Children’s Story

Children’s Story – To Be Caught Was to Die

by

This story is about Amanda, a young Waldensian girl living in one of the Piedmont valleys of northern Italy. Toward the end of the Middle Ages, as it had been for centuries, it was a death penalty to own or to read a Bible.

For hundreds of years, through ages of persecution, the Waldenses secretly had Bibles hidden. They read and memorized them, and secretly distributed them to those who could read throughout all of Europe. Many of the Waldenses were caught and martyred. At times, crusades [papal armies] were sent out to destroy all the Waldenses, but God always preserved a remnant. It was the seeds from their witness and from the Bibles they distributed that eventually helped to bring about a reformation and religious freedom throughout Europe.

As Amanda grew, her mother carefully instilled within her the treasures of the Bible that she herself had learned at her mother’s knee. When very young, she had already memorized large portions of Scripture. She was also drilled in the importance of secrecy and of the danger of owning such a Book. To be caught was to die, but to read it and obey it was to have eternal life.

One day, suddenly and unexpectedly, it happened. Father was gone, and Mother was kneading the bread dough, getting ready to put it into pans for the oven. Mother, as usual when no one was around, had her Bible open upon the table. This was a time when she often memorized. It was at that instant that Amanda heard hoof beats coming around the trail to their valley home at the foot of the mountains. They were almost upon them before she heard the sound. She just had time to peek out to see two soldiers jumping off their horses in front of the door!

“Mother!” she gasped, “Mother, they are soldiers!” That is all she needed to say. She knew they were caught, for the soldiers did not wait to knock; they simply kicked the door open and walked in, looking for the Book. To be caught was to die, and Amanda knew they were caught! The Bible was right there, and there had been no time to hide it!

“Where is the Book!” they demanded. “You have been reported as having a Bible. Turn it over to us now.” Amanda was shocked. Surely they could see the Bible lying open right there upon the table. She looked at her mother, but the Bible was not there! Where was it? All she saw was Mother calmly putting the last pan of bread into the oven as though this was an every day occurrence, and she could not be bothered until her bread was safely baking.

Then turning around, Mother simply said, “I do not know who could have reported such a thing. You will not find a Bible in this house. You can search if you like.”

“Why, Mother!” Amanda thought to herself, for she had been taught never to lie. Now, of course, if the soldiers could not find the Bible, her mother had not lied, but how could she be so sure they would not? How could her mother be so calm, Amanda wondered. How could Mother have hidden it so quickly? and where? She had not moved from where she had been standing while kneading the bread. It was a mystery too great for her to ponder.

To be continued…

Children’s Story – To Be Caught Was to Die, Part II

by

In Part 1 of our story, the home where Amanda, a young Waldensian girl, lived with her parents was being searched by soldiers who had been told the family had a Bible. To be caught with a Bible was to die!

One soldier kept a careful eye on Amanda and her mother, while the other began to ransack the house.

Amanda watched with amazement as he went from corner to corner, not missing a nook or cranny. He tested all the boards of the floor and the timber of the walls to see if there might be a secret hiding place. Obviously he had done this before.

He came to where Mother had been making her bread. Surely he would find it now! He opened the firebox to see if there were any remnants of a burnt book inside. Where could Mother have hidden it, and how could she maintain such calmness and composure? The soldier opened the cupboards and emptied them. He opened the oven door, but all that was there were loaves of bread baking.

“I told you that you would not find a Bible in this house,” Mother reminded them. Amanda was beginning to believe her. Finally, in frustration, they left, thinking they had received a false report.

Amanda held her breath until they could no longer hear the horses. Then, still whispering from fear, Amanda asked, “Mother, wherever did you put the Bible?”

“Let me take the bread out of the oven first; I was afraid it might get too done before they left. . . . There now, doesn’t that look fine?” Mother said, holding up the first loaf. “Isn’t it wonderful how the Lord always provides for our needs? Dear, we must thank the Lord for protecting us, for surely if He had not sent His angel we would have been caught.”

“But, Mother, where is the Bible? Did an angel really take it?”

“Not exactly, my dear,” Mother answered. “But an angel did tell me what to do. Come, let us kneel and thank God for His protection.”

“Now, dear,” said Mother upon rising from her knees, “We will have some fresh bread for supper when Father comes. He should be here shortly.” Then, as though remembering Amanda’s question, she said, “You will find out about the Bible then.”

Now Amanda watched the path for Father. Upon seeing him, she ran to give him the exciting details of the day. “Wherever Mother put the Bible I do not know,” Amanda said breathlessly.

The house was still a wreck, but the table was set, and there in the middle of it was a loaf of bread. It was not the prettiest loaf of bread, as Mother had evidently not had time to smooth it out when the soldiers came. After grace, Mother cut the bread. Usually Father cut it, but this time Mother insisted. How carefully, almost reverently, she cut through the crust, as though this loaf of bread was the most precious thing on earth.

“Mother! There is the Bible!” Amanda exclaimed. Cautiously, Mother peeled the bread away from the precious Book. It seemed undamaged, as though miraculously preserved.

“So that is what happened to the Bible!” said Amanda in wonder. “You wrapped it in the bread dough and stuck it in the oven. Surely, if you had not been studying the Bible while making your bread you could not have hidden it, and the soldiers would have found it.”

“That is right,” said Mother. “When the soldiers came, I did not have time to even think. It was as if an angel spoke to me, and my hands immediately complied. I wrapped the Bible in the bread dough, put it in the last loaf pan, and put it into the oven. I would never have been able to think of it so quickly. Surely the Lord has protected us.”

Reprinted from https://www.StepstoLife.org (cited June 7, 2002).

Children’s Story – The Golden Windows

by

“Oh, dear!” exclaimed Ruth impatiently, as she straightened the book shelves. “I do wish we could have a new carpet this spring. I never liked this at all, and now it is so faded and worn it is simply dreadful. It makes me miserable every time I look at it.”

“Then, since you say you cannot very well have a new one just now, why do you look at it?” asked Aunt Rachel, smiling. “There are a great many unpleasant things in our lives—we find them every day—some of which we are unable to prevent. If we persist in thinking of them and keep fretting about them, we make ourselves and everybody about us miserable.

“It seems to me we might all learn a lesson from the bees. I have read that when anything objectionable, that they are unable to remove, gets into a hive, they set to work immediately to cover it all over with wax. They just shut it up in an airtight cell, and then forget all about it. Is not that a wise way for us to manage our aggravations?

“Someone sent me a postcard the other day with this motto: ‘The secret of happiness is not in doing what one likes, but in liking what one has to do.’ It is not in having and doing just as we like, but in being determined to make the best of the inevitable. When you find an unpleasant thing in your life that cannot be removed, find a way to deal with it and then forget it.

“And then I think that many times it helps to get a different view of things. You remember the story of the golden windows, do you not? A little boy who had very few pretty things in his own home because his parents were poor, often stood in his own doorway at sunset time and looked longingly at the big house at the top of the opposite hill. Such a wonderful house it was! Its windows were all of gold, which shone so bright that it often made his eyes blink to look at them. ‘If only our house was as beautiful,’ he would say. ‘I would not mind wearing patched clothes and having only bread and milk for supper.’

“One afternoon his father told him he might do just as he pleased, so he climbed the hill from his house and up the other long hill. He was going to see the golden windows. But when he reached the top of the other hill he stopped in dismay; his lips began to quiver, his eyes filled with tears. There were no golden windows there—nothing but plain, common windows like his own. ‘I thought you had beautiful golden windows in your house,’ he said to the little girl in the yard.

“Oh, no!’ she said, ‘our windows are not worth looking at, but stand beside me and you will see a lovely house with truly golden windows. See?’

“The little boy looked. ‘Why, that is my house,’ he exclaimed, ‘and I never knew we had golden windows!’

“You see, much depends on your point of view. I have lived to be an old woman, Ruth, and I have come to feel that the most heroic lives are lived by those who put their own troubles out of sight, and strive by every means in their power to ease the burden of others, who leave always behind them the influence of a cheery, loving, thankful spirit.”

Reprinted from The King’s Daughter and Other Stories for Girls, A. B. Publishing, Ithaca MI, 1993, 210–213.

Children’s Story – A Modern Raven

by

The most wonderful answer to prayer that I ever saw was that of a poor Mohammedan widow, who, with her children, was starving.

I had closed the White Memorial Hospital in Pasrur, India, for two months. One day, I decided to open it, and, taking with me my assistant, a young Indian girl, we drove in the evening to put the hospital and dispensary in order. As my decision was made suddenly, I took with me only a small five-cent loaf of bread and some butter. The next morning at five o’clock, we ate most of the bread and butter.

We were so anxious to open to patients the next day that we worked on till two o’clock that afternoon, forgetting our need of food. Then, becoming weak and faint, I sent the assistant to prepare some Indian bread and greens for herself, telling her I would take what was left of the bread and butter we had in the morning.

Later, I drew a small table to the edge of the veranda, and sat down to my bread and butter. My Indian assistant drew a native bedstead close to the veranda, with her bread and greens on a brass plate, and also made ready to eat.

She had just seated herself, but had not yet touched her food, when a big black mountain crow, or raven, flopped down on her. He took one side of the bread in one claw and the opposite side in the other claw. Then he carefully brought his feet together and took up the vegetables.

It is not uncommon for crows to steal food from our plates when we sit outside, but they generally fly into a tree near by and caw and brag. This bird acted differently, and although both of us were most indignant, we watched him with interest. Up into the clear sky he went, over the hospital, across the city, on, on, till only a speck, when he seemed to sink and vanish. I shared my bread and butter with my assistant, and we finished the work. Then we opened up to patients the next day.

I cannot recall whether it was one or two days later that we saw a poor, weak woman coming in the gate, carrying a baby in her left arm, and a child of two or more on her right hip. Two other children came trailing after her, snatching at her clothes whenever they could to help themselves along. She staggered to the veranda and sank exhausted to the floor. We revived her, and asked from what she suffered.

“I am a Mohammedan widow,” she said. “My husband died six months ago, and left me with these four children. My children and I have been starving. For three days we had nothing to eat. I prayed, oh, how I prayed to Mohammed; but Mohammed never cares for women and children. Then I prayed to the gods of the Hindus, but they, too, never care for women and children. Then I threw myself on the ground and clasped my hands as the Christians do, and I cried, ‘O God of the Christians, send food to us, that my children may not die.’

“While praying, a crow dropped down and swept my head with its wings and flew away. I lifted my head and looked. There before me lay a beautiful piece of bread and some vegetables. I took the food, and my children and I ate.

“Some of the village women came past me as we ate, and asked me where I got the food. I told them the crow had brought it. ‘That is not a poor man’s food,’ they said. ‘That has come from some one of the better class.’

“ ‘I know the tender-hearted doctor who has a hospital at Pasrur,’ one woman said. ‘I think if you go to her, she will take you in and care for you.’ I started at once. Sometimes we got a ride, sometimes we walked, but we are here.”

My assistant thanked God that she had been counted worthy to give her dinner to answer this woman’s prayer. It was her food, without a doubt, that the crow had carried to the starving widow and her children.

True Education Reader, ©1931, Maria White, M.D., 354–356.

“Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to Me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on Me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).

Children’s Story – He Will Soon Be Here

by

After a long day’s journey, I arrived at the house of some relatives in Wales, who had invited me to spend Christmas with them. After the first greetings had been exchanged, I said, “But I don’t see my dear Ruthie.”

“No, Aunt, one of the children answered, “Ruth is out this evening, and she wants to have you all to herself first when she returns, because she has some news that nobody else is to tell you.”

Ruth, the eldest daughter, had been for some time engaged to a young man holding a civil post in India. There was every probability of his being able to revisit England in a few months and claim his bride; but when last I heard from Ruth, the time for his coming was still unsettled. I at once guessed her good news had reference to this matter. Soon after I had retired for the night, there came a gentle tap at my bedroom door, and Ruth entered; there was a light in her eyes, a joyous elasticity in her step.

“Auntie,” she cried as she embraced me, “they have not told you?”

“No, darling, only that you have something to tell.”

So, making me sit down by the fire, she told me, with a happy, blushing face, while she drew a letter from her pocket, that Herbert had written to say he would be home from India soon.

When Ruth had left me, I sat thinking how much more gladness there should be in the lives of those who are looking for the coming of the heavenly Bridegroom. Every day spent with my niece taught me, in some new and practical way, how the thought of our Lord’s appearing should regulate our present aims and occupations—should influence our views concerning the possessions, privations, joys, and sorrows of this life.

I noticed she was less often with the family, and one day I went to find her in her room. There I found her sitting at a table which was covered with books; she was reading a large volume and busily making notes from it.

“This is a new interest of yours, Ruthie, isn’t it?” I remarked.

“Yes, Aunt, but you see Herbert is so clever; I do not want him to find me very ignorant, so I am studying history two hours a day. And as he said something in his last letter about touring Europe after the wedding, I want to improve my French and German efficiency.”

One afternoon as the women of the house were going shopping, Ruth declined the outing, and when her mother inquired what she could bring for her, Ruth replied, “Nothing, thank you, Mamma. I must think about my outfit next month, as Herbert will soon be here.”

On another occasion I heard some young friends ask her if she had heard anything about the house in India where she was to live. “Hardly anything,” she answered, “except that he has been preparing it for a long time, and he will be there.”

The impression left upon my mind by her earnest looking for her expected bridegroom has never been erased. When the things of this life threaten to assume an undue importance, I recall Ruth’s oft-repeated words, “It is not worthwhile, when he will soon be here;” and I strive to bring the glory of Christ’s soon return to bear on all the interest of time; to keep me sober in its joys, and content in its sorrows; and to be careful for nothing because “the Lord is at hand.” And many times when I have longed for more information regarding the Promised Land, I have remembered Ruth’s simple words with respect to her unknown dwelling in India and rested my heart on the blessed thought, “He who loves me with an everlasting love is preparing a mansion for me there.”

Children’s Story – Spare Moments

by

Alean, awkward boy cameone morning to the door of the principal of a celebrated school and asked to see him.

A servant eyed his thread-worn clothes, and thinking he looked more like a beggar than anything else, told him to go around to the kitchen.

The boy did as he was directed, and soon appeared at the back door.

“I should like to see Mr. Brown,” said he.

“You want a breakfast, more like,” said the servant girl, “and I can give you that without troubling him.”

“Thank you,” responded the boy, “I should have no objection to a bit of bread, but I should like to see Mr. Brown, if he can see me.”

“Some old clothes, may be what you want,” remarked the servant, again eyeing the boy’s patched trousers. “I guess he has none to spare; he gives away a lot,” and without minding the boy’s request, she set out some food upon the kitchen table and went about her work.

“Can I see Mr. Brown?” again asked the boy, after finishing his meal.

“Well, he’s in the library. If he must be disturbed, he must, but he does like to be alone sometimes,” replied the girl in a peevish tone. She seemed to think it very foolish to admit such an ill-looking fellow into her employer’s presence. However, she wiped her hands, and told him to follow her.

Opening the library door, she said: “Here’s somebody, sir, who is dreadfully anxious to see you, and so I let him in.”

I don’t know how the boy introduced himself, or how he opened his business, but I know that after talking awhile, the principal put aside the volume he was studying, took up some Greek books, and began to examine the new-comer. The examination lasted some time. Every question that the principal asked, the boy answered as readily as could be.

“Upon my word,” exclaimed the principal, “you certainly do well!” Looking at the boy from head to foot, over his glasses, he asked, “Why, my boy, where did you pick up so much?”

“In my spare moments,” answered the boy.

Here he was, poor, hard-working, with but few opportunities for schooling, yet almost fitted for college, by simply improving his spare moments. Truly, are not spare moments the “gold dust of time”? How precious they should be! What account can you give of your spare moments? What can you show for them? Look and see.

This boy can tell you how very much can be laid up by improving them; and there are many other boys [and girls], I am afraid, in the jail, in the house of correction, in the bar or in the pool hall, who, if you should ask them when they began their sinful courses, might answer, “In my spare moments.”

“In my spare moments I played addictive games.”

“In my spare moments I began to smoke and drink.”

“It was in my spare moments that I began to steal candy from the corner store.”

“It was in my spare moments that I gathered with wicked associates.”

Oh, be very, very careful how you spend your spare moments! Temptation always hunts you out in small seasons like these when you are not busy; Satan gets into your hearts, if he possibly can, in just such gaps. There he hides himself, planning all sorts of mischief. Take care of your spare moments. “Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do.” Manuscript Releases, vol. 2, 216.

Reprinted from Tiger and Tom and Other Stories for Boys, A. B. Publishing, Inc., Ithaca, MI., 1993.

Children’s Story – God Seen in All His Works

by

In that beautiful part of Germany which borders on the Rhine River, there is a noble castle, as you travel on the west bank of the river, which you may see lifting its ancient towers on the opposite side, above the grove of trees about as old as itself. About forty years ago, there lived in that castle a noble gentleman, Baron Philippie. He had only one son, who was not only a companion and a comfort to his father, but a blessing to all who lived on his father’s estate. It happened, on a certain occasion, that, this young man being from home, there came a French gentleman to the castle, who began to talk of his heavenly Father in terms that chilled the old Baron’s blood, who reproved him, saying, “Are you not afraid of offending God?” The gentleman replied that he was not, for he had never seen Him.

The Baron did not notice the answer, but the next morning he took his visitor about the castle grounds and, among other objects, showed him a very beautiful picture that hung on the wall. The gentleman admired it very much and remarked that whoever drew that picture, knew how to use the pencil.

“My son drew that picture,” said the Baron.

“Then your son is a clever man,” replied the gentleman.

The Baron then went with his visitor into the garden and showed him beautiful flowers and the plantations of forest trees.

“Who had the ordering of this garden?” asked the gentleman.

“My son,” replied the Baron, “he knows every plant here, from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop on the wall.”

“Indeed,” replied the gentleman, “I shall think very highly of him soon.”

The Baron then took him into the village and showed him a small, neat cottage, where his son had established a school, and where he caused all young people who had lost their parents to be received and nourished at his expense. The children in the house looked so innocent and so happy that the gentleman was very much pleased, and when he returned to the castle, he said to the Baron, “What a happy man you are to have so good a son!”

“How do you know that I have so good a son?”

“Because I have seen his works, and I know that he must be good and clever if he has done all that you have showed me.”

“And you have not seen him?”

“No, but I know him very well for I judge of him by his works.”

“True,” replied the Baron, “and in this way I judge the character of our heavenly Father. I know by His works that He is a being of infinite wisdom, power, and goodness.”

The French gentleman felt the force of reproof and was careful not to offend the good old Baron any more by his remarks.

Creation

All things bright and beautiful,

All creatures great and small,

All things wise and wonderful,

The Lord God made them all.

He gave us eyes to see them,

And lips, that we might tell

How great is God Almighty,

Who has made all things well.

—Cecil F. Alexander, 1848

Children’s Story – Missionary Spirit

by

Oh!” thought Anna Markham to herself as she closed the book she had been reading about a mission in Madagascar. “How I wish it were possible for me to do something like this for Christ,” and here Anna lost herself in a sort of heroic dream. She pictured herself teaching, exhorting the unbelievers in India, or in some far African station, where the gospel had never before been heard. She fancied herself enduring suffering, starvation, imprisonment and torture for her faith, and had just come so far in her romance as to be “led out for execution,” and “forgive her murderers with her last breath,” when her mother called her from the next room.

The rapt, ecstatic look on Anna’s face gave way instantly to a fretful frown. “Oh, dear!” she said sharply to herself, “I never can be let alone a minute.”

She threw down the book and went to her mother.

“Well, what is it?” she asked in a most ungracious tone.

“I want you to run over to Mrs. O’Hara and take her the dinner I have prepared for her, and Anna, if you can, get her up and make up her bed.”

“Oh, Mother!” said Anna, as if she had been asked to perform impossibilities, “I can’t bear to go to Mrs. O’Hara’s, and the house is so dirty and disagreeable.”

“She is an old lady and all alone,” said her mother with some displeasure. “She cannot do anything for herself now, and it is the duty of her neighbors to take care of her till she is well.”

“She might go to the resthome and let the nurses take care of her.”

“She won’t go, as you know very well, and there are some good reasons on her side too. Besides, do you think it would be any more agreeable for the staff at the resthome to nurse Mrs. O’Hara than it is for you?”

“Well, I don’t like to,” said Anna very crossly.

Anna obeyed her mother; however, she performed her errand in so ungracious and uncharitable a manner and assumed such an air of martyrdom that Mrs. O’Hara, who was by no means reserved in speech, told her that she’d “never be the lady her mother was.” So Anna went home disgusted and wished herself away from a home where “no one understood her.”

By the next day, however, she had forgotten about the matter and was telling her mother about the missionary story she had been reading and how she should like nothing better than to go as a missionary to Africa.

“What would you do there?” asked Mother, rather amused.

“Oh! Teach the children, and the women, and take care of the sick, and so forth.”

“You think the natives of Africa would be less disagreeable than Mrs. O’Hara and you would take more pleasure in doing for them than for your own neighbor?”

The question at first angered Anna, but then she began to feel a little ashamed.

“Isn’t it rather better on the whole,” said Mother, “to look about us and see what little things we can do if we will, than to spend the time fancying what great things we would do if we only could?”

After a little consideration, Anna began to see how little of the true missionary spirit she possessed and to feel that she was not actuated by right motives.

We must be willing to take up the little crosses that lie in our pathway and to labor for the good of others. In doing this we may show a true missionary spirit.

Children’s Story – Tom’s Revenge

by

“I hate Ned Lane,” said Tom Bixby, doubling his fists and stamping his feet. “He’s a mean, spiteful, wicked boy. I wish he were dead, I do!”

Then Tom broke down and fairly burst into tears. His mother, who had heard his angry words, came out to the garden to see what had caused them. She, too, was indignant at what she saw. There was Tom’s pet dog, Fawn, stretched out cold and stiff on the grass. Around his neck a string was tied, from which dangled a card. On it these words were written in a scraggy, blotted hand: “He’ll never chase my chickens no more.—Ned Lane.”

“Oh, Mother!” cried Tom, “look at poor, poor Fawn; see what that cruel Ned has done. Oh, how I hate him. I’ll be revenged.”

Fawn had been a favorite with the Bixby family, and in spite of the fact that he would pursue chickens and tear the clothing of passing pedestrians or hide away stockings and handkerchiefs when they were not put away, Mrs. Bixby had borne with him. She had hoped that his youthful faults would be cured in time. She knew that Ned Lane had been very angry because of the loss of two rare fowls, which Fawn had shaken and torn to pieces, and she felt that Fawn had been a great annoyance to the neighbors—a great transgressor.

But what to do with Ned was the question, for Tom’s heart was almost broken.

“Tom,” she said, “you say you hate Ned. Do you wish, what I heard you say just now, to be really avenged?”

“Yes, Mother, I want to see him suffer. I wish all his chickens were gone.”

“Ned has done a cruel deed, and I do not wonder that you are deeply grieved; but, my son, he that hateth his brother is a murderer.”

“He’s not my brother.”

“In one sense he is; yet I am sure you do not mean that you would really like to see him dead and cold like your dog. If you think of the meaning of your words, I am sure you wish him no such ill. I think there is a way by which you can make him very sorry for this and yet keep your own self-respect.”

The gentle tones won their way to Tom’s heart. He sat down by his mother, and she passed her soft hand over his hot brow and soothed him tenderly. Then she gave him her plan for being “quits,” as he called it, with Ned, and for getting the victory.

The next day, when Ned Lane met Tom Bixby on his way to school, he was rather mortified to hear nothing about Fawn. He was prepared to defend himself if attacked. But Tom passed in silence. He tried to say “Hallo, Ned!” but failed in the attempt. All the morning, however, when the boys were in the classes together, Tom looked and acted as usual, and at recess he engaged heartily in games with the other boys.

When Ned, feeling more and more uncomfortable, went home to dinner, a surprise awaited him. A superb pair of Brahma-pootra fowls had arrived, with a string and card attached: “For those my poor Fawn chased.—Tom Bixby.”

I cannot say truly that the two from this time became fast friends; but this I know, Ned Lane was thoroughly ashamed of his mean and unworthy action, and never after was guilty of the like cruelty, while Tom felt, even at Fawn’s grave, that forgiveness is sweeter than revenge.

Children’s Story – A Mother’s Love

by

The story is told of a sharecropper family who lived in the South shortly after the Civil War. Every year when the crops were harvested, the family’s share was barely sufficient to provide food and clothes for the next year. There was never enough for any luxuries or things that could make life easier or more pleasant.

One year the fields yielded a bumper crop, and after all of the necessities were bought, there was enough money left over to buy something special for the entire family. The only condition was that the purchase had to be approved by every family member. So the mail order catalog was opened and the pages turned slowly. The pages pictured wonderful attractions for various members of the family, but nothing suited the liking of every member of the family until they came to the page featuring mirrors. When they saw the mirrors, the family decided unanimously that a mirror was something they could all use.

Well, the day came when the mirror arrived. The package was quickly opened, and the father beheld his own image for the very first time. At first there was a look of puzzlement, then a smile, and then great laughter as his face displayed the sheer delight of seeing himself in the mirror.

By now the rest of the family members were anxiously waiting their turn, and as the mirror passed from member to member, the response was the same, until it passed into the hands of the youngest member. In a moment the look of anticipatory joy vanished and was replaced by a look of grief and terror, as he saw his reflection for the first time. The family’s laughter ended abruptly as they all realized the little boy’s pain. As a baby he had been burned in a fire, and his face was badly disfigured.

Looking in the mirror, then back at his mother, then in the mirror and back to his mother, he said to her, “Did you know I looked like this?”

“Yes, son,” came her response.

Looking again in the mirror and then back at his mother, a tear running down her cheek, he asked, “How could you love someone as ugly as me?”

Grasping the child and holding him close, she looked deep into his eyes and said, “I love you because you’re mine.”

The love of a mother that looks beyond her son’s disfiguring burns and says, “I love you, because you are mine,” reminds us of God’s love that looks beyond our sins and weaknesses, that grasps us close to His breast with those same words, “I love you, because you are mine.”

God loves us so much that He wants us to live with Him in Heaven. He sent Jesus to show us how we must live each day on earth so we can go to Heaven. If you live like Jesus, obeying all the things God asks you to do in His Word, you will be able to see Him one day soon.