There Is Something Waiting For Me

A self-made millionaire Eugene Lang greatly changed the lives of a sixth-grade class in East Harlem.  Mr. Lang had been asked to speak to a class of the fifty-nine sixth-graders.  What could he say to inspire these students, most of whom would drop out of school?  He wondered how he could get these predominantly black and Puerto Rican children even to look at him.

Scrapping his notes, he decided to speak to them from his heart.  "Stay in school," he admonished, "and I'll help pay the college tuition of every one of you."

At that moment the lives of those student changed.  For the first time they had hope.

One student said, "I had something to look forward to, something waiting for me.  It was a golden feeling."

Nearly ninety percent of that class went on to graduate from high school.

- Parade magazine

The Need To Ask And The Need For Answers

A father and his small son were walking one afternoon when the youngster asked how the electricity went through the wires stretched between the telephone poles.  "Don't know," said the father.  "Never knew much about electricity."

A few blocks farther on the boy asked what caused lightning and thunder.  "To tell the truth," said the father, "I never exactly understood that myself."

The boy continued to ask questions throughout the walk, none of which the father could explain.  Finally, as they were nearing home, the boy asked, "Pop, I hope you don't mind my asking so many questions..."

"Of course not," replied the father.  "How else are you going to learn?"

- submitted by Jay Martin, The Pastor's Story File (August 1992)