Topic(s): Priorities

• Money can buy a house but not a home.
• Money can buy a bed but not sleep.
• Money can buy a clock but not time.
• Money can buy position but not respect.
• Money can buy a book but not knowledge.
• Money can buy blood but not life.
• Money can buy medicine but not health.
• Money can buy sex but not love.
• Money can buy insurance but not safety.

“Wherefore do ye . . . labour for that which satisfieth not?” —Isaiah 55:2

The Family Meal

Topic(s): Family, Wisdom

In her book The Surprising Power of Family Meals (Steer Forth Press, 2005), Miriam Weinstein explains that eating ordinary, average, everyday supper with your family is strongly linked to lower incidents of bad outcomes such as teenage drug and alcohol use, and to good qualities like emotional stability. It correlates with kindergartners being better prepared to learn to read. (It even trumps getting read to.) Regular family supper helps keep kids out of hospitals. It discourages both obesity and eating disorders. It supports your staying more connected to your extended family, your ethnic heritage, your community of faith.

The 2003 survey indicated that children and teens who share dinner with their families five or more nights a week were 32% likelier never to have tried cigarettes, 45% likelier to have never tried alcohol, and 24% likelier never to have smoked marijuana. “Those who eat lots of family dinners are almost twice as likely to get A’s in school as their classmates who rarely eat as a family,” Weinstein adds.

“My son, eat thou honey, because it is good; and the honeycomb, which is sweet to thy taste.” —Proverbs 24:13

Saying Good-bye to Mom

Topic(s): Faith, Family, Mother, Pain & Suffering

It is Mother’s Day weekend and my mom is dying from pancreatic cancer. She is only sixty-five and I will miss her very much. We are a family who believes in and loves God very much. Faith is the victory that overcomes. Right now faith is what is needed to overcome my grief. I would like to tell you our family good-bye story.

Over the last six months my parents have read their Bible together every day. They started with the Psalms and then moved on to passages concerning heaven. Mom asked Dad to read the Bible to her, even if she were to slip into a coma. As we have all gathered together, our family has drawn strength from the Lord, as much as from one another.

My mom has been under hospice care, and we were told that she would drift into a non-responsive state within twenty-four hours. Mom has not been able to respond much. Dad leaned over, kissed her, and told her he would be okay and that we kids would help take care of him. Mom replied, “I’m tired.” Dad told her it was okay. We gave them alone time, and Dad talked to her. He came out to us and cried. He asked us to all go and say good-bye one last time. One by one we all said our good-byes and cried. When the last one was finished we gathered around her. We asked if she would like us to sing “Amazing Grace.” Her response was, “Ninety-four verses.” We began to sing, and this little woman of ninety pounds began to mouth every word. No voice, but her spirit was singing. As we finished, she cried. In the strongest voice she could muster she said, “I love you.” She reached out and hugged Dad, then asked that we carry her to bed.

Her body is with us, but her eyes are closed and she no long grabs my hand. We watch now as she anxiously waits to be with the Lord she loves. Her faith preaches sermons beyond any that I preach from the pulpit. She is dying with dignity, but even greater, she is dying with the Lord. As David so beautifully said, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.” While that verse has never been easy for me to understand, I think I glimpsed some of the preciousness that God sees, in the death of my mother. I will miss her. My mother taught me how to live, but now she has taught me how to die.

Are you ready to die? Are you confident that in your death you will be with the Lord? If you struggle knowing, I hope you will contact me. I would like to share with you the greatest story ever told. Then, together with the Lord, we will not say “good-bye,” but “hello” to Christ our Lord. —Jeffrey Dillinger, Whitehall, Tennessee