It Only Took An Hour

Back in the old country, there was a Pastor who invested his life savings in timber. When a forest fire broke out and his finances literally went up in smoke, the Pastor’s friends worried about how to break the devastating news to him. They hemmed and hawed until the Pastor said, “You’re afraid to tell me about the fire, aren’t you?”

“You know?” they asked surprised.

“I found out about an hour ago.”

“And you’re not upset?” they asked.

“I was,” he answered, “I’m over it now.”

“It was only an hour ago!”

“Tell me,” said the Pastor, “Didn’t you once suffer a loss by fire? Why aren’t you distraught about it?”

“My fire was 10 years ago.”

“OK, so for you, it took 10 years. For me, it took an hour. The point is we both got over it.”

The truth here is that it is not the passage of time itself that heals but it is the right perspective that brings healing. 

Why Did God Make Me As I Am?”

A happily married woman with two children lost both of them. They were buried in the same grave. After that, she suffered a deep emotional collapse. For years her family fed and cared for her as though she was as weak and helpless as a little child.

One day her aunt, a joyful Christian, took her turn at feeding her. The distraught and despondent woman said, “Auntie, you keep on saying that God loves us. I used to think so too; but if He loves us, why did He make me as I am?”

The aunt kissed her gently, said with the wisdom of years, “Dear, He hasn’t made you yet. He’s making you now!”

“When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie, My grace, all-sufficient, shall be thy supply; The flame shall not hurt thee; I only design Thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine.”

Eddie and Alice Smith