Pastoral Resources

• Christ never preached any funeral sermons.
  
  
• His is a loving, tender hand, full of sympathy and compassion.
  
  
• Take your stand on the Rock of Ages. Let death, let the judgment come: the victory is Christ's and yours through Him.
  
  
• The only man who ever suffered before Christ was that servant who had his ear cut off. But most likely in a moment afterward he had it on, and very likely it was a better ear than ever, because whatever the Lord does He does it well No man ever lost his life with Him.
  
  
• A great many people wonder why it was that Christ did not come at once to Martha and Mary, whom He loved, whenever He heard of their affliction. It was to try them, and it is the same with His dealings toward us. If He seems not to come to us in our afflictions, it is only to test us.
  
  
• When the Spirit came to Moses, the plagues came upon Egypt, and he had power to destroy men's lives; when the Spirit came upon Elijah, fire came down from heaven; when the Spirit came upon Gideon, no man could stand before him; and when it came upon Joshua, he moved around the city of Jericho and the whole city fell into his, hands; but when the Spirit came upon the Son of Man, He gave His life; He healed the broken-hearted.
  
  
• No matter how low down you are no matter what your disposition has been you may be low in your thoughts, words, and actions you may be selfish your heart may be overflowing with corruption and wickedness yet Jesus will have compassion upon you. He will speak comforting words to you not treat you coldly or spurn you, as perhaps those of earth would, but will speak tender words, and words of love and affection and kindness. Just come at once. He is a faithful friend--a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.

• If you receive Him it will be well; if you reject Him and are lost it will be terrible.
  
  
• Thanks be to God, there is hope to-day; this very hour you can choose Him and serve Him.
  
  
• Now just think a moment and answer the question, "'What shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?"
  
  
• I believe in my soul that there are more at this day being lost for want of decision than for any other thing.
  
  
• One of two things you must do; you must either receive Him or reject Him. You receive Him here and He will receive you there; you reject Him here and He will reject you there.

• The mightiest man that ever lived could not deliver himself from his sins. If a man could have saved himself, Christ would never have come into the world.
  
  
• He came to deliver us from our sinful dispositions, and create in us pure hearts, and when we have Him with us it will not be hard for us. Then the service of Christ will be delightful.
  
  
• If you are under the power of evil, and you want to get under the power of God, cry to Him to bring you over to His service cry to Him to take you into His army. He will hear you He will come to you, and, if need be, He will send a legion of angels to help you to fight your way up to heaven. God will take you by the right hand and lead you through this wilderness, over death, and take you right into His kingdom. That's what the Son of Man came to do. He has never deceived us just say here: "Christ is my deliverer."

• God will honor our faith.
  
  
• There is nothing on this earth that pleases Christ so much as faith.
  
  
• Faith is the foundation of all society. We have only to look around and see this.
  
  
• I believe there is no man in the world so constituted but he can believe in God's word. He simply tells you to believe in Him, and He will save you.
  
  
• When I was converted twenty years ago I felt a faith in God but five years after I had a hundred times more faith, and five years ago I had more than ever, because I became better acquainted with Him. I have read up the Word, and I see that the Lord has done so and so, and then I have turned to where He has promised to perform it, and when I see this I have reason to believe in Him.

• There is not an excuse but is a lie.
  
  
• God's service a hard one! How will that sound in the judgment?
  
  
• It is easy enough to excuse yourself to hell, but you cannot excuse yourself to heaven.
  
  
• When a man prepares a feast, men rush in, but when God prepares one they all begin to make excuses, and don't want to go.
  
  
• My friends, to accept this invitation is more important than anything else in this world. There is nothing in the world that is so important as the question of accepting the invitation.
  
  
• If everybody could understand everything the Bible said it wouldn't be God's book; if Christians, if theologians, had studied it for forty, fifty, sixty years, and then only began to understand it, how could a man expect to understand it by one reading?
  
  
• If God were to take men at their word about these excuses, and swept everyone into his grave who had an excuse, there would be a very small congregation in the Tabernacle next Sunday there would be little business in Chicago, and in a few weeks the grass would be growing on these busy streets.

• All you have got to do is to prove that you are a sinner, and I will prove that you have got a Saviour.
  
  
• Do you believe the Lord will call a poor sinner, and then cast him out? No! his word stands forever, "Him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out."
  
  
• If God put Adam out of this earthly Eden on account of one sin, do you think He will let us into the Paradise above with our tens of thousands sins upon us.
  
  
• The only charge they could bring against Christ down here was, that He was receiving bad men. They are the very kind of men He is willing to receive.
  
  
• "Lord, you don't really mean that we shall preach the Gospel to those men that murdered you, to those men that took your life?" "Yes," says the Lord, "go and preach the Gospel to those Jerusalem sinners." I can imagine Him saying: "Go and hunt up that man that put the cruel crown of thorns upon My brow, and preach the Gospel to him. Tell him he shall have a crown in My kingdom without a thorn in it."

• We must not limit the mighty grace of God.
  
  
• Grace means undeserved kindness. It is the gift of God to man the moment he sees he is unworthy of God's favor.
  
  
• A man does not get grace till he comes down to the ground, till he sees he needs grace. When a man stoops to the dust and acknowledges that he needs mercy, then it is that the Lord will give him grace.
  
  
• If you are ready to partake of grace you have not to atone for your sins--you have merely to accept of the atonement. All that you want to do is to cry, "God have mercy upon me," and you will receive the blessing.
  
  
• "The grace of God hath power to bring salvation to all men," and if a man is unsaved it is because he wants to work it out; he wants to receive salvation in some other way than God's way; but we are told that "he that climbeth up another way, the same is a thief and a robber."
  
  
• When we get full of this grace we want to see everyone blessed--we want to see all the churches blessed, not only all the churches here, but in the whole country. That was the trouble with Christ's disciples. He had hard work to make them understand that His gospel was for everyone, that it was a stream to flow out to all nations of the earth. They wanted to confine it to the Jews, and He had to convince them that it was for every living being.

• What reason have I for doubting God's own word?
  
  
• I just as much believe that God sent Christ into the world to be the Saviour of the world, as I believe that I exist.

• The drunkard, the open blasphemer, the worst sinners, are precisely the ones that need Jesus most. The well don't need Him at all.
  
  
• There is many a gem in these billiard halls that only needs the way pointed out to fill their souls with the love of Christ.

• If you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ you are free.
  
  
• There is no sin in the whole catalogue of sins you can name but Christ will deliver you from it perfectly.
  
  
• We are led on by an unseen power that we have not got strength to resist, or else we are led on by the loving Son of God.
  
  
• The trouble is, people do not know that Christ is a Deliverer. They forget that the Son of God came to keep them from sin as well as to forgive it.
  
  
• You say "I am afraid I cannot hold out." Well, Christ will hold out for you. There is no mountain that He will not climb with you if you will; He will deliver you from your besetting sin.
  
  
• Satan rules all men that are in his kingdom. Some he rules through lust. Some he rules through covetousness. Some he rules through appetite. Some he rules by their temper, but he rules them. And none will ever seek to be delivered until they get their eyes open and see that they have been taken captive.
  
  
• When Christ was on the earth there was a woman in the temple who was bowed almost to the ground with sin. Satan had bound her for eighteen years but after all these years of bondage Christ delivered her. He spoke one word and she was free. She got up and walked home. How astonished those at home must have been to see her walking in.

• Praise is not only speaking to the Lord on our own account, but it is praising Him for what He has done for others.
  
  
• If we have a praise church we will have people converted. I don't care where it is, what part of the world it's in, if we have a praise church we'll have successful Christianity.
  
  
• Every good gift that we have had from the cradle up has come from God. If a man just stops to think what he has to praise God for, he will find there is enough to keep him singing praises for a week.
  
  
• We have in our churches a great deal of prayer, but I think it would be a good thing if we had a praise meeting occasionally. If we could only get people to praise God for what He has done, it would be a good deal better than asking Him continually for something.

• There are over two hundred passages in the Old Testament which prophesied about Christ, and every one of them has come true.
  
  
• God didn't give the world two different Bibles; they are one, and must be believed from back to back, from Genesis to Revelations, or not at all.
  
  
• I haven't found the first man who ever read the Bible from back to back carefully who remained an infidel. My friends, the Bible of our mothers and fathers is true.
  
  
• The Word of God may be darkened to the natural man, but the way of Salvation is written so plain, that the little child six years old can understand it if she will.
  
  
• Set more and more store by the Bible. Then troubles in your Christian life will pass away like a morning cloud. You will feed and live on the Word of God, and it will become the joy of your soul.
  
  
• There are dark and mysterious things in the Bible now, but when you begin to trust Christ your eyes will be opened and the Bible will be a new book to you. It will become the Book of books to you.
  
  
• I notice if a man goes to cut up the Bible and comes to you with one truth and says, "I don't believe this, and I don't believe that,"--I notice when he begins to doubt portions of the Word Of God he soon doubts it all.
  
  
• If you will show me a Bible Christian living on the Word of God, I will show you a joyful man. He is mounting up all the time. He has got new truths that lift him up over every obstacle, and he mounts over difficulties higher and higher, like a man I once heard of who had a bag of gas fastened on either side, and if he just touched the ground with his foot, over a wall or a hedge he would go and so these truths make us so light that we bound over every obstacle.

• All should work and ask God's guidance.
  
  
• The world knows little of the works wrought by prayer.
  
  
• Let us pray, and as we pray, let us make room for Jesus in our hearts.
  
  
• Unless the Spirit of God is with us, we cannot expect that our prayers will be answered.
  
  
• David was the last one we would have chosen to fight the giant, but he was chosen of God.
  
  
• Every one of our children will be brought into the ark, it we pray and work earnestly for them.
  
  
• The impression that a praying mother leaves upon her children is life-long. Perhaps when you are dead and gone your prayer will be answered

• I would rather go into the kingdom of heaven through the poor house than go down to hell in a golden chariot.
  
  
• I believe there are more young men who come to Boston who are lost because they cannot say no, than for any other reason.
  
  
• It ain't necessary to leave the things of this life when you follow Him. It is not necessary to give up your business, if it's a legitimate one, in order to accept Christ. But you mustn't set your heart on the old nets by a good deal.
  
  
• A great many people want to bring their faith, their works, their good deeds to Him for salvation. Bring your sins, and He will bear them away into the wilderness of forgetfulness, and you will never see them again.
  
  
• Do you believe that He would send those men out to preach the gospel to every creature unless he wanted every creature to be saved? Do you believe He would tell them to preach it to people without giving people the power to accept it? Do you believe the God of heaven is mocking men by offering them his gospel and not giving them the power to take hold of it? Do you believe He will not give men power to accept this salvation as a gift? Man might do that, but God never mocks men. And when he says "Preach the gospel to every creature," every creature can be saved if he will.
  
  
• Lift your eyes from off these puny Christians--from off these human ministers, and look to Christ. He is the Saviour of the world. He came from the throne to this earth: He came from the very bosom of the Father. God gave Him up freely for us, and all we have to do is to accept him as our Saviour. Look at Him at Gethsemane, sweating as it were great drops of blood; look at Him on the cross, crucified between two thieves; hear that piercing cry, "Father, Father, forgive them, they know not what they do." And as you look into that face, as you look into those wounds on His feet or His hands, will you say He has not the power to save you? Will you say He has not the power to redeem you?

• The best truths are got by digging deep for them.
  
  
• When we know our Bible, then it is that God can use us.
  
  
• When we find a man meditating on the words of God, my friends, that man is full of boldness and is successful.
  
  
• When a man is filled with the Word of God you cannot keep him still. If man has got the Word, he must speak or die.
  
  
• Let us have one day exclusively to study and read the Word of God. If we can't take time during the week, we will have Sunday uninterrupted.
  
  
• Now, as old Dr. Bonner, of Glasgow, said, "The Lord didn't tell Joshua how to use the sword, but He told him how he should meditate on the Lord day and night, and then he would have good success."
  
  
• One thing I have noticed in studying the Word of God, and that is, when a man is filled with the Spirit he deals largely with the Word of God, whereas the man who is filled with his own ideas refers rarely to the Word of God. He gets along without it, and you seldom see it mentioned in his discourses.

• Now I am no prophet, nor the son of a prophet, but one thing I can predict; that every one of our new converts that goes to studying his Bible, and loves this book above every other book, is sure to hold out. The world will have no charm for him; he will get the world under his feet, because in this book he will find something better than the world can give him.
  
  
• What can botanists tell you of the lily of the valley? You must study this book for that. What can geologists tell you of the Rock of Ages, or mere astronomers about the Bright Morning Star? In those pages we find all knowledge unto salvation here we read of the ruin of man by nature, redemption by the blood, and regeneration by the Holy Ghost. These three things run all through and through them.

• The most solemn truth in the gospel is that the only thing Christ left down here is His blood.
  
  
• A man who covers up the cross, though he may be an intellectual man, and draw large crowds, will have no life there, and his church will be but a gilded sepulcher.
  
  
• There is either of two things we must do. One is to send back the message to heaven that we don't want the blood of Christ to cleanse us of our sin, or else accept it.
  
  
• Into every house where the blood was not sprinkled, the destroying angel came. But wherever the blood was on door-post and lintel, whether they had worked much, or whether they had worked none, God passed them over.
  
  
• A man who has not realized what the blood has done for him has not the token of salvation. It is told of Julian, the apostate, that while he was fighting he received an arrow in his side. He pulled it out, and, taking a handful of blood threw it into the air and cried, "Galilean, Galilean, thou hast conquered."
  
  
• Look at that Roman soldier as he pushed his spear into the very heart of the God-man. What a hellish deed! But what was the next thing that took place? Blood covered the spear! Oh! thank God, the blood covers sin. There was the blood covering that spear--the very point of it. The very crowning act of sin brought out the crowning act of love; the crowning act of wickedness was the crowning act of grace.
  
  
• It Is said that old Dr. Alexander, of Princeton College, when a young student used to start out to preach, always gave them a piece of advice. The old man would stand with his gray locks and his venerable face and say: "Young man, make much of the blood in your ministry." Now, I have traveled considerable during the past few years, and never met a minister who made much of the blood and much of the atonement but God had blessed his ministry, and souls were born into the light by it.

• There was never a sermon which you have listened to but in it Christ was seeking for you. I contend that a man cannot but find in every page of this book that Jesus Christ is seeking him through His blessed Word. This is what the Bible is for--to seek out the lost.
  
  
• No man in the world should be so happy as a man of God. It is one continual source of gladness. He can look up and say, "God is my Father, Christ is my Saviour, and the Church is my mother."
  
  
• There is no other way to the Kingdom of God but by the way of the cross, and it will be easier for you to take it now than it will be afterward.
  
  
• Everything has to be tried by the sinner before he will come to Christ. He has to feel that there is nothing that can save him but Christ, then he will come.
  
  
• Have not some of you heard a sermon in which you were offered as a sinner to the Lord Jesus Christ, and your conscience was troubled? You went away, but you came back again, and the Spirit of God came upon you again and again, and you were troubled. Haven't you passed through that experience? Don't you remember something like that happening to you? That was the Son of God seeking for your soul.
  
  
• The Son of God has come into the world to bless us. Look at that Sermon on the Mount. It is filled with the word blessed, blessed, blessed. I think it occurs nine times. His heart was full of blessings for the people. He had to get it out before He gave His sermon.
  
  
• A rule I have had for years is to treat the Lord Jesus Christ as a personal friend. His is not a creed, a mere empty doctrine, but it is He himself we have. The moment we have received Christ we should receive Him as a friend. When I go away from home I bid my wife and children good-by, I bid my friends and acquaintances good-by, but I never heard of a poor backslider going down on his knees and saying: "I have been near You for ten years Your service has become tedious and monotonous I have come to bid You farewell good-by, Lord Jesus Christ." I never heard of one doing this. I will tell you how they go away they just run away.

• It is the greatest pleasure of living to win souls to Christ.
  
  
• I believe in what John Wesley used to say, "All at it, and always at it," and that is what the Church wants to-day.
  
  
• If we were all of us doing the work that God has got for us to do, don't you see how the work of the Lord would advance?
  
  
• There is no man living that can do the work that God has got for me to do. No one can do it but myself. And if the work ain't done we will have to answer for it when we stand before God's bar.
  
  
• What makes the Dead Sea dead? Because it is all the time receiving, never giving out anything. Why is it that many Christians are cold? Because they are all the time receiving, never giving out an anything.

• If Christ comes into our hearts we are not ashamed.
  
  
• I wish we had a few more women like the woman of Samaria, willing to confess what the Lord Jesus Christ had done for their souls.
  
  
• Believing and confessing go together; and you cannot be saved without you take them both. "With the mouth confession is made unto salvation." If you ever see the kingdom of heaven you have to take this way.
  
  
• Satan puts straws across our path and magnifies it and makes us believe it is a mountain, but all the devil's mountains are mountains of smoke; when you come up to them they are not there.
  
  
• I do not know anything that would wake up Chicago better than for every man and woman here who loves Him to begin to talk about Him to their friends, and just to tell them what He has done for you. You have got a circle of friends. Go and tell them of Him.
  
  
• I can't help thinking of the old woman who started out when the war commenced with a poker in her hand. When asked what she was going to do with it she said: "I can't do much with it, but I can show what side I'm on." My friends, even if you can't do much, show to which side you belong.
  
  
• I may say with truth that there is only about one in ten who professes Christianity who will turn round and glorify God with a loud voice. Nine out of ten are still born Christians. You never hear of them. If you press them hard with the question whether they are Christians they might say, "Well, I hope so." We never see it in their actions we never see it in their lives. They might belong to the church you go to, but you never see them at the prayer-meetings or taking any interest in the church affairs. They don't profess it among their fellows or in their business, and the result is that there are hundreds going on with a half hope, not sure whether their religion will stand them or not.

• It is our privilege to know that we are saved.
  
  
• We shall draw the world to Christ when we are filled with religion.
  
  
• He that overcometh shall inherit all things. God has no poor children.
  
  
• I hold to the doctrine of sudden conversion as I do to my life, and I would as quickly give up my life as give up this doctrine, unless it can be proved that it is not according to the word of God. Now, I will admit that light is one thing and birth is another. A soul must be born before it can see light. A child must be born before it can be taught it must be born before it can walk it must be born before it can be educated.

Perhaps the most famous gold strike in American history occurred in January 1848 when a man named John Marshall found gold at Sutter’s Mill in northern California. The find set off a gold rush that reached a frenzied pitch and even attracted prospectors from Europe—but it ruined Marshall and John Stutter, the man who owned the land where gold lay for the taking. Sutter’s land was overrun by gold seekers, his cattle were stolen, and he was driven into bankruptcy. Marshall died drunken and penniless.

Lanny Bassham, Olympic gold-medalist in small-bore rifle competition, tells what concentration does for his marksmanship: “Our sport is controlled nonmovement. We are shooting from 50 meters—over half a football field—at a bull’s eye three-quarters the size of a dime. If the angle of error at the point of the barrel is more than .005 of a millimeter (that is five one-thousandths), you drop into the next circle and lose a point.

So we have to learn how to make everything stop. I stop my breathing. I stop my digestion by not eating for 12 hours before the competition. I train by running to keep my pulse around 60, so I have a full second between beats—I have gotten it lower, but found that the stroke-volume increased so much that each beat really jolted me. You do all of this and you have the technical control. But you have to have some years of experience in reading conditions: the wind, the mirage. Then you have the other 80% of the problems—the mind.

A fascinating study on the principle of the Golden Rule was conducted by Bernard Rimland, director of the Institute for Child Behavior Research. Rimland found that “The happiest people are those who help others.” Each person involved in the study was asked to list ten people he knew best and to label them as happy or not happy. Then they were to go through the list again and label each one as selfish or unselfish, using the following definition of selfishness: a stable tendency to devote one’s time and resources to one’s own interests and welfare—an unwillingness to inconvenience one’s self for others.” (Rimland, ‘The Altruism Paradox,’ Psychological Reports 51 [1982]: 521) In categorizing the results, Rimland found that all of the people labeled happy were also labeled unselfish. He wrote that those “whose activities are devoted to bringing themselves happiness...are far less likely to be happy than those whose efforts are devoted to making others happy” Rimland concluded: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” (Ibid., p. 522).

At their school carnival, our kids won four free goldfish (lucky us!), so out I went Saturday morning to find an aquarium.

The first few I priced ranged from $40 to $70. Then I spotted it—right in the aisle: a discarded 10-gallon display tank, complete with gravel and filter—for a mere five bucks. Sold! Of course, it was nasty dirty, but the savings made the two hours of clean-up a breeze.

Those four new fish looked great in their new home, at least for the first day. But by Sunday one had died. Too bad, but three remained. Monday morning revealed a second casualty, and by Monday night a third goldfish had gone belly up.

We called in an expert, a member of our church who has a 30-gallon tank. It didn’t take him long to discover the problem: I had washed the tank with soap, an absolute no-no. My uninformed efforts had destroyed the very lives I was trying to protect.

Sometimes in our zeal to clean up our own lives or the lives of others, we unfortunately use “killer soaps”—condemnation, criticism, nagging, fits of temper. We think we’re doing right, but our harsh, self-righteous treatment is more than they can bear.

- Richard L. Dunagin

Goldfish racing. No kidding. In some parts of this country you’ll find a race course consisting of 12 long transparent tubes filled with water. The goldfish are separated from plastic model “sharks” by a thin wall, but at the starting signal the dividing barrier is let down. Players sitting at a counter operate levers which control the movements of particular sharks. As the sharks chase the spooked goldfish across the finish line, a photoelectric cell records the undisputed winner, causing its number to flash on the scoreboard.

Sam Goldwyn, the movie producer, used to mangle the English language so badly that his malaprops and mixed metaphors came to be known as Goldwynisms. Some that have become classics are...

A verbal contract isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.

Every Tom, Dick, and Harry is named William.

Now, gentlemen, listen slowly.

For your information, I would like to ask a question.

Include me out.

Don’t talk to me while I’m interrupting.

I may not always be right, but I’m never wrong.

Once there was a man who was such a golf addict that he was neglecting his job. Frequently he would call in sick as an excuse to play.

One morning, after making his usual call to the office, an angel up above spotted him on the way to the golf course and decided to teach him a lesson. "If you play golf today, you will be punished," the angel whispered in his ear.

Thinking it was only his conscience, which he had successfully whipped in the past, the fellow just smiled. "No," he said, "I've been doing this for years. No one will ever know. I won't be punished."

The angel said no more and the fellow stepped up to the first tee where he promptly whacked the ball 300 yards straight down the middle of the fairway. Since he had never driven the ball more than 200 yards, he couldn't believe it. Yet, there it was. And his luck continued. Long drives on every hole, perfect putting. By the ninth hole he was six under par and was playing near-perfect golf. The fellow was walking on air.

He wound up with an amazing 61, about 30 strokes under his usual game. Wait until he got back to the office and told them about this! But, suddenly, his face fell. He couldn't tell them. He could never tell anyone.

The angel smiled.

Once there was a man who was such a golf addict that he was neglecting his job. Frequently he would call in sick as an excuse to play.

One morning, after making his usual call to the office, an angel up above spotted him on the way to the golf course and decided to teach him a lesson. “If you play golf today, you will be punished,” the angel whispered in his ear.

Thinking it was only his conscience, which he had successfully whipped in the past, the fellow just smiled. “No,” he said, “I’ve been doing this for years. No one will ever know. I won’t be punished.”

The angel said no more and the fellow stepped up to the first tee where he promptly whacked the ball 300 yards straight down the middle of the fairway. Since he had never driven the ball more than 200 yards, he couldn’t believe it. Yet, there it was.

And his luck continued. Long drives on every hole, perfect putting. By the ninth hole he was six under par and was playing near-perfect golf. The fellow was walking on air.

He wound up with an amazing 61, about 30 strokes under his usual game. Wait until he got back to the office and told them about this! But, suddenly, his face fell. He couldn’t tell them. He could never tell anyone. The angel smiled.

One of golf’s immortal moments came when a Scotchman demonstrated the new game to President Ulysses Grant. Carefully placing the ball on the tee, he took a mighty swing. The club hit the turf and scattered dirt all over the President’s beard and surrounding vicinity, while the ball placidly waited on the tee. Again the Scotchman swung, and again he missed. Our President waited patiently through six tries and then quietly stated, “There seems to be a fair amount of exercise in the game, but I fail to see the purpose of the ball.

They were looking for famous golf sayings to be inscribed in a specified area in the Golf Hall of Fame when it was under construction in Pinehurst, N.C. The first one selected is one of the most often-used expressions the game has produced. It’s “Oh, no!”

A golfer who had been playing badly went to a psychiatrist who told him to relax by playing a round of golf without a ball. “Do everything you would normally do, but use an imaginary ball,” advised the psychiatrist.” The golfer tried it the next day. He stepped up on the first tee, imagined he got a 260-yard drive, made a fine approach shot to the green, then putted for a par. The round went splendidly and as he approached the 18th hole, he met another golfer playing the same way—no ball.

The other golfer had seen the same psychiatrist. They decided to play the last hole together and bet $10 on the outcome. The first golfer swung at his imaginary ball and announced that it had gone 280 yards right down the middle of the fairway. The second golfer matched his drive. The first fellow then took out his 5-iron and after swinging at his imaginary ball, he exclaimed, “Look at that shot! It went right over the pin and the reverse spin on it brought it right back into the hole! I win.”

“No you don’t,” said the second golfer. “You hit my ball.”

A 16-year-old named William left home to seek his fortune. His earthly possessions were tied in a bundle carried in his hand. One day he met an elderly canal-boat captain who listened to his story that his family was too poor to keep him, and the only skill he had was making candles and soap.

The old captain knelt and prayed for the boy’s future and afterward gave him some advice.

“William, someone will be the leading soap-maker in New York. It could be you. Be a good man, give your heart to Christ, pay the Lord all that belongs to Him, make an honest soap, give a full pound, and I’m certain you’ll be a prosperous and rich man.”

The 16-year-old who listened to godly counsel was William Colgate, who not only prospered beyond his wildest dreams but was able to give millions of dollars to the Lord’s cause.

Love God more than you fear hell.

Once a week, let a child take you on a walk.

Make major decisions in a cemetery.

When no one is watching, live as if someone is.

Succeed at home first.

Don’t spend tomorrow’s money today.

Pray twice as much as you fret.

Listen twice as much as you speak.

Only harbor a grudge where God does.

Never outgrow your love of sunsets.

God has forgiven you, you’d be wise to do the same.

When you can’t trace God’s hand, trust His heart.

Toot your own horn and the notes will be flat.

The book of life is lived in chapters, so know your page number.

Live your Christianity.

Business is made up of ambiguous victories and nebulous defeats. Claim them all as victories.

Keep track of what you do; someone is sure to ask.

Be comfortable around senior managers, or learn to fake it.

Never bring your boss a problem without some solution. You are getting paid to think, not to whine.

Long hours don’t mean anything; results count, not effort.

Write down ideas; they get lost like good pens.

Always arrive at work 30 minutes before your boss.

Be sure to sit at the conference table-never by the wall.

Help other people that network for jobs. What goes around comes around.

Don’t take sick days-unless you are.

Assume no one can/will keep a secret.

Always have an answer to the question “What would I do if I lost my job tomorrow?”

Go to the company holiday party.

Don’t get drunk at the company holiday party

Avoid working on the weekends. Work longer during the week if you have to.

The most successful people in business are interesting.

Sometimes you’ll be on a roll and everything will click; take maximum advantage. When the opposite is true, hold steady and wait it out.

Never in your life say,” It’s not my job.”

Be loyal to your career, your interests and yourself.

Understand the skills and abilities that set you apart. When ever you have an opportunity, use them.

People remember the end of the project. As they say in boxing,” Always finish stronger than you start.”

Never have more children than you have car windows.

Never loan your car to someone to whom you have given birth.

Pick your friends carefully. A “friend” never goes on a diet when you are fat or tells you how lucky you are to have a husband who remembers Mother’s Day--when his gift is a smoke alarm.

Seize the moment. Remember all those women on the Titanic who waved off the dessert cart.

Know the difference between success and fame. Success is Mother Teresa. Fame is Madonna.

Never be in a hurry to terminate a marriage. Remember, you may need this man-woman someday to finish a sentence.

There are no guarantees in marriage. If that’s what you’re looking for, go live with a Sears battery.

Never go to a class reunion pregnant. They will think that’s all you have been doing since you graduated.

We could all save ourselves a lot of words if we’d only remember that people rarely take advice unless they have to pay for it.

The trouble with good advice is that it usually interferes with your plans.

Good advice is what your own kids disregard but save to give to their kids.

The story is told of a new bank president who met with his predecessor and said, “I would like to know what have been the keys to your success.” The older gentleman looked at him and replied, “Young man, I can sum it up in two words: Good decisions.” To that the young man responded, “I thank you immensely for that advice, sir, but how does one come to know which are the good decisions?” “One word, young man,” replied the sage. “Experience.” “That’s all well and good,” said the younger, “but how does one get experience?” “Two words,” said the elder. “Bad decisions.”

My grandmother, a staunch Southern Baptist, had marched me off to Sunday school and church regularly. So when I switched to the Episcopal church after marriage, she challenged me: “What’s wrong with the Baptist Church, son?”

“Well,” I explained, “Carole and I flipped a coin to see if we would go to her church or mine, and I lost.”

“Serves you right,” said my grandmother. “Good Baptists don’t gamble.”

A severe rash prompted a man from a rural area to come to town to be examined by one of my colleagues. After the usual history-taking followed by a series of tests the physician advised the patient that he would have to get rid of the dog that was evidently causing the allergic reaction. As the man was preparing to leave the office, my colleague asked him out of curiosity if he planned to sell the animal or give it away.

“Neither one,” the patient replied. “I’m going to get me one of them second opinions I been reading about. It’s a lot easier to find a doctor than a good bird dog.”

Good counsel failing men can give, for why?

He that’s aground knows where the shoal doth lie.

If you’re into bumper-sticker philosophy, you’ve probably seen the axiom, “I owe, I owe, so off to work I go.” For a vast portion of the workforce, that’s the best reason they can muster for going to the job each day. According to one poll, only 43 percent of American office workers are satisfied with their jobs. In Japan, the figure dips to 17 percent. In the first century, Christian slaves had even less reason to be enthusiastic about their work. But Paul gave them a way to grasp a glimpse of glory amid the grind. He wanted them to “adorn the doctrine of God,” that is, to show the beauty of their faith in Christ by how they work (Ti. 2:10).

A significant and often overlooked way that we serve God is in our everyday tasks. Martin Luther understood this when he wrote, “The maid who sweeps her kitchen is doing the will of God just as much as the monk who prays—not because she may sing a Christian hymn as she sweeps but because God loves clean floors. The Christian shoemaker does his Christian duty not by putting little crosses on the shoes, but by making good shoes, because God is interested in good craftsmanship.”

What kind of person is best able to involve others and himself in good decision making? J. Keith Louden lists seven qualities:

1. The ability to look ahead and see what’s coming—foresight.

2. Steadiness, with patience and persistence and courage.

3. A buoyant spirit that in spite of cares generates confidence.

4. Ingeniousness, the ability to solve problems soundly yet creatively.

5. The ability to help others.

6. Righteousness, the willingness to do the right thing and speak the truth.

7. Personal morality of a quality that commands the respect of others**

One morning I opened the door to get the newspaper and was surprised to see a strange little dog with our paper in his mouth. Delighted with this unexpected “delivery service,” I fed him some treats. The following morning I was horrified to see the same dog sitting in front of our door, wagging his tail, surrounded by eight newspapers.

I spent the rest of that morning returning the papers to their owners.

I think that many of us, when Christ has enabled us to overcome one or two sins that were an obvious nuisance, are inclined to feel (though we do not put it into words) that we are now good enough. He has done all we wanted him to do, and we should be obliged if he would leave us alone. But the question is not what we intended ourselves to be, but what he intended us to be when he made us...

Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what he is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on. You knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised.

But presently he starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is he up to? The explanation is that he is building quite a different house from the one you thought of—throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards.

You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage, but he is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it himself. - C. S. Lewis

Hugging can be vital for your emotional well-being. Everybody feels skin hunger throughout their lives, and unless that hunger is satisfied by touching, there’s a vital void in the emotional make-up that’s going to cause deep unhappiness. We all know that babies thrive on frequent stroking. Well, adults are no different. When they are not patted on the hand, embraced around the shoulder or hugged, they withdraw into themselves.

I prescribe four hugs a day for survival, eight for maintenance and twelve for growth.

Four preachers met for a friendly gathering. During the conversation one preacher said, “Our people come to us and pour out their hears, confess certain sins and needs. Let’s do the same. Confession is good for the soul.” In due time all agreed. One confessed he liked to go to movies and would sneak off when away from his church. The second confessed to liking to smoke cigars and the third one confessed to liking to play cards. When it came to the fourth one, he wouldn’t confess. The others pressed him saying, “Come now, we confessed ours. What is your secret or vice?” Finally he answered, “It is gossiping and I can hardly wait to get out of here.”

Pain is not good in itself. What is good in any painful experience is, for the sufferer, his submission to the will of God, and, for the spectators, the compassion aroused and the acts of mercy to which it leads.

Two little boys had quarreled. But the next morning Johnny took his cap and headed for Bobby's house again. Surprised, an older member of the family said teasingly, "What! Going to play with him again? I thought you quarreled only last evening and were never going to have anything more to do with each other. Funny memory you have." Johnny looked a little sheepish, dug his toe into the carpet for a moment, then flashed a satisfied smile as he hurried away. "Oh! Bobby and me's good forgetters!"

Tourists stand in wondering admiration before some of the palaces of the old world that have endured for more than a thousand years without a crack or seam. The Pantheon at Rome stands just as it did well over two thousand years ago. This would be impossible had not its foundations been right. The Rialto Bridge that spans the Grand Canal in Venice was erected in a.d. 1588. It has stood as it now stands for over four centuries, but that bridge rests on twelve thousand piles driven deeply into the soil. What is true of buildings is also true of life. God cannot and will not build the Christian virtues into your life, or fill you with the Holy Spirit for His service, until the proper foundation of receiving Christ and Him crucified as your Savior and Lord has been laid.

Those like myself, whose imagination far exceeds their obedience, are subject to a just penalty; we easily imagine conditions far higher than any we have really reached. If we describe what we have imagined we may make others, and make ourselves, believe that we have really been there.

Today’s business people can learn a lot about good leadership from orchestra conductors, says the Harvard Business Review. The first thing a good conductor does is put together a first-rate group of musicians. Toscanini, for example, could not have gotten great music out of a high school band. The next thing the conductor does is make sure that his musicians share his satisfaction with the quality of the music. If they don’t all feel an equal sense of accomplishment the conductor’s leadership has failed and he will not make great music.

The late Harry Rimmer penned the following letter to Charles E. Fuller of the Old Fashioned Revival Hour, shortly before his death.

"Next Sunday you are to talk about heaven. I am interested in that land because I have held a clear title to a bit of property there for over 50 years. I did not buy it. It was given to me without money and without price; but the Donor purchased it for me at a tremendous sacrifice.

"I am not holding it for speculation. It is not a vacant lot. For more than half a century I have been sending materials, out of which the greatest Architect of the universe has been building a home for me, which will never need remodeling or repairs because it will suit me perfectly, individually, and will never grow old.

"Termites can never undermine its foundation for it rests upon the Rock of Ages. Fire cannot destroy it. Floods cannot wash it away. No lock or bolts will ever be placed upon the doors, for no vicious person can ever enter that land, where my dwelling stands, now almost completed and almost ready for me to enter in and abide in peace eternally, without fear of being rejected.

"There is a valley of deep shadow between this place where I live, and that to which I shall journey in a very short time. I cannot reach my home in that city without passing through that valley. But I am not afraid because the best Friend I ever had went through the same valley long, long ago and drove away all its gloom. He stuck with me through thick and thin since we first became acquainted 55 years ago, and I hold His promise in printed form, never to forsake me or leave me alone. He will be with me as I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, and I shall not lose my way because He is with me.

"I hope to hear your sermon on heaven next Sunday, but I have no assurance I shall be able to do so. My ticket to heaven has no date marked for the journey, no return coupon and no permit for baggage. Yes, I am ready to go, and I may not be here while you are talking next Sunday evening, but I will meet you there some day."

In his book, I Almost Missed The Sunset, Bill Gaither writes:

Gloria and I had been married a couple of years. We were teaching school in Alexandria, Indiana, where I had grown up, and we wanted a piece of land where we could build a house. I noticed the parcel south of town where cattle grazed, and I learned it belonged to a 92-year-old retired banked named Mr. Yule. He owned a lot of land in the area, and word was he would sell none of it. He gave the same speech to everyone who inquired: “I promised the farmers they could use it for their cattle.”

Gloria and I visited him at the bank. Although he was retired, he spent a couple of hours each morning in his office. He looked at us over the top of his bifocals.

I introduced myself and told him we were interested in a piece of his land. “Not selling,” he said pleasantly. “Promised it to a farmer for grazing.”

“I know, but we teach school here and thought maybe you’d be interested in selling it to someone planning to settle in the area.”

He pursed his lips and stared at me. “What’d you say your name was?”

“Gaither. Bill Gaither.”

“Hmmm. Any relation to Grover Gaither?”

“Yes, sir. He was my granddad.”

Mr. Yule put down his paper and removed his glasses. “Interesting. Grover Gaither was the best worker I ever had on my farm. Full day’s work for a day’s pay. So honest. What’d you say you wanted?”

I told him again.

“Let me do some thinking on it, then come back and see me.”

I came back within the week, and Mr. Yule told me he had had the property appraised. I held my breath. “How does $3,800 sound? Would that be okay?”

If that was per acre, I would have to come up with nearly $60,000! “$3,800?” I repeated.

“Yup. Fifteen acres for $3,800.”

I knew it had to be worth at least three times that. I readily accepted.

Nearly three decades later, my son and I strolled that beautiful, lush property that had once been pasture land. “Benjy” I said, “you’ve had this wonderful place to grow up through nothing that you’ve done, but because of the good name of a great-granddad you never met.”

“A good name is more desirable than great riches; to be esteemed is better than silver or gold.” (Prov. 22:1).

“Good news.” Our word gospel comes from two Old English words. There is no good news like the good news that God sent his Son to die on a cross to get rid of our sins. 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 summarizes the good news, or gospel, that the apostle Paul preached. The term emphasizes the truth that salvation is entirely of grace. From its use for the central Christian message, the word came to be used as the title of each of the four books (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) that tell the story of Jesus’ life and atoning death.

Doctor to patient: “I have bad news and worse news.”

Patient: “So let’s have it.”

Doctor: “The bad news is that you only have 24 hours to live.”

Patient: “I can’t imagine what could be worse than that!”

Doctor: “I forgot to tell you yesterday.”

All news is not beautiful. Or had you noticed? But bad news is good news for Christians, in a sense, because we see in it opportunities to turn things around. Or, as Jesus said, to be lights in a dark world. Christians can do more than curse the darkness. We can light a candle. We can change the world.

Dear God, before I go to sleep

And end another day,

I’m happy that you’re always here

To listen while I pray.

Please bless my special family, Lord,

Whom I love as much as you.

Please help me to be good for them

The way you’d want me to.

So God, please watch me as I sleep,

But Lord, before I do,

It’s good to know you’re loving me

As much as I love you.

Good night God.

I recall the comment of the late Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse, pastor, Tenth Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, who said, “If I had only three years to serve the Lord, I would spend two of them studying and preparing.”

Dallas Seminary will not be insensitive to the economic struggles and time demands of our students. But this does not mean we will lose the reputation of being a place where the diligent study of the Scriptures occurs.

As C. S. Lewis declared: “If all the world were Christian it might not matter if all the world were uneducated. But a cultural life will exist outside the Church whether it exists inside or not. To be ignorant and simple now—not to be able to meet the enemies on their own ground—would be to throw down our weapons, and betray our uneducated brethren who have no defense but us against intellectual attacks of the heathen.

“Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason, because bad philosophy needs to be answered. The cool intellect must work not only against cool intellect on the other side, but against muddy heathen mysticisms which deny intellect altogether. Most of all, perhaps, we need intimate knowledge of the past. The learned life is then, for some, a duty.”

I’ve learned that if you give a pig and a boy everything they want, you’ll get a good pig and a bad boy.

I’ve learned that if you give a pig and a boy everything they want, you’ll get a good pig and a bad boy.

A mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions. During periods of great change, answers don’t last very long but a question is worth a lot. The word question is derived from the Latin quaerere (to seek), which is the same root as the word quest. A creative life is a continued quest, and good questions are useful guides. We have found that the most useful questions are open-ended; they allow a fresh, unanticipated answer to reveal itself.

These are the kind of questions children aren’t afraid to ask. They seem naive at first. But think how different our lives would be if certain questions of wonder were never asked. Jon Collins of Stanford’s Graduate School of Business has compiled the following list of questions of wonder:

Albert Einstein: What would a light wave look like to someone keeping pace with it?

Bill Bowerman (inventor of Nike shoes): What happens if I pour rubber into my waffle iron?

Fred Smith (founder of Federal Express): Why can’t there be reliable overnight mail service?

Godfrey Hounsfield (inventor of the CAT scanner): Why can’t we see in three dimensions what is inside a human body without cutting it open?

Masaru Ibuka (honorary chairman, Sony): Why don’t we remove the recording function and speaker and put headphones in the recorder? (Result: the Sony Walkman.)

Many of these questions are deemed ridiculous at first.

Other shoe companies thought Bowerman’s waffle shoe was a “really stupid idea.”

Godfrey Hounsfield was told the CAT scan was “impractical.”

Masaru Ibuka got comments like: “A recorder with no speaker and no recorder—are you crazy?”

Fred Smith proposed the idea of Federal Express in a paper at Yale and got a C.

“A good conscience is able to bear very much and is very cheerful in adversities. An evil conscience is always fearful and unquiet. Never rejoice except when you have done well. You shall rest sweetly if your heart does not accuse you.

“Sinners never have true joy or feel inward peace, because ‘there is no peace for the wicked,’ says the Lord (Isaiah 57:21).

The glory of the good is in their consciences, and not in the tongues of others, The gladness of the just is of God, and in God; and their joy is of the truth.

“A person will easily be content and pacified whose conscience is pure. If you consider what you are within, you will not care what others say concerning you. People consider the deeds, but God weighs the intentions.

“To be always doing well and to esteem little of one’s self is the sign of a humble soul.

“For not he who commends himself is approved, but whom the Lord commends,” says Paul (2 Corinthians 10:18). To walk inwardly with God, and not to be kept abroad by any outward affection, is the state of a spiritual person.”

“Conscience is that faculty in me which attaches itself to the highest that I know, and tells me what the highest I know demands that I do.

“It is the eye of the soul which looks out either toward God or toward what it regards as the highest authority.

“If I am in the habit of steadily facing toward God, my conscience will always introduce God’s perfect law and indicate what I should do.

“The point is, will I obey? I have to make an effort to keep my conscience so sensitive that I walk without offense. I should be living in such perfect sympathy with God’s Son that in every circumstance the spirit of my mind is renewed.

“The one thing that keeps the conscience sensitive to Him is the habit of being open to God on the inside.

“When there is any debate, quit. There is no debate possible when conscience speaks.”

There are good reasons for doing some things fast: because life is crowding in hard, and if the thing isn’t done fast it won’t be done at all, or because doing it isn’t half so rewarding as doing something else. Therefore, iron fast so you can paint slow. Shop fast so you can sew slow. Cook fast so you can spend some time with a child before it disappears into an adult.

Resolved, That I will do whatsoever I think to be most to the glory of God, and my own good, profit, and pleasure, in the whole of my duration; without any consideration of the time, whether now, or never so many myriads of ages hence.

Resolved, to do whatever I think to be my duty, and most for the good and advantage of mankind in general.

Resolved, never to lose one moment of time, but to improve it in the most profitable way I possibly can.

Resolved, to live with all my might, while I do live.

Resolved, never to do any thing, which I should be afraid to do if it were the last hour of my life.

Resolved, Never to speak evil of any one, so that it shall tend to his dishonour, more or less, upon no account except for some real good.

Resolved, To study the Scriptures so steadily, constantly, and frequently, as that I may find, and plainly perceive, myself to grow in the knowledge of the same.

In the Korean conflict, which was never officially termed a "war," the Eighth United States Army and the North Korean Communists ravaged the city of Seoul three times. It was a battle of wits as well as of arms because the American soldiers were thousands of miles from the source of their ammunition supply. At the outset of the conflict, they had to be ready to fight, to dig in and hide, or to retreat, if ordered. The very word "retreat" has always had a shameful connotation on the battlefield, so the generals and colonels chose to call it "a strategic withdrawal." Sometimes, when the battle against sin and Satan becomes hot in the Christian's life, discretion is the better part of valor, and a hasty retreat to the place of prayer is not only indicated but wise.

Jean Frederick Oberlin, a minister in 18th century Germany, was traveling by foot in winter when he was caught in a severe snowstorm. He soon lost his way in the blowing snow and feared he would freeze to death. In despair he sat down, not knowing which way to turn. Just then, a man came along in a wagon and rescued Oberlin. He took him to the next village and made sure he would be cared for.

As the man prepared to journey on, Oberlin said, “Tell me your name so that I may at least have you in grateful remembrance before God.”

The man, who by now had recognized Oberlin, replied, “You are a minister. Please tell me the name of the Good Samaritan.”

Oberlin said, “I cannot do that, for it is not given in the Scriptures.”

His benefactor responded, “Until you can tell me his name, please permit me to withhold mine.”

1. I love a dog. He does nothing for political reasons.

2. Congress is so strange. A man gets up to speak and says nothing, nobody listens and then everybody disagrees.

3. Never blame a legislative body for not doing something. When they do nothing, they don’t hurt anybody. When they do something is when they become dangerous.

4. I really can’t see any advantage of having one of your party in as President. I would rather be able to criticize a man than have to apologize for him.

5. It’s no disgrace not to be able to run a country nowadays, but it is a disgrace to keep on trying when you know you can’t.

6. It looks to me like any man that wants to be President in times like these lacks something.

7. They’ve already started arguing over who will be the speaker at next year’s conventions. What they better worry about is who is going to listen.

8. There should be a moratorium called on candidates’ speeches. From now on, they are just talking themselves out of votes.

9. A President-elect’s popularity is the shortest lived of any public man’s. It only lasts till he picks his Cabinet.

10. The promising season ends on Election Day. That same night, the alibi season begins and lasts for the next four years.

11. Our government is the only people that just love to spend money without being compelled to, at all. But the government is the only people that don’t have to worry where it is coming from.

12. Last year we said: “Things can’t go on like this!” And they didn’t—they got worse.

13. In Washington, yesterday, everybody I tried to talk to was a Presidential candidate. Both Houses spent all week arguing politics. Did you ever figure it out? They are the only people that are paid to do one job and do every other one there is but that.

14. Lord, the money we do spend on government, and it’s not a bit better than the government that we got for one-third the money 20 years ago.

15. This inflation was brought on by the actions of many peoples of the whole world, and its weight will be lifted by the actions of many peoples of the whole world, and not by a Republican or a Democrat.

16. With old inflation riding the headlines, I have read till I am bleary-eyed. We are living in an age of explanations, but no two things that have been done to us have been explained twice the same way, by even the same man.

17. When it comes to a showdown, Washington must never forget who rules—the people.

A boy who applied for work was told by the manager he did not think they had enough work to keep another boy employed. The boy said, "But I am sure, sir, that you must have enough work to hire me. You don't know what a little amount of work it takes to keep me busy." Many so-called disciples are like this boy. They want to follow Jesus, not to see how much they can do for Him, but how little. To such the Lord never says, "Follow me." Any who enter Christian service for the sake of having an easy time will be disappointed. Christ is a busy Commander of busy soldiers.

The tree that never had to fight

For sun and sky and air and light,

That stood out in the open plain

And always got its share of rain,

Never became a forest king

But lived and died a scrubby thing.

The man who never had to toil

To heaven from the common soil,

Who never had to win his share

Of sun and sky and light and air,

Never became a manly man,

But lived and died as he began.

Good timber does not grow in ease;

The stronger wind, the tougher trees;

The farther sky, the greater length;

The more the storm, the more the strength;

By sun and cold, by rain and snows,

In tree or man, good timber grows.

Where thickest stands the forest growth

We find the patriarchs of them both;

And they hold converse with the stars

Whose broken branches show the scars

Of many winds and of much strife —

This is the common law of life.

One said: “I got this poodle for my wife.”

The other man said: “Sure wish I could trade mine in for something like that.”

My husband, two-month-old daughter and I were flying to Kansas for a family wedding and met up with my father on a connecting flight. He was sitting in business class and felt guilty because we were in coach.

To compensate, Dad made his way to the back of the plane after take-off, bringing with him some first-class goodies and taking my fidgety daughter up front with him for a few minutes. Just then a woman behind me, who had seen the whole thing, leaned forward and asked, “Did you just trade that baby for a couple of packs of pretzels and some cookies?”

Many years ago two boys were working their way through Stanford University. Their funds got desperately low, and the idea came to them to engage Padarewski for a piano recital. They would use the funds to help pay their board and tuition.

The great pianist’s manager asked for a guarantee of $2,000. The guarantee was a lot of money in those days, but the boys agreed and proceeded to promote the concert. They worked hard, only to find that they had grossed only $1,600.

After the concert the two boys told the great artist the bad news. They gave him the entire $1,600, along with a promissory note for $400, explaining that they would earn the amount at the earliest possible moment and send the money to him. It looked like the end of their college careers.

“No, boys,” replied Padarewski, “that won’t do.” Then, tearing the note in two, he returned the money to them as well. “Now,” he told them, “take out of this $1,600 all of your expenses, and keep for each of you 10 percent of the balance for your work. Let me have the rest.”

The years rolled by—World War I came and went. Padarewski, now premier of Poland, was striving to feed thousands of starving people in his native land. There was only one man in the world who could help him, Herbert Hoover, who was in charge of the U.S. Food and Relief Bureau. Hoover responded and soon thousands of tons of food were sent to Poland.

After the starving people were fed, Padarewski journeyed to Paris to thank Hoover for the relief sent him.

“That’s all right, Mr. Padarewski,” was Hoover’s reply. “Besides, you don’t remember it, but you helped me once when I was a student at college, and I was in trouble.”

If you want to be happy, healthy, successful, and livelonger, give your spouse a kiss before you go to work each day. That’s the conclusion of a study conducted by a group of German physicians and psychologists, in cooperation with insurance companies.

According to Dr. Arthur Sazbo, the study found that those who kiss their spouse each morning miss less work because of illness than those who do not. They also have fewer auto accidents on the way to work. They earn 20 to 30 percent more monthly and they live about five years more than those who don’t even give each other a peck on the cheek. The reason for this, says Dr. Sazbo, is that the kissers begin the day with a positive attitude. A kiss signifies a sort of seal of approval in the eyes of Dr. Sazbo and his colleagues and, they believe, those who don’t experience it, for whatever reason, go out the door feeling not quite right about themselves.

Whether you give this study any credence or not, an au revoir kiss every morning can do you no harm. Maybe you can expand the study and write a book, Pucker Up to Grow Rich, Feel Good, and Live Longer. It could be a best-seller.

A Christian family moving into a new community wanted to keep their lawn well mowed so they might be a good testimony in the neighborhood. However, they mowed the lawn so early in the day they disturbed the neighbors. When this was called to their attention, instead of feeling hurt and offended, they made their apologies and promised to cut the grass at a more reasonable hour. What might have developed into a neighborhood feud became instead an evidence of their good will.