Editor: Richard (Dick) Innes
Published by: ACTS International
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Vol. 15– – No. 0913 March 02, 2013
Thought for the week: "Go as far as you can see; when you get there, you'll be able to see farther." – J.P. Morgan
My six-year-old grandson called his mother from his friend Charlie's house and confessed he had broken a lamp when he threw a football in their living room.
"But, Mom," he said, brightening, "you don't have to worry about buying another one. Charlie's mother said it was irreplaceable."
One day a man's wife died, and on that clear, cold morning, in the warmth of their bedroom, the husband was struck with the pain of learning that sometimes there isn't anymore.
No more hugs, no more special moments to celebrate together, no more phone calls just to chat, no more "just one minute."
Sometimes, what we care about the most gets all used up and goes away, never to return before we can say good-bye and say "I love you."
So while we have it, it's best we love it, care for it, fix it when it's broken and heal it when it's sick.
This is true for marriage, children with bad report cards, dogs with bad hips, and aging parents and grandparents. We keep them because they are worth it, because we are worth it.
Some things we keep—like a best friend who moved away or a sister-in-law after divorce. There are just some things that make us happy, no matter what.
Suppose one morning you never wake up, do all your friends know you love them?
It's so very important to let every one of your friends know you love them, even if you think they don't love you back.
It was the coldest winter ever. Many animals died because of the cold.
The porcupines, realizing the situation, decided to group together to keep warm. This way they covered and protected themselves; but the quills of each one wounded their closest companions.
After a while, they decided to distance themselves one from the other and they began to die, alone and frozen. So they had to make a choice: either accept the quills of their companions or disappear from the
earth.
Wisely, they decided to go back to being together. They learned to live with the little wounds caused by the close relationship with their companions in order to receive the heat that came from the others. This way they were able to survive.
The best relationships are not the ones that bring together perfect people, but when each individual learns to live with the imperfections of others, and can admire the other person's good qualities.
If you want to make a change in another person's life, the place to begin is with yourself, not with your parents, or your boyfriend or girlfriend, or your professor, or your boss.
When George Washington was 16, he discovered a booklet of 110 maxims describing how a well-mannered person should behave. He was so convinced that these maxims would help him become a better person that he set out to incorporate them into his daily living. Among Washington's many virtues, his commitment to civility marked him as a gentleman and helped him become a universally respected and enormously effective leader.
By today's standards, Washington's notions of civility seem quaint and old-fashioned, but the purpose of manners and etiquette is to soften relationships with respect and to treat others graciously.
Instead of updating our concept of manners to accord with modern lifestyles, we seem to be abandoning the notion of civility entirely. We're exposed to heavy doses of tactless, nasty, and cruel remarks on daytime talk shows, dating games, and courtroom and reality programs.
As a result, we've produced a generation that's comfortable being brutish and malicious and a society that's increasingly coarse and unpleasant.
In a tense world full of conflicts, frustrations, and competition, civility is an important social lubricant that helps us live together constructively. If we care about the world we're making for our children, we need to be less tolerant of mean-spirited, discourteous, and impolite remarks and do a better job of teaching and modeling civility.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
"The reason you don't have what you want is that you don't ask God for it. And even when you do ask, you don't get it because your whole motive is wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure."1
People who provide simplistic solutions to life's complex problems can leave a trail of hurt people in their path. I heard a so-called "faith healer" tell a woman who had just experienced a major stroke that the reason she wasn't healed after he prayed for her was because she (and not he) lacked faith. I mean, how cruel can you get?
I attended a lecture on healing attended by some 300 people, all in some form of ministry. At one point during the lecture the speaker asked all those not feeling well to stand. About 50 people stood—including me. The speaker called on the demon of sickness to be "cast out" en masse. He then told all those who had been healed to sit down. All but nine or ten of us sat down. One by one he then "cast out" the demon of sickness and told the individual to sit down if he had been healed.
One by one they sat down. Then came my turn! He then "cast" the demon of sickness out of me. Nothing happened. The pressure to conform and lie was incredible. I refused to do so. I told the speaker that I still felt sick and that I thought my upset stomach was because of a new medication I was on, and I sat down. He moved on to the next person. During the following break one attendee thanked me for not yielding to the pressure to conform.
I've heard another well-known speaker teach that the answer to personal problems was to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and another that the answer to loneliness was to accept Jesus as your Savior. These may be an answer for some situations but certainly not for all.
Some of our problems are physical in nature, including biological problems such as a chemical imbalance in the brain; numerous problems are emotional in nature caused by unresolved negative emotions and/or by impaired relationships; and some by a multiple of different spiritual causes. Problems may be caused by a combination of all three of these areas.
The causes of our problems can be very complex and multiple, so to tell a person who has appendicitis that he has a demon or doesn't have enough faith to be healed is ignorant, insensitive, cruel and possibly even life-threatening—and certainly not Christian or Christ-like.
As psychologist Abraham Maslow said, "If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail." May I suggest you stay clear of hammer theology—it is neither of the truth nor of God.
Suggested prayer: "Dear God, please help me to be sensitive to the needs of others and never give simplistic solutions to life's complex problems. Help me to understand the nature of human suffering and always seek the truth about the true causes of my own and other's problem, when called for, and thereby pray accordingly. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus' name, amen."
1. James 4:2-3 (NLT).
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