In Loving Memory

 

 

 

John H. Greiner

(Rev. John's Father)

Lester Duane Arnett

(Lady's Father)

Mathew & Rita Kolar

(Pappy's Parents)

Mathew Kolar II

(Pappy & Lady's Son)

 Charles L. Ingersoll

(Nurd's Father)

Little John

(Everyone's Friend)

Kenneth A. Clark

(Cheryl's Dad (Hollywood's Wife)

 

Terri Schindler

(Never Again...)

 

If you have a sorrow, a burden or a loss, an aching need for healing...Hang It On The Cross.

 

If worry steals yor sleep and makes you turn and toss...Hang It On The Cross.

 

If your heart is feeling heavy...Hang It On The Cross.

 

Every obstacle to faith or doubt you come across, every unanswered prayer...Hang It On The Cross.

 

For Christ has borne our brokenness and dearly paid the cost, to turn our trials to triumph...Hang It On The Cross.

 

 

 


Mrs. Charles E. Cowman - Streams in the Desert 

"There he proved them" (Exod. 15:25)
 
I stood once in the test room of a great steel mill. All around me were little partitions and compartments. Steel had been tested to the limit, and marked with figures that showed its breaking point. Some pieces had been twisted until they broke, and the strength of torsion was marked on them. Some had been stretched to the breaking point and their tensile strength indicated. Some had been compressed to the crushing point, and also marked. The master of the steel mill knew just what these pieces of steel would stand under strain. He knew just what they would bear if placed in the great ship, building, or bridge. He knew this because his testing room revealed it.
 
It is often so with God's children. God does not want us to be like vases of glass or porcelain. He would have us like these toughened pieces of steel, able to bear twisting and crushing to the uttermost without collapse.
 
He wants us to be, not hothouse plants, but storm-beaten oaks; not sand dunes driven with every gust of wind, but granite rocks withstanding the fiercest storms. To make us such He must needs bring us into His testing room of suffering.
 
Many of us need no other argument than our own experiences to prove that suffering is indeed God's testing room of faith.--J. H. McC
 
It is very easy for us to speak and theorize about faith, but God often casts us into crucibles to try our gold, and to separate it from the dross and alloy. Oh, happy are we if the hurricanes that ripple life's unquiet sea have the effect of making Jesus more precious. Better the storm with Christ than smooth waters without Him.--Macduff
 
What if God could not manage to ripen your life without suffering?
 

 

Mrs. Charles E. Cowman - Streams in the Desert
 
"And he went out carrying his own cross" (John 19:17).
 
There is a poem called "The Changed Cross." It represents a weary one who thought that her cross was surely heavier than those of others whom she saw about her, and she wished that she might choose an other instead of her own. She slept, and in her dream she was led to a place where many crosses lay, crosses of different shapes and sizes. There was a little one most beauteous to behold, set in jewels and gold. "Ah, this I can wear with comfort," she said. So she took it up, but her weak form shook beneath it. The jewels and the gold were beautiful, but they were far too heavy for her.
 
Next she saw a lovely cross with fair flowers entwined around its sculptured form. Surely that was the one for her. She lifted it, but beneath the flowers were piercing thorns which tore her flesh.
 
At last, as she went on, she came to a plain cross, without jewels, without carvings, with only a few words of love inscribed upon it. This she took up and it proved the best of all, the easiest to be borne. And as she looked upon it, bathed in the radiance that fell from Heaven, she recognized her own old cross. She had found it again, and it was the best of all and lightest for her.
 
God knows best what cross we need to bear. We do not know how heavy other people's crosses are. We envy someone who is rich; his is a golden cross set with jewels, but we do not know how heavy it is. Here is another whose life seems very lovely. She bears a cross twined with flowers. If we could try all the other crosses that we think lighter than our own, we would at last find that not one of them suited us so well as our own.--Glimpses through Life's Windows
 
If thou, impatient, dost let slip thy cross, Thou wilt not find it in this world again; Nor in another: here and here alone Is given thee to suffer for God's sake. In other worlds we may more perfectly Love Him and serve Him, praise Him, Grow nearer and nearer to Him with delight. But then we shall not any more Be called to suffer, which is our appointment here. Canst thou not suffer, then, one hour or two? If He should call thee from thy cross today, Saying: "It is finished-that hard cross of thine
 
From which thou prayest for deliverance," Thinkest thou not some passion of regret Would overcome thee? Thou would'st say, "So soon? Let me go back and suffer yet awhile More patiently. I have not yet praised God." Whensoe'er it comes, that summons that we look for, It will seem soon, too soon. Let us take heed in time That God may now be glorified in us. --Ugo Bassi's Sermon in a Hospital.
 

 
Unknown
 
Sandra felt as low as the heels of her Birkenstocks as she pushed against a November gust and the florist shop door. Her life had been easy, like a spring breeze. Then, in the fourth month of her second pregnancy, a minor automobile accident stole her ease. During this Thanksgiving week she would have delivered a son. She grieved over her loss. As if that weren't enough, her husband's company threatened a transfer. Then her sister, whose holiday visit she coveted, called saying she could not come. What's worse, Sandra's friend infuriated her by suggesting her grief was a God-given path to maturity that would allow her to empathize with others who suffer. "Had she lost a child?  No - she has no idea what I'm feeling," Sandra shuddered. Thanksgiving? "Thankful for what?" she wondered. For a careless driver whose truck was hardly scratched when he rear-ended her? For an airbag that saved her life but took that of her child?
 
"Good afternoon, can I help you?" The flower shop clerk's approach startled her. "Sorry," said Jenny, "I just didn't want you to think I was ignoring you." "I . . . . I need an arrangement." "For Thanksgiving?" Sandra nodded. "Do you want beautiful but ordinary, or would you like to challenge the day with a customer favorite I call the "Thanksgiving Special."  Jenny saw Sandra's curiosity and continued, "I'm convinced that flowers tell stories, that each arrangement insinuates a particular feeling. Are you looking for something that conveys gratitude this Thanksgiving?"
 
"Not exactly!" Sandra blurted. "Sorry, but in the last five months, everything that could go wrong has." Sandra regretted her outburst but was surprised when Jenny said, "I have the perfect arrangement for you."  The door's small bell suddenly rang. "Barbara! Hi" Jenny said. She politely excused herself form Sandra and walked toward a small workroom. She quickly reappeared carrying a massive arrangement of green bows, and long-stemmed thorny roses. Only, the ends of the rose stems were neatly snipped, no flowers. "Want this in a box?" Jenny asked. Sandra watched for Barbara's response. Was this a joke? Who would want rose stems and no flowers! She waited for laughter, for someone to notice the absence of flowers atop the thorny stems, but neither woman did. 
 
"Yes, please. It's exquisite,"said Barbara. "You'd think after three years of getting the special, I'd not be so moved by its significance, but it's happening again. My family will love this one. Thanks." Sandra stared. "Why so normal a conversation about so strange an arrangement?" she wondered. "Ah, said Sandra, pointing. "That lady just left with, ah . . . ." "Yes?" "Well, she had no flowers!" "Off?" "Off. Yep. That's the Special. I call it the "Thanksgiving Thorns Bouquet." "But, why do people pay for that?"
 
In spite of herself she chuckled. "Do you rally want to know?" "I couldn't leave this shop without knowing. I'd think about nothing else!" "That might be good,"said Jenny. "Well," she continued, "Barbara came into the shop three years ago feeling very much like you feel today. She thought she had very little to be thankful for. She had lost her father to cancer, the family business was failing, her son was into drugs, and she faced major surgery." "Ouch!" said Sandra. "That same year, I lost my husband. I assumed complete responsibility for the shop and for the first time, spent the holidays alone. I had no children, no husband, no family nearby, and too great a debt to allow any travel." "What did you do?" "I learned to be thankful for thorns." Sandra's eyebrows lifted. "Thorns?" "I'm a Christian, Sandra. I've always thanked God for good things in life and I never thought to ask Him why good things happened to me. But, when bad stuff hit. Did I ever ask! It took time to learn that dark times are important. I always enjoyed the flowers' of life but it took thorns to show me the beauty of God's comfort. Your know, the Bible says that God comforts us when we're afflicted and from His consolation we learn to comfort others." Sandra gasped. "A friend read that passage to me and I was furious! I guess the truth is, I don't want comfort. I've lost a baby and I'm angry with God."
 
She started to ask Jenny to "go on" when the door's bell diverted their attention. "Hey, Phil!" shouted Jenny as a balding, rotund man entered the shop. She softly touched Sandra's arm and moved to welcome him. He tucked her under his side for a warm hug. "I'm here for twelve thorny long-stemmed stems!" Phil laughed, heartily. "I figured as much," said Jenny. "I've got them ready."  She lifted a tissue-wrapped arrangement form the refrigerated cabinet. "Beautiful," said Phil. "My wife will love them." Sandra could not resist asking, "These are for your wife?" Phil saw that Sandra's curiosity matched his when he first heard of a Thorn Bouquet. "Do you mind me asking, 'Why thorns?" "IN fact, I'm glad you asked, "He said. "Four years ago my wife and I nearly divorced. After forty years, we were in a real mess, but we slogged through, problem by rotten problem.  We rescued our marriage - our love, really. Last year, at Thanksgiving, I stopped in here for flowers. I must have mentioned surviving a tough process because Jenny told me that for a long time she kept a vase of rose stems --- stems! --- As a reminder of what she learned from 'thorny' times. That was good enough for me. I took home stems, My wife and I decided to label each one for a specific thorny situation and give thanks for what the problem taught us. I'm pretty sure this stem review is becoming a tradition." Phil paid Jenny, thanked her again and as he left, said to Sandra, "I highly recommend the Special!"
 
"I don't know if I can be thankful for the thorns in my life, "Sandra said to Jenny. "Well, my experience says that thorns make roses more precious. We treasure God's providential care more during trouble than at any other time. Remember, Sandra, Jesus wore a crown of thorns so that we might know His love. Do not resent thorns." Tears rolled down Sandra's cheeks. For the first time since the accident she loosened her grip on resentment. "I'll take twelve long-stemmed thorns, please." "I hoped you would, " Jenny said. "I'll have them ready in a minute. Then, every time you see them, remember to appreciate both good and hard time. We grow through both." "Thank you. What do I owe you?" "Nothing. Nothing but a pledge to work toward healing your heart. The first year's arrangement is always on me." Jenny handed a card to Sandra. "I'll attach a card like this to your arrangement but maybe you'd like to read it first. Go ahead, read it." My God, I have never thanked Thee for my thorn! I have thanked Thee a thousand times for my roses, but never once for my thorn. Teach me the glory of the cross I bear, teach me the value of my thorns. 
 
Show me that I have climbed to Thee by the path of pain. Show me that my tears have made my rainbow. ---- George Matheson-
 

 

Elisabeth Elliot

 

"Arise and eat"  1Kings 19:5

 

When the Spirit of God comes to us, He does not give us glorious visions, but he tells us to do the most ordinary things imaginable...

As we do them we find Him there.  The inspiration that comes to us in this way, is an initiative against depression.  But we must take the first step, and do it in the inspiration of God.

 

Four more days until she would be seventeen. It would be her father's birthday, too, but there would be no celebration this year. It was the depth of the Great Depression and her father was dying. The children knelt around his bed while their mother prayed, but the girl wondered whether anyone was listening. Was God near enough to hear a prayer? Did he take any notice of their situation?

On the day of the funeral it rained. Only the mother's friends came--the father's didn't bother. The girl, who was working as a maid, had to borrow a dress for the occasion. When they returned to the empty house the sense of desolation was nearly overwhelming. But the widow, who had been silent for three days, went into the kitchen, picked up her broom, and began to sweep.

"I cannot explain how that action and that soft whisk-whisk sound gave me courage to go on," the girl wrote many years later. "My mother was now the head of the house, and we followed. We did not sit down and ask 'What next? What will we do?' Our home was mortgaged and my father's lawyer stole her property. She walked out of his office a penniless widow with seven children, ages eight to eighteen. Later someone asked my mother how she had stood it. The answer was simple: 'I prayed.'"

The combination of prayer and faithful carrying out of duty has been balm to many, when all hope has seemed to dissolve. The Word of the Lord came to Ezekiel: "I am taking from you at one blow the dearest thing you have, but you must not wail or weep or give way to tears. Keep in heart; be quiet, and make no mourning for the dead" (Ezekiel 24:15-17 ). God denied Ezekiel the usual expressions of mourning and told him he was not to "eat the bread of despair." Ezekiel's response was, in effect, Yes, Lord. "I spoke to the people in the morning," Ezekiel said, "and that very evening my wife died. Next morning I did as I was told." Obedience was his consolation.

So the psalmist also found it: "Happy are they who obey his instruction...In thy statutes I find continual delight...I will run the course set out in thy commandments, for they gladden my heart" (Psalms 119:2, 16, 32 ). Happiness, delight, gladness--where can they come from when the world has fallen in?

A study of this psalm reveals the psalmist's firsthand knowledge of nearly every sort of human woe. For each he finds the same comfort: the Word of the Lord, variously called "commandments," "instruction," "counsel," "law," "statutes," "truth." He understood the sense of alienation all of us experience: "I am but a stranger here on earth." He knew unfulfilled desire: "My heart pines with longing." He had been "put down": "Set me free from scorn and insult...the powers that be sit scheming together against me.'' He knew all about the sense of utter desolation: "I lie prone in the dust...I cannot rest for misery." He had been persecuted: "Bands of evil men close round me...Proud men blacken my name with lies."

The one who wrote this psalm had plenty of reason, humanly speaking, to feel very sorry for himself. But it is not self-pity that prompts him to list his troubles. It is rather a candid assessment, in the presence of the Lord, of the truth of his situation, each item on his list followed by prayer for the particular help needed, or by a renewed affirmation of trust in the Word of his God.

The one who is called "a Roaring Lion" (1 Peter 5:8) knows well that his prey will be much easier to catch when weakened by sorrow or trouble of any kind. The woman with the broom shamed that lion. She did not "faint in the day of adversity," collapse in a heap, or wallow in a slough of self-pity. She knew where to find the strength to carry on. She went there at once and received the power which, as the apostle Paul discovered, "comes to its full strength in weakness."

In the same way I have been rescued from the lion's claws when everything in me said "You can't take this." I woke one morning in a tiny temporary leaf shelter in Ecuador's jungle to find rain falling in solid sheets. The river had risen dangerously. The thought of trying to pack up in the downpour, get into a dugout canoe with my little daughter, and be poled up another river all day long to a remote clearing was too bleak. I was lonely, desolate, trapped. But that "Amazing Grace" that had brought me safe thus far reminded me of what I should do. I looked up to the Lord. "Lo, I am with you all the days" came the word. All the days, no matter what the weather, or how total the isolation. I took heart and, like the woman with the broom, did the next thing, which was to pack up and get myself and Valerie into the canoe. I think it rained all day, but it didn't matter, for the weather in my soul had cleared up.

A wonderful thing happens when we turn to the Lord and "pick up the broom." We find, as the psalmist found, that "this day, as ever, thy decrees stand fast; for all things serve thee" (Psalms 119:91)