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The Power of Prayer

6/29/2013

A voyaging ship was wrecked during a storm at sea and only two of the men on it were able to swim to a small, desert-like island. The two survivors, not knowing what else to do, agreed that they had no other recourse but to pray to God. However, to find out whose prayer was more powerful, they agreed to divide the territory between them and stay on opposite sides of the island.
The first thing they prayed for was food. The next morning, the first man saw a fruit-bearing tree on his side of the land, and he was able to eat its fruit. The other man's parcel of land remained barren.

After a week, the first man was lonely and he decided to pray for a wife. The next day, another ship was wrecked, and the only survivor was a woman who swam to his side of the land. On the other side of the island, there was nothing.

Soon the first man prayed for a house, clothes, and more food. The next day, all of these were given to him. However, the second man still had nothing.

Finally, the first man prayed for a ship, so that he and his wife could leave the island In the morning, he found a ship docked on his side of the island. The first man boarded the ship with his wife and decided to leave the second man on the island. He considered the other man unworthy to receive God's blessings, since none of his prayers had been answered.

As the ship was about to leave, the first man heard a Voice from heaven booming, “Why are you leaving your companion on the island?”

“My blessings are mine alone, since I was the one who prayed for them,” the first man answered. “His prayers were all unanswered and so he does not deserve anything!”

“You are mistaken!” the Voice rebuked him. “He had only one prayer, which was answered. If not for that, you would not have received any of My blessings.”

“Tell me,” the first man asked the Voice, “What did he pray for that I should owe him anything?”
“He prayed that all your prayers be answered.”

For all we know, our blessings are not the fruits of our prayers alone, but those of another praying for us!

Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

Taking Stock of Valuables

6/27/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

Waylon Prendergast, 37, of Tampa, Florida, committed a spur-of-the-moment robbery while on his way home from a late-night drinking session. A very inebriated Mr. Prendergast forced his way into the house through an open upstairs window, filling a suitcase with cash and valuables before setting the living room on fire to cover his tracks. He then escaped through the back door and made his way home, chuckling all the way. Only as he turned the corner into his own street, however, and discovered three fire engines outside his house, did he realize that in his drunkenness he had, in fact, burgled and ignited his own property. His comment: "I had no idea I had so many valuable possessions."

While we may not do anything quite that stupid (at least nothing that makes the national newspapers), there are times when we need to stop and reflect, coming to same conclusion Mr. Prendergast did: "I had no idea I had so many valuable possessions."

From family and friends to material comforts (like electricity and running water), from our basic needs (like food) to luxuries other generations never dreamed of, from the freedoms we enjoy to the jobs we hold, there is much that we have been blessed with that we take for granted.

Truly, we have no idea we have so many valuable possessions.

© 2005, John C. Fitts, III. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

Tied to the Past

6/25/2013

Backstage at a circus, motivational speaker Jim Donovan noticed that the elephants were kept in place by nothing stronger than a thin rope that tied one leg to a stake in the ground. Puzzled, Donovan asked one of the trainers what prevented these powerful animals from just snapping the rope and running away.

The answer? Raised in captivity, the elephants are held like that from an early age when they're much smaller and weaker. They get so accustomed to the fact that they can't break the rope that eventually they stop trying. When they're full grown, they never attempt to pull themselves free.

Like the elephants, how many of us go through life hanging onto a belief that we cannot do something simply because we failed at it once before. Have you avoided trying something new because of a limiting belief? Worse, how many of us are being held back by someone else's limiting beliefs?

Don't let yourself be held prisoner by beliefs and expectations that are no longer true -- if they ever were.

From "The Howe Herald." Adapted from "Why Elephants Don't Run," by Jim Donovan. Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

Encouragement

6/24/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

Some of the greatest success stories of history have followed a word of encouragement or an act of confidence by a loved one or a trusting friend. Had it not been for a confident wife, Sophia, we might not have listed among the great names of literature the name of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

When Nathaniel, a heartbroken man, went home to tell his wife that he was a failure and had been fired from his job in a customhouse, she surprised him with an exclamation of joy.

"Now," she said triumphantly, "you can write your book!"

"Yes," replied the man, with sagging confidence, "and what shall we live on while I am writing it?"

To his amazement, she opened a drawer and pulled out a substantial amount of money.

"Where on earth did you get that?" he exclaimed.

"I have always known you were a man of genius," she told him. "I knew that someday you would write a masterpiece. So every week, out of the money you gave me for housekeeping, I saved a little bit. So here is enough to last us for one whole year."

From her trust and confidence came one of the greatest novels of American literature, The Scarlet Letter.

Author: Nido Qubein. Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

The "Want To"!

6/19/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

I remember the night in Miami when our son, Ian, was just five years old. We were staying with relatives and it was his bedtime. When I looked at the living room floor, I knew we had a problem. Toys were all over the place.

"Ian," I said, "you need to pick up all those toys before you go to bed."

"Daddy," he said, "I'm too tired to pick up my toys."

My immediate inclination was to force him to clean up the room. Instead, I went into the bedroom, laid down, and said, "Ian, come here. Let’s play Humpty Dumpty."

He climbed up on my knees and I said, "Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall." And he fell. Ian laughed and said, "Let's do it again." Well, after the third "fall," I said, "Okay, but first go pick up those toys."

Without thinking, he ran into the living room and in ninety seconds he

finished a job that could have taken half an hour. Then he jumped back on my knees and repeated, "Daddy, let’s do it again."

"Ian, I thought you were too tired to pick up those toys." He answered, "I was, Daddy, but I just wanted to do this!"

Good leadership is like this father, changing the “have to” to “want to.”

From a story by Neil Eskelin. Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

The Danger of Drifting

6/17/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

When I was a young boy my parents took few vacations since my father was a traveling salesman. He was on the road from Monday to Friday each week. Loading up the car and driving was hardly relaxing for him. So our few visits to the beach were much anticipated and appreciated.

What child does not enjoy playing in the waves, building sandcastles, and tasting the briny waters of the Gulf or the Atlantic Ocean? What mother does not fear her precious one being swept away by a cruel undercurrent or being knocked down and drowned by a sneaky wave? So my brother and I always heard the warning about staying within eyesight or earshot. "Remember to keep watching the lifeguard stand! Always stay in front of it so that I can keep an eye on you."

Of course, with aggravating consistency, within fifteen minutes we found ourselves about a quarter of a mile down the beach. It seems that if you don't constantly keep watching the point of reference, you will drift. We found ourselves being the object of the fervent shouts along the shore of an anxious mother who ordered us back up the beach to her watchful eye.

Drifting is a danger that plagues us as we journey through life. Marriages grow stale and die because couples slowly drift apart. Careers, children, and other obligations may cause us to lose focus on the reference point. The love that burned so brightly in the beginning may grow dim. Rather than a crisis event, it seems that the real danger was drifting.

At work we set goals to keep us focused on ever improving. The alternative may be to fall into a habit of settling for the good instead of the best. Goals keep us from drifting.

At times this happens in our walk of faith. We must pay attention to what is really important, lest we drift away. God may use people or circumstances like that anxious mother to jar us and remind us of his loving care.

© 2005, John C. Fitts, III. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

The Little Things Count

6/14/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

William McKinley, the 25th president, once had to choose between two equally qualified men for a key job. He puzzled over the choice until he remembered a long-ago incident.

On a rainy night, McKinley had boarded a crowded streetcar. One of the men he was now considering had also been aboard, though he didn't see McKinley. Then an old woman carrying a basket of laundry struggled into the car, looking in vain for a seat. The job candidate pretended not to see her and kept his seat. McKinley gave up his seat to help her.

Remembering the episode, which he called "this little omission of kindness," McKinley decided against this man on the streetcar.

Our decisions – even the smallest, fleeting ones – tell a lot about us.

Adapted from Presidential Anecdotes, by Paul F. Boller, Jr. Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

Handling Hostility

6/13/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

A woman was bitten by a dog suspected of having rabies. She was rushed to the hospital, treated, and left in a room to wait for an autopsy report on the dog. Only then would she know whether or not she might have rabies. An intern on duty that day thought he should explain the seriousness of the situation to the woman. She asked him a lot of questions, and by the end of the interview, the intern realized that he had told her more than he intended to tell her. She was visibly shaken.

Later, when he came by to look in on her, she was sitting on the side of the treatment table, writing. She would pause occasionally and stare out into space, then resume writing. The young doctor was sure he had upset her so much that she was writing her will, or funeral instructions, or some other equally grave document. He went back in to try to calm and comfort her. He asked if she were writing her will. "Oh, no," she said, “just in the event I have been infected, I'm making a list of people I want to bite before I die."

Hostility is one of the most basic and most dangerous problems in all of life. The abrasive forces and frictions of life generate in each of us a certain amount of negative feeling each day. If this feeling is not immediately discharged on otherwise handled, it accumulates. This accumulation is subject to causing an untimely and inexplicable explosion of anger.

To be angry is to be human. To allow anger to fester and deteriorate into hostility is to endanger both soul and body. You may check your emotional health -and normalcy - by making a list of the people you would "like to bite before you die" and then check that list to see if they are the same people who were on the list last year. Then check to see if the reasons are the same. If the persons and reasons are the same year in and year out, you are in danger. If the people and the reasons change frequently, you are relatively normal. If the list is short, and frequently without names, you are growing in grace.

No human emotion is more common, or more combustible than anger. Anger is like fire, which can be used to cook a meal or to burn down a house. Don't let your anger see the sun set. When you are angry, ask God to guide you - He will.

© 2005, John C. Fitts, III. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

Pecans in the Cemetary

6/12/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

On the outskirts of a small town, there was a big, old pecan tree just inside the cemetery fence. One day, two boys filled up a bucketful of nuts and sat down by the tree, out of sight, and began dividing the nuts.

"One for you, one for me. One for you, one for me," said one boy. Several dropped and rolled down toward the fence.

Another boy came riding along the road on his bicycle. As he passed, he thought he heard voices from inside the cemetery. He slowed down to investigate. Sure enough, he heard, "One for you, one for me. One for you, one for me."

He just knew what it was. He jumped back on his bike and rode off. Just around the bend he met an old man with a cane, hobbling along.

"Come here quick," said the boy, "you won't believe what I heard! Satan and the Lord are down at the cemetery dividing up the souls."

The man said, "Beat it kid, can't you see it's hard for me to walk." When the boy insisted though, the man hobbled to the cemetery. Standing by the fence they heard, "One for you, one for me. One for you, one for me..."

The old man whispered, "Boy, you've been tellin' the truth. Let's see if we can see the Lord." Shaking with fear, they peered through the fence, yet were still unable to see anything.

The old man and the boy gripped the wrought iron bars of the fence tighter and tighter as they tried to get a glimpse of the Lord.

At last they heard, "One for you, one for me. That's all. Now let's go get those nuts by the fence and we'll be done."

They say the old man made it back to town a full five minutes ahead of the boy on the bike.

Reprinted from Grace Drops, Volume 3 (2005).

An Aim in Life

6/10/2013

© Patty Fitts. All Rights Reserved.

An army chaplain tells of the time he was asked to preach at a church some 20 miles from the base. He took his family along, but had neglected to tell his six-year-old daughter where they were going.

After a few miles on the road, she asked, "Dad, when we get to where we're going, where will we be?"

A good question! And one all of us should try to answer for ourselves. Think of your life's journey. When you get to where you're going, where will you be? One year, five years, or even 20 years from now, if you keep heading in the same direction you are heading and keep doing what you are doing, what will your life look like? Not only vocationally and financially, but what kind of person will you have become? Do you have a pretty clear picture of the way you would like things to turn out, or will you be as surprised when it happens as everybody else?

It has been my experience that most people do not spend much time with these questions. But as Henry David Thoreau once said, "In the long run, we only hit what we aim at." To live aimlessly is to waste this precious gift of life. But to live with direction is to live fully.