A ROCKY FOUNDATION

         A group of blind men came across an elephant. They tried to learn and imagine what the elephant is like by touching it. The first blind man put out his hand and touched the side of the elephant. “How smooth! An elephant is like a wall.” The second touched the trunk. “How round! An elephant is like a snake.” The third touched the tusk. “How sharp! An elephant is like a spear.” The fourth touched the ear. “How wide! An elephant is like a fan.” An argument ensued, each blind man thinking his own perception of the elephant was the correct one. Their guide called out. He said “The elephant is a big animal; each man touched only one part. Each one of you knows only a part. You must put all the parts together to find out what an elephant is like”. The full nature of God is beyond human comprehension and language. He is infinite, unique and incomparable to anything created. Human beings seeking to understand God are like the blind men. They only touch a s...

  The Boxer Rebellion in China was the largest massacre of Protestant missionaries in history, with 188 adults and children being killed. Thirty thousand Chinese Christians also perished during the summer of 1900 at the hands of the Boxers. Among them was Chang Shen, the best known evangelist in Manchuria. Chang had been a notorious character prior to his conversion—a gambler, thief, and womanizer. At midlife he lost his eyesight, and neighbors considered it a judgment from God. Hearing of a missionary hospital in a distant area, Chang traveled hundreds of miles only to find all the beds full. The hospital chaplain kindly gave him his own bed, and over time, doctors partially restored Chang’s vision. In the process they introduced him to Jesus Christ. When Chang asked for baptism, missionary James Webster told him, “Go home and tell your neighbors you have changed. I’ll visit you later, and if you are still following Jesus, I will baptize you.” When Webster arrived in Chang...

  In his writing “a look into my garden” H.P. Barker gave this graphic illustration. “As I looked out into the garden one day, I saw three things. First, I saw a butterfly. The butterfly was beautiful, and it would alight on a flower and then it would flutter to another flower and then to another, and only for a second or two it would sit and it would move on. It would touch as many lovely blossoms as it could, but derived absolutely no benefit from it. Then I watched a little longer out my window and there came a botanist. And the botanist had a big notebook under his arm and a great big magnifying glass.  The botanist would lean over a certain flower and he would look for a long time and then he would write notes in his notebook.He was there for hours writing notes, closed them, stuck them under his arm, tucked his magnifying glass in his pocket and walked away. The third thing I noticed was a bee, just a little bee. But the bee would light on a flower and it would sink d...