Grandma's Stories, Stories for Teens

Pilgrim’s Progress (1)

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“When’s Uncle Jeff coming round again, Mum?” Bobby asked one day after school. “Well, as a matter of fact, he’s coming round for tea tonight”, Mum said. “Oh good” said Bobby, “I wonder if he has any more stories for us!” “You’ll have to ask him when he gets here”, Mum said with a smile, “I’m sure he’ll have something to tell you anyway!” She knew that Uncle Jeff loved telling stories and he was very good at it.    After tea was over, and Uncle Jeff was sitting comfortably on the couch, Bobby went along and snuggled up beside him. “Can you tell us a story please Uncle Jeff?” he asked. “Oh, please”, Betty said and got up on the other side of him. Even Sarah pulled a chair up and pretended she was reading a book, but she was really listening to what Uncle Jeff was telling the others. “Well, it’s like this”, Uncle Jeff said, “I picked up this book that I had when I was little like you Bobby, and I thought that it was a really good story to tell you children next time I came round”. “What’s it called?” Bobby asked. “Well, it’s what is called a parable story”, Uncle Jeff said, “That means it’s an earthly story with a heavenly meaning. Here goes….

  ” There was once a man whose name was Pilgrim, who was walking along a road away from his house. He had this huge bundle on his back like a back-pack and he was crying and sighing a lot as he went along. He was reading a book as he went, and it only seemed to make him sadder than ever. ‘Oh, what shall I do?’ he cried out loud.    When he went home to his wife and family, he would wipe his eyes, and blow his nose and try to be cheerful. One day his wife said to him, ‘I know something is bothering you. What are you reading in that book all the time?’ ‘Oh my dear’, he said, ‘ It tells me that dreadful things are going to come on this world, and I don’t know how to be saved from them’. But his wife had seen him like this other times, and she tried to cheer him up.           

One day, he was walking along the road again, when he met a man whose name was Evangelist. ‘This book I’m reading tells me that there are dreadful things going to happen and I’m not ready for them. I want to know how to be saved from them. This back-pack I’m carrying seems to get heavier every time I read this book’.

‘Well, you’d better get ready for this by going to that little gate right over the other side of this paddock. See that light over there? Head straight for it and you will find what to do when you get there. Don’t stop to talk to anyone, and don’t go off the path!’

‘Oh, thank-you so much’, Pilgrim said and set off at a good pace for the light. His wife and friends saw him going and they called out to him, ‘Come back, come back’, but he started to run.

Two of his friends ran after him and tried to get him to turn around. One was called Twisty, and the other one was Obstinate. ‘No, no!’ Pilgrim said, “I’m not going to listen to you. I’ve come from the City of Destruction and I want to find the City of Life where I’ll be safe”.     As he turned to carry on, Twisty said to him, “I’ve a good mind to come with you’, and he started to go with him.

‘Well, I’m going home’, said Obstinate, ‘I’m not going to be seen with you two crack-pots’, and he went back home. ‘Tell me more of what you expect to find’, Twisty said as they carried on.

‘Well it’s a wonderful place’, Pilgrim said, ‘And I know it’s true because the One Who wrote this book cannot tell a lie’. “I know who that is”, Bobby said, interrupting Uncle Jeff, “I bet it is meaning that it’s God!”

“That’s right Bobby”, said Uncle Jeff, and carried on with the story…. “Pilgrim got quite excited as he was walking along talking to Twisty. ‘It’s an awfully long way’, Twisty said after a bit, and he began to slow down. ‘Oh, but it’s worth it when you get there’, said Pilgrim, and he carried on telling him all about what to expect.

The next thing they knew was that the ground had got very wet and slippery and before they knew it, they were up to their middles in a swampy bit of ground. ‘Oh, this is the Swamp of Despair’, Pilgrim said, ‘I’ve heard of it. It’s so easy to caught in this’

‘This is dreadful’ cried Twisty, ‘I didn’t know it was going to be this hard. Yuk!’ and he spat some of the mud out of his mouth. ‘Why didn’t you watch where you were going?’ he snapped at Pilgrim, ‘If I ever get out of this, I’m going right back home!’ He heaved himself out of the slimy mud and splashed his way back to solid ground. ‘You can carry on by yourself’, he called out to Pilgrim, ‘I’m off!’ And Pilgrim didn’t see him again.”

“Why did he give up so easy?” Betty wanted  to know, “I wouldn’t have! I’d have kept going!”

“Well, you see some people don’t like trouble and they go back where they’ve come from when things get hard”, Uncle Jeff said.

“What happened next?” Bobby asked.

“We’ll leave that for next time,” Uncle Jeff said, “I don’t want you to forget the lessons in this part of the story”.

Adult Testimonies

Audrey’s Testimony

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This story shows how God works in different ways to bring people to Him.  Audrey was a  middle aged home help and addicted to smoking, coffee and T.V. She never gave God  a thought.  She began  working for an elderly God-fearing lady. This lady never spoke to Audrey about her faith, but Audrey saw the Bible beside her bed, and noticed  her gentle loving manner.

     One day she gave Audrey a CD  of  testimony to take home and listen to. As usual that evening, Audrey immediately turned the T.V. on, made her coffee and lit a cigarette. Before going to bed, she decided to listen to the CD, and heard the speaker tell how God had given him the strength to give up smoking. She thought, “If God did that for him, perhaps He could do it for me too!”

    Waking up the next morning, she didn’t think of her cigarettes once. After a while, she thought in wonderment, “I haven’t had a smoke yet!” and stretched her hand out for the packet. While taking the first breath of smoke, she found it was utterly horrid to her, and she  threw it down. Twice more she tried to smoke with the same result.  After this, she never smoked another cigarette. She took the CD  back, not telling the lady of her experience.

     Shortly afterwards, her daughter arrived back from Australia and stayed with her. Usually they wouldn’t be together  for five minutes without verbally sparring with each other. But this time, Audrey held her tongue when her daughter baited her.  “What’s happened to you Mum?” she asked “You’re different!”  Without even stopping to think, Audrey replied, “It’s the love of Jesus”.  With that confession of the name of Jesus, the light dawned on her soul, and Audrey was never the same again.  She found she had a totally different outlook on life. Now she wanted to be with other Christians, and to go to church services….something she had never done before. She wanted to learn what was in the Bible, and found it was a really interesting book to read….she just couldn’t put it down.

     Audrey had heard vaguely about Moses….after all they had made a film about the story of crossing the Red Sea, but she had no idea what led up to it. Of course she had heard something about a boy called David killing a giant, but she didn’t have a clue exactly what happened. Then there was the story of the whale swallowing Jonah, but she had thought that no-one with any sense would take any notice of a story like that! But now she read in the New Testament that Jesus had said it really had happened.                        Every page she read opened her understanding further. She couldn’t get enough of it. As she read the book of Psalms, she found to her amazement that David was just like we are because sometimes he was terribly happy and other times he was right down in the dumps. She found that Peter was always opening his mouth and putting his foot in it. He never knew when to shut up!                                                                                                                     

    Then there was that young man called Saul who hated the early Christians so much that he was dragging them off to prison and if he could,  he would have their heads chopped off. Yet one day God called out to him from the sky, and he fell to the ground. When he got up he found he  was blind. He knew that it was Jesus Himself who had called out to him. Then there was the man who went to him and touched his eyes, making him see again. What a difference it made to  him once  he believed in Jesus and began to preach about him!  Audrey knew she was like every one of those people, and she knew that what God had done for them, He would do for her!    We see from this that God treats each one of us as individuals….He has made each person unique and He deals with each one of us according to our needs. Yet there is only one way to Him even though there are many different ways He brings us to this point, and that is through the Lord Jesus Christ. Our understanding may be limited, but we must be willing to accept Him and His way.

Life Lessons

Why Are You Feeling Down? Hope in God….

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“I   need   encouragement,  you   need   encouragement, we   ALL   need encouragement !” The words of the speaker wafted on, and I little dreamed how these introductory words would stick in my mind for over fifty years!     I can see now after a span of years, that to encourage  others is one of the best gifts that God has given to each one of us. No matter how old or how young we are, we can all say nice things to others, especially those in our own family.

     David, in spite of knowing God so well, is a classic example of one who needed encouragement. Jonathan (King Saul’s son) and David were best friends. They had clicked right from the start of their first meeting in Saul’s court . Jonathan liked David very much, with his youthful freshness and good looks that took everyone’s eye. As they talked together that they both felt the other was a special friend. They thought alike and Jonathan loved the way David appreciated God, while David felt he had someone he could trust in the dangerous court of King Saul.    Even more than Jonathan looking after David’s needs, was his appreciation of God’s plans for David’s future. He not only knew that God’s plan was for David to be the next king, but he was happy about it and planned that he would be second in command. When David was on the run for his life, he would meet him as often as he could, and encourage him in the Lord, looking to the future when he would work with David as King. They were so sure of this that they made a covenant (promise) together before the Lord promising that they would always keep it.     But the time came when they were separated, to see each other no more, and David was left without the comfort of Jonathan’s encouragement.

    Perhaps you are missing friends you once had and now you are separated from them.  What can you do?  What did David do?      David told  God all about it. Things couldn’t have looked blacker for him. His friend was gone, his enemies were still after him, and they had taken his wife and family captive and his own men had turned against him.

    We have times when we feel like this. We all have enemies of fears, doubts, and other problems, even not feeling well; these enemies  seem about to swamp us at times. David may have wondered where God was in all this mess…..where were His promises now? However could he get out of all this?     But he took himself to task…. “Why are you so cast down O my soul? Hope in God!” “Be of good courage and He shall strengthen your heart”. “My heart is fixed O God”, he would say, “I will sing and give You praise in spite of my enemies!”

     So we too, can fix our hearts and minds on the Lord and not be afraid of bad things. We can think about Him and count our blessings. Think of all we can be thankful for in spite of our circumstances and we  will be encouraged with a fresh outlook on things. It is surprising what a difference a thankful spirit makes, and being thankful for the outcome of our prayers BEFORE we see the answer will give the peace of God that passes all understanding.

You can read these stories about David and Jonathan in the Bible in 1 Samuel18:1-16;   20:41-42;   23:16-18

Morning Musings

Coping with the Unexpected!

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We never know what is around the corner for each one of us!! A car crash is one of the classic cases of the unexpected. No matter how careful we are, there is always the danger of the other person’s inattention. Then again, there is our own health situation, where we never know what is lurking deep within our own body. An annoying pain can herald a more sinister cause than we have ever dreamed of.

    We can be setting off for a day’s outing to meet friends at the beach, when another vehicle veers into your path and can’t be avoided. Suddenly, when you were going about minding your own business, now you are catapulted into being everybody else’s business! The police come screaming into your vision; a fire engine appears from nowhere; helpful passers-by stop to see what help they can offer. Before you know what has happened, an ambulance turns up and help is at hand.

   Or maybe you wake up in the night with a heavy feeling on your chest, and find it is hard to breathe. You wonder what you should do for the best. You think that if you wait a while, it will go away, and it eventually does. But what if it comes back later in the day?

    We are blest to live in a country where help is at hand in cases like these. We think that if we prepare with insurance policies put in place, there is nothing to worry about. But sometimes the emergency is more dire than that and nothing can stop the catastrophe happening.

    A husband waited for his wife to come home from being out, but when she still didn’t turn up, he began to look for her. The very place he didn’t think to look was right at hand, and he eventually found her collapsed in her own bathroom with her life gone. For her it was too late for help.

    We must make sure that we are ready to meet our God while we still have time to put wrongs right….not a one of us can have a sure hope without having made a conscious decision to do this. Let’s make sure that we have the ticket ready for the greatest trip of our life that may be just around the corner!!

Morning Musings

More of What the Bible Says….

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We have already seen the analogy that is used in the Bible of our bodies being the Building and Dwelling place of God, but there is another aspect that is used too, and that is of what we DO with our lives. This is spoken of as what we are building for God and His Kingdom. In 1 Corinthians 3: 9-16, we are reminded that not only are we the BUILDING OF God, but that we ourselves are BUILDING FOR, His Kingdom. Paul reminds his readers here that he has laid the foundation for them when they came to the Lord Jesus, but now it is up to each one of them to build on that foundation. This goes for us too….what we do with our lives now, all goes into that building.

     Whatever we spend our time doing these days will one day be tested by the fires of the Lord’s eyes (Revelation 1:14). We must remember that He can see into our very hearts to see whether what we are doing is for His glory or just for our own glorification. We are told too, that whatever we do, we must do it as unto the Lord, and He knows  how pure all our motives are. This doesn’t mean that we are to live a hermit’s life just contemplating the future, but if we can’t take the Lord with us where we go and what we do, it is better left behind.

    People watch us to see if our lives measure up to what they hear us say….for instance, there is no point having a bumper sticker on your car that says “Jesus Saves”, if we drive in an unsafe manner!!   So let’s make sure we build with gold, silver or precious stones that will withstand the fires of judgment and not just with wood, hay and straw which will all be burned up at that day.

We are all builders for our God,  Building with gold or merely sod, The day we stand before His face, What can we give Him for His grace?

Morning Musings

What the Bible Says…

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     We have just been through all the rooms of the house of our heart, seeking to see where we fit into this idea. But you know, the Bible uses this same analogy as we read in  Ephesians 2:21…In whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple (house) in the Lord. We know through the Scriptures that all those who believe in the work of Christ have been brought near, right into the family of God and have become His House. We have the same foundation as the Israelites of old, the foundation of the prophets and apostles, with Jesus Christ as our chief corner Stone.      This is the only church that God recognizes….His people as living stones all fitting together to make a holy temple to the Lord….His dwelling place, where He lives! Our Lord Jesus Himself prayed to His Father saying that as He (the Father) was in Him (the Son), so He (the Son) was in His people. (John 17:23) What a mind boggling thought this is!!     Peter too, brings out the thought of believers being living stones, made into a spiritual house with Jesus Christ being the chief corner stone (1 Peter 2:4-8). The pictures of everyday things in the Scriptures that are used as spiritual pictures are amazing, and so easy to understand!

God’s Church is made of living stones, Not rocks or bricks, but flesh and bones, He lives within His people here, And  to each one is very near.

Morning Musings

Have I REALLY Handed it all to Him?

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     On one of my morning trysts with my Lord in the living room before anyone else was stirring, we were reading together His promises about me in abiding in Him. I was sure I WAS abiding in Him….after all, here we were together enjoying fellowship together over His Word weren’t we?    Then He turned me to that verse in the Old Testament where the psalmist was asking God to search his heart, and know his thoughts, and try him to see if there was still some wicked way in him (Psalm 139:23-24).    I started to squirm as I thought how scary it would be if He turned those pure and holy eyes on my innermost being! I couldn’t trust myself to be totally one hundred percent honest. I knew what I ought to be, and I knew that I wanted to be that, but WAS I? I knew that my heart was deceitful above all things and desperately wicked  and that only God could know it (Jeremiah 17:9-10).  I didn’t even know it myself! ” I know that you want to follow Me with all your heart”, Jesus said, “Would you mind giving me your smart phone for a while?”

What would I do without it? I shrunk back, keeping it in my pocket. What if he went on to the log, and saw what I’d been looking at? And read those catty comments I’d put onto Facebook? And read some of those suggestive remarks my friends had sent to make me laugh?     Suddenly those things didn’t seem quite so clever or witty as I’d thought they were when I got them! Besides, what would I do without the phone there at my fingertips? Someone might try to get hold of me, or worse still, maybe the Lord would answer for me! What would my friends think if they got Him on the phone?

   It came on me in a flash, that He already knew all those things! There was nothing at all that I could hide from Him! He didn’t need to get the phone to know those things…the point was, was I ready to hand all those things over to Him too? Those little resentments and excuses that I always made, refusing to take the blame. Being offended if I thought I was being overlooked? “Oh Lord”, I cried in repentance, “You can see me through and through, you know every little rotten thought I’ve ever had. Help me to walk in Your way everlasting, beginning now so I won’t be ashamed before You as I go into eternity!” “My child”, He said with that beautiful smile of His, “That is what I’ve been wanting to hear from you all along!” He handed me my phone back again, “Now use this for My glory, speaking of the things of Myself to build others up, sending words of encouragement to them, and praising others”.

My desires were now what He desired, and He was giving it all back to me! What joy! What blessings He bestows!  “Oh Lord!” I cried, “Help me to be each day what You want me to be, and to do only what You want me to do!”

 

Morning Musings

Transferring the Title….

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    A thought came to me one day. I asked Him, “Lord, is there any chance that You would take over the management of the whole house and operate it for me as You did that hall cupboard? Would You take the responsibility to keep my life what it ought to be?”

    His face lit up as He replied, “I’d love to! That is what I want to do. You cannot be a victorious Christian in your own strength. Let me do it through you and for you. That is the way. But,” He added slowly, “I am just a guest. I have no authority to proceed, since the property is not mine.”

     Dropping to my knees, I said, ‘Lord, You have been a guest and I have been the host. From now on I am going to be the servant. You are going to be the owner and Master.”

    Running as fast as I could to the strongbox, I took out the title deed to the house describing its assets and liabilities, location and situation. I eagerly signed the house over to Him alone for time and eternity.

 “Here,” I said. “Here it is, all that I am and have, forever. Now You run the house. I’ll just remain with You as a servant and friend.”

    Things are different since Jesus Christ has settled down and has made His home in my heart!

See what God has to say to YOU.