Faith isn't Faith until it's all you're holding onto

Venturing out to the edge … of the precipice
Staring into the Grand Canyon of Papa’s love,
Letting the wind blow in your face the freshness of a breeze whose scents you’ve only barely tasted before
You take the risk …it’s time…
You take the step …it’s time…
You plunge…and suddenly…
You are flying…

~ William P Young
Author of "The Shack"

THE ANT AND THE CONTACT LENS A true story by Josh and Karen Zarandona

Brenda was a young woman who was invited to go rock climbing.
Although she was very scared, she went with her group to a tremendous
granite cliff. In spite of her fear, she put on the gear, took hold of the rope,
and started up the face of that rock.
Well, she got to a ledge where she could take a breather. As she was hanging on there, the safety rope snapped against Brenda's eye and knocked out her contact lens. Well, here she is, on a rock ledge, with hundreds of feet below her and hundreds of feet above her. Of course, she looked and looked and looked, hoping it had landed on the ledge, but it just wasn't there. Here she was, far from home, her sight now blurry.

She was desperate and began to get upset, so she prayed to the Lord to help her to find it. When she got to the top, a friend examined her eye and her clothing for the lens, but there was no contact lens to be found. She sat down, despondent, with the rest of the party, waiting for the rest of them to make it up the face of the cliff. She looked out across range after range of mountains, thinking of that verse that says, "The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth." She thought, "Lord, You can see all these mountains. You know every stone and leaf, and You know exactly where my contact lens is. Please help me."

Finally, they walked down the trail to the bottom. At the bottom there was a new party of climbers just starting up the face of the cliff. One of them shouted out, "Hey, you guys! Anybody lose a contact lens?" Well, that would be startling enough, but you know why the climber saw it? An ant was moving slowly across the face of the rock, carrying it on it's back.

Brenda told me that her father is a cartoonist. When she told him the incredible story of the ant, the prayer, and the contact lens, he drew a picture of an ant lugging that contact lens with the words, "Lord, I don't know why You want me to carry this thing. I can't eat it, and it's awfully heavy. But if this is what You want me to do, I'll carry it for You." I think it would probably do some of us good to occasionally say, "God, I don't know why you want me to carry this load. I can see no good in it and it's awfully heavy. But, if you want me to carry it, I will."

God doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called. Yes, I do love GOD. He is my source of existence and my Savior. He keeps me functioning each and every day. Without Him, I am nothing, but with Him...I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me. (Phil. 4:13)

"I had always felt life first as a story – and if there is a story
there is a storyteller." – G.K. Chesterton

"Everytime someone tells a story well, the gospel is served.”
~ Eugene Peterson

1. You will receive a body.
   You may like it or hate it,
   but it's yours to keep for the entire period.
   
   
2. You will learn lessons.
   You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called, "life."
   
   
3. There are no mistakes, only lessons.
   Growth is a process of trial, error, and experimentation.
   The "failed" experiments are as much a part
   of the process as the experiments that ultimately "work."
   
   
4. Lessons are repeated until they are learned.
   A lesson will be presented to you
   in various forms
   until you have learned it.
   When you have learned it,
   you can go onto the next lesson.
   
   
5. Learning lessons does not end.
   There's no part of life
   that doesn't contain its lessons.
   If you're alive, that means
   there are still lessons to be learned.
   
   
6. "There" is no better a place than "here."
   When your "there" has become a "here",
   you will simply obtain another "there"
   that will again look better than "here."
   
   
7. Other people are merely mirrors of you.
   You cannot love or hate something
   about another person
   unless it reflects to you something
   you love or hate about yourself.
   
   
8. What you make of your life is up to you.
   You have all the tools and resources you need.
   What you do with them is up to you.
   The choice is yours.
   
   
9. Your answers lie within you.
   The answers to life's questions lie within you.
   All you need to do is look, listen, and trust.
   
   
10. You will forget all this.

~

You know you’re truly someone’s friend
when they share their other friendships with you.

~someone

A vision without a task is but a dream
A task without a vision is drudgery
A task with a vision is the hope of the world

- inscription on a church in Sussex 1730