A Parable

Building Barns

“This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.” Luke 12:21

The preacher stood in front of his congregation, beaming, “Today we are implementing a new system that will allow us to greater serve the needs of this congregation during worship.  This system is cutting edge and designed to boost attendance and provide greater spiritual nourishment.  Its name is Gimmix.  Gimmix is an electronic control package that allows us to run lights, sound, auto-tune, projections, video, and live recording from one console.  We will be able to pre-program the entire worship and run it for each of the services.  From the same console we can record and upload the service to our website.   The ministers and elders feel this is the biggest advancement our church has made since we added electric guitar.  Please join me in applauding the programmers that rushed to install Gimmix for this Sunday’s service.“  

The worship leader got up amidst the applause and waited for the new moving lights to ballyhoo, indicating that worship had begun.  There was a pause and a loud POP!  All the lights went out.  The mic went dead.  The preacher got back up. 

“Just a few moments,” he shouted, “we are clearly running into some technical difficulties.” 

He waited nervously.  From the back of the auditorium, a man in a blazer and jeans came forward and whispered in the preacher’s ear.  “It appears we may have a serious electrical overload.  We won’t be able to run Gimmix today, and we didn’t make any back-up plans.  You are all invited to enjoy an early brunch.” 

Slowly the church filled from the darkened auditorium into the sunlit parking lot.  They stood dazed, thrown by the interruption in their Sunday routine.  A little girl looked up at her father. “Daddy, why are we having church outside?”

“We aren’t,” he said, “We aren’t having church today because the Gimmix didn’t work.”

“Oh,” she said.

People were starting to edge away.  The little girl started to sing.  It was one of the older songs with a memorable melody that they still sang sometimes.  Her father looked down at her joined in her song.  Slowly more members of the crowd joined in until the whole congregation was singing.  The preacher emerged from the church and his embarrassment turned to amazement when he saw his church, without aide, leadership, sound systems, lights, or lyrics singing:

Just as I am without one plea,

But that thy blood was shed for me

And that though bidst me come to thee

Oh Lamb of God I come, I come.

The Puppy Who Grew Wings

Original concept by Alex Blair

There once was an adorable little puppy—as cute as a fuzzy brown ball of fur could be—with floppy ears, a whippy tail, big brown eyes, and oversized paws.  His name was Puppikins.

Puppikins had one dream—to fly and soar in the clouds.  He would try to fly by jumping off the ottomans and chairs in his master’s house, but he always fell on his floppy ears.  He wished and wished for wings.

One day, he noticed little feathers growing out of his back.  Gradually, his little wings grew and Puppikins tried to fly harder than ever.  Eventually, he could glide a few feet across the room, and soon he learned to use the right muscles to flap his wings.  Now, he could rise up right off the floor.  Everyday his wings grew stronger and he could fly higher.  Puppikins looked forward to the day he would soar up in the clouds.

The time came that he could fly longer and higher than ever before, and he decided that that was the day he would try to reach the clouds.  So, Puppikins gathered his strength and took off.  His joy grew as he flew higher and higher, until—WHAM! —he hit the ceiling fan and was flung back to the floor.  Not to be deterred by set backs when he was so close, Puppikins got back up and tried again, only to be flung back again.  On his third try, he dodged the fan!  Now, he was flying higher than ever.  Soon he would be soaring in the clouds.  Higher and higher—WHACK!  He hit the ceiling and fell to the floor a sadder and wiser dog.  For he remembered—he was an inside dog.

The moral of the story is that if you try hard enough and dream big enough, you can overcome seemingly impossible obstacles only to discover your achievements are useless.  The end.