Jesus Remains the Reason for the Season

How to be a Mean Mother

A Mean Mother never allows candy or sweets

to take the place of well-balanced meal.

A Mean Mother insists on knowing where her

children are at all times, who their friends

are, and what they do. A Mean Mother breaks

the Child Labor Law by making her children

work ~ washing dishes, making beds,

learning to cook, and doing other cruel and

unpleasant chores.

A Mean Mother makes life miserable for her

offspring by insisting that they always

Tell the truth.

A Mean Mother produces teenagers who are

wiser and more sensible. A Mean Mother

can smile with secret delight and pride

when she hears her own grandchildren

call their parents, “mean.”

What we need now are more

Mean Mothers…and Fathers!

Langston Hughs' "Mother to Son"

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Well, son, I'll tell you:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor,
Bare.
But all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps
'Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now,
For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.

Calling All Angels

Jane Siberry's "Calling All Angels"

A man is placed upon the steps, a baby cries, 
And high above the church bells start to ring, 
And as the heaviness the body, oh the heaviness settles in, 
Somewhere you can hear a mother sing 

Then it's one foot, then the other, as you step out onto the road, 
How much weight? how much weight? 
Then it's how long? and how far? 
And how many times before it's too late? 

Calling all angels, 
Calling all angels, 
Walk me through this one, 
Don't leave me alone, 
Calling all angels, 
Calling all angels, 
We're cryin' and we're hurtin', 
And we're not sure why.

And every day you gaze upon the sunset,
With such love and intensity, 
It's almost, it's almost as if,
If you could only crack the code, 
Then you'd finally understand what this all means. 

But if you could, do you think you would 
Trade in all the pain and suffering? 
Ah, but then you'd miss 
The beauty of the light upon this earth 
and the sweetness of the leaving 

Calling all angels, 
Calling all angels, 
Walk me through this one. 
Don't leave me alone. 
Callin' all angels, 
Callin' all angels, 
We're tryin', 
We're hopin', 
We're hurtin', 
We're lovin' ,
We're cryin',
We're callin',
'Cause we're not sure how this goes.

The Apostle Paul Speaks About Life

For I am persuaded that 
Neither death,

Nor life,

Nor angels,

Nor principalities,

Nor powers,

Nor things present,

Nor thing to come,

Nor height,

Nor depth,

Nor any other creature,

Shall be able to separate us from 

The love of God

Which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

                       ~Paul to the Church in Rome
                                    (Romans 8:38 & 39)

Norman Vincent Peale Writes About a Successful Life

To laugh often and love much;
To win the respect of intelligent persons

And the approbation of honest critics;

To earn the affection of children,

And endure the betrayal of false friends;

To appreciate beauty;

To find the best in others;

To give one’s self;

To leave the world a bit better,

Whether by a healthy child, a garden patch,

Or a redeemed social condition;

To have played and laughed with enthusiasm,

And sung with exultation;

To know even one life breathed easier

Because you have lived…

This is to have succeeded!

Rudyard Kipling Speaks to His Son About Life

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build ‘em up with wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And - which is more - you’ll be a Man my son!

— Rudyard Kipling, 1895

Mark Twain Writes About Twenty Years From Now

In the Arena

It is not the critic who counts;
Not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles,
Or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena,
Whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood;
Who strives valiantly;
Who errs,
Comes up short again and again,
Because there is no effort without error and shortcoming;
But who does actually strive to do the deeds;
Who knows the great enthusiasms,
The great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause;
Who at the best knows in the end
The triumph of high achievement,
And who at the worst, if he fails,
At least fails while daring greatly,
So that his place shall never be with those
Cold and timid souls
Who neither know victory nor defeat.

~Theodore Roosevelt

Luther on Life

This life therefore is not righteousness,
But growth in righteousness,
Not health,
But healing,
Not being,
But becoming,
Not rest,
But exercise.
We are not yet what we shall be,
But we are growing toward it,
The process is not yet finished,
But it is going on.
This is not the end,
But it is the road.
All does not yet gleam in glory,
But all is being purified.

~Martin Luther

My Advocate

I sinned, and straightway, posthaste, Satan flew 
Before the the presence of the most High God,
And made a railing accusation there.
He said, "This soul, this thing of clay and sod,
Has sinned. 'Tis true that he has named Thy Name,
But I demand his death, for Thou hast said,
'The soul that sinneth, it shall die.' Shall not
Thy sentence be fulfilled? Is justice dead?
Send now this wretched sinner to his doom.
What other thing can Righteous Ruler do?"
And thus he did accuse me day and night,
And every word he spoke, oh God, was true!
Then quickly, One rose up from God's right hand,
Before whose glory angels veil their eyes.
He spoke, "Each jot and tittle of the Law
Must be fulfilled: the guilty sinner dies!
But wait,suppose his guilt were all transferred
To Me. and that I paid his penalty!
Behold My hands, My side, My Feet! On day
I was made sin for him, and died that he
Might be presented faultless at Thy throne!"
And Satan fled away. Full well he knew
That he could not prevail against such love,
For every word my dear Lord spoke was true!

~Martha Snell Nicholson