To Illustrate - Christianity Today

The Toughest Question

My son Bjorn got sick last week. I took his temperature, and it was 102.5. Out came the children’s Advil. He slugged down a dose, and 45 minutes later his fever was back down to 100.

Just before bed, I checked his temperature again. It was back up. More Advil. I checked again 45 minutes later; now it was 103. By midnight, his skin was hot, he was lethargic, and his temperature was 104. I called the hospital. “Bring him in as soon as possible,” they said.

I told him we were going to the doctor. Bjorn looked at me with weary, wondering eyes and said, “Am I going to die, Daddy?”

Immediately, I had three reactions. Common sense: “No, you are not going to die. We just need to get this fever down.” Emotional: “I’m scared.” Visions of children with bizarre diseases flooded my heart. Spiritual: “Dear Jesus, cover him. Heal him. Love him.”

“No, Son, you’re not going to die,” I told him. I didn’t want to scare him. I was fairly certain his fever was not life-threatening. But my mind flashed to the many parents in this world who have had to look at their children, knowing that the ultimate answer to that question is “yes.”

And I wonder if in the heavenly places there was once a conversation between the Father and the Son, when the Son asked the question, “Am I going to die, Daddy?” and in his heart the Father knew the answer was, “Yes.”

Per Nilsen, Burnsville, Minnesota (Death of Christ, Easter, Suffering) John 3:16; Romans 8:32

My Better Half

“Side Show” is an unusual musical based on the true story of the Hilton twins. They were conjoined twins who rose from poverty, exploited as a sideshow attraction, to become a singing and dancing act in vaudeville in the 1930s and later stars of a couple of “B” movies.

One unusual element of this play is that the two lead actresses must play their parts “joined at the hip.” It doesn’t matter how good their individual talents are if they can’t work together, and if they can’t do it convincingly. The success of the show depends on the success of their partnership. If one of them decides to go solo, the show is over! They’re only in business as long as they stick together.

That is a good picture of marriage. Once the commitment is made, husband and wife are, as it were, “joined at the hip.” They succeed or fail together. Other people don’t generally think of one without thinking of the other. Wherever life’s drama takes them, their success lies in doing it together.

Lee Eclov, Lake Forest, Illinois (Commitment, Marriage, Teamwork) Matthew 19:3-6; 1 Corinthians 7

Count the Cost, or Ignore it?

Problems have plagued NASA in their attempt to reach Mars. In 1997 the Mars Pathfinder Lander riveted the nation’s attention with a live feed from Mars’ surface. We were fascinated as we saw live pictures. The future looked bright for a new and improved NASA. They planned to send at least one mission to Mars every 26 months, but to do this they had to follow the new policy of their director Dan Goldin: “Faster. Better. Cheaper.”

Trying to design these missions for about one tenth the cost, they cut staff and undertrained those who remained; they overworked their navigation teams, giving them responsibilities for up to three missions at one time. They tried to get a quality product without putting money, effort and time into it.

The next two missions were utter failures. In September 1999 the Mars Climate Orbiter failed due to a dumb mistake. The builder had used English units of measure in the systems while the operators at NASA were using metric units. This past spring the Mars Polar Lander broke into thousands of tiny pieces as it hit the surface of Mars at 50 miles an hour because a design flaw cut the braking system off too soon. This flaw, the engineering team acknowledged, could have been prevented by running a software simulation that was not purchased because of lack of funding. Skipping steps ended in disaster.

Eugene A. Maddox, Interlachen, Florida (Choices, Commitment, Failure) Luke 14:28-30

Blessing Are the Poor

Poorer Americans give a greater percentage of their income to charity. In 1998, those who

earned under $10,000 gave 5.2%,
earned $10,000 to $19,999 gave 3.3%,
earned $75,000 to $99,999 gave only 1.6%.

Time (7/24/00) Submitted by Jerry De Luca, Montreal West, Canada (Charity, Giving, Money) Luke 6:20, 21:1-4; 2 Corinthians 9:6-15

Givers Receive

I’ve been going to professional baseball games and trying to get a souvenir baseball as far back as I can remember. A foul ball, a homer, even a batting practice ball—anything would do.

At practice for the St. Louis Cardinals—watching Mark McGwire and his teammates—I got to know a five-year-old boy who was also trying to get a ball. His name was James. He tried hard to pronounce the players’ names as he politely asked for a ball: “Mr. Timwin (Timlin), can I have a ball, please?”

Before I knew it, my mission became getting a ball for James. For about 20 minutes, I told him the names of the players near the fence where we stood. The players turned and smiled as James tried to say their names. Still, no ball. Finally I told James he could have my ball if I caught one (I had been unsuccessful in catching a ball for almost 28 years, so that felt like a safe promise).

I wouldn’t be telling this story if you didn’t know what happened five minutes later. I caught a ball, and yes, I gave it to James. I wonder how often God waits to give us something until we are willing to give it away?

Mike Herman, Glen Ellyn, Illinois (Generosity, Promises, Surrender) Luke 6:38; 2 Corinthians 9:6-11

I Want My NIV

MTV political correspondent Tabitha Soren says: No matter how secular our culture becomes, it will remain drenched in the Bible. Since we will be haunted by the Bible even if we don’t know it, doesn’t it make sense to read it? To read the Bible is to be reminded, as Bill Moyers says, “that what is in us is worth more.”

USA Weekend (6/13/99) (Bible, Popular culture, Truth) Isaiah 40:7-8; 1 Peter 1:23-25, 2:2

Through a Glass, Darkly

On a warm, summer night, my wife and I were traveling in our car with Micah, our 3-year-old son, who sat in the back seat. After many miles of driving in the darkness, we came to a stop in a remote area. The brightness of the traffic light revealed all of the dirt, dead bugs, and insects on our windshield. Micah said, “Look how dirty!”

My wife and I didn’t think much of his comment until a moment later when we drove on—away from the light and back into the darkness. Upon reentering the darkness, we could no longer see the mess on our windshield, and Micah quickly piped up and said, “Now the glass is clean!”

Before the law came, the dirt within us hid under the darkness. But when God gave the law, its light shined on the windshield of our hearts and revealed the filth of sin we’d collected on our journey. The law, then, is a light that shows us how sinful we really are. It cannot cleanse us or make us whole. But it does starkly highlight the true situation of our souls—and thus can lead us to Christ.

William Wimmer, Benton, Arkansas (Grace, Law, Sin) Romans 7:5-14; Galatians 3:24

Have You Met My Sister?

The essence of all pantheism, evolutionism, and modern cosmic religion is really in this proposition: that Nature is our mother. Unfortunately, if you regard Nature as a mother, you discover that she is a step-mother. The main point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is our sister. We can be proud of her beauty, since we have the same Father; but she has no authority over us; we have to admire, but not to imitate.

This gives to the typically Christian pleasure in this earth a strange touch of lightness that is almost frivolity. Nature was a solemn mother to worshippers of Isis and Cybele. Nature was a solemn mother to Wordsworth or to Emerson. But Nature is not solemn to Francis of Assisi or to George Herbert. To St. Francis, Nature is sister, and even a younger sister: a little, dancing sister, to be laughed at as well as loved.

G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy (Ignatius) (Evolution, Nature, New Age Religions) Psalm 8, 19

Paper or Plastic?

There is an old legend about three men. Each man had two sacks, one tied in front of his neck and the other tied on his back. When the first man was asked what was in his sacks, he said, “In the sack on my back are all the good things friends and family have done. That way they’re hidden from view. In the front sack are all the bad things that have happened to me. Every now and then I stop, open the front sack, take the things out, examine them, and think about them.” Because he stopped so much to concentrate on all the bad stuff, he really didn’t make much progress in life.

The second man was asked about his sacks. He replied, “In the front sack are all the good things I’ve done. I like to see them, so quite often I take them out to show them off to people. The sack in the back? I keep all my mistakes in there and carry them all the time. Sure they’re heavy. They slow me down, but you know, for some reason I can’t put them down.”

When the third man was asked about his sacks, he answered, “The sack in front is great. There I keep all the positive thoughts I have about people, all the blessings I’ve experienced, all the great things other people have done for me. The weight isn’t a problem. The sack is like sails of a ship. It keeps me going forward.

“The sack on my back is empty. There’s nothing in it. I cut a big hole in its bottom. In there I put all the bad things that I think about myself or hear about others. They go in one end and out the other, so I’m not carrying around any extra weight at all.”

What are you carrying in your sacks?

H. Norman Wright, The Perfect Catch (Bethany House, 2000) (Forgiveness, Grace, Gratitude) Psalm 19:14; Philippians 4:4-9

Superstar Mom’s Priorities

Movie star Nicole Kidman, wife of superstar Tom Cruise, talks about the sacrifices a mother and wife must make:

It’s tough being a woman and having kids and working, definitely. I see people who say, “Oh yeah, I’m doing it all”—forget it. Something is going to give—usually when you are just really, really tired. I only work now if I really feel it’s worth it. And I have to say no to things I really love because it’s just not the right time. Sure, you could try to do it all and try to take all the roles you want, but you wouldn’t know your kids and you wouldn’t know your marriage. I think that’s a big thing. Distance destroys relationships. It just does.

Talk (Sept 2000) Submitted by Dave Goetz, Wheaton, Illinois (Career, Family, Priorities, Sacrifice) Proverbs 31:10-31; Titus 2:4-5

Broken Homes, Broken Children

Children in post-divorce families do not, on the whole, look happier, healthier, or more well-adjusted even if one or both parents are happier.

National studies show that children from divorced and remarried families are more aggressive toward their parents and teachers. They experience more depression, have more learning difficulties, and suffer from more problems with peers than children from intact families.

[Being the child of divorced families is] feeling sad, lonely and angry during childhood. It’s traveling on airplanes alone when you’re seven to visit your parent. It’s having no choice about how you spend your time and feeling like a second-class citizen compared with your friends in intact families who have some say about how they spend their weekends and their vacations. It’s wondering whether you’ll have any financial help for college from your college-educated father, given that he has no legal obligation to pay.

It’s reaching adulthood with acute anxiety. Will you ever find a faithful woman to love you? Will you find a man you can trust? … Not one of the men or women from divorced families whose lives I [interviewed] wanted their children to repeat their childhood experiences … They envied friends who grew up in intact families.

Judith Wallerstein in The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce (Hyperion, 2000) Submitted by David Whitney, Annapolis, Maryland (Children, Divorce, Family, Marriage) Mark 10:1-12

Seeds of the Spirit

A woman has a dream where she wanders into a shop at the mall and finds Jesus behind a counter.

Jesus says, “You can have anything your heart desires.”

Astounded but pleased, she asks for peace, joy, happiness, wisdom, and freedom from fear. Then she adds, “Not just for me, but for the whole earth.”

Jesus smiles and says, “I think you misunderstand me. We don’t sell fruits, only seeds.”

from The Ascent of a Leader by Bruce McNichol and Bill Thrall (Jossey Bass, 1999) (Fruit of the Spirit, Fruitfulness, Prayer) Galatians 5:22-23; 6:7-8

Now That’s a Save!

The Atlanta Braves were playing the Colorado Rockies. After nine innings, the score was tied.

The game went into extra innings. Soon, the Rockies had used all their relief pitchers, and had sent the starting pitcher from the previous night’s game back out for an inning.

In the twelfth, the Rockies had a terrible choice. Should they send out one of their two remaining starting pitchers, who would have to play over the next two days, or a utility player? They chose to send an injured catcher, Kevin Mayne, to the mound.

“Can you pitch?” the catcher asked him.

“Sure” said Kevin, even though he had never pitched in his life.

A few pitches went over the catcher’s head. One flew behind a batter’s back, but Mayne managed to get the Braves out on two grounders and a fly ball. The catcher-turned-pitcher had kept the Braves from scoring.

Now, the Rockies were up to bat in the bottom of the twelfth inning. When Mayne’s position came up, Mayne, with an injured batting hand, couldn’t. So the Rockies sent out a new player who had never had a hit in the major leagues.

Of course he drove a run in to win the game.

Why tell this story? Because sometimes [Christian workers] have to fill uncomfortable positions. Sometimes you even have to do it when you are hurt. You have to go out there and take one for the team.

Dave Travis, Church Champions Update (8/25/00) (Risk, Service, Teamwork) John 13:1-17; Titus 3:1

Going the Distance

Running track in my prep school days taught me a valuable lesson. I was at the Pennsylvania Relays, a famous Eastern track meet, and our relay team was going to run in the championship race.

I was the lead-off man and in the second lane. The man in the first lane held the 100-meter dash record for prep school runners. He also held a record for arrogance. When I got to the line and we were putting our starting blocks down, he said, “May the best man win. I’ll be waiting for you at the finish line.”

We went into the blocks. The gun sounded. He took off, and the other seven of us settled in behind him. We went around the first turn and down the back stretch. About 180 meters into the race, I suddenly saw the record holder in front of me, holding his side, bent over, and groaning as he jogged along. We all passed him like he was standing still. Because I’m such a gentleman, I waited for him at the finish line.

At the end of the race my coach took me aside. “I hope you’ve learned a lesson today. It makes little difference whether you hold the record for the 100-meter dash if the race is 400-meters long.”

Gordon MacDonald from message at Promise Keepers (8/11/00) (Arrogance, Endurance, Pride) Hebrews 10:36, 12:1-2; James 1:3-4

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