He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.

Science is the refusal to believe on the basis of hope.

The article cited new research saying that 91% of American women and 85% of men pray--but perhaps most amazing was the finding that one out of five atheists and agnostics prays each day!

Yesterday is a dream, Tomorrow is a vision, Today is a bitch.

I have never assumed that the people I talk to are so certain it is true that the question is not still very much alive for them. Is anyone ever that certain? I assume always that they want to know if it is true as much as I do myself. I assume that even the most religiously disillusioned and negative among them want it to be true as much as the religiously devout do--want to be shown it, want it to be made somehow flesh before their eyes, want to be able to rejoice in it for themselves. And it is because, at some level of their being, their wanting is so great that you must be so careful what you give them, and because your wanting to give it is so great, too. If you are any good at all with words--if you are any good at all as an actor, with an actor's power to move people, to fascinate people, to move them sometimes even to tearsÑyou have to be so careful not to make it just a performance, however powerful. You have to remember that it is not what you are saying that is important for them to believe in, but only God. You have to remember how Jesus consigned to the depths of the sea those who cause any who believe in him to sin and how one sin you might easily cause them is to believe in yourself instead. I wrote my sermons at great length and with great care. I learned to write in shorter, simpler sentences that I had in my books because a listener loses track otherwise. Though I never dared step into the pul-[PAGE BREAK]pit without everything, including the Lord's Prayer and the announcements, fully written out in front of me, I learned to be free enough of my manuscript to be able to read it without appearing to do so. I put on the best performance I could, in other words, and preached with all the eloquence I could muster, not only to them, of course, but also to myself because much of what preachers say they say to themselves, to keep their own spirits up, to answer their own souls' questionsÑthe sermon as whistling in the dark. There were times when I felt that something better and truer than my words was speaking through my words. There were times when I felt they were only words. There were times when the words seemed to fall dead from my lips and other times when I could see only too clearly how effective they were being. And maybe I entirely misjuged which time was which. I don't know. I know only that Barth is surely right when he says that no one risks the wrath of God more perilously than the minister in the pulpit, and yet at the same time I know that, as a minister, there are few places I would rather be. The excitement and challenge of it. The chance that something better than what you are can happen, that something more than you know can be spoken and heard.

Three friends die in a car accident, and upon their arrival to heaven, they are all asked, "When you are in your casket and friends and family are mourning upon you, what would you like to hear them say about you?" The first guy says, "I would like to hear them say that I was a great doctor of my time, and a great family man." The second guy says, "I would like to hear that I was a wonderful husband and school teacher which made a huge difference in our children of tomorrow." The last guy replies, "I would like to hear them say "LOOK, HE'S MOVING!!!"

Parable of the Twins Once upon a time, twin boys were conceived in their mother's womb. Weeks passed and the twins developed. As their awareness grew, they laughed for joy: "Isn't it great that we were conceived? Isn't it great to be alive?" Together the twins explored their world. When they discovered the umblical cord and realized that it passed life to them from their mother, they sang for joy. "How great is our mother's love, that she shares her own life with us." As weeks stretched into months, the twins began to notice that they were changing rapidly. "What does it mean?" asked one twin. "It means that our stay in this world is drawing to an end," said the other. "But I don't want to go. I want to stay here always." "We don't have a choice, and who knows--maybe there is life after birth!" "But how can that be? We will shed our life-cord, and how is life possible without it? Besides, no one has ever returned to the womb to tell us there is life after birth. No, this is the end." And so the one twin fell into despair. "If conception ends at birth, what is the purpose of life in the womb? It is meaningless. Maybe there is no mother at all!" "But there has to be," protested the other. "How else did we get here? How do we remain alive?" "Has either of us actually seen our mother? Maybe she lives in our minds. Maybe we made her up because we felt better believing in her." And so the last days in the womb arrived with deep questioning and fear. Finally, the moment of their birth arrived. And when the twins passed from their world, they opened their eyes. And the cried, because it was so beautiful.

From Parade magazine comes the story of self-made millionaire Eugene Land, who greatly changed the lives of a sixth-grade class in East Harlem. Mr. Lang had been asked to speak to a class of 59 sixth-graders. What could he say to inspire these students, most of whom would drop out of school? He wondered how he could get these predominantly black and Puerto Rican children even to look at him. Scrapping his notes, he decided to speak to them from his heart. "Stay in school," he admonished, "and I'll help pay the college tuition for every one of you." At that moment the lives of these students changed. For the first time they had hope. Said one student, "I had something to look forward to, something waiting for me. It was a golden feeling." Nearly 90 percent of that class went on to graduate from high school.

A man sentenced to death obtained a reprieve by assuring the king he would teach his majesty's horse to fly within the year--on the condition that if he didn't succeed, he would be put to death at the end of the year. "Within a year," the man explained later, "the king may die, or I may die, or the horse may die. Furthermore, in a year, who knows? Maybe the horse will learn to fly."

A number of years ago researchers performed an experiment to see the effect hope has on those undergoing hardship. Two sets of laboratory rats were placed in separate tubs of water. The researchers left one set in the water and found that within an hour they had all drowned. The other rats were periodically lifted out of the water and then returned. When that happened, the second set of rats swam for over 24 hours. Why? Not because they were given a rest, but because they suddenly had hope! Those animals somehow hoped that if they could stay afloat just a little longer, someone would reach down and rescue them. If hope holds such power for unthinking rodents, how much greater should is effect be on our lives.

"I am not an optimist, because I am not sure that everything ends well. Nor am I a pessimist, because I am not sure everything ends badly. I just carry hope in my heart . . . . Life without hope is an empty, boring and useless life. I cannot imagine that I could strive for something if I did not carry hope in me. I am thankful to God for this gift. It is as big a gift as life itself."

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace and you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Hope has two beautiful daughters Their names are anger and courage; anger at the way things are, and courage to see that they do not remain the way they are. – Augustine

Patience with others is Love, Patience with self is Hope, Patience with God is Faith. -- Adel Bestavros

http://www.cbc.ca/cp/world/041011/w101198.html Washington state teen found alive in wrecked car 8 days after crash 06:09 PM EDT Oct 14 2004 MELANTHIA MITCHELL SEATTLE (AP) - After eight days, Laura Hatch's family had almost given the 17-year-old up for dead, and sheriff's deputies had all but written her off as a runaway. Then she was found, badly hurt and severely dehydrated, but alive and conscious, in the back seat of a crumpled car, 60 metres down a ravine. A volunteer searcher who said she had had several vivid dreams of a wooded area found the wrecked car in the trees Sunday. Hatch, who remained hospitalized Monday in serious condition, was last seen at a party Oct. 2. When she did not show up by the next day, her family filed a missing person's report. The initial search was slowed because there had been underage drinking at the party, and the young people who attended would not say where it had been held, sheriff's Sgt. John Urquhart said. On Oct. 6, detectives learned the party had been in a neighbourhood east of Lake Washington and searched along her likely route home, Urquhart said. But prospects dimmed as the days passed. "We had already given her up and let her be dead in our hearts," her mother, Jean Hatch, told KOMO-TV. Urquhart noted that in 24 years with the department, he had never known of a person to survive eight days without food or water. He said an investigation into the accident was underway. During the search, a statewide bulletin was released and advisories were sent to local police agencies. But Urquhart said family and friends indicated "the most likely scenario was that she was a runaway." Hatch's parents organized a volunteer search Saturday, and that night Sha Nohr, a church member and mother of a friend of Hatch's, said she had dreams of a wooded area and heard the message, "Keep going, keep going." On Sunday morning, Nohr and her daughter drove to the area where the crash occurred, praying along the way. "I just thought, 'Let her speak out to us,' " Nohr told the Seattle Times. Nohr said something drew her to stop and clamber over a concrete barrier and more than 30 metres down a steep, densely vegetated embankment where she barely managed to discern the wrecked Toyota Camry in some trees. She called to her daughter, who flagged down a passing motorist. The man helped Nohr get closer to the car as aid was summoned. "I told her that people were looking for her and they loved her," Nohr recalled, "and she said, 'I think I might be late for curfew.' " Hatch was being treated at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle for dehydration, a blood clot on the brain, and broken bones in her face, hospital spokeswoman Susan Gregg-Hanson said. The teen's doctor said Hatch's dehydration contributed to her survival by keeping a blood clot caused by the crash from expanding in her brain. Dr. Richard Ellenbogen said Hatch was disoriented, thinking only a day had passed, but he said she was "in amazing shape for someone lost for eight days." Ellenbogen said doctors were rehydrating Hatch and carefully monitoring her condition. "This is a good story. We're hoping it has a really happy ending," he said. A call Monday to the family home in Redmond was answered by one of Hatch's sisters, who declined comment. "We were afraid that we weren't going to find her, we weren't going to get her back," Hatch's other sister, Amy, told KING-TV in Seattle. "This is the best thing that could happen because there were a million awful scenarios."

What is faith? Faith is my acceptance of God's fact. It always has its foundations in the past. What relates to the future is hope rather than faith, although faith often has its object or goal in the future, as in Hebrews 11. Perhaps for this reason the word chosen here is `reckon'. It is a word that relates only to the past -- to what we look back to as settled, and not forward to as yet to be. This is the kind of faith described in Mark 11:24: "All things whatsoever ye pray and ask for, believe that ye have received them, and ye shall have them." The statement there is that, if you believe that you already have received your requests (that is, of course, in Christ), then `you shall have them'. To believe that you may get something, or that you can get it, or even that you will get it, is not faith in the sense meant here. This is faith -- to believe that you have already got it. Only that which relates to the past is faith in this sense. Those who say `God can' or `God may' or `God must' or `God will' do not necessarily believe at all. Faith always says, `God has done it'.