The Prized Treasures

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  “Will the prized treasures of today always be the cheap trifles of the day before? Will rows of our willow-pattern dinner-plates be ranged above the chimneypieces of the great in the years 2000 and odd? Will the white cups with the gold rim and the beautiful gold flower inside (species unknown), that our Sarah Janes now break in sheer light-heartedness of spirit, be carefully mended, and stood upon a bracket, and dusted only by the lady of the house? . . . .   The “sampler” that the eldest daughter did at school will be spoken of as “tapestry of the Victorian era,” and be almost priceless. The blue-and-white mugs of the present-day roadside inn will be hunted up, all cracked and chipped, and sold for their weight in gold, and rich people will use them for claret cups; and travellers from Japan will buy up all the “Presents from Ramsgate,” and “Souvenirs of Margate,” that may have escaped destruction, and take them back to Jedo as ancient English curios.” Jerome K. Jerome, “T...

Hope and Change

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Some thoughts from my friend, Dr. John Williamson at the First Baptist Church of Ridgeway,
SC:

"Last Tuesday, our nation inaugurated a new president amid shouts of 'hope' and 'change.' I don't mean to sound cynical, but didn't we hear this before about two years ago, and two years before that, etc. Any candidate wins an election by promising hope and change. No one has ever
run on a platform of: 'Let's keep everything just like it is.'

For the Christian, our hope for change is not found in any human political leader as well intended as he or she may be. Our hope is in the Returning Lord, 'Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence' (I Peter 3:15).

I'm also very glad that our God never changes. 'I the LORD do not change' (Malachi 3:6). Whatever He was; He still is! Whatever He said, He'll still fulfills."

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