I heard a story about a man touring a foundry. The tour guide asked the man if he would wait for him for a few minutes and he would be right back. After a few minutes the man heard awful sounding noises coming from the furnace where the dross was being separated.
When the tour guide returned the man met him in a panic. The man wanted the tour guide to hurry and told him he the thought the furnace was ready to explode and begged him to turn the furnace down.
The tour guide said no. In fact, he was about to turn it up even higher. He explained it was only the baser elements belching and hollering that was the cause of all the racket. He said if he turned the furnace up it would burn them off.
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4/3–There was a business executive who was deep in debt and could see no way out.
Creditors were closing in on him. Suppliers were demanding payment. He sat on the park bench, head in hands, wondering if anything could save his company from bankruptcy.
Suddenly an old man appeared before him. “I can see that something is troubling you,” he said.
After listening to the executive’s woes, the old man said, “I believe I can help you.”
He asked the man his name, wrote out a check, and pushed it into his hand saying, “Take this money. Meet me here exactly one year from today, and you can pay me back at that time.”
Then he turned and disappeared as quickly as he had come.
The business executive saw in his hand a check for $500,000, signed by John D. Rockefeller, then one of the richest men in the world!
“I can erase my money worries in an instant!” he realized. But instead, the executive decided to put the uncashed check in his safe. Just knowing it was there might give him the strength to work out a way to save his business, he thought.
With renewed optimism, he negotiated better deals and extended terms of payment. He closed several big sales. Within a few months, he was out of debt and making money once again.
Exactly one year later, he returned to the park with the uncashed check. At the agreed-upon time, the old man appeared. But just as the executive was about to hand back the check and share his success story, a nurse came running up and grabbed the old man.
“I’m so glad I caught him!” she cried. “I hope he hasn’t been bothering you. He’s always escaping from the rest home and telling people he’s John D. Rockefeller.”
And she led the old man away by the arm.
The astonished executive just stood there, stunned. All year long he’d been wheeling and dealing, buying and selling, convinced he had half a million dollars behind him.
Suddenly, he realized that it wasn’t the money, real or imagined, that had turned his life around. It was his newfound self-confidence that gave him the power to achieve anything he went after.
Scripture:
Matthew 6:34
Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
Humor:
A violinist noticed that his playing had a hypnotic effect on his audiences. They sat motionless, as though they were in a trance. He found he had the same effect on his friends’ pets. Dogs and cats would sit spellbound while he played. Wondering if he could cast the same spell over wild beasts, he went to a jungle clearing in Africa, took out his violin and began to play. A lion, an elephant, and a gorilla charged into the clearing, stopped to listen, and sat mesmerized by the music. Soon the clearing was filled with every kind of ferocious animal, each one listening intently. Suddenly another lion charged out of the jungle, pounced on the violinist, and killed him instantly. The first lion, bewildered, asked, “Why did you do that?” the second lion cupped his paw behind his ear. “What?”
I was first introduced to the idea of inciting incidents in Donald Miller’s brilliant book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. In fact, that’s what inspired me to take Robert McKee’s Story Seminar. As an offshoot of that book, Don started a company called Storyline, and I love its mission: to help people tell better stories with their lives.
Are you living your life in a way that is worth telling stories about?”
“That punch line punctuates Don’s life. It put a period on his feelings of incompetence and began a new sentence, a new chapter in his life.
God wants to write His story through your life. And if you give Him complete editorial control, He’ll write an epic. Of course, it’ll involve some epic conflict. But the God who began a good work in you will carry it to completion, even if it takes eighteen generations!
Telling a better story with your life begins with identifying the inciting incidents in your past. That’s your backstory. Then you start creating incidents with intentionality. That’s the rest of the story.”
Are you living your life in a way that is worth telling stories about?”
“The sad reality is that most people spend their lives accumulating the wrong things. Instead of accumulating experiences, they accumulate possessions. And when that’s your objective, you end up possessed by your possessions. You don’t own them; they own you.”
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–A very old lady looked in the mirror one morning. She had three remaining hairs on her head, and being a positive soul, she said, “I think I’ll braid my hair today.” So she braided her three hairs, and she had a great day.
Some days later, looking in the mirror one morning, preparing for her day, she saw that she had only two hairs remaining. “Hmm, two hairs… I fancy a centre parting today.” She duly parted her two hairs, and as ever, she had a great day
A week or so later, she saw that she had just one hair left on her head. “One hair huh…,” she mused, “I know, a pony-tail will be perfect.” And again she had a great day.
The next morning she looked in the mirror. She was completely bald.
Finally bald huh,” she said to herself, “How wonderful! I won’t have to waste time doing my hair any more..”
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4/2–Power is actualized only when word and deed have not parted company.
Story:
4/2–Napoleon’s horse was once startled and raced away out of the control of the famous general. An alert private mounted his horse and quickly brought Napoleon’s horse under control. Napoleon responded, “Thank you, Captain.” The soldier was taken aback, yet saluted and snapped, “Thank you, sir.”
He immediately headed for his barracks, packed his bags and moved into the officers’ quarters.
He requested a new uniform also. By the general’s word, his rank changed.
He didn’t argue or question—the one with the authority had spoken. He accepted that authority.
By His death on the cross, and by His authority—we are saved. Not only is our rank changed from lost to saved—so is our eternal destiny. The One with the authority has spoken.
– adapted from In the Eye of the Storm, Max Lucado
Scripture:
1 Corinthians 13:1
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
Humor:
Fred and Mabel were both patients in a mental hospital. One day as they both walked beside the swimming pool, Mabel jumped into the deep end and sank to the bottom. Without a thought for his own safety, Fred jumped in after her, brought her to the surface, hauled her out, gave her the kiss of life and saved her.
The next day happened to be Fred’s annual review. He was brought before the hospital board, where the director told him, “Fred, I have some good news and some bad news: the good news is that in light of your heroic act yesterday we consider that you are sane and can be released from this home back into society. The bad news is, I’m afraid, that Mabel, the patient you saved, shortly afterwards hung herself in the bathroom with the belt from her bathrobe. I’m sorry but she’s dead.”
“She didn’t hang herself,” Fred replied, “I put her there to dry.”
Napoleon’s horse was once startled and raced away out of the control of the famous general. An alert private mounted his horse and quickly brought Napoleon’s horse under control. Napoleon responded, “Thank you, Captain.” The soldier was taken aback, yet saluted and snapped, “Thank you, sir.”
He immediately headed for his barracks, packed his bags and moved into the officers’ quarters.
He requested a new uniform also. By the general’s word, his rank changed.
He didn’t argue or question—the one with the authority had spoken. He accepted that authority.
By His death on the cross, and by His authority—we are saved. Not only is our rank changed from lost to saved—so is our eternal destiny. The One with the authority has spoken.
– adapted from In the Eye of the Storm, Max Lucado
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