Subscribe  

Thursday, April 7, 2005

It was one of those unrehearsed Presidential moments that capture America's Chief Executive in situations you might never otherwise see. After George W. Bush's Second Inauguration, there was a prayer service at the National Cathedral, and an offering was taken for which the President was apparently unprepared. What the camera captured was his Father, Former President Bush, reaching over his son's shoulder from the pew behind him. He was slipping the President of the United States some money to put in the offering plate. It all happened pretty quickly and pretty skillfully, but the camera got it, and you just had to smile.

Wednesday, April 6, 2005

It was early last February, and we had just gotten several inches of snow - that wet, heavy kind. As you probably know, February is about the time that cabin fever starts to set in for those of us who have something called winter, and we're really ready for the cold to be over. Well, it isn't at that point; usually for a few more weeks. But I saw something so amazing that day of the February snow that I went for my camera to take pictures of it. On the south side of our shed, I saw something just barely peaking out from the snow. It was the shoots of our yellow daffodils! I brushed off the snow and I captured it on film - the promise of a coming spring in the middle of a very wintry day!

Tuesday, April 5, 2005

It was Moving Day! If you've ever moved from one house to another, across the street or across the country, you know how much fun it can be. And if you think it's fun, you've obviously never done it. Our daughter and son-in-law and their two boys had moved a lot of their belongings to a temporary house while major repairs were being done on their house. A few weeks after they hauled a lot of their life into their temporary home, they got to move it out again and back into their real home. We all pitched in, and there were a lot of trips back and forth with armloads of boxes and bags, and loading everything into several family vehicles. Our three-year-old grandson was watching all the work going on, and as he heard some of us discussing what was still left to do, he quickly volunteered his personal perspective. We hadn't yet asked him to do anything, but he still turned to walk away with these words on his lips: "I'm not available right now."

Monday, April 4, 2005

I don't think I've ever "teared up" during a President's State of the Union Address to Congress - until one unforgettable moment during President George W. Bush's State of the Union early in 2005. For me, it had absolutely nothing to do with politics. It was an intensely human moment that almost transcended politics. At one point in his speech, he paid tribute to the Iraqi people for their courage in going to the polls in the face of incredible danger. Then, the President introduced a guest that was sitting in the gallery next to the First Lady - a woman who has been an Iraqi freedom activist for 11 years - since Saddam Hussein had her father executed. She stood with her index finger in the air, still tinted with that identifying purple dye of one who had voted. She was very moved by the standing ovation from everyone in the chamber.

Thursday, March 31, 2005

Lots and lots of marble steps - that's one thing I remember from our family trip to Washington D.C. when the kids were little. In fact, our youngest was about two years old the first time we went there. In fact, he told me at that time that he was very interested in seeing the legislative, judicial, and executive branches of the government firsthand. Oh, but those steps! Have you ever been to the U.S. Capitol building or the Lincoln Memorial? You may remember feeling new feelings in your legs by the time you reached the top. Imagine our little guy. He looked up at those stairs and he knew there was no way with those short little legs. So was he stuck at the bottom with no hope of reaching the top of the steps? Hey, wait a minute. That's not true. He had me! And I had one of those child carriers on my back which he got in. And he made it where he never could have gone himself, because someone bigger carried him.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

My wife and I like Mexican food. Actually, I just like food, but she likes Mexican food much hotter than I do. She likes the salsa, the hot sauce - the really hot stuff. I like wimp sauce on mine actually. But not even she can handle what our friend from Mexico goes for. He doesn't just like hot sauce on his food. He likes molten lava. Even the candy he eats has chilies in it. It brings tears to our eyes, but he pops it like we do M&M's. Recently, he told me about a Mexican pepper that he had never tasted before. Some friends recommended it to him. He took a big bite out of it and really enjoyed it. It wasn't hot, it was actually mild. He enjoyed it so much, he ate some more. No fire, no burn, just a nice taste experience - until a few minutes later. Here's how he told it - "Suddenly, my mouth burst into flames!" Now, when he thinks something's hot, it's on fire, man! But there was no hint of the fire when he was biting into it. I loved what he named this particular pepper. He calls it "The Liar."

Thursday, March 24, 2005

You can have some say in what seat you get on an airplane. In fact, I usually reserve the kind of seat I want in advance. But you don't have any say in who your neighbors will be. Like the children who were in the seat behind me on one flight. My first clue that it was going to be an interesting flight was their squealing and crying before we ever took off. Mom just didn't seem to have her young daughter and her younger son under control, but she was trying. As we took off, I heard her tell her daughter loudly, "Don't squeeze your brother's head!" That sounded like a reasonable request to me. Then she gave a reason, "You know he's got a fever and he keeps throwing up!" Oh, great! For some strange reason, I instinctively ducked. The way I figured it, a straight trajectory would carry anything that came from that boy's mouth right to my head. I looked at the passenger next to me and we both just kind of shrugged and bent our heads down. Well, nothing terribly gross happened, but all during the flight, I kept thinking about those flu germs flying all around me and I hoped I'd taken enough Vitamin C that morning!

Wednesday, March 23, 2005

Our sons both played linemen positions on their high school football team - which means they had to take their share of jokes about being big and dumb. Linemen's numbers are usually like 70-something, and they were number 75 and 76. So the word was that linemen wore their I.Q. on their jerseys. It's probably a good thing most of us were never told what our Intelligence Quotient is and really a good thing it wasn't advertised on our jersey! But after all is said and done, there's a measurement of your capabilities that's far more important anyway.

Wednesday, March 16, 2005

While our Ministry Headquarters was being built, we had a problem. We were soon moving out of the space we had rented in another area, and we had no space to move into and the ministry couldn't stop in between! That's when my wife began to take a second look at the one structure on the land that we were about to build on - an old pole barn. At first glance, it looked like a good storm could knock it over. Someone jokingly suggested that it was still standing only because the termites were holding hands! But my wife has this incredible ability to see potential in something that everyone else would tend to give up on. She persuaded me to consult with a contractor friend, who affirmed that, surprisingly, this was a building with a good foundation and solid rafters. So we went to work. Within weeks that old barn became a wonderful temporary office building, roofed with donated shingles and covered with donated siding. Today, it still houses some of our Team and it serves some vital purposes in our ministry. And when visitors come, they can't figure out why we keep calling it "the barn." We know what it was before my wife saw what it could be!

Friday, March 4, 2005

We just had the wonderful joy of a visit from our son, his wonderful wife and our awesome little granddaughter. She's two, but I think she has the vocabulary of a five-year-old. Besides being unexplainably beautiful (being my granddaughter, that is), she really knows how to communicate - with words, with gestures, facial expressions. We love our time with her, and she seems to love her time with us. But this isn't home. They live many miles from here. She needs to be home ultimately, sleeping in her bed, playing with her toys, being around the people she loves there, and enjoying her personal world. This is where she visits. That's where she lives. She was in the car with Mommy and Daddy, all strapped in her toddler seat and ready to pull out of the driveway to head home. But, oh how she cried! She begged me to get in. She begged me to sit down. Her crying broke a grandparent's heart. But she's home now, and she's loving being where she lives. It's just that leaving is so hard.

Monday, February 14, 2005

We were nearly three thousand miles from home when my wife was hit by this agonizing attack of gallstones. The situation was so acute that we had to get her to a hospital where it was quickly determined that she would need surgery to remove the stones. From what we understood, it could take six weeks for her to be able to travel back after the operation. Back home a cure would have meant this invasive incision. But God, of course, had this planned all the time. The hospital friends directed us to just happened to have on its staff one of the premier laser surgeons in the country. He zapped those gallstones with a laser beam and they were history. My honey was good to go in two days! Last week, a friend of ours lost his glasses - for good. He had a laser procedure on his eyes, and almost immediately his vision deficiencies have been corrected, and who needs glasses! Gallstones gone, vision corrected - with the power of a laser - with the power of focused light.

Thursday, February 10, 2005

In every war, battles take the names of previously little-known places and propel those places into the history books. In the war in Iraq, Fallujah will be such a place. As a center for insurgent activity and hostage executions, it became a major combat focus for the U. S. military, and like all such places, a spawning ground for heroes. Sgt. Rafael Peralta was one of those heroes. Before Fallujah, he had already built a reputation for putting his Marines' interests ahead of his own. USA Today reported that, as a platoon scout, he actually was not assigned to the assault team that entered an insurgent safe house near Fallujah. His assignment allowed him to avoid that danger, but he asked the squad leader if he could join their assault team. Sgt. Peralta was, in fact, one of the first Marines to enter that house. Rifle fire wounded him in the face, and he fell to the floor. Then an insurgent rolled a fragmentation grenade into the area where Peralta and the others were seeking cover. Then they made a break for the door - which turned out to be locked. They pounded frantically. That was when Sgt. Peralta grabbed the grenade that would, in a moment, threaten the lives of his comrades. He cradled it into his body and took the full force of the explosion. The squad leader later said, "He saved half my fire team."

Friday, February 4, 2005

He's been a phenomenon on the American scene for over 50 years - Dr. Billy Graham. Again and again, decade and decade, more than any other individual, he has appeared on the list of America's most respected men. In the twilight of his long ministry, his crusades have taken on a great sense of poignant significance. His crusade in Los Angeles near the end of 2004, attracted tens of thousands to the Rose Bowl, and many thousands to begin a personal relationship with the Savior Billy Graham has proclaimed all these years. His message each night was translated instantaneously into 26 languages, including sign language. Interpreters fed their translation to groups of people sitting in their language groups, hearing the translation via headsets tuned to appropriate low-wave frequencies on their little radios. Billy Graham's Crusades have been translated since 1980, but never into so many languages as in Los Angeles. The translating coordinator explained that it was important that each person hear the message in his own "heart language."

Friday, January 21, 2005

It's an old Asian parable with a lot of "right now" wisdom. A little boy had been trying for many days to capture one of the little birds that snacked in the family fields. He had tried over and over again to hide in the bushes and surprise one of those birds enough to get his hands on it. Finally, after many failed attempts, he captured his prize. And he couldn't wait to show his mommy. He wrapped his hands around that little bird and he ran all the way to his house. As soon as the little guy saw his mother, he proudly extended his cupped hands and said, "Mommy, I got a bird! He's really cute!" But his joy didn't last long. As he slowly opened his hands for his mother to see, he noticed the bird wasn't moving - or breathing. It was one heartbroken boy who cried, "Mommy, I was afraid I'd lose him. But I held him so tight, I crushed him."

Thursday, December 30, 2004

The funeral plans for Matt were in the works. The Park Service had announced that Matt was one of five people who had been killed in a plane crash on a mountainside in Montana. The funeral never happened. Suddenly, Matt's bereaved parents heard the stunning news: although he had been badly injured, their son, along with one other Forest Service worker, had just been rescued alive, miles from the crash site. Rescue workers at the scene of the crash had concluded that the charred wreckage and the scattered human remains indicated that the crash had been "insurvivable," they said. But amazingly, Matt and his fellow worker hiked for 29 hours, often in subfreezing temperatures, until they reached a highway where a motorist picked them up. One news magazine called it, "A Miracle in the Snows of Montana" (Newsweek, October 4, 2004).

Monday, December 27, 2004

This is really tough for a New York Yankees fan, but I heard something really good from a player on that other team - the 2004 World Champion (oh boy that hurts!) Boston Red Sox. Their dramatic eight game string of victories carried them from three games down to the Yankees all the way to a four game sweep of the World Series. Curt Schilling, a veteran star pitcher for the Red Sox, had pitched one of those first playoff losses to the Yankees. Then he came back dramatically to pitch a stellar game to help the Red Sox pull off a dramatic turnaround. They interviewed Curt Schilling immediately after that decisive victory. The interviewer wanted to talk about the injury Curt had overcome, but that wasn't what Curt wanted to talk about. His first response went like this: "I just want to say that I really felt God's touch out there tonight. Seven years ago, I became a Christian. But that first game, it was me doing it and you saw the results. Tonight, I gave it all to God, and He really touched me. Tonight you saw what He could do."

Friday, December 24, 2004

With two teenage boys who love football, one Christmas gift is sure to be a hit - a new leather football. And when it's a rare 60-degree Christmas morning, you're not just going to sit around the Christmas tree and admire that ball - you're going to go right outside and do what you're supposed to do with a football. So the three men of the house were quickly out of the house and in the middle of the street, passing that football back and forth. I was back for a long one - the pass was right to me. And I caught it - right on the end of my little finger, like the Christmas klutz. The emergency room is not where you want to spend a chunk of your Christmas, but that's where I was - with a special souvenir of that Christmas - a broken finger.

Thursday, December 23, 2004

It may well be the favorite song of the Christmas season - a lullaby written to the Christ Child many years ago in a little mountain village in Austria. A village pastor was desperate for some music for his Christmas Eve service since the church organ wasn't working, thanks to a mouse eating through parts of the organ! His composition didn't stay in that village. It spread from the Alps around the world, and you can't have a Christmas season without hearing it - probably multiple times. The signature song of celebrating Christmas - "Silent Night." Every verse ends with those beautiful calming words, "Sleep in heavenly peace." Nice words. Not always the way it is.

Wednesday, December 22, 2004

It's been used by many a parent to intimidate their children into being good for at least one month of the year. It's that list - you know, the one immortalized in the song, "Santa Claus is Coming to Town." You know the line: "He's making a list, checking it twice. Gonna find out who's naughty and nice." I never wanted to be on that naughty list. (Warning: Cover your child's ears at this point.) Then I found out there's no such list.

Tuesday, December 21, 2004

The Christmas season isn't complete for my friend Brian if he doesn't sing in that wonderful combined choir presentation of one of the most glorious musical compositions of all time - Handel's "Messiah" - with its unforgettable "Hallelujah Chorus." For many, it's a special part of their Christmas season. When George Friedrich Handel wrote that "Hallelujah Chorus," it was hardly a hallelujah time in his life. He was broke, indigent, and almost despondent. Then an acquaintance contacted him about writing an oratorio for a benefit concert to raise money to help some people get out of debtors' prison. In those days, if you couldn't pay your debts, you got thrown into prison. Maybe you're especially glad they don't still do that today! Well, in less than a month, Handel composed that masterpiece that would end up inspiring millions for centuries to come. Its first performance was life changing for him and for many people. Because of that night of "Hallelujah Chorus" for the "Messiah," 142 prisoners went free!

Subcategories

Your Hard Times

Your Relationships

Page 188 of 215

A Word With You Categories

                

GET IN TOUCH

Hutchcraft Ministries
P.O. Box 400
Harrison, AR 72602-0400

(870) 741-3300
(877) 741-1200 (toll-free)
(870) 741-3400 (fax)

FIND OUT MORE

Home / About

What We Do / Resources

News / Blog / Store

Contact Us / Privacy Policy

Donate

STAY UPDATED

We have many helpful and encouraging resources ready to be delivered to your inbox.

Please know we will never share or sell your info.

Subscribe

rhm-logo-white Copyright 2025 - All Rights Reserved - Hutchcraft Ministries

Back to top