Look for the ones who are poor in spirit; who mourn their sin; who aren’t entitled, always insisting on their own way, but are meek; who are sick to death of sin and all its nonsense and so hunger and thirst for righteousness like it is water. When you find people like that, make sure they know who Jesus is. Make sure Jesus is the one who fills their impoverished spirit, who has forgiven their sins, who receives their life and worship, and whose righteousness they depend upon and pursue. When you find such people, tell them to join!
Jonathan Leeman

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THE TRAIN WRECK

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#1 · February 1, 2003, 2:41 pm

Posted by: bigguyhereagain <bigguyhereagain@...>

<>< THE TRAIN WRECK ><>
 
I was driving to the grocery store just thinking of everything on my
list to do today. Taking the kids to soccer practice, cleaning the house,
getting groceries, getting the oil changed in the car, the list went on
and on. I was feeling overwhelmed and was already tired before I had
even gotten started.

On my way to the store I saw something horrible happen, a train had run
into a car that was crossing the tracks. I thought "Oh no! This is
horrible, there is no way the driver of that car could have lived!!"
I was the closest car to the tracks so I put my car in park and got out.
I ran over to the car and looked in and could not believe what I was
seeing. Tears came to my eyes and I just couldn't take it. Inside the
car was a woman driving that was obviously dead. In the backseat was a
baby in it's car seat bleeding everywhere and next to the baby was a
little girl who I guessed to be about 4 years old and she was bleeding
also. Just then the little girl spoke. She said, "Is my mommy and baby
sister okay?"
I just looked at her and said, "Honey I don't know. There is a doctor
on his way right now."
Just then the little girl started crying saying, "Don't take my mommy
and my baby sister. Take me with you too!! Please!!"
She was pleading at who knows what to take her - but take her where???
I asked the little girl who she was talking to and she said, "Don't you
see? That Angel is taking my mommy and my baby sister! I want to go with
them too! My mommy is waving goodbye to me and she is holding my baby sister
and she is smiling!" The little girl started to cry because she did not want to stay, she wanted to go with her mommy and her baby sister. I felt so sorry for
her. I didn't believe in God and I thought to myself, where did an Angel come
from? What kind of God would take a mommy and a baby but not the little
sister? At that moment I saw the little girl start to smile so big as she held
her arms out to something, someone to pick her up. I thought to myself that
she must be delirious and maybe she is hurt worse than I thought.
Just then the little girl closed her eyes and slumped over in her seat.
She was dead!
I couldn't be sad even though this was a 4-year-old little girl that had
just died. You wouldn't be sad either if you could see that beautiful
smile on her face! I guess her mommy and baby sister came back to get
her. That was also the day that God came to get me - as that was the
day that I became a believer and turned my life over to the Living God.

 
<><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><  <><
 
<>< Fishing ><>
 
     Howard County Sheriff Jerry Marr got a  disturbing call one Saturday afternoon a
few months ago.  His 6-year-old grandson Mikey had been hit by a car while fishing in
Greentown with his dad.  The father and son were near a bridge by the Kokomo
Reservoir when a woman lost control of her car, slid off the bridge and hit Mikey at a rate
of about 50 mph.
 
     Sheriff Marr had seen the results of accidents like this and feared the worst.  When he got to Saint Joseph Hospital, he rushed through the emergency room to find Mikey conscious and in fairly good spirits considering what had happened to him.
    "Mikey, what happened?" Sheriff Marr asked.
 
     Mikey replied, "Well, Papaw, I was fishin' with Dad, and some lady runned me over, I flew into  a mud puddle, and broke my fishin' pole and I didn't get to catch no fish!"
    As it turned out, the impact propelled Mikey  about 500 feet, over a few trees and an
embankment and in the middle of a mud puddle.  His only injuries were to his right femur bone which had broken in two places.  Mikey had surgery to place pins in his leg.Otherwise the boy is fine.
 
    Since all the boy could talk about was that his fishing pole was broken, the Sheriff went out to Wal-Mart and bought him a new one while he was in surgery so he could have it when he came out.
 
    The next day the Sheriff sat with Mikey to keep him company in the hospital.  Mikey was enjoying his new fishing pole and talked about when he could go fishing again as he cast into the trash can.
 
    When they were alone, Mikey, just a matter-of-fact, said, "Papaw, did you know Jesus is real?"
 
   "Well," the Sheriff replied, a little startled. "Yes, Jesus is real to all who believe in him
 and love him in their hearts."
 
    "No," said Mikey.  "I mean Jesus is REALLY real."
 
    "What do you mean?" asked the Sheriff.
 
    "I know he's real 'cause I saw him." said Mikey, still casting into the trash can.
    "You did?" said the Sheriff.
 
    "Yep," said Mikey.  "When that lady runned me over and broke my fishing pole, Jesus caught me in his arms and laid me down in the mud puddle."
 
><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>  ><>
 
<>< The Rented Room ><>

Our house was directly across the street from the clinic
entrance of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.  We lived
downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to outpatients at the
clinic.
 
One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at
the door.  I opened it to see a truly awful looking man.  
 
"Why, he's hardly taller than my eight-year-old," I thought as I
stared at the stooped, shriveled body.  But the appalling thing
was his face, lopsided from swelling, red and raw.
 
Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, "Good evening. I've come
to see if you've a room for just one night.  I came for a
treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there's no
bus 'til morning."
 
He told me he'd been hunting for a room since noon but with no
success, no one seemed to have a room.  "I guess it's my face...
I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more
treatments..."  
 
For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me,
"I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch.  My bus
leaves early in the morning."
 
I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch.
I went inside and finished getting supper.  When we were ready,
I asked the old man if he would join us.  "No thank you.  
I have plenty."  And he held up a brown paper bag.
 
When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk
with him a few minutes.  It didn't take a long time to see that
this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body.
 
He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her
five children, and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from
a back injury.
 
He didn't tell it by way of complaint; in fact, every other
sentence was prefaced with a thanks to God for a blessing.
 
He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was
apparently a form of skin cancer.  He thanked God for giving him
the strength to keep going.
 
At bedtime, we put a camp cot in the children's room for him.
When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded
and the little man was out on the porch.
 
He refused breakfast, but just before he left for his bus,
haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said,
 
"Could I please come back and stay the next time I have a
treatment?  I won't put you out a bit.  I can sleep fine in a
chair."  He paused a moment and then added, "Your children made
me feel at home.  Grownups are bothered by my face, but children
don't seem to mind."
 
I told him he was welcome to come again.
 
And on his next trip he arrived a little after seven in the
morning.  As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the
largest oysters I had ever seen.  He said he had shucked them
that morning before he left so that they'd be nice and fresh.
 
I knew his bus left at 4:00 a.m., and I wondered what time he
had to get up in order to do this for us.
 
In the years he came to stay overnight with us, there was never
a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables
from his garden.
 
Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special
delivery; fish and oysters packed in a box of fresh young
spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed.  
 
Knowing that he must walk three miles to mail these and knowing
how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.
 
When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a
comment our next-door neighbor made after he left that first
morning.  "Did you keep that awful looking man last night?  
 
I turned him away!  
You can lose roomers by putting up such people!"
 
Maybe we did lose roomers once or twice.  But oh!  If only they
could have known him, perhaps their illness would have been
easier to bear.  I know our family will always be grateful to
have known him; from him we learned what it was to accept the
bad without complaint and the good with gratitude to God.
 
Recently, I was visiting a friend who has a greenhouse.
As she showed me her flowers, we came to the most beautiful one
of all, a golden chrysanthemum bursting with blooms.
 
But to my great surprise, it was growing in an old dented, rusty
bucket.  I thought to myself, "If this were my plant, I'd put it
in the loveliest container I had!"
 
My friend changed my mind.  "I ran short of pots," she
explained, "and knowing how beautiful this one would be,
I thought it wouldn't mind starting out in this old pail.  It's
just for a little while, till I can put it out in the garden."
 
She must have wondered why I laughed so delightedly,
but I was imagining just such a scene in heaven.
 
"Here's an especially beautiful one," God might have said when
he came to the soul of the sweet old fisherman.  
 
"He won't mind starting in this small body."
 
All this happened long ago -- and now, in God's garden,
how tall this lovely soul must stand.
 
Have A Blessed Day
Dave and Barbara
 
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