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M Memory
Good inventors occasionally discover useful ideas just working in their own backyards. And resourceful homemakers are constantly making world-class products out of items grown in their own backyards.
But homemade articles are not always the best. I heard of one wise pastry cook who advertised "Pies just like your mother made $5.00 each. Pies just like your mother thinks she used to make $10.00 each." Which reminds us that the quality of everything homemade may not be perfect or in any way better than regular store-bought goods. Some backyard discoveries may be valuable, but many are just mediocre.
Backyard religion is the same. The faith that an individual forges on his own, apart from the counsel of God's Word, mostly turns out to be a poor, low-quality substitute for the real thing.
Topics/Tags: Memory; False Religion
A young woman reminiscing about her youth once wrote: "I loved my uncle's ranch when I was a child! There was space to run unhampered, freedom to explore. The dust lay inches thick upon the trails, and running barefoot down the path of sifting powder was a sumptuous sort of feeling. The barn was my playground, full of animated toys. . . . The mint grew wild and plush beside the creek, and my aunt made berry pies and the smell would seek me out wherever I played . . . "
She goes on, however, to infuse some "reality" into those memories: "If I am not careful, Lord, I can edit out these memories and forget that I got a bee sting where I picked the mint, and burned my tongue time and time again on the berry pies . . . or that the barn smelled just awful, or that the horse made my bottom sore, and the dust that felt like sifted powder made me sneeze all summer. . . . . But if I'm wise, I will remember that all of life has both of these things in it."
Many Christians fail to do God's work in the present because they are too busy romanticizing the past. Lest we get carried away reminiscing about how "perfect" the past was, let's not forget that ALL of life--past, present, and future--has its good and bad points.
Source: John Claypool, Stages, pp. 85-86
Topics/Tags: Memory
"Hats off to the past …
Sleeves up for the future."
-- Gary Heard
Melbourne, Australia
Source: Christian Leadership mail list
Bruce Springsteen sang a song called "Glory Days" in which he described the longing of several of his friends to return to days gone by. He sings of a former star high school athlete wishing for a return to his exciting, glamorous days of stardom.
I had a friend was a big baseball player,
back in high school
He could throw that speed ball by you,
make you look like a fool, boy
Saw him the other night ...
I was walkin' in, he was walkin' out
We went back inside ...
but all he kept talkin' about—Glory Days...
The instances of athletes enduring in stardom for an entire career are really the exception, not the rule. Many a former big-play-maker is sitting around today wondering, like the character in Springsteen’s song, where the "glory days" went.
Are WE doing the work God has called us to do TODAY? … or, are we simply sitting around longing for the "glory days" of yesterday to return?
Source: Zeke Moore
Topics/Tags: Memory; Glory, temporal; Work; Activity
Life would be more pleasant if we could forget our troubles as easily as we forget our blessings.
Source: "Christian Leadership" email discussion list
I hear, and I forget.
I see, and I remember.
I do, and I understand.
— Ancient sanskrit
Source: Dr. Stan Toler, ed., Pastor's Little Instruction Book.
Topics/Tags: Memory; Learning; Action; Understanding
A wife was berating her husband for forgetting her birthday. Luckily, the husband came up with the perfect response: "How do you expect me to remember your birthday when you never look any older?"
______
We can take heart knowing that our heavenly Father never forgets the details of our lives.
Source: Zeke Moore
Topics/Tags: Memory; Forgetting; Birthday
In Forrest Gump, Forrest's friend Jenny had endured a childhood of abuse and neglect at the hands of her father. In one scene, Forrest and Jenny visit her old house, and Forrest watches as Jenny throws stone after stone at the weather-beaten old house which held so many painful memories for her.
When Jenny finally quit throwing rocks and began to cry, Forrest said, "Sometimes there just aren't enough rocks."
_______
Sometimes life's wounds are so great that no amount of stone-throwing can ease the pain. Thankfully, we have a heavenly Father who can bring healing over time.
Source: Phil Callaway, The Total Christian Guy, Harvest House, 1996, p. 127.
A variation on the classic "Serenity Prayer":
God grant me the Senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones I do, and the eyesight to tell the difference…
Source: Joe Bradford. In "Illustrations_Clergy" email discussion list.
We were traveling one summer in the Pocono Mountains and, like a good Presbyterian family, attended church while we were on vacation.
One lazy Sunday we found our way to a little Methodist church. It was a hot day, and the folks were nearly drowsing in the pews. The preacher was preaching on and on, until all of a sudden he said, "The best years of my life have been spent in the arms of another man's wife."
The congregation let out a gasp and came to immediate attention. The dozing deacon in the back row dropped his hymnbook.
Then the preacher added, "It was my mother."
The congregation tittered a little and managed to follow along as the sermon concluded.
I filed away this trick in my memory, since it was such a great way to regain the congregation's attention. The next summer, on a lazy Sunday, I was preaching and the flies were buzzing around and the ushers were sinking lower and lower in their seats in the back row until I could hardly see them. Then I remembered our experience in the Pocono Mountains, so I said in a booming voice, "The best years of my life have been spent in the arms of another man's wife."
Sure enough, I had their attention! One of the ushers in the back row sat up so fast he hit his head on the back of the pew in front of him! I had them.
But, you know something, I forgot what came next!
All I could think to say was, "…and, for the life of me, I can't remember her name!"
—Pastor Roger Matthews
Source: Lowell Streiker, ed. An Encyclopedia of Humor. 1998, Hendrickson Publishers.
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