from Peanuts cartoon

Charlie Brown: "Do pretty girls know they are pretty?"
Lucy: "Only if somebody tells them."

Comment: actually a compliment to a pretty girl makes them even prettier. They glow. Kind words are like vitamins. They nourish the spirit, and a lifted spirit makes the entire body healthier. Not only that a happy spirit spreads loving-kindness to others. So a compliment is a wonderful way of creating an ever-expanding chain of good will . It can spread like a prairie-fire of goodness. Here is a beautiful way to create a needed form of global warming.

Soft is Better than Loud

A SOFT ANSWER DOES TURN AWAY WRATH

It’s reassuring to doubters, such as I, to find science reinforcing Biblical ideas. (Don’t get too worried about me. I don’t depend on science for the basic issues.) Here’s a new development I read about in a national magazine: A SOFT ANSWER DOES TURN AWAY WRATH, according to the results of a four-month study of unruly children who were discipline problems in school. Normal and loud teacher reprimands that could be heard by the whole class had no effect on the disruptive behavior of such children. When the teachers switched to soft reprimands that could be heard only by the child being corrected, most of the unruly children misbehaved less often. A return to loud reproaches resulted in an increase in poor behavior, and later a return to soft corrections again resulted in better behavior.

 K. Daniel O’Leary, associate professor of psychology, and a team of graduate students at the State University of New York, Stony Brook, conducted the study.

We who take the Bible so literally might try putting some of its very concrete suggestions into practice – starting with this one.

Thanks to Deborah Norville for this:

The Benefits of Being Consciously Grateful
1. They felt better about their lives as a whole.
2. They were more optimistic.
3. They were more energetic.
4. They were more enthusiastic.
5. They were more determined.
6. They were more interested.
 7. They were more joyful.
8. They felt stronger about handling challenges.
9. They exercised more (nearly an hour and a half more per week).
10. They had fewer illnesses.
11. They got more sleep.
12. They made more [progress toward important personal goals.
 13. They were more likely to have helped someone else.
 14. They were perceived by others to be m0ore generous and helpful.
15. They were less envious of those with more possessions.
16. They were less cluttered.

Other benefits:
A. Clearer thinking—more creativity and openness to ideas.
B. Better resilience during tough times.
C. Higher immune response.
D. Less likelihood of being plagued by stress.
E. Longer lives.
F. Closer family ties.
G. Greater religiousness.

Growth in Kindness

GROWTH IN KINDLINESS

We come now to the next fruit of the Spirit – kindliness.

This is a very homely virtue, homely in the British sense of belonging to the home – a very commonplace, ordinary virtue. And yet it is ordinary as salt, and as essential. Without kindliness there is no virtue in the other virtues. It puts a flavor into all the other virtues; without it they are insipid and tasteless; or worse, they degenerate into vices. Love, joy, peace, good temper; without kindliness are very are very doubtful virtues. So it is no chance that this is the middle virtue of the nine, putting flavor into all the others.

So to grow in kindliness is to grow in virtues that are flavored with a certain spirit. The spirit of kindliness pervades everything. The Old Testament, especially the Psalms, uses the expression “lovingkindness.” A little boy explained the difference between kindness and lovingkindness: “Kindness is when your mother gives you a piece of bread and butter, but it is lovingkindness when she puts jam on it as well.”

But in the New Testament a content has gone into kindness that made the adding of “loving” unnecessary. We have quoted a passage into which the content of Jesus has gone into the words: “Treat one another with the same spirit as you experience in Christ Jesus” (Phil.2:5, Moffatt). Not merely the same actions, but the same spirit in the actions as was in Jesus. This is the high water of morality in this universe. Beyond this the human race will not, and cannot, progress. This is a character and conduct ultimate. This gives kindness a plus – an infinite plus.

And this saves kindness from mere maudlin sentimentality. It can be very severe – severe because He loves so deeply that He often has to save us by hard refusals. And His kingdom can cut – it can cut when, like a surgeon, He insists on cutting out of us moral tumors and cancers. But always His severity is security. It is redemptive. He loves us too much to let us go.

O Christ, show they kindness to me this day even if it be a cutting kindness, for I don’t want leniency; I want life. Amen.

AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: I want God to be kind to me in the form that my deepest necessities demand.

It is Finished

It is Finished When The Angel told Joseph of Nazareth that Mary was going to give birth to a son, and his name would be Jesus, The Angel added these words: "He will save his people from their sins". Thirty three years later the carpenter’s son was dying on a wooden cross at a place called Golgotha. There is no evidence that Joseph was still alive, or that he was present, as was his wife, Jesus' mother, Mary. Now as Jesus came to the end of his life he breathed out a sentence that is incredibly important. He said, “it is finished.” It would be natural to consider this to be about his being alive, that his suffering was over, but it was a lot more than that. When Jesus said those three simple words he was announcing that the whole complicated, meticulous system of sacrifices and rituals that were designed to obtain forgiveness of sin was now over. All religions, more than anything else, have majored in laws, systems, practices and rituals designed to satisfy God, or the gods. Paying for sins committed, offering some kind of penance to protect oneself from God, or the gods, was what religion was all about. (This is not totally unknown today, even in Christianity). Meanwhile Divinity was above it all, enjoying heavenly satisfactions, while always threatening to punish, or harm, the people on earth if they neglected their religious obligations. Religion was about keeping the gods happy, or obeying God to avoid damnation or tribulation. Jesus' death on the cross cancelled the need for that anywhere in the world. “It is finished.” Jesus paid the debt of humanity in full, for every human being. The world is changed. It is reasonable to conclude that God in Jesus had something else in mind than to have people preoccupied with rituals, sacrifices, laws designed to keep God from punishing them. When Jesus death was planned, and then carried out, it was a supreme act of love for humanity. It also signaled that there was something else that God/Jesus had in mind for civilization. The sacrificial system had played an important role in keeping people God-conscious, and God serving. But it had deteriorated into rituals and activities that had lost much of their meaning. The sacrifices and rituals had become nearly meaningless for positively directing lives. So God took care of it. “It is finished.” The religious system was turned upside-down. All of this included a powerful new revelation about the nature of God. Rather than understanding God as threatening, punishing, angry, and demanding payment for sins, while enjoying the pleasures of being above it all there was a new revelation. It is that God is Love! The incredible bottom line of Jesus death, and the ending of the sacrificial system, is that God loves people. What will we do with that? A new agenda was another part of Jesus mission. What now if religion is no longer what it was? More about that later.

Did You Know? ------ Kreational Kindness

Environmental Care and Kindness—Loving God’s Creation Did you know… 700 Years---is how long it takes a plastic bottle to degrade in a landfill. 80-100 Years---is the lifespan of an aluminum can in a landfill. 1 Million Years---is the lifespan of a glass bottle in a landfill. 90 Days---is how long it takes a recycled aluminum can to be made into something useful. 14 20-ounce clear plastic water bottles, when recycled, can create one Extra Large T-Shirt.

Drama At the Gas Station

Drama at the Gas Station The lady had a chrome-plated fish symbol neatly fixed to the back panel of her white Lincoln Continental. The name Jesus was spelled out inside the lines defining the shape of the fish. The whole scene is fixed in my memory because the driver, a large blond woman, was very upset with the gas station attendant. He, a small Asian person, had accidentally spilled oil on the fender and motor of her beautiful car, in the process of adding some to the crankcase. There was a hot verbal interchange, I couldn't hear distinctly as I pumped my gas. Then just before she slammed her door and sped away in a huff she bellowed: "Vell, vy don't you people go back to your own country!" I hoped the attendant didn't notice the "Jesus" sign on the back. It was a pathetic scene, but I couldn't keep from laughing at the irony of her words spoken with a heavy European brogue. She had a Christian label on her automobile, but her soul was sour.