Remember Mt. St Helens

In their book, The Truth Behind Left Behind, Mark Hitchcock and Thomas Ice wrote about the morning of May 18, 1980, when Mount Saint Helens in S.W. Washington, "exploded with the force of thirty thousand atomic bombs, sending super-sonic concussive waves that flattened everything within 150 square miles. On the heels of that wave, a fifty-foot wall of mud and ash screamed down the mountain and into the surrounding forest land, burying everything in its path and changing the landscape forever."

Harry Truman, the eighty-three-year-old caretaker of a lodge on Spirit Lake at the foot of Mount Saint Helens, knew all about the multiple seismographic evidence that warned of a pending massive explosion. Harry claimed that he knew more about this mountain than anybody else. He ignored the endless earthquakes in the preceding two months, the hundreds of steam blast explosions, and the massive eighty-meter bulge on the mountain side.

He claimed it wouldn't dare blow up on him. But it did. Harry, along with all others who ignored the warning signs, was buried under 600 feet of volcanic ash and material.

Make absolute sure that you are not like Harry Truman who disregarded all of nature's warnings about the pending doom, and ignore God's repeated warnings.

Dear God ..
thank You ..
that you have warned me ..
time and again ..
to be ready ..

I believe ..
and I ask ..
for Your forgiveness ..
for all my sins ..

Thank You for hearing and answering my prayer ..

.. amen ..

Dreams: God's Forgotten Language?

Dreams not only give valuable personal insights but also have given many creative insights. Some inventors, for example, have received profound ideas from dreams. I recall reading how the inventor, Elias Howe, designed the first sewing machine. He was having great difficulty in conceiving a workable needle. When he was close to running out of money, he had an unusual dream. He dreamt that he was about to be executed because he failed to design a sewing machine for the king of a strange country.

In his dream he was surrounded by guards, all of whom held spears that had been pierced with holes near the tip. Howe woke up and immediately rushed to his workshop. The perfect concept for the sewing machine needle came to him in this dream. Within a few hours the first sewing machine design was well on the way to being completed.

I have heard it said that the theory of relativity came to Einstein in either a dream or a vision. Apparently he saw it on a beam of light. I have also read that the design for the first radio tube came to the inventor in a dream.

Was it time for these discoveries to come into the world and did God give them to the persons who were trained to understand them and put them to use? Or did they just happen by chance? I prefer to think the former.

So whatever we think about dreams, they are a God-given gift in that He gave us the ability to dream. Whether we repress them as many do, ignore them as most do, or use them for creative purposes as some do is entirely up to each individual.

If you want to remember your dreams, keep a pen and pad at your bedside and record any dream that makes a strong impression on your mind. Speaking personally, dreams have given me some valuable insights for growth and recovery.

Compassion and Kindness

Michael Josephson of Character Counts shared how he "once read of a man on a subway with two young children who were being loud and unruly. The man seemed to ignore their behavior, so a fed-up passenger confronted him: 'Sir, don't you see how your children are disturbing everyone? How can you be so thoughtless?'

"The man sobbed, 'I'm so sorry. Their mom just died and I've been thinking of how we'll live without her.' In an instant the critic's self-righteousness turned to self-condemnation.

"Why is it that so many of us have to be hit over the head before we turn on our caring and empathy buttons?

"The next time you have the choice between being right and being kind, choose kindness."

My Life

Do Yu Understand ?

Togetherness

Some of the most fascinating trees I have ever seen are the magnificent California and West Coast redwoods. They reach their leafy arms heavenward, commonly growing 200 to 275 feet tall. The tallest one in Humboldt County, California, towers 368.6 feet in height. These trees stand like sentinels of time and have done so for hundreds of years.

They've been through winds, earthquakes, fires and storms—still they stand. Nothing seems to deter them.

What is so amazing is that these trees, among the tallest in the world, have a comparably shallow root system and yet they rarely ever fall. How do they keep standing even in the wildest of storms ? It's because the redwood's root systems reach out for great distances and are intertwined with one another. They literally hold each up other up.

If you and I are going to reach our full potential, we too need the support of each other, not to be overdependent but inter-dependent.

None of us can stand alone.

Dear God

please help me

to be like a mighty redwood tree

giving and receiving support

to and from my friends

so that I, too, can reach the heights

of my God-given potential.

Thank You for hearing and answering my prayerz

Redeeming the Time

Chuck Colson tells about one prisoner he met who had been on death row for fifteen years. His name was John Irving.

John was allowed out of his cell for only one hour a day. The rest of the time he was studying to become a minister—preparing to serve God.

Noticing that John had nothing in his cell but a few books, Colson offered to give him a TV.

"Thanks," John said, "but no thanks. You can waste an awful lot of time with those things."

Can you imagine wasting time on death row?

Colson goes on to say, "The real evils of the entertainment industry are not the violence and profanity—offensive though they are. No, it's the banality: the sheer waste of time. When we turn the TV on, we turn our minds off; studies have shown that the analytical areas of the brain nearly shut down during extended TV viewing."

Project 2020 - "Mapping the Global Future"

Found this incidently. This was published in 2004 by the US Government Printing Office. Interesting study and interesting today's implementations. Please keep it in mind that this study was done/ completed in 2004 and the project named "Mapping the Global Future" was launched in 2004.

Best Regards.

Azhar Abbas

Project 2020 - "Mapping the Global Future" from Azhar Abbas

The Answer Is In Your Hands

Zig Ziglar wrote that according to legend, it was reputed that a very wise old man who lived on a hilltop overlooking the beautiful city of Venice, Italy, could answer any question anyone might ask him. Two local boys figured they could trick him, so they caught a bird and took it to the wise sage.

"Tell us," they asked, "is the bird in our hand dead or alive?"

The wise man replied, "Son, if I say the bird is alive, you will close your hands and crush it to death. Or, if I say the bird is dead, you will open your hands and it will fly away. The answer is in your hands."

And so it is with life. Whether we succeed or fail, live a meaningful or empty life, lay up treasures in heaven or go empty handed to meet God, it's all in our hands! For whatever we sow we reap. It's the law of the harvest.

Dear God ..

help me ..

to invest my life ..

in eternity ..

and lay up treasures ..

in heaven ..

so I will reap abundantly ..

in this life and the next ..

 

Thank You for hearing and answering my prayerz ..

I am Sorry

I am sorry from Azhar Abbas

Do You Want to Be Made Whole?

If I were to ask you if you want to be made whole, I'm sure you would say yes. But what does it mean to be whole? Simply put, it means to become a whole person especially in mind and spirit; that is, to become emotionally well, and spiritually well. Quite a challenge to be sure.

As long as we live in our human body we will be subject to sickness and disease. However, the more whole we become emotionally and spiritually, the healthier we are more likely to be physically. Unresolved spiritual and/ or emotional issues make us much more susceptible to illnesses of all kinds.

For instance, a person whose life is riddled with guilt because of sin, or is nursing a grudge and refusing to forgive someone who has hurt him or her is more than likely to get sick physically and/ or mentally. Many an ulcer, for example, is caused not so much by what we are eating but by what is eating us on the inside. And when I repress super-charged negative emotions, as John Powell puts it, "My stomach keeps score."

While the principle for being made well/ whole is simple, the process is anything but simple. That is, if we want to be made well/ whole, we need to resolve all past hurts, forgive anyone and everybody who has ever hurt us, face and resolve every buried negative emotion, and make our life right with God.

Remember, too, there is a world of difference between a want and a wish. To be made well/ whole takes total commitment, personal honesty, and determination. The half-hearted never make it. They may wish to get well but they don't want it badly enough to be willing to pay the price of doing what it takes to be made well/ whole.

Do you truly want to be made whole/well ? For only to the degree that we are made whole will our lifestyle, our behavior and actions, our manner of living, and our relationships be wholesome.

Dear God

please help me

to understand fully

what it means

and what it takes

to be made whole,

and give me

the courage and will

to do what I need to do

in order to be made whole.

 

Thank You for hearing and answering my prayerz.