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Recently a little girl played on the swings of a city park. Her parents sat on a bench a short distance away and watched. Each time the swing reached the apex of its backward arc, the girl threw her body back, pulled with her arms at the chains that supported the swing, pumped with her legs, and forced the swing to return forward, higher still.
The scriptures say, "Men are that they might have joy,"1 and we are left asking ourselves, if that is truly the intent, why is the earth a place of so much pain? It must groan under the weight of human sorrow. We run sometimes without meaning and die before we intend. We scramble for bread to fill us and, filled, worry if we will have enough tomorrow. Weeds grow in our grass, disease cripples us, disappointment dashes us; and, through it all, we question if something, somewhere, has gone terribly wrong.
As long as language survives and men's hearts are pure, the Sermon on the Mount will be rehearsed with reverence; For, within that short expression, lie the hope and glory of mankind. Across the boundaries of time and geography, the words still whisper their message of hope and consolation.
Those who enjoy life know and understand that life is a process, not a destination. It's filled with peaks and valleys, high and lows, good and bad. For some, like the Apostle Paul, the struggle is often intense and dramatic. For most of us, the struggle is simply coping with the problems of daily living.
It is an unwritten law that excess is dangerous. And, in a democracy such as the United States, where good fortune and technology have combined to produce prosperity for the majority of the people, excess is especially prevalent.
“Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them,”1 according to William Shakespeare. That may be true. But what is greatness?
The world is not so complicated as many people believe. Yes complication is easy to find, All one has to do is look at our cities, our technologies, our sciences, even our arts; and what one finds is so complex that a specialized education is required to understand it.
Rudyard Kipling, in a poem titled simply, “If,” investigates the many attributes of maturity. Among the attributes he discovers, one recurs in several forms: the courage to take risks— not the risks of the gambling hall, but of the life lived faithfully and well.
Rudyard Kipling, in a poem titled simply, “If,” investigates the many attributes of maturity. Among the attributes he discovers, one recurs in several forms: the courage to take risks— not the risks of the gambling hall, but of the life lived faithfully and well.
The Savior gave a telling parable when He asked, "What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost until he find it?"1
Freedom and Power are two of life's more valuable possessions. To be of greatest value both must accompanied with responsibility. But like anything else, they too can be abused and misused.
Call it what you will: Persistence, Tenacity, Resolution, or Perseverance; it is still the quaint old principle of getting back on the horse that has thrown you-again and again. It is a simple faith in ourselves that, if we want something badly enough, we can achieve it—not without persistence, not without work and struggle and sacrifice—but that it can be done.
1985 marks the fortieth anniversary of the end of World War II: in May of 1945 peace came to Europe; in September of the same year the war ended in the Pacific. And so, today a brief remembrance of that time—of B-29s and torpedoes, of bombs and bayonets, and of courage and sacrifice.
There are some in the world today who think of our economic age as the "Age of Entrepreneurs." It is a time to take a chance on a dream, to try something different, to have faith in the future. The entrepreneurial spirit is one of courage, independence, and risk-taking. Those who have it are the ambitious people who fire the furnace of economic development, who are unafraid to extend themselves into unknown. They are the ones who are credited with creating a business atmosphere of opportunity and growth.
God is the maker of all things. But of all His creations, He has set man apart by extending to us the opportunity and responsibility of creative enterprise. He made us to be like Him, to be not merely created, but to be creators.
A father died and left a grieving child. "Where is my father now?" she asked, then paused. Scanning a family portrait, she saw his mark on every child, gene deep. One with father's dark eyes, another with his height, large hands on still another to cup with comfort a slumping shoulder. "That's where my father lives," she said.
We speak, in religion, of having Christlike love and compassion, but is it something of which we just speak? Perhaps we dwell too much on theology and not enough on religion, too much on theory and not enough on application, too much dogma to the neglect of charity and brotherly kindness.
It is difficult to talk of suicide since it is such a personal act, yet one which affects many others. We also speak without experience, yet some have called it cowardice, insanity, and failure.
There is a time everyone in school anticipates. It is the end—graduation. It is also a time usually referred to as commencement—the beginning. As the young, and some who are not so young, graduate and leave the halls of formal education, they begin to realize that they are, in a sense, freshmen again—that the good life is a series of learning experiences.
Napoleon Bonaparte once said: “There are only two powers in the world—the sword and the pen; and, in the end, the former is always conquered by the latter.” History has proven the statement to be right, in the long term—the pen is mightier. But, in the short run, even Napoleon turned to war to achieve […]
Centuries ago, King Solomon offered some parental advice to his people. It seems equally applicable today: "Train up a child in the way he should go; and when he is old, he will not depart from it."1
If given our choice, I suppose we would choose a less fearsome world. We would like a place where weeds did not invade the lawn, nor pain invade life; where best-laid plans worked out, and ignorance did not ever rule over wisdom. We'd like a world where bodies did not age, cells did not deteriorate, nor muscles tire. We'd like a world where there was enough food to feed the hungry, money to pay the bills, and creature comforts for all.
The potential of each human being is usually greater than the product of our lives. It is generally accepted that most of us go through our lives only partially aware of the full range of our abilities. Why? Well, it may be that we lack the courage to take risks—the courage to change failure.
In springtime, the world is renewed. The crocuses put forth their shoots in search of the sun" the grasses that were gray beneath the snow turn green again: the snow itself which only yesterday was ice-packed in the mountains, becomes a life-giving river to valley farms being plowed in preparation for the season's planting.
If we would have our way, we would book ourselves a safe passage through this life.
The world shouts its demands at us in many ways. Voices over a thousand radio stations jangle at once. Undigested bits of information come creeping into corners of our house. Pressure keeps us running first one way, then another until finally we learn to respond only to the loudest and most insistent.
Shakespeare's Juliet, on her balcony pondered a question that gives cause for consideration yet today. "What's in a name?" she asked. "That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet..."1 And, she noted that her beloved Romeo would still be the same person if he were named something else.
For many of us, life is a visit to a large picture gallery—a gallery where most of the paintings are facing the wall. Our senses are drowned by beauty, but little of it is ours. We walk among the aesthetic wonders of nature and art as blind people oblivious to the delicate harmony which surrounds us.
One of life's more youthful and exciting times is the annual renewal of the earth called spring. It's a time when one can have a simple but powerful communion with nature. It is one of the best remedies for spiritual ills. It stirs our spirits. We experience surges of energy and optimism as we witness longer periods of sunlight, warming temperatures, and the landscape putting on a new face of color. But the miracle of spring comes so quietly each year that many of us take it for granted and fail to comprehend its significance.
More than a hundred years ago the famous English man of letters, Samuel Johnson, said, “The applause of a single human being is of great consequence.”1 Today it is still true that most of us respond well to a sincere word of praise.