Editor: Richard (Dick) Innes
Published by: ACTS International
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Vol. 12 â€" No. 1910 May 08, 2010
Thought for the week: "If the mountain were smooth, you couldn't climb it." â€" Unknown (quoted by David Nixon)
"The greatest conflicts are not between two people, but between one person and himself." â€" Garth Brooks
"The greater part of our happiness depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances." â€" Martha Washington
"The amount of satisfaction you get from life largely depends on your own ingenuity, self-sufficiently, and resourcefulness. People who wait around for life to supply their satisfaction usually find boredom instead." â€" Dr. William Menninger
"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty." â€" Thomas Jefferson
"Never Complain About What You Permit." â€" Unknown
"It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it." â€" Benjamin Franklin
Living on Earth is expensive, but it does include a free trip around the sun every year.
Birthdays are good for you; the more you have, the longer you live.
How long a minute is depends on what side of the bathroom door you're on.
Ever notice that the people who are late are often much jollier than the people who have to wait for them?
If ignorance is bliss, why aren't more people happy?
Most of us go to our grave with our music still inside of us.
If Walmart is lowering prices every day, how come nothing is free yet?
You may be only one person in the world, but you may also be the world to one person.
Don't cry because it's over; smile because it happened.
We could learn a lot from crayons: some are sharp, some are pretty, some are dull, some have weird names, and all are different colors … but they all have to learn to live in the same box.
Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.
A truly happy person is one who can enjoy the scenery on a detour.
Happiness comes through doors you didn't even know you left open.
"You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."1
"You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot help little men by tearing down big men.
You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn.
You cannot build character and courage by destroying men's
initiative and independence.
You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they
can and should do for themselves."2
1. Dr. Adrian Rogers
2. Often credited to Abraham Lincoln but more likely by the Rev. William John Henry Boetcker (according to an article on Snopes.com)
Another winter has come and gone. Summer will soon be hereâ€"at least in the Northern Hemisphere. Fall or autumn will be here before we know it, and then Christmas and another New Year. Time flies. Life is shortâ€"and for some of us it is getting shorter all the time. I am reminded of the challenging words by an unknown author:
"Only one life
'Twill soon be passed.
Only what's done for Christ
Will last."
According to the writer of this article, the following version has some very slight differences than the previous versions. For example, some understand that she was a Health Worker, not a plumbing/sewer specialist, but the essence of the story is consistent. This is true, according to Snopes: www.snopes.com/politics/war/sendler.asp.
The death of a 98 year-old lady named Irena was reported recently. During WWII, Irena got permission to work in the Warsaw Ghetto, as a Plumbing/Sewer specialist.
She had an 'ulterior motive.'
Being a German, she KNEW what the Nazi's plans were for the Jews.
Irena smuggled infants out in the bottom of the tool box she carried and, for larger kids, she carried a burlap sack in the back of her truck. She also had a dog in the back that she trained to bark when the Nazi soldiers let her in and out of the ghetto. The soldiers, of course, wanted nothing to do with the dog, and the barking covered the kid's/infant's noises. During her time of doing this, she managed to smuggle out and save 2500 kids/infants. She was caught, and the Nazis broke both her legs, arms and beat her severely. Irena kept a record of the names of all the kids she smuggled out and kept them in a glass jar, buried under a tree in her back yard. After the war, she tried to locate any parents that may have survived it, and reunited the family. Many, of course, had been gassed. Those kids she helped got placed into foster family homes or adopted.
In 2007 Irena was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. She was not selected. Al Gore won for a slide show on Global Warming.
And we all know who won the Nobel Peace Prize last year and for what?
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 they 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.
"So here I [Caleb] am today, eighty-five years old! I am still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out; I'm just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then. Now give me this hill country that the LORD promised me that day. You yourself heard then that the Anakites were there and their cities were large and fortified, but, the LORD helping me, I will drive them out just as he said."1
A former mentor of mine, the late Cecil Osborne, spent most of his working years as the pastor of a church that helped found a number of daughter churches. He also saw the need for a counseling ministry for hurting people, and when he retired from the pastorate at or about age 65, he set up a full-time counseling ministry. He was close to age 60 when he published his first of a dozen books, The Art of Understanding Yourself," and kept counseling until he was well into his 80s.
Numerous other people have seen great achievements in their senior years. For example, "Cervantes completed Don Quixote when he was nearing 70. Clara Barton, at 59, founded the American Red Cross. Goethe finished the dramatic poem 'Faust' at 82. Verdi composed 'Othello' at 73, 'Falstaff' in his late seventies. Benjamin Disraeli became Prime Minister of England for the second time at 70."2
"Pablo Picasso was still painting at age 91. Arturo Toscanini gave his last performance at 87. Konrad Adenauer was chancellor of West Germany at 87. And the accomplishments of many senior members of God's Kingdom would make an even more impressive story if they could all be told."3
Admittedly, in Caleb's day people lived much longer than we do today. Nevertheless, no matter how old we are, we are never too old to serve God. Just check with your pastor and he will show you many ways you can do this.
Suggested prayer: "Dear God, whatever years I have left I want to serve you all the days of my remaining life. Please lay on my heart what I can do to be a part of your plans and what you are doing in the world today. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus' name, amen."
1. Joshua 14:10-12 (NIV).
2. Today in the Word (Chicago, IL: Moody Bible Institute,
1991), p. 9.
3. Ibid.
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