Collages

Can you remember when in grade school, a long time ago for some, you made a collage for an art project? The collages we made couldn’t be assembled with just a bunch of anything and everything, no we had to choose a theme and gather things that pertained to that theme. I can remember pictures of presidents, newspaper headlines, leaves from trees, canceled mail envelopes with postage stamps of all kinds on them. I think I made one with pictures of automobiles from a half dozen magazines. Well anyway, I remember it was fun doing, cutting up magazines and gluing it all together on a special thick piece of paper. Little did we know that making a collage was a fun introduction in learning to gather facts and figures and statistics which we would be doing for the rest of our life. Without this seemingly simple ability we would find it difficult to reason and make good decisions and basically function in our very complex world today. Praise God for your abilities and pray for the mentally challenged.
O,K. here’s a collage of Christian One-Liners that have been cluttering my desk for months. **Some people are kind, polite and sweet spirited, until you try to sit in their pew. **Many folks want to serve God, but only as advisers. **It’s easier to preach ten sermons than it is to live one. **Coincidence is when God chooses to remain anonymous. **Don’t put a question mark where God has put a period. **Don’t wait for six strong men to take you to church. **The good Lord didn’t create anything without a purpose, but mosquitoes come real close. **People are funny. They want the front of the bus, the middle of the road and the back of the church. **Forbidden fruits make many jams. **God grades on the cross, not the curve. **Opportunity may knock once, but temptation bangs on your front door every day. **Quit gripping about your church. If it were perfect, you couldn’t belong. **If your church wants a better preacher, it only needs to pray for the one it has. **God himself does not propose to judge a man until he’s dead, so why should you? **Some minds are like concrete; thoroughly mixed up and permanently set. **Peace starts with a smile. **I don’t know why people keep changing churches. What difference does it make which church you stay home from?! **Are you “Standing On The Promises” or just sitting on the premises? **We’ve been called to be witnesses; not lawyers or judges. **Be fishers of men. You catch ‘em / He’ll clean ‘em. **He who angers you, controls you. **Never give God instructions; just report for duty. **Sin will take you places you never meant to go; keep you there longer than you intended to stay and cost you more than you can afford. **The task ahead of us is never as great as the POWER behind us. **Don’t change the message; let the message change you. **If God is your co-pilot; swap seats! **You tell how big a person is by what it takes to discourage him. **1cross + 3 nails = 4 given.
[Psalm 37: 25] (NIV) “I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread.” We can always depend on God, and we are also reminded by the writer, we’re not young forever. (Ecclesiastes 9: 10) The teacher, Solomon, son of David, reminds us that: “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the grave, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.” Your collage of love will be finished, forever.

Facades Of Life

It is said, “You can’t make a silk purse from a sows ear” and the meaning behind this is, it’s impossible to make something excellent from poor material. Even though I changed my career focus several years back, I still receive free magazines and information from the auto/truck industry concerning parts sales and service. I generally glance through them to see and wonder over the new things the engineers are coming up with. I think it won’t be long before an owner/operator of a vehicle repair shop is going to have to be a college grad with an engineering degree to be successful in the trade. Well, most of these publications are geared toward the young entrepreneur about to get their feet wet in the wonderful world of owning a business. (I think everyone should own a business at least once in their life. They would certainly come away with a greater understanding for the decisions of their next employer.) Most of the articles deal with what to, and what not to do when getting started in business. The greatest aspect dealt with is appearance to the public, your potential customers. Developing the proper eye candy on the street side of your building and the atmosphere (first impression) one step inside the door is stressed over and over again. I never was too good at that. I just did good work at a fair price. But then again, my entrepreneurship only lasted 20 years.
Imagine for a moment your life is a house with four walls. The front wall is the side you show the world. It’ where you put your best foot forward, you know, the carefully crafted image we all have. One of the side walls, or the second wall of our life is the “private” side, the person that only your family, close friends and co-workers see. This side is usually a little rougher than the front, since these people know the “real” you a little better. They sometimes see you at your worst and know how bad you can really be. The third wall is worse still, a hidden side, the image of yourself that you keep in your own mind. This side is rougher yet, because it includes many hidden sins that you alone know about, the darker parts of your inner self that are carefully hidden from even those closest to you. Finally we reach the back of the house, the fourth wall. The fourth wall is the image of you that God sees. It can be the most beautiful or the most embarrassing side because there is nothing you can do to conceal a single part of it from the piercing eyes of God. Strangely, this side of you can be the worst or the best side of all.
[Galatians 3: 26-27] By a miracle of grace, the fourth wall really can become the most beautiful wall, more perfect even than the carefully groomed image of the first wall. For as a baptized believer, the blood of Jesus covers your sins like a fresh coat of gleaming white paint that will never crack, peel or fade. Christ can make the fourth wall of your life more perfect than any of the other three, simply because the first three are your creation, but the fourth is His. And in Christ when God looks at you He sees a perfection you could never attain on your own; He sees the perfect image of His own son. Guess what happens when you start to see the beauty and craftsmanship that Jesus is putting into your fourth wall; your soul; your everlasting spirit. You ask Him if there might be a way for Him to help you work on the other three walls of your house. Now this I have done, and I know my relationship with the world, family, friends, co-workers, myself and God has changed for the better. A sinner has become saved in truth and love.

Bridging The Chasm

Isn’t this weather crazy? The first day of Spring rolls around and the temperature drops lower than it’s been all winter. In light of our natural gas bills, I for one am thankful for a mild winter. I just hope it’s not like a few years back when we had a freeze in April. I think it was the same year we had a one hundred degree day in the middle of February. Hey, we can’t control the weather but thankfully we can adapt to the conditions. So, it’s that time of year when you leave the house early in the morning all bundled up against the cold and arrive back home in the evening in short sleeves, discovering you forgot your jacket at work. Before you know it there are three jackets at work and none in the closet. Wait a minute; I think there’s one in the car. Well, it’s also time again to mess with the time. Don’t forget to Spring forward one hour next Sunday morning. Remember something else. When your pets look at you like your some kind of nut getting up so early in the morning or for the first few mornings they’re jumping up and down and running all over the place thinking you’ve awaken early to take them on another car trip, give them a little slack. They’re not clock-eyed you know.
Billy Bob and Jethro decided to go fishing on a cool spring day. They arrived at the lake early in the morning and dropped their lines in the water. After fishing for several hours Billy Bob caught dozens of fish, while Jethro hadn’t even gotten a bite. Jethro asked, “Billy Bob, what’s your secret?” Billy Bob answered, “Mmu motta meep da mmrms mmrm.” Jethro asked, “What did you say?” Billy Bob replied, “Mmu motta meep da mmrms mmrm.” Frustrated, Jethro again asked, “What?” where upon Billy Bob spit into his hand and exclaimed, “You’ve gotta keep the worms warm!”
[Luke 9: 23-26] As disciples of Christ, we have been called to be “fishers of men” and we “keep the worms warm” by setting a good example for our families, friends, colleagues and others with whom we come in contact with each day. In 1948 someone had the bright idea of a suspension bridge spanning the Niagara River connecting the United States and Canada, saving hours of travel time between the countries. However, nobody was sure how to get the first cable across the chasm. Someone had an idea, “Let’s offer a ten dollar prize to the first kid that can fly a kite from one side to the other.” Engineers scoffed at the idea, but in 1948 history had the last laugh. A young boy by the name of Homan Walsh flew his kite from one side to the other. His kite string was tied to a larger string and pulled back across. The larger string was tied to a small rope, which was attached to an even larger rope each time being pulled from one side to the other. Eventually the ropes turned into steel cables until finally the strong steel cable that began the construction was strung across the Niagara. What began with a small kite string eventually became the supporting cable of a suspension bridge that nobody thought was possible. Amazing things can happen in our spiritual life if we will allow the little things to add up. The impossible has already been accomplished. Jesus has linked man to God the Father once again through His sacrifice of life bring about forgiveness for sin. But, baptism and faith are not enough. We must grow in spirit to be approved of God. (2 Peter 1: 3-11) We must finish building the bridge, with Jesus as our main support. A crown of life awaits those who are spiritually linked to heavenly land.

One Day Closer

Well, as any optimistic Texas philosopher will tell you in the middle of a drought, “We’re one day closer to the next good rain”. I’m sure if I live long enough I’ll hear the people who are now saying, “I wish it would rain” turn their attitude to, “I wish it would stop raining”, because, as in the past, that seems to be the weather pattern for this part of the country, like it or not. After a rather uneventful mild winter, spring seems to be popping out all over. Trees are budding out new leaves and a patch of bluebonnets and other wildflowers are already being seen here and there showing off their colors. New plowed and bedded ground is evidence of freshly planted crops by faithful souls who are still willing to risk it all. I guess that’s what keeps us all going day in and day out. We all have an investment in this life of one sort or another and it tends to drive us to protect it no matter the environmental crisis. We’re always one day closer to a better tomorrow.
“I Know Why” by Shelby Cannon; age 8; 3rd grade; Longview, Texas.
I wonder why we have flowers? I wonder why we have showers? I wonder why we have trees? I wonder why we have seas? I wonder why we have hills? I wonder why we have meals? I wonder why we have fathers and brothers? I wonder why we have sisters and mothers? I wonder why we have seasons? I think I know the reasons.
I know why we have flowers. I know why we have showers. I know why we have trees. I know why we have seas. I know why we have hills. I know why we have meals. I know why we have fathers and brothers. I know why we have sisters and mothers. I know why we have seasons. I did not look hard for the reasons. You can see the answer clearly. It is because God loves us so dearly.
[Romans 8] Corrie ten Boom, a Holocaust survivor and writer, used to say, “When the train goes through the tunnel and the world gets dark, do you jump out? Of course not! You sit still and trust the engineer to get you through.” Dark and unsure times do enter our life from time to time, like it or not. And our investments tend to make us our own engineer as we force more wood into the boiler to produce more steam powering us forward. The question is, to what? “What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?” (Luke 9:25)(NIV) Don’t get me wrong now. I’m not trying to plant couch potatoes here. Everyone should do their best to be productive earning a living and everyone has the right to pursue happiness in this world, but as Jesus asks, at what cost? I hope you read the chapter indexed. Consider for a moment the investment God has made in you. First, you’re made in His image, spirit. This spirit is the “self” that Jesus talked about. Our place in the universe, which God made, is in a body that God also made. God did not want man to be a robot to Him, so gave man the ability to choose. This ability makes us do some pretty stupid things at times; David compares us to sheep needing a Shepard. God gave us rules, which helped, until the rules became more important than the rule-giver. God’s greatest investment in man was Himself. Jesus, the Word of God, became flesh and lived as a human. To show us how special we are to Him, he took the sins of the world upon himself and died as a ransom for all sin. Are you convinced, as Paul is, that because of these things, “…nothing can separate me from the love of God.” You’re now one day closer to your eternal choice.

Greatness Helps

Well, even after all the precautions I’ve been taking, I finally caught this miserable winter cold that’s been going around. I haven’t coughed this much since I quit smoking over ten years ago. Speaking of sharing things with one another, I experienced a pleasant encounter the other day. I didn’t know it at the time, but one of our local schools was engaged in “Please and Thank-You Week”. I was driving through the parking lot of a busy supermarket and near the main entrance there’s always congestion with both pedestrians and moving vehicles. A young mother with her grade school daughter stood patiently wanting to cross through the moving traffic with their basket of groceries. I stopped and motioned them to cross in front of me. While doing so the mother leaned down saying something to her daughter. With that the little girl turned toward me, with a big grin on her face, front toothless I might add, and said, “Thank-You!!” to which I replied, smiling “Your Welcome”. I certainly wanted to help mom, sharing the lesson.
Bob Richards, Olympic athlete and pole-vaulter, says, “Greatness is all around us. It’s easy to be great because great people will help you. What is fantastic about all the conventions I go to is that the greatest in the business will come and share their ideas, their methods and their techniques with everyone else. I’ve seen the greatest salesmen open up and show young salesmen exactly how they did it. They don’t hold back. I’ve also found it true in the world of sports.” Bob goes on to say, “I’ll never forget the time I was about a foot below Dutch Warmer’s pole vault record, which I was trying to break. I called him on the phone. I said, “Dutch, can you help me? I seemed to have leveled off. I can’t get any higher.” He said, “Sure Bob, come on up to visit me and I’ll give you all I’ve got.” I spent three days with the master, the greatest pole-vaulter in the world. There were things that I was doing wrong and he helped me to correct them. To make a long story short, I went up eight inches. The great guy gave me the best that he had. I’ve found that sports champions and heroes are willing to do this just so you can become great too.”
[Philippians 4: 4-9] Why did God send His son to dwell among us? To be the greatest of God’s prophets. Jesus was sent to share with all the world the loving peace and grace of His Father in heaven. People called on Jesus to heal them and listen to what He preached about the kingdom to come. He picked twelve men to become great orators of salvation and God’s saving grace. They would be instrumental in the establishment of the church and would share God’s plan for righteous living. In the beginning this new way of living was simply called “The Way”, but before too long, people began to tag the followers of Christ, Christians. Jesus taught that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven would be humble, a servant to all and the last in self-indulgence. So how does one become a great Christian? Seek out greatness, the Holy Spirit, who inspired men of God to write things of God. The Bible is our greatest source for guidance toward living a righteous life. Call upon the Master and spend some time with Him, like the rest of your life. He’s willing to help you correct the problems you might have that are holding you back from living a righteous life. Have you leveled off at just being good and helping others? Become great and share God’s plan of salvation with someone who is struggling.