What If?
Several years ago a group of historians authored a book called If—Or History Rewritten. Some of the ifs those scholars considered were these: What if Robert E. Lee had not lost the Battle of Gettysburg? What if the Moors in Spain had won? What if the Dutch had kept New Amsterdam? What if Booth had missed when he shot at Abraham Lincoln? What if Napoleon had escaped to America?
O Holy Night
According to tradition, a Christmas song once brought peace to a battlefield. It happened on Christmas Eve during the Franco-German War (1870-1871) as the two sides faced each other in their trenches.
When Jesus Comes In
In 1932, as the US was undergoing a financial breakdown, missionary Robert Cummings was suffering an emotional breakdown. As he carried on his evangelistic ministry with his wife in India, he became obsessed by blasphemous and sinful thoughts so overwhelming that he felt cast aside by God and eternally lost. Hospital care and therapy were of no help. His wife brought him back to the US where he was placed in a private mental facility.
A Matter Of Credentials
For 11 years, an official at a Michigan community college impressed fellow workers as a highly qualified and faithful administrator. He did his work so well that the Board of Trustees named him as a finalist in their search for a new president of the school. Then a routine background check was made on him. What it turned up surprised everyone. No documentation could be found for the man's master's and doctoral degrees.
A Christmas Story
"Suppose there was a king who loved a humble maiden," begins a parable by Danish philosopher Sören Kierkegaard (1813-1855). How could he declare his love for her? She might respond out of fear or coercion, but he wanted her to love him for himself.
Stretching Our Souls
A man and his young son went to a repair shop to get a rake fixed. When the job was finished, the man asked what the charge would be.
God's Answer To Loneliness
Most of us have experienced loneliness in some form or another. I remember the deep sense of aloneness that swept over me during my first day in the military when I was exposed to almost constant cursing and foul language.
Grandpa's Tree
When I first saw the twisted Christmas tree, I wished Grandpa were alive to fix it. He could make any tree beautiful. No matter how bad it looked when we gave it to him, it was beautiful when he gave it back.
Old-timers
How striking are the last lines that David Livingstone (1813-1873) penned on the night he died! His sons found that the famous missionary had died on his knees beside his bed, in the posture of prayer. He had written these words: "My Jesus, my King, my life, my all; to Thee again I dedicate myself." For Livingstone, every day was another day to serve and to grow.
