WFW: Money Bear

"So is he that layeth up treasure for himself,
and is not rich toward God."
Luke 12:21 (KJV)

"And he spake a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully: And he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits? And he said, This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided? So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God. And he said unto his disciples, Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat; neither for the body, what ye shall put on. The life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment."

Luke 12:16-23 (KJV)

Bear was so sad to run into her friend, good 'ol Money Bear, at the dump the other day. Someone had propped him up against the dump man's little shack, just down the hill from the main dumpster, probably hoping some kid might still want him and take him home, to give him a second chance at life.

But despite his cheery smile and his coat filled with money, there obviously were no takers. He looked so pathetic sitting there, too, leaning against the peeling paint of the wall, grime all over his face, his once cheery green bow tie hanging loose. Oh, sure, he was still wearing that wide smile, eyes still bright with glee over all the money he'd collected during his life, and pinned to his coat.

But where had it gotten him in the end?

Bear had tried to warn him. Tried to remind him that moth and rust do corrupt -- that it's better to put your treasures into heaven -- that earthly wealth passes away -- that you can't take it with you.

But did Money Bear ever listen?

No.

Whenever the church collection basket for the Missionary Offering went by, Money Bear ignored it, even though his coat already had bills hanging out all over it, and he had plenty to spare. He always wanted to keep what he had . . .

Was always looking for more.

He loved to shop the aisles of Bear-Mart though. Loved to build Dens with hand crafted Maple furniture (very expensive stuff). Loved to squeeze that extra bit of profit out of any business deal, even though it often met his customers weren't treated quite fairly. (He always had a rationalization. Always an excuse. So long as it allowed him to keep pinning bills onto his coat.)

Despite that though, he was a pretty fun bear to be around -- had a basically good heart.

Just always had a blind spot when it came to money.

But where does all that money get him at the dump?

It's all too sad.

Bear will miss him.





Internet Cafe Devotions is hosting Word Filled Wednesday, and this week's links are HERE . So be sure and drop over there as well, to find links to the whole selection of entries by Christian writers, and/or to add a link of your own and join in the fun! We all welcome comments and discussion! Bear is also joining in the Seven Clown Circus "Wordful Wednesday" loop this week, and likely in future weeks as well. Seven Clown Circus is not Christian focused -- goal is to post photo(s) and commentary.
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Bear's news and free multi-media Christian resources: Bear's Writing Den

WFW: Showers of Blessing

"And I will make them and the places round about my hill a blessing; and I will cause the shower to come down in his season; there shall be showers of blessing. And the tree of the field shall yield her fruit, and the earth shall yield her increase, and they shall be safe in their land, and shall know that I am the Lord, when I have broken the bands of their yoke, and delivered them out of the hand of those that served themselves of them. ... Thus shall they know that I the Lord their God am with them, and that they, even the house of Israel, are my people, saith the Lord God."

Ezekiel 34:26-27 & 30 (KJV)

Bear had been having a rough couple of weeks. Celebration over the computer victory (finally getting back on the Net after a full month of computer glitches, breakdowns, and bugs) was short-lived. Because almost immediately, the Bearmobile broke.

Bear was driving home from a distant town one night, when it suddenly jerked a couple of times and stopped running completely.

Even so, Bear sent up many thanks to the Lord that she was only 20 miles away from the Den, and that the Bearmobile died right across the street from a mechanic's shop. And thanked the Lord also for a kind policeman who arranged to have it pushed across the street into the mechanic's parking lot. It seemed to be that all was going well, and she'd be back on the road soon, even though she had to abandon the Bearmobile there and get a ride home.

And she wasn't too worried about it, because she'd taken the Bearmobile in for a tuneup just a couple weeks before, and the man who worked on it said everything looked very good. He didn't think that the weird noise it was making was the engine. But felt it was more likely a twig or something caught near a belt, even though he couldn't track it down. Or something else minor. He told her to bring it back when the noise got louder, so he could hear more clearly where it was coming from, to make it more findable.

So she wasn't at all worried, initially, the night it broke.

But Bear got really sick off and on during much of the following week.

Plus, the mechanic (whose parking lot the Bearmobile was stuck in) was having some problems of his own that week, and couldn't get to it.

So at the end of a full week, still no Bearmobile.

Finally, (since that mechanic was still having problems and hadn't even started working on it yet) Bear took the Bearmobile key over to another mechanic a few blocks away. He cheerfully said it would be no problem to tow it over and get to work on it.

So Bear was temporarily encouraged again, although still getting pretty sick repetitively.

That was last Thursday evening though, many days ago now.

And still no Bearmobile.

It's been a week and a half since it broke, and Bear doesn't even yet know what's wrong with it or how much it will cost to fix (assuming it's fixable). Nor does she yet know when this current mechanic will actually start work on it.

Meanwhile, the nature and pattern of Bear's symptoms lately has caused her to be concerned that her overall health problem might be worsening.

Then, just when Bear was feeling the most stretched by these happenings, suddenly...

The above pictured "shower" of gifts poured in, all in one day.

Bear hadn't made it to the Post Office for a week, and the card, mug, and "Bear Country" button were all waiting for her there (gifts sent by two separate households of friends).

She felt so blessed and cheered by them, that she took their picture for this post.

And then, within just a few hours, a neighbor stopped by with all the fresh garden veggies and the cross bookmark and another gift.

The gifts were now from three separate households . . . That's when Bear knew that it wasn't only her friends who were kindly cheering her up, but the Lord also.

So she took another picture of the veggies and bookmark and inserted it into the first picture.

Bear thinks it's pretty incredible the way He provides a sign He's still with us when we most need it.

"... thus shall they know that I the Lord their God am with them ..."

And Bear is so thankful to kind friends and kind Lord for sending showers of sunshiny blessings on a cloudy day.






Internet Cafe Devotions is hosting Word Filled Wednesday, and this week's links are HERE . So be sure and drop over there as well, to find links to the whole selection of entries by Christian writers, and/or to add a link of your own and join in the fun! We all welcome comments and discussion!
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Bear's news and free multi-media Christian resources: Bear's Writing Den

WFW: Grasshopper's Journey

"Now the Lord had said unto Abram,
Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred,
and from thy father's house,
unto a land that I will show thee:"
Genesis 12:1 (KJV)

Bear was in her Bearmobile, zipping down the highway at 60 mph when she first noticed the miniature hitchhiker desparately clinging to her windshield wiper. She watched as he adjusted his position slightly to get a better grip with his suction feet. The tiny feelers on his head were waving wildly in the wind.

Bear laughed. This little hopper was on more of a journey than he'd ever bargained for, back when he'd innocently climbed aboard at the Den's driveway.

She decided she couldn't pass up such a picture, and carefully reached into a pack for her cell phone camera, while keeping an eye on highway. By propping the camera up against the glass, and adjusting it little by little, (holding it at arm's length and trying to center the viewfinder by guesstimate) she was able to catch a few shots.

It seemed to her that the grasshopper was even hamming it up a bit, leaning against the glass sometimes, seeming to pose for the camera. But he might have just been yelling to Bear to stop taking pictures, and pull the car over somewhere so he could get off this crazy machine.

Forty miles later, Bear gave him his chance. In fact, she felt so sorry for the poor little guy that she pulled to the curb as soon as she got off the highway.

The grasshopper seemed to catch his breath a bit, looking around cautiously, still clinging tightly to the windshield wiper.

He couldn't seem to believe it was over.

Then, apparently deciding it was truly safe, he made what must have been at least a 15 foot leap, to solid concrete. A second long leap and he was out of sight, heading for a distant patch of grass.

As she pulled away from the curb, Bear wondered what his life would be like in his new town. She wondered what he felt like, being so unexpectedly transplanted from the cool grassy shade around the Den, to a new, strange town, so far away... in a grasshopper's eyes -- a world away.

She shook her head, still amazed the grasshopper had been able to hold on at highway speeds for so long. The little guy was certainly a trooper.

Sometimes it seemed to Bear that she too seemed to find herself unexpectedly hurtling along to an unknown destination in life, (being whisked up in the Lord's Providential Plan), feeling as vulnerable as a grasshopper precariously clinging to a windshield wiper at highway speeds in the hot July afternoon.

She decided she could learn much from her tiny hitchhiking friend about how to hang on at times like those... Until that final great leap for joy that comes at the end of every such journey... when faith finally becomes sight.

Internet Cafe Devotions is hosting Word Filled Wednesday, and this week's links are HERE . So be sure and drop over there as well, to find links to the whole selection of entries by Christian writers, and/or to add a link of your own and join in the fun! We all welcome comments and discussion!

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Bear's news and free multi-media Christian resources: Bear's Writing Den

WFW: Singing Flowers

"What if...?"

"What if...?"

"What if...?"
Matthew 6:28-34 (KJV) "And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:  And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.  Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?" 

"Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?  (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.  But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you."

"Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself..."

God surprised Bear a couple weeks ago with this whole field filled with flowers and butterflies, just across the path that runs by the Den, to remind her of this at a time when she's feeling like a "Bear of little faith". She can see them every morning right now, when she opens the Den's shades to the sunrise.

(Even with all these pictures, there are still large parts of the field left hidden... so many flowers, Bear couldn't even fit them all into the camera's viewfinder at the same time.)

Yet her "flesh" tends to remain hard to convince. Her mind seems to constantly love to run after all the "what ifs"...

What if this computer problem turns out to be the hard drive and can't be fixed? Even a cheap computer would be 350 bucks, at least...

What if one of the Den's income sources, which has dried up recently, ends completely, long term? How would Bear make ends meet then?

What if the ominous new sound the Bearmobile is making lately is a major engine problem? After all it IS nineteen years old...

What if the computer error at Bear's insurance company that arbitrarily canceled Bear's dental insurance doesn't get corrected? (And why the glitch NOW, just when she desperately needs several of her teeth fixed?)

What if...?

What if...?

What if...?

Maybe that's why God gave Bear a whole field of flowers to gaze upon this year. No matter how many "what ifs" plague the Bear, there's a whole bouquet of flowers for each one, in plain view, seeming to be singing...

"And all these things shall be added unto you..."

"Hallelu, Halleluia!"

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Word Filled Wednesday is now hosted weekly at Internet Cafe Devotions, and the beginning of the list of links to entries is usually posted by Wednesday morning, with more links added throughout the day. This week's list is posted Here. So be sure and drop by, to find the whole selection of entries by Christian writers, and/or to add a link of your own and join in the fun! We all welcome comments and discussion! Bear is also joining in the Seven Clown Circus loop this week, and likely in future weeks as well. It's not Christian focused -- goal is to post photo(s) and commentary.




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Bear's news and free multi-media Christian resources: Bear's Writing Den

WFW: Surviving the Dust

Black Sunday in the Midwestern United States, April 14, 1935

A farmer's son in Cimarron County, Oklahoma, standing in the midst of dust. 

(Arthur Rothstein, photographer, 1936, Library of Congress)

Elkhart, Kansas, May 1937 (Library of Congress)

Eph 6:13 (KJV) "Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, 

that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand."

Back in the 1930's, in the Midwestern part of the United States, in the midst of terrible economic times, came drought -- a drought so extreme that the harvest and fruit of America's bread basket literally turned to dust. Dust storms of awesome magnitude began sweeping across that part of the country, and even between the storms, dust ruled the land. Cars were buried in it; livestock died from breathing it. Farming families, already entrenched in poverty, began starving in the midst of it.

Thus began one of the greatest and most desperate migrations the United States had ever seen. Families in dire poverty piled scant household belongings high on the backs of rickety vehicles and headed West to escape the clouds of dust, desolation, and hopelessness that ruled the land. After all, who could stand against such a "storm"?

Bear grew up on stories passed down in her family about those days; but it didn't really sink in until recently, that there were people who actually chose to remain in the Midwest throughout those years of desolation.

Recorded history has so vividly painted the picture of those forced to leave. There are photos of dust turning daylight into darkness as it rolled in over the towns; photos of cars buried in it; photos of dead, dust-covered cattle; photos of skeletal women and children coated with grime, hugging each other in tears; photos of graves of people who died along the highways while trying to make it out...

But photos highlighting the lives of those who stayed behind are more rare. There's not much talk of those who stood -- of those who hung sheets over their windows; stuck rags in cracks in their houses' walls and at the foot of doors; sheltered their remaining livestock as best they could; those who clenched grit-filled teeth and kept slogging on through it, actually managing to survive. They didn't sell their precious land or compromise their inheritance, but held on to it tightly, even though with swollen, grime-coated fingers.

Instead of retreating out of the dust, they walked through it; and, when it came to the point that they could walk no longer, they simply "stood".

Bear has noticed a recurring pattern in her own life. It seems that, whenever she pursues a certain direction/goal, billows of "dust" begin to roll in (in the form of all sorts of hassles, setbacks, and problems) even though she knows the direction/goal is a good one and feels it's of the Lord. In the past, she has been repetitively diverted, always choosing to migrate out of the path of the "storm"; always driven back. Lately though, she has found her mind often returning to more recent stories about those "dust bowl" days, relayed to her by one of her elderly friends -- stories about what it was like to live in the Midwest and to be part of a family that actually chose to stay put, in the midst of the drought and darkness of those times. Stories of an eventual hard-won victory... Because that family "stood", their children got the chance to grow up on land soon filled again with "amber waves of grain" and fat livestock.

Bear's thinking it's time for her to stand also, despite those billows of dust rolling in on her own horizon, and threats of daylight fading into darkness.

Because there are times when the Lord calls us to continue on, despite all the dust that might be brought against us... Times when He calls us to do what is so unnatural for us... instead of being driven back by it all, to simply stand; and more, to walk on through, until we reach the sunlight that we know, by faith, shines beyond.

Internet Cafe Devotions will be hosting Word Filled Wednesday this week with the direct link to the list of entries/links HERE. So be sure and drop over there as well, to find links to the whole selection of entries by Christian writers, and/or to add a link of your own and join in the fun! We all welcome comments and discussion!
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Bear's news and free multi-media Christian resources: Bear's Writing Den

Word Filled Wed.: The Flower and the Storm

Genesis 1:11-12 (KJV) "And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.  And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good."

Bear braced herself for the worst as she opened the shade of the Den's front window one morning after a major storm. She expected the beautiful purple flower, which had lately so cheered her heart, to be bent and broken by the high winds and pelting rain of the evening before, its petals in shreds.

And it had been such a nice flower too.

She was not one for gardening, and so plants grew wild around the Den, living and dying on their own. Bear never planted flowers. Yet this one had insisted on growing right in front of her window, all alone, within direct sight when she was working at the computer. And she had quickly grown quite fond of it.

Although the storm had mostly subsided now, the wind was still blowing rather persistently this morning.

Bear peeked around the shade.

The little iris stood strong, waving and dancing in the wind.

She stared. Then put on her glasses to double check.

The purple flower smiled back at her, assuring her that all was well with the world.

Still not believing her eyes, she headed out the front door of the Den to get a closer look. Gently, she lifted the flower's petals with a paw, in wonder. They were not even torn! Yet so fragile. How could they have possibly survived the storm? How was the plant still standing now? Small branches had broken off the trees.

It was always so easy to overlook the incredible miracles of God's creation and handiwork, while rushing about in the day to day routines and activities of the Den. Easy to feel overwhelmed by life's problems and worries and storms. Easy for Bear herself to feel fragile, convinced that the next blast of a storm would surely take her down. Yet here stood proof that God was quite able to make the most delicate of His creations stand, no matter what the weather brought.

How much more would He do for Bear and His other beloved children, walking through the valleys and storms of this life?

After examining the plant for long minutes, Bear still felt awed. She grabbed her camera and tried to get a picture of her flower friend's smiling face. But it was a tricky shot, and kept coming out blurry. Because the subject wouldn't hold still for its photo.

It was too busy, joyously dancing in the wind.

Susan over at Forever His is hosting Word Filled Wednesday this week. So be sure and drop over there as well, to find links to the whole selection of entries by Christian writers, and/or to add a link of your own and join in the fun! We all welcome comments and discussion! (Also see Bear's post from yesterday for more of an explanation of Word Filled Wednesday, if you're unfamiliar with it).
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Bear's news and free multi-media Christian resources: Bear's Writing Den