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IT IS WELL WITH MY SOUL
Horatio Gates Spafford, a 43-year-old Chicago Businessman, suffered financial disaster in the great Chicago fire of 1871. He and his wife were still grieving over the death of their son shortly before the fire, and he realized they needed to get away for a vacation. Knowing that their friend Dwight L. Moody was going to preach in evangelistic campaigns in England that fall, Spafford decided to take his entire family to England. His wife and four daughters went ahead on the SS Ville du Havre, and he planned to follow in a few days.
But on the Atlantic Ocean the ship was struck by an iron sailing vessel and sank within 12 minutes. 226 lives were lost – including the Spafford’s four daughters. When the survivors were brought to shore at Cardiff, Wales, Mrs. Spafford cabled her husband two words: "Saved alone."
Spafford booked passage on the next ship. As they were crossing the Atlantic, the captain pointed out the place where he thought the ship had gone down. That night, Spafford penned the following words:
When peace like a river attendeth my way
When sorrows like sea billows roll
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say
It is well; it is well with my soul.
Fearfighter, a kind of psychiatric computer, is one of two programs endorsed by Britain’s health advisory watchdog for people with panic attacks, mild depression, or phobias. People uncomfortable with getting advice from a computer can still choose to see therapists, but the option of logging on for help is now available — and will be paid for by the government-run National Health Service. Though it cannot prescribe medicine, the computerized treatment is possible because people with phobias, from fear of spiders to fear of heights, tend to get the same basic therapy. The program asks patients to identify the personal triggers that set off their panic attacks. They're told to be more observant of these red flags and to keep a diary of things they avoid because it makes them nervous. Then, the computer gives them homework. (Ed Note: As for me, computers all too often make me think I need a psychiatrist.) (SOURCE: USA Today 10/4/07)
A vicar was retiring after 25 years in the parish. As he came to clear out his bedroom, he found a small bowl with 5 eggs and £1,000 in it. Baffled he called his wife, "Darling, what is this little basket under the bed with five eggs and £1,000 in it?"
"Oh," she said "I must confess that everytime you preach a bad sermon I put an egg in the basket." Secretly the vicar was pleased. "Not bad five bad sermons in 25 years" he thought. "And what about the £1,000?"
"Well every time I get a dozen, I sell them!"
WHEN TO RELAX AND WHEN TO STRUGGLE
Author Sam Keen, in his provocative little book called Apology for Wonder, tells us the lesson he learned as young boy swimming in the Indian River inlet on the Delaware coast. Keen says that swimming there was very tricky, because the outgoing waters from the bay met the incoming tides waves from the ocean, and so the currents were very irregular arid there were often very strong movements of the water. It was very dangerous to swim there. But he learned that if he just relaxed and yielded to the outgoing currents, and let them carry him well out into the sea, then he could swim across the current and find a calmer place below the inlet to swi...
It was one of the worst days of my life: The washing machine broke down, the telephone kept ringing, my head ached, and the mail carrier brought a bill I had no money to pay.
Almost to the breaking point, I lifted my one-year-old into his high chair, leaned my head against the tray, and began to cry.
Without a word, my son took his pacifier out of his month and stuck it in mine.
Source: Clara Null "Humor for Preaching and Teaching"
IN THE END, WHAT IS IT THAT HONESTLY, REALLY MATTERS?
When I was a student chaplain at a hospital in Philadelphia, I spent a great deal of my time in the geriatric wing. The general routine was to start the shift by checking in with all the patients on the floor to see if anyone needed to talk or pray about things.
The women always wanted to talk, and the men, they were so predictable. On the first day I would stick my head in the door of a man's room and say hello. We would have some small chit-chat and then very soon, I would be ushered out to, "help someone in greater need". On the second day I would stick my head in the door and I would get the wave, "Doing alright son, have a good day." Then, on the third day things would be different. By this time the men had taken the tests they came in for and had been given "the news" by their doctors, which usually was very bad news.
On the third day I always knew the visit to these men was going to be a long visit. I would stick my head in and say hello and the response was always the same – silence. Usually, they would be looking out the window or looking at nothing at all. I would pull up a chair, and just wait; in a few moments they would start talking.
You know, these men rarely talked about their illness, or even about the treatments ahead. They always talked about life, the things they did, both with great satisfaction and great regret. They would talk about this person and that person, and finally always, I mean always, they would wonder, that in the end, what is it that honestly, really matters?
Finally, God has the Hebrews' attention. Finally, God has them where He wants them. Now they have to stop and consider: In the end, what is it that honestly, really matters?
THE WILD MOUSE
When I was a young child, maybe seven or eight, my family and I went to Beach Bend Amusement park in Bowling Green KY, not too far from our home. I love amusement parks. Especially then when mom and dad were paying for everything. The day turned out to be a day that would shape my life for the next eight years or so.
My sister talked me into getting on a roller-coaster with her. Now, I listened to her encouragement. I looked the coaster over-—not a large one, small cars that seat only two people, and I looked at the name, "Wild Mouse." I knew mice weren’t very ferocious, the ones I had seen were the ones dad removed from under the hot-water-heater in traps, their heads all smashed, eyes bugged out...So, a roller-coaster named Mouse wouldn’t be scary, or so I thought.
I later found out in my adult years, that the "Wild Mouse" is a style of roller-coaster developed by a German, Franz Mack, in the early 60s.
What separates the Mouse from other roller coasters, is its small car size—-two to four people--and its style of turns. Most of the turns on the Mouse are 90 to 180 degree turns with no cant. Cant is the difference in elevation of the two tracks. When you drop the elevation of one tack, it results in a banked turn.
On a regular roller-coaster with banked turns, you see the track in front of you in the turn. On a Wild Mouse with no cant, you see the rest of the theme park in front of you, giving you the feeling your going off the track! Now I said it shaped my life for the next eight years because it was that long before I ever got on another roller-coaster. The Wild Mouse scared me to death! This crazy life can seem like we are going off-track, but God has us at every turn.
YOU CAN WORRY TO DEATH
Chronic worry can cause serious physical problems, such as ulcers, heart attacks, and high blood pressure. Dr. Charles Mayo, of the famous Mayo Clinic, wrote, "Worry affects the circulation, the heart, the glands and the whole nervous system. I have never met a man or known a man to die of overwork, but I have known a lot who died of worry." Y...
MOSES AND THE BUSH JOKE
We all know that our past President from TX is now a private citizen, back in his home state. I heard that recently George W. Bush was waiting in an airport lobby when he noticed a man in a long flowing white robe with a long flowing white beard and flowing white hair. The man had a staff in one hand and some stone tablets under the other arm.
Now, George W. knows enough about the Bible to figure this one out, so he approached the man and inquired, "Aren’t you Moses?" The man ignored George W. and stared at the ceiling. George W. positioned himself more directly in the man’s view and asked again, "Aren’t you Moses?" The man continued to ignore him and look away. George W. tugged at the man’s sleeve and asked once again, "Aren’t you Moses?" The man finally responded in an irritated voice, "Yes I am".
George W. asked him "Why don’t you want to talk to me?” Moses replied, "The last time I spoke to a Bush I had to spend forty years in the desert."
It is a terrible thing for one¡¦s destiny to be truncated. This is a true story. There were two pastors driving on one of the roads in Lagos, Nigeria. One is a Nigerian, the other a foreigner. They got to a point under a bridge, where the people that we called "area boys" were begging for money and suddenly the foreign pastor started to cry and was pointing to one of the boys begging. God opened his eyes to see who He originally created the boy to be. He saw by his side, his original; dressed in an immaculate suit, someone was behind him carrying apparently his suitcase, they were waiting for an elevator in a 15 story building in the heart of New York city and a lot of CEOs were waiting for him on the 1oth floor of that same building for a very important and decisive meeting. From the foundation of the world, that was the plan of God for his life, a CEO, owner of multinational companies, international businessman, but he was under the bridge in Lagos begging for bread to survive, why? Because the enemy has struck and has taken away what originally God gave to him and replaced it with another one.
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