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November 26, 2021

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When you've driven as much as I have over the years, you know when it's time to stop. I've been driving along at night, and suddenly I'm enveloped in this thick fog; usually in the mountains. Semis are pulled over to the side of the road, and they're professional drivers. They know well enough not to go on. It's definitely time to stop before I hit something. Same thing when I suddenly find myself in one of those driving rainstorms, or I've been in a snow storm. You know, "whiteout" they call it. Those times when you literally can't see a car length in front of you. It's like you're temporarily blind, and you'd better not keep pushing ahead.

November 25, 2021

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Well, the President of the United States - let's see, he's got wars to manage, a wild economy to handle. You know what? Every Thanksgiving he steps up to one of the most decisive responsibilities of his office. He pardons a turkey; well, actually, two turkeys. This is really serious business. Actually they even have a backup turkey (this is the truth) just in case Turkey #1 isn't able to serve as, well, what one writer called the ungobbled gobbler.

November 24, 2021

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There almost was no first Thanksgiving. There were almost no Pilgrims. Those Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock got hit very hard their first winter. Many of them died, and many more could have died from starvation if it hadn't been for one man - an Indian brave called Squanto. As a young man, he'd been kidnapped and carried off to England to be a servant. While Squanto was there, he learned English and he learned about Christ. Because of the kindness of some of the people he met, he eventually made it back across the Atlantic to his people; except his people weren't there anymore.

November 23, 2021

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It had been an awful spring for tornadoes - record-setting in many ways. Again and again, our news coverage then was filled with those all-too-familiar images of a city or a neighborhood leveled and the death toll rising. One of them hit pretty close to where we are. It hit in Joplin, Missouri.

November 22, 2021

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When you speak in public settings as much as I do, you learn there are two people in that auditorium you really want on your side. One is the man in charge of the sound. Without him, no one can hear you. The other is the man in charge of the spotlight, because without him, no one can see you.

November 19, 2021

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Nobody ever said college guys are going to win the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval. Right? I mean, entering many of their dorm rooms is only for the very brave, and those with a strong stomach. Where is Mom when you really need her?

November 18, 2021

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It was the only kind of day they have at O'Hare Airport - busy. It was August, and I was one of the thousands of passengers there who had plans and schedules, things we had to do, places we had to be. But, as far as I know, none of us made it. No, Chicago had a record-breaking storm that day - over nine inches of rain. There was massive flooding, in fact so much that the airport was literally flooded closed. That created an interesting dynamic with no one able to come in or go out. It was sort of like Camp O'Hare all of a sudden. Many of us spent the day trying to find either a way out, or a phone to call out, or a place to spend the night. It was before cell phones, and it was a few years ago and that's why we didn't have all the technology to contact somebody. Virtually no one did what he or she had planned to do that day. Oh no! Our plans didn't go through all because of one storm! The rich, the poor, the powerful, the famous, the unknown, the young, the old - didn't matter. Suddenly your destiny was out of your control. You know what? Storms will do that to you.

November 17, 2021

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Every once in a while another turf fight breaks out in places like New York City, and it's not between rival youth gangs. Let's say, the police department and the fire department. There's kind of a competitiveness there. They'll clash over whose job is whose.

November 16, 2021

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Life has a lot of disrupting sounds, huh? And you can learn to tune a lot of them out: sirens screaming, telephones ringing, TVs blaring, trains rumbling. But there's one sound almost impossible to ignore - a baby's crying. If there's a baby in your house and he starts crying, what should you do? Just yell, "Nuisance!" and shut the door? Turn up the music? Yell back? Not unless you're a hopeless rookie at handling babies. No, you know the crying isn't the problem. It's what's causing the crying. Pointing at the baby and saying, "Stop that!" probably isn't going to make a lot of difference. See, the crying isn't going to stop until their little tummy is filled ... or until he gets the relief that only a good burp can give ... or until you get the baby out of that mess. Yep, the crying is a nuisance, but the need behind the crying - that's the real issue.

November 15, 2021

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Some couples' wedding vows get tested sooner; some get tested later. My friends had theirs tested right away. When they went to Mexico for their honeymoon, they promptly picked up some Spanish speaking bug down there, and they got very, very sick in the middle of what was supposed to be their very romantic honeymoon. I think it was commonly called Montezuma's Revenge or something like that.

November 12, 2021

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We had heard so much about the Stealth bomber, and it comes under the radar at night, you know, virtually invisible to ground defenses. So, some years ago, we were shocked when we heard that one of those had been downed during NATO's bombing of Serbia. We saw the burning plane wreckage on Serb TV, but there was no mention of the pilot. Well, my wife and I stopped as soon as we heard the news and we prayed for the safety of that pilot wherever he was. And as it turned out, our military launched an all-out search for him as soon as they learned his plane was down. In fact, their rescue tactics are so sophisticated no one really told the whole story of how they went about it. But I was impressed, not to mention all the other pilots who were risking their lives every day over Serbia...at how they were committed to the rescue, whatever it took. Boy, you know, the pilot knew it. And they brought him out!

November 11, 2021

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Tony was one of the best-liked teachers in our local school - at least he had our kid's vote. As he and I were working together on a project at our house, I was really surprised to learn about his background. I never would have guessed it. See, he grew up in a very tough neighborhood in our area. It was sharply divided into these ethnic pockets. Well, actually, into ethnic gangs. And Tony, by his own admission, was a fighter. Most of the guys in his neighborhood were. And then, five of his good friends died violently in two months time - five friends in two months; one of them his very best friend. Two of his friends are now serving prison terms - two of the survivors that is.

November 10, 2021

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My wife and I were in Colorado, and she said, "I want to go to a ghost town." I did too, because I was pretty sure there wouldn't be any antique stores there. So we drove many miles down this rutted road into this deserted little village called Winfield. Now it wasn't like this 100 years ago. No, then the gold and silver fever was in the air, and Winfield was alive with the boom that was going on in that area. There were fortune hunters, fortune spenders, and fortune losers.

November 9, 2021

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Like most countries, America has some holidays that are pretty meaningful. We've got the Fourth of July to celebrate our independence. We've got Veterans' Day and Memorial Day, and those are great times to remember all those who've fought for our freedom. We celebrate the birthdays of some great Americans like Lincoln and Washington and Martin Luther King. And then there's one oddball day on your calendar though - Groundhog Day.

November 8, 2021

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I watched the new high school football coach at our local high school back then work an amazing transformation. Before he took over, playing our team meant an almost automatic win for the other team. After the new coach came and made his mark, our team almost always went to the state championship. Our sons can tell you one reason why - they played for him. He used to run some very grueling practices, but he told them he was building a "fourth quarter team" - a team that had the endurance to finish strong when their opponents were fading. And you could count on our team dominating the final quarter of the game. They knew how decisive it would be, and they were prepared to give it all. In fact, at the end of the third quarter, the players would pump each other up with this familiar war cry, "Fourth quarter! It's ours!"

November 5, 2021

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First we hear the stories of the disasters. Then we hear the stories of the people affected by those disasters. Especially the heroes. Some years ago, there were these horrific floods that swept through Queensland, Australia, carrying away loved ones, and houses, cars, and communities. But there's one story from that tragedy that I'm not going to forget. It's about a 13-year-old boy named Jordan - from a town called Toowoomba.

November 4, 2021

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It was a sad ending to the TV movie and the man the movie was about. The last scene showed his plane disappearing into the fog with the famous pilot struggling to get his bearings. That pilot was the man that the movie called the "American Prince," John F. Kennedy, Jr. And for most Americans it struck a poignant chord when we heard that the one we once knew as "Little John-John" had died with his wife and sister-in-law in a tragic plane crash; a crash made even more tragic by the fact that it apparently didn't have to happen. Investigators indicated that JFK, Jr. had wanted to reach his destination so much that he seemed to ignore the fact that he was flying into conditions he wasn't prepared for. If only he had waited until conditions were right.

November 3, 2021

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Norway is 35 times smaller than Russia, but they went head to head with Russia for the most medals won way back in the 1994 Winter Olympics. One of Norway's speed skaters won the gold medal in Lillehammer. A Norwegian skier stole America's spot at mogul skiing. And one after another, Norway dominated cross-country events. Little Norway was a big winner in those Olympics.

November 2, 2021

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We went on this guided tour of this large cave near us. You walk through these winding and really narrow passageways and you admire the wonders that God has created from stalagmites, stalactites, and underground rivers. We entered this one large chamber, and the guide turned on the light and directed our eyes to this high vaulted like cathedral ceiling. You can probably guess what animals we saw hanging up there - bats, lots of bats. The guide told us that the early explorers of this cave had found large quantities of what she called bat guano. If you don't know what that is, never mind. It's gross, that's what it is. But they made lots of money selling that stuff. Really? Who would buy it? I mean, "What good could bat dung possibly be?" Surprise! She said they make gunpowder out of it! And even more surprisingly, they said they can turn that gross stuff into makeup like mascara and lipstick!

November 1, 2021

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Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction, and honestly, this is a true story. Friends of ours have a big dog. And their neighbor threatened them about that dog. She had this white fluffy rabbit and a rabbit hutch in her backyard. And she said, "I'll tell you, if that dog ever hurts that rabbit of mine, I'll sue you for everything you're worth."

                

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

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