Daily Devotional; formerly Chaplains Corner

[ampaterry]

For today, I have adapted one from a story told in Illustrations Unlimited by James S. Hewett.

An old television circus show once featured a Bengal tiger act. Like most TV shows of that era, it was done live before an audience. One evening, the tiger trainer went into the cage with several tigers to do a routine performance. The door was locked behind him. The spotlights highlighted the cage, the television cameras moved in close, and the audience watched in suspense as the trainer skillfully put the tigers through their paces.

In the middle of the performance, the worst possible fate befell the act: the lights went out! For twenty or thirty long, dark seconds the trainer was locked in with the tigers. In the darkness they could, with their more acute vision, see him, but he could not see them. A whip and a small kitchen chair seemed meager protection under the circumstances, but he survived, and when the lights came on, he calmly finished the performance.

In an interview afterward, he was asked how he felt knowing that the tigers could see him but that he could not see them. He first admitted the chilling fear of the situation, but pointed out that the tigers did not know that he could not see them. He said, "I just kept cracking my whip and talking to them until the lights came on. And they never knew I could not see them as well as they could see me."

This experience gives us a picture of human life. At some point in our lives, all of us face the terrifying task of fighting tigers in the dark. Some face it constantly. What we must remember at such times is that God is with us; we need never allow the enemy to think we believe otherwise.

The Word of God tells us this:
Genesis 28:15 (KJV);
"And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of."

Isaiah 43:2 & part of 3 (KJV);
"When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the LORD thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour:"

Face your tigers with boldness, guys, and never let 'em know how close to filling your drawers you might really be.

[jack404]

i'm working on my own idea, i hope the Good Lord is leading me into the right direction, but no matter , what i think and what i know are two very different things , but getting closer as time goes by

cheers to you Terry

[Krogen]

Originally Posted by ampaterry

Face your tigers with boldness, guys, and never let 'em know how close to filling your drawers you might really be.

Thanks for that one, Terry! Your way with words reminds me of Pastor Nordsletten, my Pastor as I was growing up. He was a down-to-earth Norwegian who spoke his mind in the language of his flock. You're a teacher in the very same way that he was. Thanks.

[ampaterry]

We all struggle with that gap, Jack, between positive and maybe -

Welcome to TFF, Krogen -
I think everyone has been in that state sometime or other - why sugar coat it?
LOL!!

Thank you for your support, guys -

For today, something along the lines of that gap Jack speaks of, and how to breach it -

Many of us older folks remember Ice Houses. Judy remembers them in Minnesota, where she grew up - and I can remember some folks having them in Illinois as well. In the winter, men would go out on the frozen lakes or rivers and use hand saws to cut big blocks of ice from the surface. These were then hauled into the ice houses, which had thick walls, no windows, and a tightly fitted door. Here, the ice was placed on a layer of sawdust, and covered with another layer. When the weather warmed up, these houses were used as refrigerators, and would last until winter came again. Like the pot bellied stove folks used to sit around at the general store, the ice house is just another piece of American culture that has been replaced by modern technology.

I read a story about a man who lost a valuable watch while working in an ice house. He searched diligently for it, carefully raking through the sawdust, but couldn't find it. The other men working the ice also looked, but their efforts, too, proved futile.

A small boy who heard about the fruitless search slipped into the ice house during the noon hour and soon emerged with the watch. Amazed, the men asked him how he found it.
"I closed the door," the boy replied, "lay down in the sawdust, and kept very still. Soon I heard the watch ticking."

Often the question is not whether God is speaking, but whether we are being still enough, and quiet enough, to hear.

The Word of God tells us about listening to the voice of God:
1 Kings 19:12 (KJV);
"And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice."

Proverbs 8:34 (KJV);
"Blessed is the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my doors."

James 1:19 (KJV);
"Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:"

May God bless you, guys, and help to quiet your heart and mind as you listen for him - -

[BlackEagle]

Spot on, Terry.
This reminds me of what the last verses of Psalm 46, and Psalm 61 say.

[ampaterry]

There is indeed a great spiritual benefit in quiet solitude, BlackEagle. So many are so caught up in the hustle and bustle that they never experience it.

As an Atheist, when we lived in Alaska, on a couple of occasions I found myself standing on the summet of a mountain, looking up through the waving curtain of the Aurora Borealis at the silent stars overhead. On each of those occasions, I experienced the presence of the being that I denied existed.

If more people spent more time in silent contemplation of the universe, there would be fewer atheists in the world.

For today -


Everyone is familiar with the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, but not many seem to have read the story of how it came about. It was written five years after the fact in the University of Pacific Review:
There were two electrical engineers in the control room that night, and the best thing that could be said for what they were doing is they were "playing around" with the machine. They were performing what the Soviets later described as an unauthorized experiment. They were trying to see how long a turbine would "free wheel" when they took the power off it.
Now, taking the power off that kind of a nuclear reactor is a difficult, dangerous thing to do, because these reactors are very unstable in their lower ranges. In order to get the reactor down to that kind of power, where they could perform the test they were interested in performing, they had to override manually six separate computer-driven alarm systems.
One by one the computers would come up and say, "Stop! Dangerous! Go no further!" And one by one, rather than shutting off the experiment, they shut off the alarms and kept going. You know the results: nuclear fallout that was recorded all around the world, from the largest industrial accident ever to occur in the world.

The instructions and warnings in Scripture are just as clear. We ignore them at our own peril, and tragically, at the peril of innocent others. Scripture tells us:

Jeremiah 6:10 (KJV);
"To whom shall I speak, and give warning, that they may hear? behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they cannot hearken: behold, the word of the LORD is unto them a reproach; they have no delight in it."

Ezekiel 12:2 (KJV);
"Son of man, thou dwellest in the midst of a rebellious house, which have eyes to see, and see not; they have ears to hear, and hear not: for they are a rebellious house."

Zechariah 7:11 (KJV);
"But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear."

Heeding the manufacturers warnings is ALWAYS a good practice, guys.
And that holds true for OUR manufacturer as well -

May He richly bless each one of you -

[BlackEagle]

Originally Posted by ampaterry

There is indeed a great spiritual benefit in quiet solitude, BlackEagle. So many are so caught up in the hustle and bustle that they never experience it.

As an Atheist, when we lived in Alaska, on a couple of occasions I found myself standing on the summet of a mountain, looking up through the waving curtain of the Aurora Borealis at the silent stars overhead. On each of those occasions, I experienced the presence of the being that I denied existed.

If more people spent more time in silent contemplation of the universe, there would be fewer atheists in the world...

The instructions and warnings in Scripture are just as clear. We ignore them at our own peril, and tragically, at the peril of innocent others. Scripture tells us:

Heeding the manufacturers warnings is ALWAYS a good practice, guys.
And that holds true for OUR manufacturer as well -

May He richly bless each one of you -

Thanks again, Terry. So very true.
Years ago I memorised Psalm 19 (which was instrumental in my dad's becoming a Christian). The first part of the Psalm tells how God shows Himself to us though His creation. What you saw in the Northern Lights in Alaska, dad saw in the stars in the Pacific Ocean during WW2. The second half describes how God's Word tells us about Him, and His instruction for living. As you say God's Word is our instruction book for life, and we ignore it at our peril.

[ampaterry]

I can remember my dad telling me how people were buried with coins on their eyes when he was a kid. I asked him why they did this, and he said to hold the eyelids shut. I asked why they used coins for this when any small object would have worked, and he said he did not know.

If you have seen the movie "Troy", you may have noticed that they placed coins on the eyes of their dead as well, and said they were "for the boatman". In ancient legends and mythology, the dead had to cross the river Styx to reach the afterlife, and the boatman that ferried them across demanded payment. I find it amazing that this custom lasted for many hundreds of years after it's meaning was completely lost.

There are many funeral customs, past and present, which we Christians find curious. Several cultures buried food, possessions, pets, horses, and slaves with the body of the deceased. Among Buddhists in Tibet, when a man dies, the holy man or lama draws the soul out of the body to show it the way to Paradise. Among Moslems, teachers come to the tomb to instruct the dead as to how he or she will answer the two examining angels. In some Buddhist countries, priests recite sacred texts around the dead body, in shifts, night and day, until his burial. Zoroastrianism forbade weeping over the dead because it made passage to the afterlife more difficult.

How different, how straightforward is the Christian view of death:

Psalms 23:4 (KJV);
"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me."

1 Corinthians 15:54-57 (KJV);
"So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."

Philemon 1:21 (KJV);
"For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain."

May God bless each one of you -

[Juker]

Amen, amen.

[BlackEagle]

Originally Posted by Juker

Amen, amen.

[ampaterry]

Thank you, guys, for your support!

When we married, I was in the service making VERY little salary, and Judy was employed in Bloomington, IL at State Farm Insurance. Within three weeks, I was transferred to Eielson AFB in Alaska, and we lived in nearby Fairbanks. As an E3, I was not supposed to bring Judy with me on that assignment, but being married for such a brief time, I had no intention of being separated from her. She held several different jobs while we lived there, but we were always poor due to the HORRID cost of living in Alaska. She bought me an '03 30-06 rifle for our second Christmas together, and it was my pride and joy! To save money, I wanted to reload my own ammunition, but Judy had lived near a gunsmith that decided smoking while reloading was a fine idea. He managed to kill himself, destroy his home, and pepper the neighborhood with bullets when he dropped a live ash into the reloading block of charged casings. Due to this, she was adamant about NOT having reloading done in her house.

The next Christmas, under the tree, there was a small package for me from her. It was a Lee Loader in 30-06 caliber.
I actually had tears running down my cheeks when I saw what it was. Not because the lee loader was my dream gift - I could have lived my entire life without one - but because my wife had sacrificed something of herself for me. She had done this in spite of her great fear in order to make me happy.

Over the years since, Judy has made many sacrifices for me, for our children, for our family, and for God. But my eyes will always mist over when I think of that shiny new Lee Loader, and her smile as she gave it to me.

The Word of God speaks of sacrifices:
Philippians 3:7-8 (KJV);
"But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,"

Romans 12:1 (KJV);
"I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service."

Hebrews 11:4 (KJV);
"By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh."

Guys, my life has been filled with many blessings.
I pray that each one of you finds yours to be also.

[BlackEagle]

We also hardly had two cents to rub together when we were first married. My wife knew I liked photography, and saved her babysitting money to buy me a used but very good Canon EOS SLR camera that I still have, and have taken many good pictues with.

As you say, what love that kind of thing shows, and God gave us an even more wonderful gift in His Son.

Thanks for the reminder, Terry.

[ampaterry]

May God bless and keep them safe, BlackEagle -

For today:

I have been involved in electronics since I was in 5th grade, and have taken several courses in various aspects of that fascinating field. Then in the 70's, I was hired by Keystone Steel and Wire in Peoria Illinois as an Industrial Electrician. The electrical part of that occupation was easy for me, but the biggest thing I had to learn was the peculiar LANGUAGE spoken by electricians. Tools all had a specific name, and was seldom the name given them in the catalogs. Linesman's pliers, for instance, were called "Klines", regardless if Kline made them or not. Slip joint pliers were called "channel locks", no matter what brand they were. High voltage impregnated linen tape was called "yellow dog", and all brands of crimp connectors were "sta-kons". After a while, it became easy to spot someone who was new on the job by his misuse of the terms.

This peculiarity was used by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to find out who was telling the truth and who was lying on their resumes a few years ago when they needed electricians. They ran a help-wanted ad for electricians with expertise at using Sontag connectors. They received 170 responses, all claiming expertise with this hardware. They used this information to sort out the fakes, however - because there is no such thing as a Sontag connector.

The Word of God tells us that NO ONE speaks the truth ALWAYS.
Psalms 116:11 (KJV);
"I said in my haste, All men are liars."

Jeremiah 9:5 (KJV);
"And they will deceive every one his neighbour, and will not speak the truth: they have taught their tongue to speak lies, and weary themselves to commit iniquity."

It is very common for people seeking employment to stretch their resume’ a bit to make themselves more attractive to prospective employers. It is important as Christians, however, to do our very best to avoid the common practices of the world. We are all liars, true, but it is a condition we should be battling, not relaxing in. Every time a Christian lies, he damages his testimony for Jesus Christ.

May God bless each one of you, guys -

[jack404]

too true eh

Cheers to you Terry

[ampaterry]

Honesty is a huge subject; there are many ways to be dishonest beyond stretching a resume - -

Have you ever made up some excuse to keep from admitting the real reason for something you did? Sometimes, we may even lie to ourselves in cases like this, imagining that cloud in the distance will bring rain, so there is no reason to wash the car when it is going to get rained on anyway. Today, the sun is out and it is simply too hot to mow the lawn. Tomorrow, the high clouds give us shade, but the impending rain will probably stop us when we are only partly done with the job.

On a beautiful fall day, four teenaged girls decided to go for a drive instead of showing up to class on time. When they did arrive, the girls explained to the teacher they had had a flat tire. The teacher accepted the excuse, much to the girls' relief.
"Since you missed this morning's quiz, you must take it now," she said. "Please sit in the four corner seats in this room without talking." When they were seated, the teacher said, "On your paper write the answer to one question: 'Which tire was flat?'"

Did you see the movie “The Lady Killers”? There is some REALLY bad language in it, so I cannot recommend you see it, but it shows how one little lie leads naturally into another, then another, then more, and eventually the whole false construct comes crashing down and usually lands on the one that started telling the lies in the first place.

The Word of God speaks a lot about lies:
Proverbs19:5 (KJV);
"A false witness shall not be unpunished, and he that speaketh lies shall not escape."

Zechariah 8:16 (NCV);
"These are the things you should do: Tell each other the truth. In the courts judge with truth and complete fairness."

Colossians 3:9-10 (KJV);
"Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds; And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him:"

May God bless each one of you -

[pipeman525]

Terry I am loving this honesty topic for the last couple of days. I really liked the story about the four girls. We need more honesty today as it is almost looked down upon in so many segments of our society.

[BlackEagle]

Falsehood usually entails lots of words. I start smelling a rat when people start talking a lot and saying not much. I like what Jesus said in Matthew 5:37:
(King James Version)

37But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.

Proverbs adds:
(Proverbs 10:18-20)
18He that hideth hatred with lying lips, and he that uttereth a slander, is a fool.
19 In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin: but he that refraineth his lips is wise.
20The tongue of the just is as choice silver: the heart of the wicked is little worth.

Thanks again, Terry. You've hit the nail on the head.

[ampaterry]

The classic old time Western movies had the hero saying little other than "Yep", "Nope" and "Maybe".

I like that kind of simple honesty - -

[RunningOnMT]

This hit home. While my friends would say I'm honest to a fault, I must confess to being a liar. Somewhere along the way I adopted the habit of using the convenient lie when it was an easier explanation for something I have done, or to avoid the embarrassment or ridicule I might receive were the truth known.

Though these "little white lies" might seem innocent enough to some, I believe that as they get easier, they also get bigger. Like all sin, what starts out seeming innocent will end up corrupting a person. This could lead to other forms of dishonesty such as stealing or bearing false witness. As Christians there should be no falseness in us, as there is no falseness in the Lord we claim to serve.

I need to start dealing more honestly with all the issues of life and quit making up excuses for the things I do. Thank you all for reminding me of this.

[ampaterry]

Far more people believe in Angels than believe in demons. The best work the Devil has ever done is to convince people that he does not exist.

A benevolent God, however, is much easier to believe in. People seek them out. It is characteristic of our time that people want to have God but do not want to have the Devil. People even invent gods for themselves, with what has been called their 'do-it-yourself God Kits'. I deal with people almost every day that claim a god like these. But these creations are gods who do not demand much of them, and they certainly are not gods who punish! They are, however, allowed to reward. Their gods absolve them from conflict and doubt, massage them, pat them on the head. They whisper sweet words into their ears in the dark of night, and contribute to their bravado in the bright daylight. But above all they are gods who will not trouble them with the fact of evil. The problems of evil, suffering, and death are not confronted, but evaded and dismissed.

The Word of God tells us that Satan caused our original fall:
Genesis 3:14-15 (KJV);
"And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."

And it tells us that he continued to inhabit the earth:
Job 1:6-7 (KJV);
"Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them. And the LORD said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it."

And finally, that he is a master of disguise:
2 Corinthians 11:14 (KJV);
"And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light."

I testify to you of an absolute certainty; Satan is alive and well, and living on planet earth. And you are NO MATCH for him without the proper arms; the Whole Armor of God.

May God bless and strengthen each one of you -

[BlackEagle]

Thanks again, Terry.
Dad has often said that in the beginning God created man, and ever since man has been trying to return the favor.
Have you read any of Frank Peretti's books...This Present Darkness, etc.?

[ampaterry]

No, I have not -

[ampaterry]

Recent discussions here regarding the religious beliefs of a candidate for President brought to mind the presidential race some years ago when Pat Robertson was running for that office. A humanist ridiculed him by asking "Do you want a president who believes he can protect the United States from a hurricane by PRAYING about it?" I thought to myself - yes indeed, that’s EXACTLY the president I want. Such faith is NEEDED in the white house and in the halls of congress; it has been too long absent. Today, many people are working very hard to convince us that this nation was founded along secular lines, and that our forefathers were NOT men of strong faith. It seems that if one of our great leaders did not have a fish emblem branded on his horse, he is called a "deist" and the case is presented that he was not a Christian.

In 1863 President Lincoln designated April 30th as a day of national humiliation, fasting, and prayer. Let me read just a portion of his proclamation on that occasion:

"It is the duty of nations, as well as of men, who owe their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon, and to recognize the sublime truth announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by a history that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord. The awful calamity of civil war which now desolates the land may be but a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole people. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has grown, but we have forgotten God."

Lincoln did not mention the name "Jesus" in this proclamation, but no rational person can doubt that he was a man of strong faith in God. The nay-sayers will not consider that he might have been trying to be sensative to his Jewish listeners in general, and the Solomon family in particular.

The word of God warns us about this in
Deuteronomy 6:10-12 (KJV);
"And it shall be, when the LORD thy God shall have brought thee into the land which he sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give thee great and goodly cities, which thou buildedst not, And houses full of all good things, which thou filledst not, and wells digged, which thou diggedst not, vineyards and olive trees, which thou plantedst not; when thou shalt have eaten and be full; Then beware lest thou forget the LORD, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage."

May God bless each one of us with wisdom this year in choosing a leader for our nation that will bring us closer to Him.

[jack404]

Cheers Terry

[ampaterry]

G'day, Jack!

Sometimes what we THINK we need is not at all what we REALLY need. For instance: Ricardo Semler tells of a lesson he learned working at Semco: "We were in yet another meeting, when we came to the purchase of $50,000 worth of file cabinets. Several departments had been waiting months for the cabinets and in desperation had decided to pool their requests.
"We didn't buy a single new file cabinet that day. Instead, we decided to stop the company for half a day and hold the First Biannual Semco File Inspection and Clean-out. Our instructions were simple: We told everyone to look inside every file folder and purge every nonessential piece of paper. I was one of Semco's biggest file hogs, with four large cabinets and a request for two more. After our cleanup, I trimmed down to a single cabinet, and that was pretty much how it went throughout the company ... The cleanup went so well that when everyone had finished, Semco auctioned off dozens of unneeded file cabinets."

And sometimes, what we think we are pursuing is not what we are really pursuing. For instance, there was a young woman in the library who grabbed and checked out a book whose cover read:
HOW TO
Attract Men
Reach Men
Hold Men
Win Men
When she got home and started reading it, she found it was a manual on building a men's Bible class.

The Word of God tells us how to discover what we really need, and how to attain it:
Romans 8:26-27 (KJV);
"Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God."

May God bless each and every one of you -