Keep Your Fork

A woman was diagnosed with a terminal illness and had been given three months to live. As she was getting her things in order, she contacted her pastor and asked him to come to her house to discuss some of her final wishes.

She told him which songs she wanted sung at her funeral service, what Scripture verses she would like read, and what outfit she wanted to be buried in. She requested to be buried with her favorite Bible.

As the pastor prepared to leave, the woman suddenly remembered something else. "There's one more thing," she said excitedly.

"What's that?" said the pastor.

"This is important," the woman said. "I want to be buried with a fork in my right hand."

The pastor stood looking at the woman, not knowing quite what to say.

The woman explained. "In all my years of attending church socials and potluck dinners, when the dishes of the main course were being cleared, someone would inevitably lean over and say, 'Keep your fork.' It was my favorite part of the meal because I knew something better was coming—like velvety chocolate cake or deep-dish apple pie.

"So, when people see me in that casket with a fork in my hand and they ask, 'What's with the fork?' I want you to tell them: 'Keep your fork. The best is yet to come!'" 

(Alan Carr, Biblical Facts about a Place Called Heaven, via Sermons.com newsletter)

Absolutes and Absolutists

"Believing in absolutes doesn't make one an absolutist," writes Chuck Colson in his news report Jubilee about a TV interview where the host accused him of being an absolutist.

Colson said, "When that TV host asked me why we Christians always try to cram our views down people's throats, I was getting nowhere. Then I remembered he loved to sail.

"Have you ever sailed at night, navigating by the stars?" I asked. "Yes," he replied.

"Could you use those stars to navigate if they appeared in different, random positions every night?"

"Of course not," he said slowly.

"I think he got it. Christians are not intolerant absolutists. We just don't want our culture to be lost at sea, unaware of the stars above that could so quickly right our course."

Building A Watermelon

I was passing through Columbus, Ohio, and stopped to eat in a restaurant. My attention was drawn to a slice of watermelon, which I ordered and ate. The melon was so good that I asked the waiter to save some of the seeds that I might take them home and plant them in my garden. That night a thought came to my mind—I would use the watermelon as an illustration.

The next morning when I reached Chicago, I had enough seeds weighed to find out that it would take about five thousand watermelon seeds to weigh a pound, and I estimated that the watermelon weighed about forty pounds. Then I applied mathematics to the watermelon. 

A few weeks before, someone had planted a little seed in the ground. Under the influence of sunshine and shower that little watermelon seed had taken off its coat and gone to work. It had gathered from somewhere two hundred thousand times its own weight, and forced that enormous weight through a tiny stem and built a watermelon. On the outside it had put a covering of green, and within that a rind of white, and within that a core of red through which it scattered little seeds, each one capable of doing the same work over again.

What architect drew the plan? Where did that little watermelon seed get its tremendous strength? Where did it find its flavoring extract and its coloring matter? How did it build a watermelon? Until you can explain a watermelon, do not be too sure that you can set limits to the power of the Almighty, or tell just what He would do, or how he would do it. Everything that lives in like manner mocks by its mystery, beauty, and power, the proud intellect of man.

The most learned man in the world cannot explain a watermelon, but the most ignorant man can eat a watermelon and enjoy it. God has given us both the things that we need, and the knowledge necessary for their use.

Why not avail yourself of His salvation, and decide to give God His place in your life? Jesus Christ is the way to God. He says, "No man cometh to the Father but by Me," and "him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out" (John 14:6; 6:37). 

"O taste and see that the Lord is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in Him" (Psalm 34:8).

—William Jennings Bryan

The Proud Flying Frog

"Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall." Proverbs 16:18

In the devotional book, Today in the Word, the writer tells the fable about a frog and a duck who shared a pond. They developed a close friendship as they talked and played together. But when the hot summer sun began to evaporate the water in the pond, the duck decided to fly to a larger body of water. Not wanting to be left alone, the frog suggested that his friend and another duck hold a stick in their bills so he could hang onto it with his mouth. In that way they could all fly to another pond.

As the three were flying high overhead a farmer looked up, saw the frog clinging to the stick by his mouth, and exclaimed, "What a brilliant idea! I wonder who thought of that?" Without hesitation the frog said, "I did!" And he was done!

The "YES" Face!

During Thomas Jefferson's presidency he and a group of travelers were crossing a river that had overflowed its banks. Each man crossed on horseback fighting for his life. 

A lone traveler watched the group traverse the treacherous river and then asked President Jefferson to take him across. The president agreed without hesitation, the man climbed on, and the two made it safely to the other side of the river where somebody asked him: "Why did you select the President to ask this favor?" 

The man was shocked, admitting he had no idea it was the President of the United States who had carried him safely across. 

"All I know," he said, "is that on some of your faces was written the answer 'No' and on some of them was the answer 'Yes.' His was a 'Yes' face."


"The most significant decision I make each day is my choice of an attitude. When my attitudes are right there's no barrier too high, no valley too deep, no dream too extreme and no challenge too great." - Charles Swindoll

Any Doctors In The House?

A strained voice called out through the darkened theater, "Please, is there a doctor in the house?"

Several men stood up as the lights came on.

An older lady pulled her daughter to stand next to her, "Good, are any of you doctors single and interested in a date with a nice girl?"

How An Old Farmer Won The Six-Day Race

Cliff Young

The year was 1983. In Australia, the long-distance foot race from Sydney to Melbourne was about to begin, covering 875 kilometers—more than 500 miles! About 150 world-class athletes had entered, for what was planned as a six-day event. So race officials were startled when a 61-year-old man approached and handed them his entry form.

His name was Cliff Young, and his “racing attire” included overalls and galoshes over his—work boots.

At first, they refused to let him enter. So he explained that he’d grown up on a 2,000-acre farm, with thousands of sheep. His family could afford neither horses nor tractors so, when the storms came, his job was to round up the sheep. Sometimes, he said, it would take two or three days of running.

Finally, they let Cliff enter, and the race began. The others quickly left him way behind, shuffling along in his galoshes. But he didn’t know the plan included stopping each night to rest, so he kept going.

By the fifth day, he had caught them all, won the race, and became a national hero. He continued to compete in long-distance races until well up in his seventies. He was an inspiration to millions and a great encourager of younger runners.

In his honor and memory, in 2004, the year after his death at age 81, the organizers of the race where he first gained fame permanently changed its name to the Cliff Young Australian Six Day Race.

What was the key to Cliff Young’s success? It goes by various names: determination, perseverance, persistence, tenacity. It means keeping one’s eye fixed steadfastly on a goal, and not stopping, no matter the difficulties or the obstacles, until that goal is achieved.
Mac Anderson & Bob Kelly