~WHY DID THE TURTLE CROSS THE ROAD?

"So God made the wildlife of the earth according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and creatures that crawl on the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good."
~Genesis 1:25~

Since it's the Lord's day, I've decided to share a truly miraculous event which I was privy to observe a couple of weeks ago.

I had decided to run an errand (to Target, as a metter of fact--where else?!), and it was rush hour (around 5 pm).  I turned onto a 5-lane road, which was not a highway but was very busy at that time of day.  All of a sudden, I saw something very small on the road in front of me, and it appeared to be moving.  It looked an awful lot like a crab walking sideways into my lane (the second lane from my right).  Perhaps the reason why I thought I saw a sand crab in the middle of the road in the middle of the suburbs in a land-locked city was due to the fact that the night before I had watched a show on the Food Network during which crabs were cooked. 

In any case, right as I moved over/past the object, I realized it was a turtle (about 6" long), and it all happened so fast that I swerved as best I could to avoid running him (or her) over--in fact, for convenience, from here on out, I'll refer to the hero (or heroine) of my story as "Myrtle."  I looked in my rearview mirror after I had passed by/over the little booger, I mean Myrtle, expecting the worst; however, what I saw was her quickly pull herself into her shell, being startled at coming so close to...well, you know.

I really wanted to stop and help poor Myrtle, and knew I would need to act fast, as the cars were moving at a rush-hour pace, and she had only made it across 1.5 out of 5 lanes.  I didn't really think there was a safe place for me to pull over and try to help her without getting squashed myself, but I decided to turn around and go back to make sure.  It's actually very dangerous to get out of your car roadside.  In fact, I've heard that sometimes people are standing by the side of the road, not because they're trying to rescue a roving reptile, but because their car has broken down or they've gotten in an accident; tragically, sometimes they end up being hit by an oncoming car.  That is why it's recommended that you stay in your car until help comes if you're ever stuck by the side of the road for any reason.  So pulling over is usually not a wise thing to do, much less to venture out into the street inself.

ANYWAY, I got turned around and started back in the opposite direction.  Before you know it I saw something up ahead--it was Myrtle the turtle!!  She had made it the rest of the way across the 2nd lane, all the way across the 3rd lane (which was a turn lane), and was now in my lane (the 4th one from my left).  Goodness, at that point I realized I had put her in more danger by turning around to try and help her, as I'm not very good at swerving to avoid things, and I was going to have to swerve to avoid her for the second time.  For example, if you must know, sometimes when I swerve to avoid potholes, I end up going right across the top of them, when I might have only hit the edge if I hadn't tried to do anything at all--go figure--and don't tell the DMV.

Right before I got to her, the car in front of me quickly changed lanes (going into the last lane on our right) to avoid her, and the next car ahead of me went over her so that their wheels were on either side of her, safely clearing her.  Then it was my turn...

Yes, I managed to swerve and avoid her, which is miraculous enough in itself, though I definitely didn't attept going over the top of her as the other car had done.  I couldn't go into the lane on the right because the coast wasn't clear.  Next, I turned right into an apartment comlex because I thought there might be a safe place for me to step out into that side of the street and rescue her.  I turned around and pulled my car up to the exit of the complex and looked down the street to my left; I saw that I wasn't super-close to Myrtle and would have to park the car and then walk quite a ways down the side of the road in order to get to her.

Right at that exact moment, a tall, lanky young man came into the street from the opposite side, strode quickly across into the 5th lane (which our remarkable, redoubtable reptile had made it into), scooped her up, and set her in the grass!  As I made my way towards Target once again, I looked to my right to see if I could figure out from whence Myrtle's knight in shining armor had come, and it appeared there was a walking trail which led down to the street.

I can't help but reflect upon what a blessed and fortunate little turtle is Myrtle; if she only knew how close she had come to being...well, you know.

So to answer the question I posed in this post's title, which isn't a rhetorical one after all...

Why did the turtle cross the road?

Well, to get to the other side, of course!

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~FATHER LOVE

Here is a portion of a note which author Nancy Kennedy wrote to her two daughters.  I think it's very appropriate for Father's Day, and it seems like such an important thing for parents to impress upon their children...

"Alison and Laura, above all, I want you to know that you are loved.  Your dad and I love you imperfectly, but you have a Father in heaven who loves you perfectly.  We have and will disappoint you, but God never will.  I want you to know that deeply and intimately."

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Even a father who is striving to "do right" by his children, who is wanting to do his best in being a godly role model, will never be perfect, and his children need to know that.  However, I would think it probably isn't that hard for them to tell whether their dad has their best interest at heart and is really trying to take the high road in his roles as parent and husband.

This leads me to another quotation which I like by
Ergun Mehmet Caner...

"Without words, men and women can testify of Jesus Christ.  When a man lives out his life as a demonstration of the sacrificial love of Christ toward his wife and daughters, he becomes a living sermon.  This type of humility and devotion to Christ will not go unnoticed in a world dying to know what true love is."

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~FRUITFULNESS

"...since the day we heard about you, we have continued praying for you, asking God that you will know fully what he wants. We pray that you will also have great wisdom and understanding in spiritual things so that you will live the kind of life that honors and pleases the Lord in every way. You will produce fruit in every good work and grow in the knowledge of God.  God will strengthen you with his own great power so that you will not give up when troubles come, but you will be patient."

~Colossians 1:9-11 (NCV)~

*Photion source

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~QUOTATION FOR THE DAY

"Jesus used the carefree attitude of the birds to underscore the fact that worrying is unnatural.  I am learning in my own life, day by day, to keep my mind centered on Christ."

~Billy Graham~

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~THE PARABLES OF...PEANUTS?

I was browsing through the Christianity section of a local used book store a couple of weeks ago, and I couldn't believe my eyes: there on the shelf sat a book entitled, The Parables of Peanuts! As I have loved Snoopy and the Peanuts gang since childhood, I was enchanted and delighted.

Below is a picture of me with my Christmas gifts one year (a wardrobe case, which I'm holding--it contained a Snoopy plush, along with outfits to dress him in; a Peanuts rug; and a Peanuts sleeping bag)...

Cartoonist Charles Schulz, the creator of the Peanuts cartoon strip, was a Christian whose faith was interwoven with his work.  Robert L. Short  was a pastor and seminary student, and in 1965, he turned a slide show he had created into a book: The Parables of Peanuts.  In it, he used the Peanuts characters to explain Christianity.  Upon its release, it rose to #1 on the New York Times' nonfiction bestseller list--10 million copies were sold in eleven languages.  Here is an article on christianitytoday.com about Schulz's passing, and here is an interview with Short.

One of the chapters of the book is entitled, "Where Your Blanket Is, There Will Your Heart Be Also," which of course is a riff on Matthew 6:21. This chapter is about idols. I can definitely identify with Linus in his love for and devotion to his thumb and blanket, as yours truly sucked her thumb and had a "bah-bah" when she was little...

Here are a few excerpts from the book...

In the cartoon above, "Linus asks two very important questions, both of which the Bible does a better job of answering than Lucy.  Linus's second question, 'Aren't I worth more than a bug?!!' comes up for answer in the New Testament when Christ says, 'Are not sparrows two a penny?  Yet without your Father's leave not one of them can fall to the ground.  So have no fear; you are worth more than any number of sparrows'--or bugs, we assume!"

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"'Being loved gives one certain wings, a certain surprising courage and energy.  Then one is more of a complete man than otherwise.  And the more one is this, the better,' said van Gogh, a favorite of Snoopy's..."

*I think this quote goes along nicely with
2 Timothy 1:7 and James 1:4*

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"It is easy enough perhaps for men to say that 'God is good' and that 'God is love' when things go well and when the skies are clear and blue, furnishing a soft background for the birds to fly and sing in.  But the real test of the Christian's faith comes only in the face of the utmost darkness, the most senseless and apparently meaningless tragedies, the bitterest and most insupportable losses of our lives.  Then especially is it important that the Christian be able to say, 'God is good' and 'God is love'; and thus also be able to say with Job: 'The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord" (1:21).  'By believing Him just when to us He seems unjust,' was the acme of faith for Luther."

~ ~ ~

"When the excitement of these days passes away, and when some of the visions begin to grow a little dim; when it becomes impossible to put into words the prayer you want to speak, then we must be able to lift our heads up, and say with all faith as Peter did, 'Lord, you know I love you.'"
(John 21:15)

~Charles Schulz~

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