One evening I ran into the cleaners to pick up my shirts. They had told me they would be ready, but now they couldn’t find them. They began searching and I stood there thinking, "This is great. Every dress shirt I own is at the cleaners - except for the one I’m wearing." While I was waiting for them to find my shirts, a woman walked in carrying an old laundry basket. Inside the laundry basket, lyi...
Perhaps you saw the story on the news about a couple who had adopted a little girl when she was only two or three weeks old. They accepted the child into the home. They grew to love the child. They watched her grow and develop. But, for some reason, the little girl didn't grow and develop normally. She is now two-and-one-half years old and the doctors have told these adoptive parents that their li...
I do not usually eat a big breakfast. Most of the time I just have a bowl of cereal, a piece of toast and a glass of juice. A couple of weeks ago, on a Sunday morning, we were out of milk, so I just headed off toward the church. On the way, I decided to go to a restaurant, grab a bite to eat and look over my sermon notes before church services. When the waitress came to take my order, I ordered th...
One night I was sitting up late watching the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. A guest on the program that evening was a 94-year-old man. He spoke of the changes that had taken place during his lifetime and he said he was against all of them. He spoke of the garden that he planted every spring. He introduced his 75-year-old girlfriend who drove him to the NBC studio for his appearance on the Tonigh...
It happens so often that it seems almost routine in our modern world. We read or listen to certain stories with interest and then make little jokes about how public figures shoot themselves in the foot when they yield to temptation and it becomes public knowledge. In recent years, we have become privy to the temptations which have seduced several public figures. Not long ago, Gary Hart was the lea...
There is a very tender and moving scene in the play, Fiddler On The Roof. Tevyev and his wife Golda are being forced to move from their home in Russia. One day Tevyev comes into the house and asks his wife, "Golda, do you love me?"
"Do I what?"
"Do you love me?"
Golda looks at him and then responds: "Do I love you? With our daughters getting married and this trouble in the town, you're upset, y...
I had just sat down to eat with a group in the fellowship hall. There was a covered-dish dinner and everyone had brought their favorite recipes. The food looked delicious and the desserts looked even better. Just as I was about to take my first bite, someone told me there was a man in the hallway who would like to speak to the pastor.
I slipped out of the fellowsihp hall to find this man who want...
It was a beautiful spring afternoon in Eastern Oklahoma when my secretary told me that Oleatha was on the phone. Oleatha was 67 years old and she had been having problems. She often became confused. She had a tendency to forget. Once, she had gotten lost going from church out to her home on a bluff that overlooked the lake. At the insistence of her family, she had gone through a battery of medical...
There is an old Arab parable about a merchant in Bagdad who sent his servant to the market one day. Before very long, the servant returned, white and trembling with fear. There was great agitation in his voice as he said: "Master, down in the market place I was jostled by someone in the crowd. When I turned around, I saw that it was Death who had jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening...
There is a small Catholic chapel in the heart of Santa Fe, New Mexico, called Chapel of Our Lady of Light. It has a fascinating story attached to the early days when there was a convent school run by the Sisters of Loretto. Apparently, the only way for the sisters to get into the loft where they slept was to climb up a ladder. This was not a major problem for the younger nuns, but it was difficult...
It had been a long day and I was ready to go home. It was almost 9 p.m. and only a few groups of people were left. They were standing in clusters and talking about various matters before getting in their cars and going to their homes. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone approaching me. He was a complete stranger, but some mysterious sixth sense told me that he was looking for me. When he wa...
In 1816, Lord Byron wrote a narrative poem that has become a classic. The poem is titled, "The Prisoner of Chillon," and it is the story of a man incarcerated in the dungeon at the Castle of Chillon near Lake Geneva, Switzerland.
The prisoner was in a narrow, cramped dungeon cell for such a long time that he began to think of it as home. He made friends with the spiders, insects, and mice that sh...
Recently, I heard a preacher on television preach a sermon on divine judgment. I have no doubt that he is sincere in his beliefs. He is very good at using words and manipulating the emotions of his audience. He is charming, witty, and entertaining. But his interpretation of judgment degrades God from a Heavenly Father to a heartless tyrant.
He drew a picture of God which makes my heart shudder, b...
I don’t suppose that it comes as any surprise to you that a minister would stand in a pulpit and affirm, "I believe in prayer." You would expect this affirmation. But, belief in prayer came normally and naturally for me as a child. Even before I can remember, I was taught to pray. The first prayer I was taught was the bedtime payer that almost all children learn. It is a simple little prayer which...
Several years ago, while I was pastoring the little Methodist Church in Geary, Oklahoma, a Fourth of July parade was scheduled. Well, there is nothing like a parade in a small town. The entire community gets into the activities. The high school marching band provides the music, there are a few floats, there is a riding club, and even the children are invited to participate by decorating their bicy...
Walter de la Mare wrote a fascinating little poem titled, "The Listeners." He wrote:
"Is anybody there?" asked the Traveler,
Knocking on the moonlight door;
And his horse in the silence chomped the grasses
Of the forest’s ferny floor;
And a bird flew up out of the turret,
Above the traveler’s head:
And he smote upon the door again a second time;
"Is anybody there?" he said.
But no one descended...
Certain events, no matter how long ago they happened, are forever etched in your mind. One such event that I shall always remember happened when I was in the third grade. It was late April, but it was not a beautiful spring day. Instead, it was a day marked by spring rains. It was a day that was dark and dreary. It was a day packed full of tornado warnings. Finally, late in the afternoon, the sch...
A little boy, growing up in a community where his father served as a Methodist minister was outside playing. He was doing all of the things that a little boy does. He was climbing trees. He was swinging on the swing set and jumping out. He was rolling and playing with his dog. His mother called him for dinner and all of the family gathered at the table. His mother looked at him and said, "Young ma...
When I was a kid growing up, I don't think I ever went anywhere without my mother saying, "Robert, there is one more thing I want to tell you." It didn't make any difference where I was going. I could have been going to camp, I could have been going to spend the night with a friend or I could have been going to a party. I don't care what it was, before I got out of the car, my mother would say, "T...
For those of you who are football fans, you know that Lou Holtz is a football coach who likes to win. Every place that he has coached, he has taken the football program and turned it around. He built Arkansas into one of the major football powers in the nation. He was turning the program around at Minnesota when he was offered the position at Notre Dame. Notre Dame’s football program had been stru...
Mildred was a fine lady. She was 64 years old when the doctors discovered that she had terminal cancer. She was in and out of the hospital several times receiving her treatments, and each time she seemed to be a little weaker than the time before. Mildred was married to one of the roughest roughnecks in Oklahoma. He was a big, burly man, and one look at him told you that in his younger days, he wa...
A couple of years ago, I was asked to serve on a panel to discuss the problems facing teenagers in our society. The panel included a school counselor, a Juvenile Judge, a drug counselor, a couple of other experts on teenage problems, and, I guess, I was the representative of the religious community. There were a variety of people in the audience, including the parents of several teenagers. During ...
Universities in the Northeast take great delight in staging Elizabethan dramas. This is one of the cultural aspects which universities in the Northeast emphasize. It is a way of giving aspiring young actors and actresses some practical experience on the stage and it is a way of taking classical literature out of the boredom of the classroom and making it come alive in the minds of students as they...
Several years ago, we were living in a community that had a population of less than 10,000 people. Because of the nearby lake and the numerous campgrounds, it was fairly common to have thousands of people visiting in our community on the weekend. However, most of these people did not feel comfortable coming into town for church. They were camping and didn’t feel comfortable coming to church in the...
A community-wide Easter pageant was planned, and people from all over the county tried out for various parts. The part of Mary Magdalene was given to a Catholic nun, a local doctor became Peter, a high school principle became Judas, and Caiphais, the hypocritical high priest, was played by a local banker. It was relatively easy selecting the people for the various parts in the Easter pageant. Howe...