If this doesn’t light your fire… your wood is wet!!!!

Good morning and happy "tank filling day" if you now me you know what that means, if not...I refer to Sunday as "tank filling day" with the meaning of spirituality....it is the day to fill up with the Holy Spirit, with you Love of Christ and of God so that you have enough spiritual fuel to get you through the week....If our tanks are not full we might run out and leave ourselves vulnerable to satan! 

In prayer this morning I was sitting here thinking about my life and the "why's" and the "how's" It seems every time Wayde and I seem to be getting on top of things...POW something hits us and drags us back down...now we need at least two tires for our van, one is looking like it will blow any time, this worries me as he travels about 60 miles round trip each day to work. Please keep us in your prayers that God will provide a way for us to get what we are in need of to keep us safe. 

I have had so many prayer request as of late and am so honored to be given the opportunity to pray with/for each of you. I believe whole heartedly in the power of prayer, I have stood witness personally, time and time again at miracles and blessings that come when fervent prayer is lifted. Please join me today in praying for all who are in need, for those who cannot seem to see a light at the end of the proverbial tunnel, for those who are in so deep that they feel they will never be able to climb out, for those who are grieving over the loss of a loved one, for my Aunt as she make her travel to Arizona to say goodbye to her son, my cousin, who is battling cancer, for my cousin who is suffering so with the pain of this "beastly" disease, might he feel the prayers and the love going out to him and might his pain be reduced down to nothing by our Father's hands,  for my cousins as they feel the heartache of losing another sibling. Also join me in praying for the sweet baby who is in need of strength and growth so that he can be put on the liver transplant list, he is fighting so hard, pray for his family as they stand each day lifting hands to God for this miracle. Please pray with me for those who are riddled with financial woes, me included, that somehow...someway....there be a way out, that there be a blessing that will calm the fear. Please join with me in praying for those who are having relationship problems, for those needing special specific prayers answered so that they can continue forward in their quest. 

Father God we come to you this morning on bended knees asking that you hold each of us in your loving and gentle hands, that you see our needs and that you know what battles we are fighting, Father provide for each of us a way today to overcome, shine a light in the very direction you would have us go and lead us by the hand so that we not get lost along the way. Father there are so many struggling with "life" we are clinging to our faith in you, we are hanging on to the promises that you have made if we do our part. Protect us from the sharp claws of satan in our weak times, protect us from ourselves when our faith begins to waiver. Father we love you and know that you have a plan for each and every one of us, help us Lord to fulfill what you have placed in us, help us to fight fervently. In the name of Jesus Christ I pray for blessings, favor, mercy, grace, abundant love, and answered prayers. Amen

I came across this story last evening and found myself crying at the end, it touched me in such a way, it gave me hope for the human race and filled my heart with joy that there is still empathy, there is still compassion and there is so much goodness in what seems to be a lost world. I pray you will read this to its entirety and allow the sense of giving where there is need, to consume your heart! I love each of you and give thanks each and every day that you are in my life, that you support my writing and that you come and pray with us! 

A Truckers Story

Dan Anderson

If this doesn’t light your fire… your wood is wet!

I try not to be biased, but I had my doubts about hiring Stevie. His placement counselor assured me that he would be a good, reliable busboy. But I had never had a mentally handicapped employee and wasn’t sure I wanted one. I wasn’t sure how my customers would react to Stevie.

He was short, a little dumpy with the smooth facial features and thick-tongued speech of Downs Syndrome. I wasn’t worried about most of my trucker customers because truckers don’t generally care who buses tables as long as the meatloaf platter is good and the pies are homemade. The four-wheeler drivers were the ones who concerned me; the mouthy college kids traveling to school; the yuppie snobs who secretly polish their silverware with their napkins for fear of catching some dreaded “truck stop germ” the pairs of white-shirted business men on expense accounts who think every truck stop waitress wants to be flirted with. I knew those people would be uncomfortable around Stevie so I closely watched him for the first few weeks.

I shouldn’t have worried. After the first week, Stevie had my staff wrapped around his stubby little finger, and within a month my truck regulars had adopted him as their official truck stop mascot.

After that, I really didn’t care what the rest of the customers thought of him. He was like a 21-year-old in blue jeans and Nikes, eager to laugh and eager to please, but fierce in his attention to his duties. Every salt and pepper shaker was exactly in its place, not a bread crumb or coffee spill was visible when Stevie got done with the table. Our only problem was persuading him to wait to clean a table until after the customers were finished. He would hover in the background, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, scanning the dining room until a table was empty. Then he would scurry to the empty table and carefully bus dishes and glasses onto his cart and meticulously wipe the table up with a practiced flourish of his rag.

If he thought a customer was watching, his brow would pucker with added concentration. He took pride in doing his job exactly right, and you had to love how hard he tried to please each and every person he met.

Over time, we learned that he lived with his mother, a widow who was disabled after repeated surgeries for cancer. They lived on their Social Security benefits in public housing two miles from the truck stop. Their social worker, who stopped to check on him every so often, admitted they had fallen between the cracks. Money was tight, and what I paid him was probably the difference between them being able to live together and Stevie being sent to a group home. That’s why the restaurant was a gloomy place that morning last August, the first morning in three years that Stevie missed work.

He was at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester getting a new valve or something put in his heart. His social worker said that people with Downs Syndrome often have heart problems at an early age so this wasn’t unexpected, and there was a good chance he would come through the surgery in good shape and be back at work in a few months.

A ripple of excitement ran through the staff later that morning when word came that he was out of surgery, in recovery, and doing fine.

Frannie, the head waitress, let out a war hoop and did a little dance in the aisle when she heard the good news.

Belle Ringer, one of our regular trucker customers, stared at the sight of this 50-year-old grandmother of four doing a victory shimmy beside his table.

Frannie blushed, smoothed her apron and shot Belle Ringer a withering look.

He grinned. “OK, Frannie, what was that all about?” he asked.

“We just got word that Stevie is out of surgery and going to be okay.”

“I was wondering where he was. I had a new joke to tell him. What was the surgery about?”

Frannie quickly told Belle Ringer and the other two drivers sitting at his booth about Stevie’s surgery, then sighed: “Yeah, I’m glad he is going to be OK,” she said.. “But I don’t know how he and his Mom are going to handle all the bills. From what I hear, they’re barely getting by as it is.” Belle Ringer nodded thoughtfully, and Frannie hurried off to wait on the rest of her tables. Since I hadn’t had time to round up a busboy to replace Stevie and really didn’t want to replace him, the girls were busing their own tables that day until we decided what to do.

After the morning rush, Frannie walked into my office. She had a couple of paper napkins in her hand and a funny look on her face.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“I didn’t get that table where Belle Ringer and his friends were sitting cleared off after they left, and Pony Pete and Tony Tipper were sitting there when I got back to clean it off,” she said. “This was folded and tucked under a coffee cup.”

She handed the napkin to me, and three $20 bills fell onto my desk when I opened it. On the outside, in big, bold letters, was printed “Something For Stevie”.

“Pony Pete asked me what that was all about,” she said, “so I told him about Stevie and his Mom and everything, and Pete looked at Tony and Tony looked at Pete, and they ended up giving me this.” She handed me another paper napkin that had “Something For Stevie” scrawled on its outside. Two $50 bills were tucked within its folds. Frannie looked at me with wet, shiny eyes, shook her head and said simply: “truckers.”

That was three months ago. Today is Thanksgiving, the first day Stevie is supposed to be back to work.

His placement worker said he’s been counting the days until the doctor said he could work, and it didn’t matter at all that it was a holiday. He called 10 times in the past week, making sure we knew he was coming, fearful that we had forgotten him or that his job was in jeopardy. I arranged to have his mother bring him to work. I then met them in the parking lot and invited them both to celebrate his day back.

Stevie was thinner and paler, but couldn’t stop grinning as he pushed through the doors and headed for the back room where his apron and busing cart were waiting.

“Hold up there, Stevie, not so fast,” I said. I took him and his mother by their arms.. “Work can wait for a minute. To celebrate you coming back, breakfast for you and your mother is on me!” I led them toward a large corner booth at the rear of the room.

I could feel and hear the rest of the staff following behind as we marched through the dining room. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw booth after booth of grinning truckers empty and join the procession. We stopped in front of the big table. Its surface was covered with coffee cups, saucers and dinner plates, all sitting slightly crooked on dozens of folded paper napkins. “First thing you have to do, Stevie, is clean up this mess,” I said. I tried to sound stern..

Stevie looked at me, and then at his mother, then pulled out one of the napkins. It had “Something for Stevie” printed on the outside. As he picked it up, two $10 bills fell onto the table.

Stevie stared at the money, then at all the napkins peeking from beneath the tableware, each with his name printed or scrawled on it. I turned to his mother. “There’s more than $10,000 in cash and checks on that table, all from truckers and trucking companies that heard about your problems. “Happy Thanksgiving,”.

Well, it got real noisy about that time, with everybody hollering and shouting, and there were a few tears, as well.

But you know what’s funny? While everybody else was busy shaking hands and hugging each other, Stevie, with a big, big smile on his face, was busy clearing all the cups and dishes from the table.

Best worker I ever hired.

Plant a seed and watch it grow.

If you shed a tear, hug yourself, because you are a compassionate person.

AMEN!!!!!!!

I looked this up on snopes to see if it was a real event or a work of fiction, unfortunately it is a work of fiction, but it is something that we hear of from time to time in the news and something I would personally like to hear a lot more of in the news rather than the usual daily fare!