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Tuesday, February 13, 2007

They keep it under glass that seals out any air getting to it. When it's not on display, it's kept underground in a vault - actually a bombproof vault. It's the most important document in the history of the United States. Of course, it's the Declaration of Independence. The men who signed it that hot July 4th in Philadelphia knew it was very important, but I wonder if they could have possibly conceived what a sacred piece of paper it would become to the nation that it launched. Here were subjects of the English king daring to declare their independence from their king. It changed their lives forever. It changed the world forever. And once a year, every Fourth of July, America stops to remember that Independence Day.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Not long ago I was speaking at a Christian workers' conference in Alaska, and a veteran missionary approached me afterward with some intriguing information. She and her husband have worked for many years with an Indian tribe in Alaska - a tribe that has an interesting custom. If you are from that tribe, you grow up learning about your backpack. It's not a real backpack, but it's a symbol of a very real human experience. The idea is that whenever you do something wrong, a rock goes in your backpack and you carry on your back all the weight of all your mistakes all your life.

Wednesday, February 7, 2007

I'm pretty sure there's a five-year-old kid in all of us (for sure there is one in me), and one place it came out in me was years ago when we took our kids to one of America's major theme parks. Like a lot of theme parks, we found you had to get there early because you have to wait for some of the most exciting attractions. The earlier you get there, the shorter the line. Of course, you can't ride all the rides simultaneously, so even the early birds end up in lines a good part of the day. Now, at this particular park, some of the longest lines are for a ride called Space Mountain. Maybe you've been there. It's basically a wild roller coaster ride through outer space in almost total darkness. When we took the kids there, I asked someone coming out how long they waited in this obviously long line. "An hour," one guy told me. An hour? Well, we did it. We even went back later and did it again. We even saw a lot of teenagers; you know, people not normally known for their patience, enduring the wait for Space Mountain. Why? Because you have to wait if you want the best stuff.

Wednesday, January 31, 2007

I have some friends who love to fish, and in their honor I have to tell you this great fisherman story I heard from my friend Ravi Zacharias. It seems that two men were out fishing in separate boats. And the one watched the other with a growing curiosity because he would catch a fish and keep it, then catch another fish and throw it away. And he continued this with catch after catch. The really strange part was that it was always the big ones that this man threw away. Finally, the man watching all this couldn't contain his curiosity, so he called out the obvious question, "How come you're throwing away the big ones?" The man answered back, "Oh, because I only have an eight-inch frying pan!"

Friday, January 26, 2007

It's a familiar scenario. A man is driving his family on vacation; let's say they're going from Chicago to California. His wife gently points out to him that she just saw a sign saying, "Welcome to Kentucky." Kentucky is definitely not between Chicago and California. Repeatedly, the Mrs. suggests that the Mr. stop and ask directions. Then she says that four-letter word, "I think we're lost." But will he stop and ask for directions? No! Maybe it's something in the male chromosome. Like most men, he's too proud to admit he's lost, and he's probably not going to end up where he hoped.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Oh, those firstborn children. Somewhere inside their brain is this tattoo: "I can do it myself." Wait. I'm a firstborn. So is our daughter. And when she decided at the age of five that she was going to bake a cake, she, of course, didn't need any help. Her "I'm going to bake a cake" moment was a good news/bad news announcement for me. Good news: my little girl is growing up. Bad news: I have to eat it. Well, we heard a lot of banging of pans in the kitchen and ultimately the smells of something baking. Maybe this was going to work after all. Minutes later, my little girl came into the living room, almost tripping over her lower lip. She was sad. She explained: "Daddy, it came out flat." Then she brought in her first cake. Or maybe I should say pancake. It was that flat. That's when Sr. Baking Advisor, Mom, entered the picture to see what our daughter could learn from the cake that fell flat. She'd put in the milk, the eggs, the flour. But she forgot just one ingredient - the baking powder - the anti-flat ingredient in a cake.

Monday, January 22, 2007

The plan was flawless. They told me that Cadillac Mountain was the first place you could see the sun rise in the United States. And my job, of course, was to provide wonderful memories and special experiences for my children. We were vacationing in Maine, and I was determined to let them have this thrill. Somehow, they didn't seem as excited about it as I was; must have been a maturity thing. Then why wasn't my wife excited? Anyway, I carefully checked the weather forecast every day until I was sure we'd have a clear morning to see the sunrise. I made everyone go to sleep early. I woke everybody up at 3:00 A. M. We were in a campground and I was afraid the kids would wake up complaining and waking up the neighbors, so I had a doughnut ready to stuff into each little mouth - including mine. I bundled everyone into the car and up we drove to the top of Cadillac Mountain. I kept checking my watch, waiting for that magic moment of the scheduled sunrise, and the moment came. No sun. We waited and waited. Surprise! The weatherman was wrong. We saw a distinctly unmemorable cloudrise.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

The thought of a fire on an airplane is really pretty unsettling. That's exactly what happened on an Air Canada flight a few years ago. The fire started in the lavatory and smoke quickly spread throughout the plane. The pilot couldn’t see and he didn't know how he was going to land. But suddenly this calm, measured voice came into the cockpit, "Just do what I say. I'll bring you in." It was the flight controller. And that calm voice literally talked the pilot in for a miraculously safe landing!

Friday, December 29, 2006

I guess you could call it creative architecture. Or you could just call it a big stone in the middle of a high brick wall. I saw this phenomenon when I visited the new station of one of our radio partners recently. The front wall of the station has this big old 230-pound stone, about halfway up the wall in the middle of the bricks. There's no way that could be mistake or an accident. It is, in fact, a message. A masonry contractor offered to do some of the work on the station, and somewhere along the way he thought about a stone like this. He thought about what the Bible says about Jesus being the "chief cornerstone." So he went to the local quarry and found this impressive piece of rock, which he installed in a central spot in the front of the building, with the "chief cornerstone" scripture reference under it. I love the reason he gave for this unusual feature. He said, "You build everything around the cornerstone."

Monday, December 25, 2006

When I was growing up, Christmas was a double-header for me, because my birthday is just a few days before Christmas. Just in case you care, it's on the date that the Wright Brothers flew the first airplane successfully. With all the time I've spend on airplanes in my life, you gotta wonder if that's some kind of destiny. That's also the date of the Battle of the Bulge. Destiny again? But I have never had a complaint about when my birthday is. As a kid, I tried to turn that into an advantage by asking for a gift that would be too much for just Christmas but not for Christmas and your birthday. And besides cleaning up in the gift department, it's just neat to have a birthday at a time when all the world seems to be celebrating. All right, not my birthday obviously, but it's just the best time of the year!

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