On The Other Hand!

My wife woke me up this morning with the unpleasant news that there was water all over the basement. The hot water tank had sprung a leak, right on cue, a few months after the warranty had run out. Four hours later, after a few phone calls, we were back in business with hot water minus about seven hundred dollars for a new tank and installation. We then took off on one of our Saturday drives. A few times during the drive my mind wandered to the question of what people do who do not have seven hundred dollars handy to pay for a new hot water tank. I'm thankful when situations such as a leaking hot water tank or car problems come up that we have the means to handle them for when I was growing up we were one of those families that had trouble paying the water bill let alone paying for a new hot water tank. As my mind continued to wander I wished that I was a handyman who could offer his services to people in need. I know...you are thinking something like this, "How noble to make such a statement and how convenient not to be able to actually follow through with it." I agree with you on that thought but it is my hope that I might be some kind of handyman. For some thirty years now I have read and read and then started to write which culminated, so far, in this blog. Do I do this for my own benefit? Sometimes I work on a blog for three or four days before publishing it. It has been a strain more times than I care to think about. At times it sent me into a cocoon and at other times I had to fight off severe discouragement but then I look at the statistics and see the visitors, and those from outside of the United States, and I'm back on track. I have had Shingles for over five weeks now, Obama vs Romney can do that to you. I don't have a comment section for others to rant and rave against me but neither could I ever read encouraging testimony, should there be any. Dale Carnegie would never recommend writing such a blog if one desired to make friends! Poor...poor me! :(  On the other hand...we live here in America, in a culture that values a football score more than a scripture verse, a pretty hairdo more than a wise statement and a dollar made more than a dollar earned. America desperately needs to hear that neither legislation nor armies...without Christ... can save, that the Republican Party may be far better than the Democrat Party but ain't no one gonna Limbo under that bar, that America may never have been a Christian nation but neither did it ever openly oppose the Giver of all of our blessings, and that capitalism may indeed be better than socialism but then again so are Shingles better than a heart attack. If there is any morsel of ability here, I'm so thankful for it. If there isn't then at least I can tell my son that I tried. OK... now for the real good part! You may not have any idea of the pure joy in even attempting to relate the glories of Jesus Christ and his Gospel, particularly in lands not saturated by that Gospel. The $64 thousand dollar question is how any Christian could not be obsessed with shouting out the love, forgiveness and mercy that they themselves had received, could not push a broom or write a letter or anything that God might use to pull one more of His sheep into the fold. When there are a lot of hits to this blog I'm humbled and worry that I might not be up to the task. On days that there have been just one visitor, and there have been some, I thank the Lord for the opportunity to focus in prayer on one person. I'll end with this: someone in Russia will be reading these words for Russia, for whatever reason, always has more visitors than other nations. If they are a Christian I get to share with a brother or sister in Christ. If not I get to testify of one soul, remarkably redeemed, mercifully kept and graciously filled with joy unsurpassable