THE TRIP HOME

A pastor had been on a long flight between church conferences. The first warning of the approaching problems came when the sign on the airplane flashed on: Fasten Your SeatBelts. Then, after a while, a calm voice said, "We shall not be serving the beverages at this time as we are expecting a little turbulence. Please be sure your seat belt is fastened."

As the pastor looked around the aircraft, it became obvious that many of the passengers were becoming apprehensive. Later, the voice on the intercom said, "We are so sorry that we are unable to serve the meal at this time. The turbulence is still ahead of us."And then the storm broke.

The ominous cracks of thunder could be heard even above the roar of the engines. Lightning lit up the darkening skies, and within moments that great plane was like a cork tossed around on a celestial ocean. One moment the airplane was lifted on terrific currents of air; the next, it dropped as if were about to crash.

The pastor confessed that he shared the discomfort and fear of those around him. He said, "As I looked around the plane, I could see that nearly all the passengers were upset and alarmed. Some were praying. The future seemed ominous and many were wondering if they would make it through the storm.

"Then, I suddenly saw a little girl. Apparently the storm meant nothing to her. She had tucked her feet beneath her as she sat on her seat; she was reading a book and every thing within her small world was calm and orderly.

"Sometimes she closed her eyes, then she would read again; then she would straighten her legs, but worry and fear were not in her world. When the plane was being buffeted by the terrible storm when it lurched this way and that, as it rose and fell with frightening severity, when all the adults were scared half to death, that marvelous child was completely composed and unafraid." The minister could hardly believe his eyes.

It was not surprisingthat when the plane finally reached its destination and all the passengers were hurrying to disembark, our pastor lingered to speak to the girl whom he had watched for such a long time. Having commented about the storm and the behavior of the plane, he asked why she had not been afraid.

The child replied, "Cause my Daddy's the pilot, and he's taking me home." There are many kinds of storms that buffet us. Physical, mental, financial, domestic, and many other storms can easily and quickly darken our skies and throw our plane into uncontrollable movement. We have all known such times, and let us be honest and confess, it is much easier to be at rest when our feet are on the ground than when we are being tossed about a darkened sky.

Let us remember: Our Father is the Pilot.. He is in control and taking us home. Don't worry!

*Adventure With Grandma*

I remember my first Christmas adventure with Grandma. I was just a kid. I remember tearing across town on my bike to visit her on the day my big sister dropped the bomb: "There is no Santa Claus," she jeered. "Even dummies know that!"

My Grandma was not the gushy kind, never had been. I fled to her that day because I knew she would be straight with me. I knew Grandma always told the truth, and I knew that the truth always went down a whole lot easier when swallowed with one of her world-famous cinnamon buns. I knew they were world-famous, because Grandma said so. It had to be true.

Grandma was home, and the buns were still warm. Between bites, I told her everything. She was ready for me. "No Santa Claus!" she snorted. "Ridiculous! Don't believe it. That rumor has been going around for years, and it makes me mad, plain mad. Now, put on your coat, and let's go."

"Go? Go where, Grandma?" I asked. I hadn't even finished my second world-famous, cinnamon bun. "Where" turned out to be Kerby's General Store, the one store in town that had a little bit of just about everything.

As we walked through its doors, Grandma handed me ten dollars. That was a bundle in those days. "Take this money," she said, "and buy something for someone who needs it. I'll wait for you in the car." Then she turned and walked out of Kerby's.

I was only eight years old. I'd often gone shopping with my mother, but never had I shopped for anything all by myself. The store seemed big and crowded, full of people scrambling to finish their Christmas shopping. For a few moments I just stood there, confused, clutching that ten-dollar bill, wondering what to buy, and who on earth to buy it for.

I thought of everybody I knew: my family, my friends, my neighbors, the kids at school, the people who went to my church. I was just about thought out, when I suddenly thought of Bobby Decker. He was a kid with bad breath and messy hair, and he sat right behind me in Mrs. Pollock's grade-two class.

Bobby Decker didn't have a coat. I knew that because he never went out for recess during the winter. His mother always wrote a note, telling the teacher that he had a cough, but all we kids knew that Bobby Decker didn't have a cough, and he didn't have a coat. I fingered the ten-dollar bill with growing excitement. I would buy Bobby Decker a coat!

I settled on a red corduroy one that had a hood to it. It looked real warm, and he would like that. "Is this a Christmas present for someone?" the lady behind the counter asked kindly, as I laid my ten dollars down. "Yes," I replied shyly. "It's .... for Bobby." The nice lady smiled at me. I didn't get any change, but she put the coat in a bag and wished me a Merry Christmas.

That evening, Grandma helped me wrap the coat in Christmas paper and ribbons (a little tag fell out of the coat, and Grandma tucked it in her Bible) and wrote on the package, "To Bobby, From Santa Claus" -- Grandma said that Santa always insisted on secrecy. Then she drove me over to Bobby Decker's house, explaining as we went that I was now and forever officially one of Santa's helpers.

Grandma parked down the street from Bobby's house, and she and I crept noiselessly and hid in the bushes by his front walk Then Grandma gave me a nudge. "All right, Santa Claus," she whispered, "get going."

I took a deep breath, dashed for his front door, threw the present down on his step, pounded his doorbell and flew back to the safety of the bushes and Grandma. Together we waited breathlessly in the darkness for the front door to open. Finally it did, and there stood Bobby.

Fifty years haven't dimmed the thrill of those moments spent shivering, beside my Grandma, in Bobby Decker's bushes. That night, I realized that those awful rumors about Santa Claus were just what Grandma said they were: ridiculous. Santa was alive and well, and we were on his team.

I still have the Bible, with the tag tucked inside: $19.95.

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He who has no Christmas in his heart will never find Christmas under a tree.

TWO BABES IN A MANGER

In 1994, two Americans answered an invitation from the Russian
Department of Education to teach morals and ethics (based on
biblical principles) in the public schools. They were invited to
teach at prisons, businesses, the fire and police departments
and a large orphanage. About 100 boys and girls who had been
abandoned, abused, and left in the care of a government-run
program were in the orphanage. They relate the following story
in their own words:

It was nearing the holiday season, 1994, time for our orphans
to hear, for the first time, the traditional story of Christmas.
We told them about Mary and Joseph arriving in Bethlehem.
Finding no room in the inn, the couple went to a stable, where
the baby Jesus was born and placed in a manger.

Throughout the story, the children and orphanage staff sat in
amazement as they listened. Some sat on the edges of their
stools, trying to grasp every word. Completing the story, we
gave the children three small pieces of cardboard to make a
crude manger. Each child was given a small paper square, cut
from yellow napkins I had brought with me. No colored paper
was available in the city.

Following instructions, the children tore the paper and carefully
laid strips in the manger for straw. Small squares of flannel,
cut from a worn-out nightgown an American lady was throwing
away as she left Russia, were used for the baby's blanket.
A doll-like baby was cut from tan felt we had brought from
the United States.

The orphans were busy assembling their manger as I walked
among them to see if they needed any help. All went well until
I got to one table where little Misha sat. He looked to be
about 6 years old and had finished his project. As I looked at
the little boy's manger, I was startled to see not one, but two
babies in the manger. Quickly, I called for the translator to
ask the lad why there were two babies in the manger. Crossing
his arms in front of him and looking at this completed manger
scene, the child began to repeat the story very seriously.

For such a young boy, who had only heard the Christmas story
once, he related the happenings accurately.. .until he came to
the part where Mary put the baby Jesus in the manger. Then
Misha started to ad-lib. He made up his own ending to the
story as he said, "And when Maria laid the baby in the manger,
Jesus looked at me and asked me if I had a place to stay.
I told him I have no mamma and I have no papa, so I don't
have any place to stay. Then Jesus told me I could stay with
him. But I told him I couldn't, because I didn't have a gift to
give him like everybody else did. But I wanted to stay with
Jesus so much, so I thought about what I had that maybe I
could use for a gift. I thought maybe if I kept him warm,
that would be a good gift.

So I asked Jesus, "If I keep you warm, will that be a good
enough gift?" And Jesus told me, "If you keep me warm, that
will be the best gift anybody ever gave me." "So I got into
the manger, and then Jesus looked at me and he told me I
could stay with him...for always."

As little Misha finished his story, his eyes brimmed full of
tears that splashed down his little cheeks. Putting his hand
over his face, his head dropped to the table and his shoulders
shook as he sobbed and sobbed.

The little orphan had found someone who would never abandon
nor abuse him, someone who would stay with him...FOR ALWAYS.

___________________________________________________

I've learned that it's not what you have in your life, but who
you have in your life that counts.

-- Author Unknown

    Roping a Deer------- (Names have been removed to protect the Stupid!)

    Actual letter from someone who farms and writes well!
    
    I had this idea that I was going to rope a deer, put it in a stall, feed it up on corn for a couple of weeks, then kill it and eat it.

    The first step in this adventure was getting a deer. I figured that, since they congregate at my cattle feeder and do not seem to have much fear of me when we are there (a bold one will sometimes come right up and sniff at the bags of feed while I am in the back of the truck not 4 feet away), it should not be difficult to rope one, get up to it and toss a bag over its head (to calm it down) then hog tie it and transport it home.

    I filled the cattle feeder then hid down at the end with my rope.

    The cattle, having seen the roping thing before, stayed well back. They were not having any of it.
    
    After about 20 minutes, my deer showed up -- 3 of them.

    I picked out......a likely looking one, stepped out from the end of the feeder, and threw... my rope. The deer just stood there and stared at me.

    I wrapped the rope around my waist and twisted the end so I would have a good hold. The deer still just stood and stared at me, but you could tell it was mildly concerned about the whole rope situation.

    I took a step towards it...it took a step away. I put a little tension on the rope and then received an education.

    The first thing that I learned is that, while a deer may just stand there looking at you funny while you rope it, they are spurred to action when you start pulling on that rope.

    That deer EXPLODED.
    
    The second thing I learned is that pound for pound, a deer is a LOT stronger than a cow or a colt. A cow or a colt in that weight range I could fight down with a rope and with some dignity.

    A deer-- no chance.
    
    That thing ran and bucked and twisted and pulled. There was no controlling it and certainly no getting close to it. As it jerked me off my feet and started dragging me across the ground, it occurred to me that having a deer on a rope was not nearly as good an idea as I had originally imagined..

    The only up side is that they do not have as much stamina as many other animals.

    A brief 10 minutes later, it was tired and not nearly as quick to jerk me off my feet and drag me when I managed to get up. It took me a few minutes to realize this, since I was mostly blinded by the blood flowing out of the big gash in my head. At that point, I had lost my taste for corn-fed venison. I just wanted to get that devil creature off the end of that rope.

    I figured if I just let it go with the rope hanging around its neck, it would likely die slow and painfully somewhere. At the time, there was no love at all between me and that deer. At that moment, I hated the thing, and I would venture a guess that the feeling was mutual.
    
    Despite the gash in my head and the several large knots where I had cleverly arrested the deer's momentum by bracing my head against various large rocks as it dragged me across the ground, I could still think clearly enough to recognize that there was a small chance that I shared some tiny amount of responsibility for the situation we were in, so I didn't want the deer to have to suffer a slow death, so I managed to get it lined back up in between my truck and the feeder - a little trap I had set before hand ... kind of like a squeeze chute .
    
    I got it to back in there and I started moving up so I could get my rope back.

    Did you know that deer bite? They do! I never in a million years would have thought that a deer would bite somebody, so I was very surprised when I reached up there to grab that rope and the deer grabbed hold of my wrist.
    
    Now, when a deer bites you, it is not like being bit by a horse where they just bite you and then let go. A deer bites you and shakes its head--almost like a pit bull. They bite HARD and it hurts.

    The proper thing to do when a deer bites you is probably to freeze and draw back slowly. I tried screaming and shaking instead. My method was ineffective. It seems like the deer was biting and shaking for several minutes, but it was likely only several seconds.

    I, being smarter than a deer (though you may be questioning that claim by now), tricked it.

    While I kept it busy tearing the tendons out of my right arm, I reached up with my left hand and pulled that rope loose. That was when I got my final lesson in deer behavior for the day.

    Deer will strike at you with their front feet. They rear right up on their back feet and strike right about head and shoulder level, and their hooves are surprisingly sharp. I learned a long time ago that, when an animal -- like a horse --strikes at you with their hooves and you can't get away easily, the best thing to do is try to make a loud noise and make an aggressive move towards the animal.

    This will usually cause them to back down a bit so you can escape.

    This was not a horse. This was a deer, so obviously, such trickery would not work. In the course of a millisecond, I devised a different strategy. I screamed like a woman and tried to turn and run.

    The reason I had always been told NOT to try to turn and run from a horse that paws at you is that there is a good chance that it will hit you in the back of the head. Deer may not be so different from horses after all, besides being twice as strong and 3 times as evil, because the second I turned to run, it hit me right in the back of the head and knocked me down.
    
    Now, when a deer paws at you and knocks you down, it does not immediately leave. I suspect it does not recognize that the danger has passed. What they do instead is paw your back and jump up and down on you while you are laying there crying like a little girl and covering your head.

    I finally managed to crawl under the truck and the deer went away.

    So now I know why when people go deer hunting they bring a rifle with a scope to sort of even the odds.