What Money Can't Buy

Have you ever thought that you don’t have much to offer?  You may not be very wealthy.  You may not be very talented.  You may not be “the brightest crayon in the box.”  You may not have the best education or have most skill, but did you know that you still have something to offer?  In the Bible the story is told of Jesus preaching to a large crowd of people by the Sea of Galilee.  After a full day, everyone was hungry.  Jesus asked if anyone had any food to share, but the only one who had thought to bring a lunch was a little boy who only had five tiny barley loaves and two small fish.  But Jesus prayed over that little lunch and when the disciples had handed out the food, 5,000 men were fed (besides the women and children)!  And in the Old Testament, God used a poor widow who lived in Zarephath who had only a little meal and a few drops of oil to feed Elijah and herself for many days.  Hey, God doesn’t need our stuff; God just needs us.  God needs us to be willing to be used of Him.  Solomon said in Proverbs 16:8, “Better is a little with righteousness than great revenues without right.”  It is better to have a right relationship with God than to be a millionaire without Him.  Hey, there’s nothing wrong with money, but you are in trouble if you are trusting in your money to gain favor with God.  Wealth may buy you a fine coffin, but it can’t buy you entrance into heaven.  Think about it.

Sticky Situation

 

When I was about ten years old, my dad had a basement dug when he built the second half of our house in Maryland.  He had the dirt from the basement spread out to level up our back yard.  But with the first rain of spring, our “new back yard” turned into a mud pit.  But for us four boys, it was heaven.  When I stepped into the mud, I lost my shoe, and I had to reach down into the mud to retrieve it.  More fun.  So we took off our shoes and wadded into the mud.  When my mother saw us, she was at first shocked, then angry, and then laughing.  After letting us play for a while, she hosed us off in the new basement stairwell.  Hey, King David could relate to getting stuck in the mud.  But what David was stuck in was more like quicksand.  He said in Psalm 40:1&2, “I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.”  David was not having fun like we were.  In fact, David despaired for his very survival.  But the dear Lord rescued David, restored David, and set David on his way.  Have you ever been in a sticky situation?  Have you struggled to get out?  God is much better at getting you out of difficult places than you are.  Why not surrender to the dear Lord and let Him get you out?  He will rescue you and put your feet on solid ground.  Let Jesus take control of your life and then rest in Him!

Davy P.

 

Miss Seal was a good second-grade teacher.  Although I can’t remember a specific thing that I learned in the second grade, I made it through college, so I must have learned enough in the second grade.  In the second grade, my favorite time of the day was recess.  There were several boys that were great at softball, and they were the envy of all of the rest of us boys.  And then there was Davy P.  He was awkward (even more than I was) and had crooked teeth.  But Davy had a gift that no other boy had in the second grade had: Davy had such bad eyes that his glasses looked like the bottoms of coke bottles.  And at recess, he would let us use his glasses to focus the sun and burn leaves.  Great fun, although Davy couldn’t see what was going on.  Hey, everyone in life has a gift.  You may not think that you have a gift (Davy and I didn’t think so), but you do.  Just try everything and you are bound to find something that you are good at.  And then use that gift to be a blessing to others.  Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 9:10, “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might …”  Whatever your talent is, do it to the best of your ability … even if it is burning leaves at recess.

Little Blessings

 

I went on a mission trip (with the tourist stuff too) to the Dominican Republic this past month and missed 5 sessions of cardiac rehab.  I was a little concerned because I’ve just grown fond of my heart pumping, and I want to keep it doing so.  But I was pleasantly surprised to find that Jason had exactly the same weights on his patio that I use at cardiac rehab.  I missed the exercise machines, but I was able to keep up with the weights.  “Thank you, dear Lord, for the little things that you give to me each day.”  Psalm 84:11, “For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.”