For Lord’s Day, March 15, 2015

Dear Saints,

I ended up getting the cold that has been going around my family and I didn’t sleep Friday night, so I took to reading through our family’s collection of Mark Twain writings.  I like to read him a lot for a lot of reasons, but one for sure is his keen humor.  Presently, I’m reading Tom Sawyer Abroad, a fanciful tale of Tom Sawyer, Jim, and Huckleberry Fin (the narrator) flying over the world in a futuristic hot air balloon. (Image source: http://www.twainquotes.com/Airtravel.html)

Presently, these men find themselves gliding over the Sahara desert, often hovering above lions and camels.  Part of what Huck conveyed last night had me chuckling so much I couldn’t help but laugh over it with the family this morning at breakfast.  I’d like to share it with you as some self-depecrating humor since I identified with Jim while reading, knowing I’ve earned a reputation from Family Camp and Men Retreats (and lolling off while watching something with the family in the evening):

Jim begun to snore–soft and blubbery at first, then a long rasp, then a stronger one, then a half a dozen horrible ones, like the last water sucking down the plug-hole of a bath-tub, then the same with more power to it, and some big coughs and snorts flung in, the way a cow does that is choking to death; and when the person has got to that point he is at his level best, and can wake up a man that is in the next block with a dipperful of loddanum in him, but can’t wake himself up although all that awful noise of his’n ain’t but three inches from his own ears.  And that is the curiousest thing in the world, seems to me.  But you rake a match to light the candle, and that little bit of a noise will fetch him.  I wish I knowed what was the reason of that, but there don’t seem to be no way to find out.  Now there was Jim alarming the whole desert, and yanking the animals out, for miles and miles around, to see what in the nation was going on up there; there warn’t nobody nor nothing that was as close to the noise as he was, and yet he was the only cretur that wasn’t disturbed by it. We yelled at him and whooped at him, it never done no good; but the first time there come a little wee noise that wasn’t of a usual kind, it woke him up.  No, sir, I’ve thought it all over, and so has Tom, and there ain’t no way to find out why a snorer can’t hear himself snore.

I don’t mind if you had me in mind as the one sawing logs while you read.  I thought of this verse as the giggles settled this morning, and hope this silly story has blessed you:

A merry heart doeth good like a medicine … (Proverb 17:22)

I hope you had a good laugh as you prepare to let the joy of the Lord be your strength anew in worship tomorrow.

Semper Reformanda,

Pastor Grant