Wesley's Cow Sermon

One day John Wesley was walking with a troubled man who expressed his doubt as to the goodness of God. He said, "I do not know what I shall do with all this worry and trouble." At the same moment Wesley saw a cow looking over a stone wall. "Do you know," asked Wesley, "why that cow is looking over the wall?" "No," said the man who was worried. Wesley said, "The cow is looking over the wall because she cannot see through it. That is what you must do with your wall of trouble - look over it and avoid it." Faith enables us to get above circumstances and look to Christ who is over all, blessed forever.

Source:
Pulpit Helps, date unknown.

Vaccinated Christians

    A little boy named Willie was in the hospital to have a piece of deformed bone removed from his arm. After surgery, he asked to see the doctor. "I hear you wanted to see me," said the doctor. Willie reached up his hand and took the doctor's hand and said, "My mamma will never hear the last about you!" That should be our attitude about Christ in response for what He has done for us - ""My friends will never hear the last about you!"
    Vance Havner said that "most American Christians have been vaccinated for Christianity. You know what a vaccination is, don't you? The person is inoculated with a small dose of 'it' and that make them immune to the real thing. Maybe that has happened to us."
    In his last speech, eleven days before he died in an air crash, Will Rogers made three important observations for anyone who would aspire to do something significant:
1) Know what you want to do;
2) Believe in what you are doing; and
3) Love what you are doing.

Source:
Pulpit Helps, date unknown.

Thank God for Ordinary Christians

By Dana Slingluff

General Eisenhower once rebuked one of his Generals for referring to a soldier as "just a Private." He reminded him that the Army could function better without its Generals than it could without its foot soldiers. "If this war is won," he said, "it will be won by the Privates." In the same way, the common, ordinary, one-talent Christians are the very backbone of the church. We have our great evangelists, our super congregations led by dynamic elders, and our wealthy brethren who are able to finance great works. But, if the work of the Lord is to be done, if the gospel is to be taken to the lost, it will be the "ordinary" Christians who will do it.

Source:
Pulpit Helps (date unknown)

Sitting by the Fire

An old man sat by the open fire
   And dreamed the years away.
While outside in the battle of life
   Many perished in the toils of day.
He never did any good, nor did he
   Ever do any wrong.
He just sat by the open fire
   And dreamed the whole day long.
Now he's left a vacant chair and
   They say he's gone up higher,
But if he still does what he used to do,
   He's sitting by the fire!

Source:
Unknown

Promises, Promises

    "What was your most difficult and perplexing case?" a psychiatrist asked his colleague at a convention.
    "I had one patient who believed he had a rich uncle in South America who was going to die and leave him a huge fortune," the other replied after pondering the question for a minute. "All day long he would wait for a letter form an estate attorney. He didn't have any social life, he never went out, he never did anything but sit and wait for this fantasy letter from a fantasy uncle."
    "How did it turn out?" asked the first psychiatrist.
    "I worked with him every single day for eight years," explained the other, "and I nearly had him cured, until that stupid letter arrived!"

Source:
Concord Coffee Break Newsletter, Concord Printing, Cape Girardeau, MO, July 1990.

Out of the Mouths of "Babes"

    One blistering day when they had guests for dinner, a mother asked her four year old son to say the blessing.
    "But, Mother, I don't know what to say," he protested.
    "Just say to the Lord what you've heard me say," she told him.
    Obediently he bowed his head and said, "Oh, Lord, why did I invite those people here on a hot day like this?"

Source:
Unknown