“Why, O Lord . . .?”

Story of the Day for Friday October 30, 2015

“Why, O Lord . . .?”

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“Why, O Lord . . .?”

Psalm 88:14

When Nick Vujicic (pronounced VOY-a-chich) was born, his mother did not cradle him in her arms. Instead, she screamed in horror, “Take him away!”

Nick was born without arms or legs. He is head, neck, and trunk – without a little deformed foot (which he calls “my little chicken drumstick”).

As he grew up in Australia, Nick was banned from attending public school. When he was finally admitted, he was cruelly bullied. At the age of 10, he contemplated suicide. He felt hopeless, alone, cold, and bitter.

Nick cried out to God, “Why?” Why did you make me like this? Why won’t you answer my prayer and grow arms and legs for me? Why?

And then Nick realized that the Lord could use him just the way he was. He noticed that others considered him an inspiration.

Today, Nick is a college graduate with a double major. In 2005, he received the “Young Australian of the Year” award. He is a dedicated Christian man – whose mantra is: “I love life! I am happy!” Nick has learned to be thankful for what he has instead of bitter for what he doesn’t have.

Nick has spoken to millions of people. Without legs, of course, he can’t stand in front of his audiences. He is just plopped there on stage. And then he deliberately tips over.

“So, what do you do when you fall down?” he asks the audience. You get back up. “But I tell you,” he says as he lies on the stage, “there are some times in life where you fall down and you don’t feel like you have the strength to get back up.” He talks about trying a hundred times to get back up . . . and failing a hundred times.

Nick thinks you should never give up. Failure is not the end, he tells us: “It matters how you’re going to finish. Are you going to finish strong?” After a long pause he concludes, “Then you will find that strength to get back up.”

Slowly, he moves toward a book and puts his forehead on it. Then he arches is body and convulses it and plops upright.

When Nick would go to the beach, he says he would watch couples holding hands and realized that, when he marries, he can never hold his wife’s hand. He fell into a mindset focusing on “I can’t do this; I can’t do that.”

Now Nick says, “But I realize, I may not have hands to be able to hold my wife’s hand. But, when the time comes, I’ll be able to hold her heart. I don’t need hands to hold her heart.”

Nick Vujicic is a happy man. He cried out to God, “Why?” And, I for one, have been deeply touched by God’s answer.

(copyright 2012 by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)

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The Race Everyone Wins

Story of the Day for Friday January 16, 2015

The Race Everyone Wins

Let everyone test his own work. Then he can take pride in what he does – without comparing himself with others.

Galatians 6:4

A little town in Wisconsin, lying on the southern shore of Lake Superior, used to hold an annual sled dog race for children.

One cold January day, a group of kids lined up to race a one mile course – marked by staking fir trees in the ice. The contestants ranged from older boys with several dogs and professional sleds to one little kid, who didn’t look more than five years old. He had a crude sled and one little dog to pull him.

When the race began the little boy and his dog were soon left behind. Halfway through the race, the boy in second place tried to pass the leader. But, while passing, he got too close and the dogs from each team started fighting. As each team approached, they joined in the melee – leaving everyone in a hopeless tangle.

Not a single team finished the race . . . except for a little boy in an old sled with a single dog pulling him.

Since ancient times, we have told Tortoise-and-Hare stories. The moral is: “Slow and steady wins the race.”

The truth, however, is that slow and steady rarely wins the race. “Fast and Steady” almost always trumps “Slow and Steady.” I like to race in a cross-country ski marathon in northern Wisconsin, called the Birkebeiner. I am a tortoise — slow, but steady. Except for a few stops at the food stations, lasting less than a minute each, I never stop to rest. But every year, the world-class athletes go screaming across the finish line while I am still slugging it out halfway through the course.

“Slow and steady wins the race” is trying to teach us to pace ourselves, and not be discouraged when others — who don’t pace themselves — jump out to a quick lead. Good advice. But, the problem with these wise maxims is that they are focused on winning. The tortoise, and the boy with a one-dog sled, will occasionally win. But rarely. Very rarely. If you view life as a competition against others, you will almost always lose the race.

The Bible talks about a better way. We should focus on doing our best, and forget about how it compares with anyone else. We can find great satisfaction in life once we quit comparing our efforts with others.

Few ski the Birkebeiner to win the race; virtually everyone skis it to do their best. They sometimes call the Birkebeiner “The Race Everyone Wins.” They’ve got it right.

(copyright 2012 by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)

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Rise Again

Story of the Day for Tuesday August 5, 2014

Rise Again

Do not rejoice over me, O my enemy. Even though I have fallen, I will rise. Though I sit in darkness, the Lord is a light for me.

Micah 7:8

Leroy and Mike were high school friends who shared a passion for basketball. They both tried out for the varsity, but Leroy made the team, while Mike was cut.

Mike was crushed.

He asked the coach if he could at least ride on the bus with the team for the district tournament. The coach let him accompany them – as long as he helped carry the player’s uniforms.

So, how do you respond to failure?

When I fail, I find it convenient to give up – claiming it is God’s will. I have often felt that, if God is behind it, then I will be successful, and it will be easy.

Over the years, I have begun to realize that Jesus doesn’t share my theology. He told a parable of a widow who kept coming to a judge with the plea, “Give me justice against my adversary.” Again and again the judge ignored her.

Eventually, she wore him down, and he heard her case.

The point that Jesus is making is that – even after repeated failure – we should never give up. The Lord will come to our aid.

In 1976, Ronald Reagan challenged the incumbent president, Jerry Ford. Reagan fought hard to gain the nomination, but in the end, Ford won.

Reagan had lost, but hadn’t given up. At the Republican National Convention, he met with tearful supporters and quoted from an old ballad, “Sir Andrew Barton.” There is a line in this poem which says:

I am hurt but I am not slain;

I will lay me down and bleed a while,

And then I will rise and fight again.

When, Mike failed to make the basketball team, he didn’t give up. All summer long, he practiced basketball with his friend Leroy Smith. And that next year, Michael Jordan did make the team.

Failure didn’t keep him down. It fueled a fire within him. Jordan says, “It all started when Coach Herring cut me.”

Do you feel like you’ve stumbled into a deep pit? Invite your enemies to come quickly, because they won’t have much time to gloat over you. The Lord is our light. He heals, he strengthens, he forgives. You can wallow in the pit for a while, but don’t get used to it down there; the Lord intends to pull you out.

You’re going to rise again.

(copyright by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)  (image: yogametaphysics.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/rising-sun-goryu-dake-peak.jpg)

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It’ll Be Enough

Story of the Day for Friday June 13, 2014

It’ll Be Enough

 

Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother said, “Here’s a boy with five loaves of barley bread and two little fish. But how far will they go among so many people?”

John 6:8-9

 

Sometimes at night, when the wolves were howling on Still Peak, our old dog, Ivan the Terrible, would join in. Some deep, primal memory told him he was part of the pack. Pointing his nose to the night sky, he would reply with a lonesome howl.

But Ivan never sounded like a wolf. He sounded like a cow trying to yodel.

Ivan the Terrible died this last summer, but I always envied him when he would sing. I didn’t envy him because he was good – he was so bad as to make you wince – but he howled nonetheless. I’m afraid to sing in public. What if I’m off-key? Ivan, on the other hand, never worried what he sounded like – he just gave you what he had.

“Use what talents you possess,“ Henry Van Dyke said, “the woods would be very silent if no birds sang there except those that sang best.”

And, yeah, I know William Purkey’s words can be misconstrued, but I like them anyway: “Dance like no one is watching, love like you’ll never be hurt, sing like no one is listening, and live like it’s heaven on earth.”

But, hey, if we don’t attempt something, at least we won’t fail, right? Who’s going to laugh at our clumsiness if we don’t join in the dance?

It turns out our common notions about this are completely backward. The well-known psychologist, Karen Horney, discovered that, if you do not attempt to do something, you will usually have the self-impression you have failed. Horney claims that, by simply attempting to do something, we will almost always conclude that we have succeeded.

It’s not about performance; it’s about trying.

All the same, we often define ourselves by our limitations. How many times have you found yourself lamenting, “I wish there was more I could do?”

But the Lord only expects you to use the gifts he’s given you, to offer what you have – and not worry about what you don’t have.

Once, a young boy had little to offer Jesus. Just five loaves of barley bread and a couple of small fish. Not much, but he gave what he had.

Yet, in the hands of Jesus, it was plenty.

Don’t focus on the talents you don’t have, the money you don’t have, the opportunities you don’t have. The only thing that matters to Jesus is using what you’ve got.

It’ll be enough.

(copyright 2012 by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)

(image: http://www.worldsundayschool.com/images/clip_image001_0111.jpg)

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Get Out of the Boat

Story of the Day for Thursday March 13, 2014 

 

Get Out of the Boat 

 

“When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified.  ‘It’s a ghost,’ they said and cried out in fear. 

But Jesus immediately said to them, ‘Take courage.  I AM.  Do not be afraid.’ 

‘Lord, if it is you,’ Peter replied, ‘tell me to come to you on the water.’ 

‘Come,’ he said.  

Then Peter got down out of the boat. . .” 

Matthew 14:26-29 

 

Most of us have had the fear of failure ingrained in us.  We view failure as something to be avoided at all costs.   

But our fears are based on a limited truth.  There are situations in life where failure means disaster.  As the saying goes, “If at first you don’t succeed, then skydiving is not for you.”   

But there are other times where we must learn to embrace failure as the inevitable process of growing.  Every musician knows that, in order to master their instrument, they must be willing to fail, and to repeatedly play wrong notes in order to learn.  Any basketball player knows that they will miss many more shots than they make before they begin to refine their shot.   

There is, of course, a way to avoid failure.  You will never hit a wrong note, you will never strike out – if you never pick up an instrument, if you never step up to the plate and swing.   

When Jesus came to his disciples walking on the water, only one of them failed.  Peter made the offer that he, too, would walk on the water if it was truly Jesus calling him.   

It was.  And he invited him to come.   

You know what happens next: Peter begins to walk on the water toward Jesus, but then he diverts his attention to the power of the storm and height of the waves, and begins to sink.   

How does Jesus respond to his doubt?  He grabs his hand and lifts him back up out of the water.   Peter had no reason to doubt, but when he failed, Jesus was there for him. 

 

In 1899, Teddy Roosevelt, in a speech to the Hamilton Club in Chicago, said: 

It is not the critic who counts, not the person who points out where the doerof deeds could have done better.  The credit belongs to the person who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood;who strives valiantly; who errs and comes up short again and again;who knows the great enthusiasms, the devotions, and spends himself orherself in a worthy cause; who at best knows in the end the triumph ofhigh achievement; and at the worst, at least fails while daring greatly;so that his or her place shall never be with those cold and timid souls whoknow neither victory or defeat.  

 

Peter may have failed.  But at least he was the only one willing to climb out of the boat and try.  

(copyright 2011 by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)

(image: http://lifewithmisty.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/boat.jpg)

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What Music Can You Play on a Broken Stradivarius?

Story of the Day for Monday February 24, 2014 

 

What Music Can You Play on a Broken Stradivarius? 

 

                And the God of all grace . . . will restore, establish, strengthen, and set you on a firm foundation. 

1 Peter 5:10     

 

Peter Cropper, from Sheffield, England, is a distinguished violinist. He is so good, he was asked to perform at the prestigious Kuhmo Music Festival in Finland.  

The Royal Academy of Music in London honored him by loaning him the use of a priceless Stradivarius violin. The violin, made by Antonio Stradivari was 258 years old and was made in his “Golden period.” It was considered one of the most valuable violins in the world.  

 

On the night of the festival, Mr. Cropper hurried on stage and tripped on an extension cord. He fell on the Stradivarius and broke the neck completely off.  

Peter was inconsolable.  

 

Charles Beare offered to repair the violin. The RoyalAcademy thanked Beare for his gracious offer, but assured him a broken Strad could never be repaired. But Cropper urged the Academy to see what Beare could do, and they finally relented and handed the violin over to Beare. 

Beare spent endless hours trying to repair the broken neck and a cracked bass bar with animal glue. After a month he presented the violin to the Academy. With Cropper in attendance they looked in astonishment – they could not find the slightest sign that the violin had ever been damaged.  

Not only did the restored violin look impeccable, but Cropper said, “. . . the violin is now in better shape than ever, producing a much more resonant tone.” That next week he performed with the Lindsay Quartet in Carnegie Hall, playing the restored Stradivarius.  

 

We all fail in life.  

So, what does God think about us when we botch things up? We know that He cares deeply about behaving the right way, so it stands to reason He is furious when we do wrong.  

Yes, God does care deeply about living rightly, because living wrongly creates so much pain to ourselves and others. But He’s the God of grace.  

Jesus never walked the streets with a clipboard –sifting out the rejects and patting the righteous on the head. If Jesus only approved of those who never failed in life, there would be no heads to pat.  

 

Never write the chapter of your failures as the last chapter of your story. The Lord, as a master craftsman, always offers to take the broken pieces of your heart, and restore you.  

And make you stronger than before.  

(copyright 2012 by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)

(image: http://chamberstudio.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Peter-Cropper-BW3.jpg)

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Too Busy Nursing Our Toes

Story of the Day for Tuesday December 10, 2013 

 

Too Busy Nursing Our Toes

                After they stoned Paul, they dragged him outside the city, assuming he was dead. But . . . he got up and went back into the city.  

Acts 14:19-20        

 

When Henry “Zeke” Bonura was sixteen, he entered the javelin competition at a National Track and Field Championship in 1925, and threw it seven feet farther than the “Chariots of Fire” Olympic gold medalist did in Paris the year before. He still remains the youngest male athlete to win an event at an AAU Track and Field Championship.  

At Loyola University, he starred in football, basketball, and track. Notre Dame’s famous football coach, Knute Rockne, called him “The South’s Wonder Athlete.”  When he played major league baseball for the Chicago White Sox he twice led American League first basemen with the lowest percentage of errors.   

I won’t tell you that Zeke Bonura was an excellent fielder – not to avoid boring you with the obvious, but to avoid lying.  

Bonura was LOUSY at first base.  Sports editor, Otis Harris wrote in 1946: “It was never established beyond a shadow of a doubt that Bonura was the worst fielding first basemen in the majors, but the consensus was that he would do until another one came along.”  

So, how could Bonura win the title of best defensive first basemen in both 1934 and 1938 and yet be considered such a bad defensive player?  

Simple. He didn’t try.  

Zeke made the brilliant discovery that you can’t be charged with an error if you don’t touch the ball. So, he let easy grounders roll into left field and waved at them with his “Mussolini salute.”  

 

I would love to take this opportunity to heap scorn on the lethargic ambitions of Zeke Bonura, but I can’t. I find myself doing the same thing. Sometimes I become so afraid of failing that I never try.  

 

On the apostle Paul’s missionary trips, he often failed to win over the people he met. Once, (against the wishes of the town’s Chamber of Commerce) they stoned Paul and left him for dead. But he picked himself up, dusted himself off, and continued to carry the Good News on his lips.  

And good things happened because he wasn’t afraid to fail. 

 

One of the greatest inventors of his time, Charles Kettering, said, “You will never stub your toe standing still. The faster you go, the more chance there is of stubbing your toe.” “But,” Kettering adds, “the more chance you have of getting somewhere.”  

 

When we get our purpose figured out, we won’t waste time trying to pad our stats. We’ll be too busy nursing our toes. 

(copyright 2012 by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre) (image: http://thumbs1.ebaystatic.com/d/l225/m/m694_L0pMaksQKBouHuLCYg.jpg)

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Total Abandonment to Your Calling

Story of the Day for Thursday April 18, 2013 

 

Total Abandonment to Your Calling

 

                        Moses said, “O Lord, please send someone else.” 

                                                           Exodus 4:13

 

Have you ever wanted to do something, but were afraid to try?

There’s a lot to be said for not trying.  Think about it: if you try to do something new, you’ll inevitably begin wobbly and will always be able to point to those who can do it better than you.  When we try, and fail, it produces embarrassment, frustration, discouragement, and criticism from others.

If, however, you simply refuse to try, you will be spared these humiliations of failure. Moses put up an admirable protest when the Lord called him to be the spokesman for his people. He stuttered. He was not a good speaker.

The Lord didn’t ask Moses to be good; he just told him to do it.

 Bill Staines is one of the most popular folksingers of our day. Both his resonant singing and accomplished guitar playing are easy to listen to.

Yet, Staines didn’t start his musical career because he was talented. He was inspired, as a child, by a framed embroidery that his mother hung above the piano. It said:

 I CAN’T PLAY

AND I CAN’T SING

BUT I CAN TRY LIKE ANYTHING

Florence Foster Jenkins loved to sing. Much to the dismay of her parents and husband, she decided to perform publicly. Her voice sounded like she was killing a cat, and the notes soared in a futile search for the correct pitch. Undaunted by any sense of rhythm, she never let the music’s tempo boss her around. Her accompanist, Mr. Cosmé McMoon, would constantly adjust the pace of the music to her unique sense of timing.

In The Book of Heroic Failures, Stephen Pile summed it up by saying, “No one, before or since, has succeeded in liberating themselves quite so completely from the shackles of musical notation.”

Jenkins’ popularity began to soar. It wasn’t simply that she was so spectacularly awful; many people know how to sing poorly. Instead, it was her total abandonment to her calling. She loved to sing. Robert Bagar in the New York World-Telegram captured her appeal: “She was exceedingly happy in her work. It is a pity so few artists are. And the happiness was communicated as if by magic to her hearers.”

Florence Foster Jenkins culminated her career on October 25, 1944, when she screeched and warbled before a sold-out crowd at Carnegie Hall.

Although Florence was fully aware of her critics, she simply didn’t care. “People may say I can’t sing,” she observed, “but no one can ever say I didn’t sing.”

 Michael Jordan nailed it: “If I try something and I don’t succeed, it doesn’t mean I failed. It means I tried.”

(text copyright 2012 by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)

(photo credit: https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQFGQ4bHkpkbNkHrnoU8Iws0Ey1IVyuNsb1xwj9VeP3D7OJSx4nPA)

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Successful Failures

Story of the Day for Wednesday February 6, 2013 

 

Successful Failures

                                             And when we heard this, we and all the others begged Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. 

                                                                                                Acts 21:12

 

Does the Loch Ness Monster really exist?  The firefighting crew from the town of Hemel Hempstead, England, decided to find out.

What if you could lure the elusive monster out of hiding by enticing it with a female decoy?  In 1975, the firemen lashed together a dozen oil barrels for buoyancy and fashioned, with a half ton of paper mâché, a seductive monstress — complete with long eyelashes. Inside the body, one man operated a canister that blew smoke out her nostrils while another operated the boat motor.

 The female monster was painted green and ready for love. They pulled her on the back of a fire truck and slowly drove to northern Scotland.

She coyly slipped into the waters of Loch Ness without incident and, for fifteen miles, cooed out a mating call as she followed the shoreline.

Sadly, the Loch Ness Monster failed to appear. Some claimed the pre-recorded mating call, that of a bull walrus, was not an appropriate invitation to romance. Others pointed to the loss of her tail when she accidentally struck a pier.

Stephen Pile wryly nailed it, “No girl is at her best under these circumstances.”

Paul’s last journey of freedom seemed a preventable tragedy. He sailed from Ephesus to Tyre, where fellow disciples warned him not to continue on to Jerusalem. Paul ignored their warning. When his ship landed at Caesarea, the prophet Agabus warned Paul he would be arrested if he continued on to Jerusalem. Paul ignored this warning as well and continued on to Jerusalem.

Sure enough, the apostle Paul was arrested. He would never see freedom again.

You can imagine the exasperation of his friends. “We repeatedly warned him not to go. What was he thinking!”

What was Paul thinking? Maybe that, when God’s in control, even his arrest isn’t a bad thing. Because of it, Paul’s case was kicked up from one court to another until, eventually, he won an audience in Rome.  Those in high authority, whom he couldn’t normally reach, would now hear the wonder of how Jesus transformed him from a murderer into a gentle child of God. What everyone else saw as a tragedy, Paul viewed as a victory. He wanted those in high places to hear the Good News.

Paul’s arrest was a failure only if you weren’t thinking like Paul.

We knew the firemen’s plan to find the Loch Ness Monster was doomed from the start, didn’t we?

Odd thing, though. On their long, slow journey transporting their monster to Loch Ness, sightseers in every town thronged the sidewalks to see their wacky invention. They sold thousands of T-shirts with their female Nessie on it.

Can you believe those loons just happened to raise a ton of money for a worthy cause?

(text copyright by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre)

(image credit: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/Loch_Ness_Monster.jpg)

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Pad Our Stats or Nurse Our Toes?

Story of the Day for Tuesday December 11, 2012 

Pad Our Stats or Nurse Our Toes?

 

                After they stoned Paul, they dragged him outside the city, assuming he was dead. But . . . he got up and went back into the city. 

                                                                           Acts 14:19-20

 

 

When Henry “Zeke” Bonura was sixteen, he entered the javelin competition at a National Track and Field Championship in 1925, and threw it seven feet farther than the “Chariots of Fire” Olympic gold medalist did in Paris the year before. He still remains the youngest male athlete to win an event at an AAU Track and Field Championship.

At Loyola University, he starred in football, basketball, and track. Notre Dame’s famous football coach, Knute Rockne, called him “The South’s Wonder Athlete.”  When he played major league baseball for the Chicago White Sox he twice led American League first basemen with the lowest percentage of errors.

I won’t tell you that Zeke Bonura was an excellent fielder – not to avoid boring you with the obvious, but to avoid lying.

Bonura was LOUSY at first base.  Sports editor, Otis Harris wrote in 1946: “It was never established beyond a shadow of a doubt that Bonura was the worst fielding first basemen in the majors, but the consensus was that he would do until another one came along.”

So, how could Bonura win the title of best defensive first basemen in both 1934 and 1938 and yet be considered such a bad defensive player?

Simple. He didn’t try.

Zeke made the brilliant discovery that you can’t be charged with an error if you don’t touch the ball. So, he let easy grounders roll into left field and waved at them with his “Mussolini salute.”

 

I would love to take this opportunity to heap scorn on the lethargic ambitions of Zeke Bonura, but I can’t. I find myself doing the same thing. Sometimes I become so afraid of failing that I never try.

 

On the apostle Paul’s missionary trips, he often failed to win over the people he met. Once, (against the wishes of the town’s Chamber of Commerce) they stoned Paul and left him for dead. But he picked himself up, dusted himself off, and continued to carry the Good News on his lips.

And good things happened because he wasn’t afraid to fail.

 

One of the greatest inventors of his time, Charles Kettering, said, “You will never stub your toe standing still. The faster you go, the more chance there is of stubbing your toe.” “But,” Kettering adds, “the more chance you have of getting somewhere.”

 

When we get our purpose figured out, we won’t waste time trying to pad our stats. We’ll be too busy nursing our toes.

(copyright by climbinghigher.org and by Marty Kaarre) 

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