Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Okay, I don't mind winter. It's a good thing since God seems to have assigned me to the North most of my life. I also don't mind snow. It's beautiful! It's even driveable if you know how to handle it. But ice - now I can't think of anything nice to say about ice. And, after the winter of '98, neither could the folks in New England and Canada. They got walloped with a mega ice-storm that left two inches of ice on everything. In Montreal, for example, power lines and poles and trees just collapsed under the weight of the ice, and thousands of people were without power for days; which means many were without heat in the middle of a Montreal winter. In one neighborhood, one man got pretty resourceful after shivering for five days. He marched across the street with a lot of orange extension cord and asked his neighbor if he could plug into their outdoor outlet. The people on one side of the street were without power and very cold. The people on the other side of the street had power and were very cozy.

That power from across the street was enough to start that man's furnace. And within a few hours, from one end of the block to the other, you could see long orange extension cords crisscrossing the street from the cold side to the warm side. Those who had no power were supplied by those who did and then everybody was warm!

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Once upon a time, the Hutchcraft family had a little fantail goldfish, and what did our daughter name him? Well, of course, Fanny. And the time came for Fanny's murky old fishbowl water to get changed. Of course, he had to be in water while that was happening or he would have developed severe respiratory difficulties. So, we put Fanny into this cramped, tiny little bowl and we put it in the kitchen sink - poor little fish. He would try to swim as usual, and he just kept bumping into the sides of the bowl a lot because they came a lot sooner than usual! It really, obviously, was not fun being in that shrunken little environment, but hey, the purpose was to improve his world - right!

Monday, January 15, 2007

I know what it is to need a stamp. You've got something that has to be mailed - like an urgent bill, for example. You've gotten spoiled by having electricity in your house, and you really don't want to see what it's like without it. Your electric bill is due, the check is written, the envelope is addressed, but you can't find a stamp. But something that happened during a recent election has to be ultimate postage desperation. An absentee ballot arrived with an unusual stamp on the envelope, a picture of an inverted World War I airplane. The news report said that stamp may well have been a rare collector's item worth $200,000! Yes, postage rates are going up, but this is out of control!

Friday, December 8, 2006

Matt is 16, and he hates his birthday. At least, that's what he told some of his friends. He said his birthday is always the worst day of the year for him, ever since his sixth birthday. He remembers that like it was yesterday. His mom went out and bought a special cake, invited all his friends to come over for Matt's birthday party, and nobody came. And since there was nobody there for the party, his mom took the cake back to the store. There was no one there to celebrate him.

Thursday, November 23, 2006

During holiday seasons in America, and especially at Thanksgiving, you can actually call the Butterball Turkey Hotline. And, yes, you can get an answer to whatever turkey questions you may have. A famous news commentator said that they had monitored that hotline last Thanksgiving, and one lady called and she said, "I've had this turkey in my freezer for 23 years. Can I use it?" This is a true story! The man on the hotline said, "Well, if your freezer has been set on zero degrees the whole time and it hasn't been defrosted, then the turkey is probably okay. Maybe the taste isn't, though." Well, the lady decided she wouldn't use the turkey after all. She gave it to her church.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

One of our common send-offs to people is, "Hey, keep in touch!" Well, today we can do that better than ever. Just take telephones, for example. We've got them everywhere - for better or worse. Many of us have phones in several rooms at home or wireless phones so we can take a call or make a call anywhere from the backyard to the bathroom. When I get on the plane, there's a phone in front of me. And, of course, with cell phones we can be in contact with people, and they with us, virtually anywhere. Take a businessperson or an investor, for example. He or she can be in contact from home, in their car, at their office, or as they're walking into the grocery store. Actually, one of the secrets of successful people is doing a good job of keeping in touch.

Friday, November 3, 2006

I know men are never lost. We just find alternative routes, right - scenic routes. I've found more than my share, but my choice of a wrong road has never led to deadly consequences. It did for Comair Flight 5191 out of Lexington, Kentucky. Somehow, the pilot went down the wrong runway; one-half the length of the runway from which he'd been cleared to take off. He ran out of runway and hit a row of trees. Tragically, 49 of the 50 people aboard died in that crash. As the investigation of the crash unfolded, we found out that the one flight controller in the tower wasn't looking when the plane turned onto that fatal runway. He had what was described as "administrative duties" to tend to, and he turned his back, and moments later - disaster.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

When you've got a God like ours, even a parade can turn out to be a place for Him to amaze you. What I'm about to tell you is not Uncle Ronnie's Story Time. It's really a story about a God that you may really need right now. I was scheduled to speak at a Native camp in Canada this past summer, and our hosts wanted me to bring a few of the Native young people that God used so mightily on our reservation teams all summer. They'd been so excited about being spiritual rescuers that they asked me if there was a reservation near the camp. They wanted to continue the outreach of the summer. There was a reservation, but we knew no one there who could help us. My wife and I got to the area a couple days early, and we decided to take in a parade in the nearby town. We prayed about God directing us where to sit. Basically, we just wanted a shady spot. Our neighbors in the spot we chose turned out to be a Native family.

Thursday, October 19, 2006

You may not remember much from your World History class, but you probably at least remember that the nations of Europe fought it out for a long time to see who was going to be Number One. For many years, their biggest way to fight it out was with their big navies. So, if a ship from England saw a ship from France, you could expect some fireworks. Of course, the way you knew what country a ship was from was that flag they flew from the top of the mast - their colors. When they would see a ship approaching on the horizon, they usually lowered their colors until they could see whether that other guy was a friend or an enemy. But occasionally there was a ship that approached those encounters in a radically different way. There were a few courageous captains who would give a simple six-word order to their crew, "Nail our colors to the mast!" But you could just hear the first mate saying, "Captain, that means we can't lower our colors, no matter what." To which the captain would say something like this - "That's right."

Thursday, October 12, 2006

When I was new to this business of wearing glasses, it took me a while to adjust to those new things on my face. But I had to get them. It was easier to get glasses than to get longer arms, and the glasses were cheaper. Sometimes when I'm real busy, I start noticing clouds developing between me and what I'm trying to read, and I see strange little spots. Then I remember I'm wearing my glasses which I have neglected to clean for a few days. When I hold them up to the light, I can see the source of the fog and the spots: dirty glasses. It's amazing how much better you can see when you clean your glasses! The world looks so much clearer!