The New Life, Inc.

My Dear Children,

Guess what?!  October fifth was my seventy-eighth birthday.  The amazing thing is I feel just as good as I did when I was thirty.  One major change, I gained about thirty pounds.

We are now in Wisconsin and fall is in the air.  There were a few snowflakes falling yesterday and I expect there will be a lot more in a few weeks.  We will be leaving here Saturday on our way to Florida and leave the snow for others to enjoy.

I was thinking back to when I was a child in the fall of the year.  It was a busy time!  It was the time to get ready for winter.  We always had a big garden with all kinds of vegetables; corn, potatoes, beans, pumpkins, squash and other things.  We would slaughter a cow and a pig and put it away for the winter.  We would all work on the wood pile and fill up the woodshed and we had to have plenty of hay and grain for the horse and cows.  Winter was coming and you had to be ready.

I remember Dad plowing the fields and getting some of the stuff done for spring.  These were things that had to be done, winter was coming, and you could not put them off till some other time.

Dear children, fall is here for us as a nation.  Are you prepared?  What do we look to now?  Our money has lost much of its value.  Many people are losing their homes or in danger of doing so.  This could be a very crucial time as to what direction this nation takes for the future.  Are you prepared for change?

Many people are out of work or afraid they will be.  Fear has gripped many people young and old alike.  Are you ready for winter?

People are angry, and they are afraid.

Dear children do not let anger control your thoughts or actions.  Do not let fear control your thoughts and actions.  Do not be afraid of the coming winter.  Look inward and not outward.  Look to God and not to the world.

I thank God that He holds my future and it is secure in Him.  My security is not in the dollar or in who is elected.  I look to the faith that God has given me and I have peace.  The winter does not frighten me!  Who is elected does not frighten me!  And some of my money is gone, that does not frighten me!

It is a time of change and I think it is time for change in us and in our nation.

Dear children, winter is only a season and another spring is coming.  Go into your heart, let God prepare you for the winter.  Look to your faith, look forward with hope and expectation, there are some good things ahead.

You are all in my thoughts and prayers,

Your loving Dad

My beloved Children,

I was just lying on the couch taking a little nap, when I awoke I was thinking of my dad and what a wonderful man he was.  From my first remembrance of him as a little child he was a gentle man.  I remember him holding me on his lap and I think we were both enjoying those times.  I remember riding on his shoulders and I loved it.  He would throw me up in the air and catch me.  What a thrill and what fun that was.  We sometimes forget some of those wonderful moments of our lives.

I didn’t realize at that time that he had only one good leg.  When he was twenty-one he lost a leg from the knee down in a motorcycle accident.  Dad had a girl friend and they were to be married and she decided not to go through with it. Later he met Lena Garry, they married, had five children and I was the last.  She came down with TB and died when I was one and a half years old.  I am just waiting to meet her in heavenly places and get to know her.

Dad also played the banjo but after my mother died he very seldom played it.  Once in a while we could get him to play but it must have brought back memories of Lena so he didn’t play very often.  Now I realize he must have been a very lonely man.  He never remarried until we were all grown up.  He then married Ruth Kinsley and had two more children.  Ruth was a wonderful woman and we really loved her.

I had such great times with my dad.  I loved to fish and he took me fishing often.  We had a boat down on the lake just a short distance from home.  We would go down on the lake in the evening and row out to about ten feet of water and anchor.  Our bait would be night crawlers or suckers.  The fishing was good and in an hour or two we would catch two fish apiece, either lake trout or salmon and they would be about twenty two inches long.  Boy these fish were good eating!  What fun we had, it still blesses my soul as I think of it now.

Dad would take me out hunting.  I didn’t have a gun yet and he would make me walk in his footsteps.  I had to really pay attention because when he would stop I had to stop three paces behind him.  I don’t recall getting a lot of game.  I expect I was making to much noise.

Another memory of those early years was riding on the farm equipment.  Dad would hold me on his lap and we would rack hay, plow ground or harrow.  I am sure I was in the way most of the time but Dad put up with me anyhow.

Sometimes when we think of the good old days, they didn’t seem so good but in spite of that there were some good times, a lot of good times!

Dear children remember the good times, think of them now and then.  I am sure they will bless you even as they have blessed me.  I have a storehouse full of these wonderful memories of my Dad, my family, and friends and so do you.  Go to that storehouse and check it out now and then, it will bless you.

God bless you my dear family.

With Love,

 Your Dad

My Dear Children,

I think of you often and pray for you every day.  I encourage you to make a habit of praying every day.  This is an important part of our Christian walk.

I also want to remind you God is still in control in these uncertain times.  Do not live in fear.  Keep your spiritual eyes on Jesus and you will have peace in your heart and mind.  Don’t allow other people to stir up your mind and emotions and rob you of peace.  Stay away from those that bring dissension and bring peace and healing wherever you can.  You will be pleasing to God.

Dear children, be good listeners.  It seems like some folks do not learn much because they never learn to listen and even when they do they are so easily distracted.  If you want to get to know someone well you must listen to them.  You learn more by listening then you do by talking.  One of the interesting things I have found is that if you can get someone to talk that never talks much they have some very interesting things to say.  On the other hand if we talk to much it drives some folks away.  May God give you the wisdom of when to talk and when to remain silent?

Many years ago in the early years of our marriage, Pauline and I went through some very difficult years.  We did not have a lot of money and there were a lot of things we wanted.  Everything we wanted cost money and as a result we used credit and our debt just got bigger and bigger.  It became a terrible burden that was hard to bear and very hard on our relationship.  Some of the things we bought, we really did not need and didn’t even use once we had it.  I think the bible calls it (Lust of the eyes), some people call it (keeping up with the neighbors).

I reached a point when I just wanted to sell my house, go out west somewhere and never come back!  I could not sell my house!  I put out signs for sale; put it in realtor’s hands, no one would even look at the house.  I tried this for several years and never had an offer on the house.  I had to face the fact God was not going to let me run away.  We stopped buying and started paying debts.  After several years the dept was gone and we had become better stewards of our money.  The holes were gone from our money bags what a relief, the burden of debt was gone.  And don’t forget, dept is a burden that is relentless.  I just thought of an old song “Change your reckless way of living.” Overspending is a reckless way of living that catches up with you after a while.

Dear loved ones, I know it is hard to learn from someone else’s experience.  I hope your experience with dept will not be as difficult as mine was.  It almost destroyed our marriage.

I hope and pray that sharing some of our life with you will make your life a little better and that we had our share of struggles even as you do.  I guess that is all for now.  Keep pressing on.  Don’t forget to go to Jesus and the Holy Spirit for help, they have helped me so many time in my life.

All my love and prayers,

Your loving Father