a thirty-five-cent part? How lucky can you get. By the way, Larry wants to talk to you about something when he has a chance.” Larry the Mechanic wants to talk to me? I know what he wants. He wants my house in exchange for totally disassembling my car, that’s what he wants. We’re about to join the ranks of the homeless.
You see from this example that the old worry about the kid is immediately replaced by a new worry about becoming homeless. I used to pity the homeless; now I am one. And so on. The worry box is wonderfully efficient and always is kept exactly full.
Worry even has a way of invading my sleep time. It’s late. The lights are out. The ceiling fan is running with that calming BAP, BAP, BAP, BAP. The air conditioner is humming quietly. I am entering that delightful land of nod, when my wife suddenly brings from my peaceful slumber with, “Was that you?” “Nope probably the dishwasher.” “I mean the snuffling.” “I don’t think so,” I answer, trying to recall the characteristics of a snuffle. She says, “Oh well, go to sleep, it was probably just my imagination.” Yeah, but maybe not. Maybe something did snuffle. Maybe it was a bird outside in the tree by the window that snuffled, but birds don’t snuffle they chirp. Squirrels are too small to snuffle. Something would have to be pretty big to snuffle. Actually the only animal that I know that makes a true snuffle is an alligator. There is an alligator which has gotten out of the pond across the road from my house. It being hot and all, he can’t seem to get enough to eat, and now has gotten into my bedroom and is snuffling under the bed waiting to attack me when I finally go to sleep.
Now notice something. It is an interesting part of my worry theory. Up to the point that Teresa mentions snuffles, my worry box is neatly layered with worries about my children, work, money, illness, poverty, pestilence, environment, war, the checkbook, famine, each patiently waiting for it’s turn for my attention. But the instant the snuffle is mentioned, and it’s source is identified as ALLIGATORS, all those other worries are blasted right out of the box by sudden inflation of the snuffle worry. War, poverty, pestilence–why, they couldn’t even be shoehorned back into my worry box, it’s packed so tight with snuffle.
As with most of my worries, the snuffle turned out to be nothing.
FROM: Joe Smith, Bricklayer
RE: My Accident Claim
I am writing in response to your request concerning Block #11 on the insurance form which asks for "the cause of injuries" wherein I put "trying to do the job alone." You said you needed more information, so I trust the following will be sufficient.
I am a brick layer by trade and on the date of the injuries, I was working alone, laying brick around the top of a four-story building when I realized that I had about 500 pounds of brick left. Rather than carry the bricks down by hand, I decided to put them into a barrel and lower them by a pulley which was fastened to the top of the building.
I loaded the bricks into the barrel and flung it out over the side of the building with the bricks in it. I then went down and untied the rope holding it securely to insure the slow descent of the barrel.As you will note on Block #6 of the insurance form, I weigh 175 pounds.
Due to my shock at being jerked off the ground so swiftly, I lost my presence of mind and forgot to let go of the rope. Between the second and third floors, I met the barrel coming down. This accounts for the bruises and lacerations on my upper body. Regaining my presence of mind, again I held tightly to the rope and proceeded rapidly up the side of the building, not stopping until my right hand was jammed into the pulley. This accounts for my broken thumb.
Despite the pain, I retained my presence of mind and held tightly to the rope. At approximately the same time, however, the barrel of bricks hit the ground and the bottom fell out of the barrel. Devoid of the weight of the bricks, the barrel now weighed about fifty pounds. I again ref...
