.
There are over 600 stories and commentaries on this blog
. It is added to daily.
There are a host of folk who take up homesteads in the valley of indecision, water their flock at the river of procrastination, build their fences with wood from the forest of false promises, get their seeds from the market of the devil and then wonder why, when the harvest of memories is gleaned, it is so full of hell.
How to avoid this? Well...first, don't treat your faith like a sundial! To understand that statement, let me share a story.
A group of American young people, having learned of a tribe that were quite primitive in their way of living and looking at life, wanted to help bring them into this century
. These people had little concept of time, other than night and day, so the eager youths thought that if they could just get the concept of hours over to them, they might become more industrious and improve their lifestyle
. And after much discussion, they decided to send a sundial, for you see a modern clock would require electricity and there was none, and batteries would soon lose their power, and even an old fashioned spring-wound clock would soon get rusty in their climate
.
When the sundial arrived the natives were elated
.
They beat their drums and danced with glee
. And then one of them made a suggestion
. "Let us build an altar to place it on that raised pedestal that we might show respect for this present
." So they did
. And daily they treated the sundial with ever growing veneration
.
Then they decided that it needed proper protection from the weather and as the sides of hut they were building grew taller and taller, less and less sun could make its way to their sundial
. And when they were finally finished, the roof totally blocked out the sun
. But there, properly resting upon its throne, the sun dial was daily worshipped
. Of course, the sundial no longer worked.
So what is to be learned? Don't treat your faith like a sundial
.
Don't cover it up with honor and respect while never taking it out into the stream of life
. Take it out where it will be tested
. Give it the chance to grow in the midst of adversity
. Shelter it and it will die or at the very least become a strangled, stringent shadow of what it otherwise might be.
Christianity by Refex...new series began
Wyrick'S Writings..and will continue each week until finished. CLICK BELOW TO GO TO NEIL'S OTHER BLOG http://wyrickswritings.blogspot.com
Some recent topic titles on his other blog, Wyrick's Writings are:ONE LOG ON A FIRE, TWO JOLLY GREEN GIANTS; LOVE AND FORGIVENESS, WISDOM IS
.WHAT IS HAPPY,60 PLUS AND NOT HOLDING" CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING URL http://wyrickswritings.blogspot.com %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
A Quote FROM Rev
. Wyrick's 9TH BOOK "THE SPIRITUAL ABRAHAM LINCOLN"
The opportunity of a formal education for young Abe was close to nil. One time they lived eighteen miles from a school. That was a lot of walking between the family farm and the one room schoolhouse he called his learning home. It is one of the reasons that over his childhood he had a little less than a year's worth of actual schooling. Because there were no books, everything was learned by rote, hence the nickname Blab Schools. Repeating over and over, so he would never forget them, sayings such as: "Live in your youth so you will not have to be ashamed in your old age. Cowards never start, the weak never finish. You can get more with an ounce of honey than a gallon of gall." He tried always to live by these and other early learned schoolhouse maxims. Nor was paper readily available. During these brief winter sessions, he would practice his lessons in the dirt or snow.
Chasing after a good book like a dog after a rabbit, he would sometimes walk as far as twenty miles to borrow one.
It was said that from the age of twelve he never went anywhere without a beloved book tucked beneath his arm.
Lincoln began to develop a list of favorites: "Aesop's Fables", thought-provoking "Pilgrim's Progress, "the works of William Shakespeare, "The Life of George Washington", and the biographies of Ben Franklin.
One section in particular in "Pilgrim's Progress" had to obviously influence his thinking. Ignorance is walking with two pilgrims and says, "My heart is as good as any man's heart...as to my thoughts, I take no notice of them."
Many of his friends chose ignorance and could neither read nor write.
He was known to comment that they were not too dumb to learn, but rather too lazy. "Some," he said, "were so lazy they couldn't have raised a good stink even if they were a skunk." I can easily imagine
Lincoln, with sadness for their lack of discipline, quoting the Apostle Paul, "As a man thinketh, so is he."1
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