Very smart girl!

When our daughter Angela was in high school she started working at a Chinese restaurant.  One summer day the owner was taking a break by shooting baskets in the back parking lot and left the screen door to the kitchen open.  A neighbor's dog ran into the kitchen followed by the owner with ball in hand, raised above his head ready to punish the intruder.  Angela who was walking through the kitchen at this moment raised her hand to block the shot and said,  "I wouldn't do that if I were you!"  "Why not?"  "If you hit that dog it will yelp and the last thing your customers want to hear is the yelp of a dog in the kitchen of a Chinese restaurant."  The owner lowered his hands and said, "Angela, you pretty smart, you know?"

Not long ago Angela suggested I print two words on the oars of my driftboat. On one "Faith" on the other, "Works."  After all if we trust in faith alone we just go around in circles.  Likewise if we are so arrogant to trust in our own efforts, like pulling on one oar, we will make no progress in our spiritual growth.  James in the New Testament writes:  "What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works?  Can his faith save him?  If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, be warmed and filled,' without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?  So also faith by itself, if it does not have works is dead.  But someone will say, 'You have faith and I have works.'  Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works."  (James 2:14-18)

Like the two oars of a boat both are needed to make progress in the right direction.  By the way Angela, "You still pretty smart."

Yours and His,

Bruce