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Posted on 05/17/2004 5:59:46 AM PDT by JustAmy
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Read: Matthew 13:18-23
When tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles. —Matthew 13:21
Bible In One Year: 1 Chronicles 4-6; John 6:1-21
A friend of actress and comedienne Gracie Allen once sent a small, live alligator to her as a gag. Not knowing what to do with it, Gracie put it in the bathtub and then left for an appointment. When she returned home, she found a note from her maid. "Dear Miss Allen: Sorry, but I have quit. I don't work in houses where there is an alligator. I would have told you this when I started, but I never thought it would come up."
Some people who say they'll serve Christ are quick to leave when trouble comes. In Jesus' parable of the soils, He pictured the various responses that people have to the gospel. For example, a person may seem to accept God's truth, but he stumbles in his faith when difficulties arise (Matthew 13:20-21). Such troubles test the sincerity of one's faith and expose the weakness of one's commitment to Christ.
But someone may say, "Shouldn't our Lord tell us up front what is involved in following Him?" He does. He appeals to us with one invitation: "Trust Me." If we let trouble or disillusionment shake our faith, we are breaking the spirit of the trust that brought us to Christ in the first place.
Father, when life brings us the unexpected and we feel like quitting, help us to be faithful to You. —Mart De Haan
*Amen* - could not have been stated more perfectly.
Thanks to both ((((Amy)))) and ((((CG)))).
I was in a ranting mood that day.
The only ones who get $50 per poem are the vanity press poetry people, who sell books for fifty bucks to the people whose poems are "selected."
It's a good scam, and doesn't really hurt anyone.
Not many people can make money writing poetry. Even those we think of principally as poets usually had a "day job."
Still, both you and I could probably individually put a book or two together, and if we combined our efforts, it might even be interesting. Chances are, our main audience is already familiar with our works, and would have no reason to buy anything.
I was ranting that day. Glad you like it. Sometimes I don't dance around too much and get to the point. That puts some people off. The people it puts off usually never served, wouldn't serve, and never had a son, daughter, mother, father, brother, sister, husband, or wife who served or will serve, so I ignore them.
Yep.
True.
On all points.
It is a hobby and a mental excercise. I write lyrics but I need someone who writes music. I used to have a song writing partner but he was killed in a car accident before we got anything sold. Since he had no survivors, I burned our work as a tribute to him. I have never had the time to track down another partner.
LOL ! I just sent that out on my email list. :^)
Maud Muller
Maud Muller on a summer's day
Raked the meadow sweet with hay.
Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth
Of simple beauty and rustic health.
Singing, she wrought, and her merry gleee
The mock-bird echoed from his tree.
But when she glanced to the far-off town
White from its hill-slope looking down,
The sweet song died, and a vague unrest
And a nameless longing filled her breast,--
A wish that she hardly dared to own,
For something better than she had known.
The Judge rode slowly down the lane,
Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane.
He drew his bridle in the shade
Of the apple-trees, to greet the maid,
And asked a draught from the spring that flowed
Through the meadow across the road.
She stooped where the cool spring bubbled up,
And filled for him her small tin cup,
And blushed as she gave it, looking down
On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown.
"Thanks!" said the Judge; "a sweeter draught
From a fairer hand was never quaffed."
He spoke of the grass and flowers and trees,
Of the singing birds and the humming bees;
Then talked of the haying, and wondered whether
The cloud in the west would bring foul weather.
And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown
And her graceful ankles bare and brown;
And listened, while a pleased surprise
Looked from her long-lashed hazel eyes.
At last, like one who for delay
Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away.
Maud Muller looked and sighed: "Ah me!
That I the Judge's bride might be!
"He would dress me up in silks so fine,
And praise and toast me at his wine.
"My father should wear a broadcloth coat;
My brother should sail a pointed boat.
"I'd dress my mother so grand and gay,
And the baby should have a new toy each day.
"And I'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor,
And all should bless me who left our door."
The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill,
And saw Maud Muller standing still.
"A form more fair, a face more sweet,
Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet.
"And her modest answer and graceful air
Show her wise and good as she is fair.
"Would she were mine, and I to-day,
Like her, a harvester of hay.
"No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs,
Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues,
"But low of cattle and song of birds,
And health and quiet and loving words."
But he thought of his sisters, proud and cold,
And his mother, vain of her rank and gold.
So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on,
And Maud was left in the field alone.
But the lawyers smiled that afternoon,
When he hummed in court an old love-tune;
And the young girl mused beside the well
Till the rain on the unraked clover fell.
He wedded a wife of richest dower,
Who lived for fashion, as he for power.
Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow,
He watched a picture come and go;
And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes
Looked out in their innocent surprise.
Oft, when the wine in his glass was red,
He longed for the wayside well instead;
And closed his eyes on his garnished rooms
To dream of meadows and clover-blooms.
And the proud man sighed, and with a secret pain,
"Ah, that I were free again!
"Free as when I rode that day,
Where the barefoot maiden raked her hay."
She wedded a man unlearned and poor,
And many children played round her door.
But care and sorrow, and childbirth pain,
Left their traces on heart and brain.
And oft, when the summer sun shone hot
On the new-mown hay in the meadow lot,
And she heard the little spring brook fall
Over the roadside, through a wall,
In the shade of the apple-tree again
She saw a rider draw his rein;
And, gazing down with timid grace,
She felt his pleased eyes read her face.
Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls
Stretched away into stately halls;
The weary wheel to a spinet turned,
The tallow candle an astral burned,
And for him who sat by the chimney lug,
Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug,
A manly form at her side she saw,
And joy was duty and love was law.
Then she took up her burden of life again,
Saying only, "It might have been."
Alas for the maiden, alas for the Judge,
For rich repiner and household drudge!
God pity them both and pity us all,
Who vainly the dreams of youth recall.
For of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these: "It might have been!"
Ah, well! for us all some sweet hope lies
Deeply buried from human eyes;
And, in the hereafter, angels may
Roll the stone from its grave away!
-- John Greenleaf Whittier
Thank you so much for the beautiful graphic and poem!
This week seems to be leaning towards patriotic and military themes, leading up to Memorial Day weekend. Very nice portrait and poem, you two! Lori, I will always love 'that' frame, which none of my software programs can make. :)
I was so young then. Thirty two years ago this summer.
I am one of those that appreciates a plain-speaking, direct, no nonsense person.
If I ask a question, I am looking for a direct answer, not beating around the bush.
Kudos to you for telling it like it is - and in a beautiful way, to boot!
If
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream -- and not make dreams your master;
If you can think -- and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings -- nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And -- which is more -- you'll be a Man, my son!
-- Rudyard Kipling (cited by Decter and Rumsfeld yesterday)
Thank you very much.
Have you ever tried Montana Arnica? (It is a homeopathic remedy you will have to get at the health food store.) I tried a spray on a thumb knuckle that I think I may have arthritis in, the pain left immediately.
I can tell that you have a powerful ability to visualize, perhaps everybody does. You and I have an outlet for the need to express our visualizations.
Maybe some of the people who seem to be frustrated, are so because they can't express themselves the way they want to.
Certainly it seems to be helping me, that I have an outlet for creativity. I seem to be getting mellower as I go.
I do!
...but she's wrong
Am not!
- I know I do! :)
No way! ;-)
Good morning, you two!
Your welcome, Alamo-Girl. It is my pleasure to be a part of Amy's "team". Thank you for coming by each day and taking time to read and enjoy our thread!
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