The Narrow Trail

By Virginia Smith

In Utah’s Wasatch Mountains just east of Salt Lake City there’s a trail I love to hike. It’s called Donut Falls. I drive up Big Cottonwood Canyon and leave my car at a small and often crowded parking area, lace up my hiking boots and take off. There are two trails – the first is wide enough for a car, though no vehicles are permitted up there. It is easy, with a gentle grade and few rocks littering the way. It’s a beautiful hike and leads to the top of the falls where I can see the donut, a giant flat rock with a round hole where thousands of gallons of rushing mountain water pour through.

The second trail isn’t so easy. It’s narrow, steep, and often jagged. I stop periodically to catch my breath, and at one place I have to climb down a six-foot muddy ledge, holding on to tree roots for balance. But it’s worth the extra effort, because the narrow trail ends below the falls instead of above it. All that water pours through the hole above me and thunders into a sheltered pool, refreshing me with a cool mountain spray as it rushes past me over a stunning rocky creek bed. The view from that angle takes my breath away. It’s well worth the struggle to get there.

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Psalm 139 Can Help You To Lose Weight

By Julie Morris, RN

Psalm 139 has been an awesome help in my weight-loss journey and it can help you too. Read each verse, followed by the thoughts I wrote years ago in my personal journal. Then try writing your own thoughts.

“O LORD, you have searched me and you know me….you are familiar with all my ways….You have laid your hand upon me.” (Lord, you know me. You know all about me, all of my negative thoughts and bad choices. You are always with me, reaching out to me, holding me—when I let you.)

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Teach Your Children

By Dorothy Ward-Winters

Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it. (Proverbs 22:6  NIV)

Our duty as parents is to train our child to be a responsible adult, just as our parents trained us. Why did we think they could only be happy if we gave them their heart’s desires?

I had it rough when I was small, and I wanted my children to have an easier life. Easier and happier. Happier meant stuffed animals, tricycles, bicycles, (I balked at motorcycles), designer clothes, cell phones, computers, I-Pods, and so on, things I did not have. No matter how hard I tried to satisfy her, there was always something new she craved. I never could make her understand that money does not grow on trees.

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Blessed Are The Persecuted

By Cheri Cowell

You have experienced the final beatitude, haven’t you? My professor asked rhetorically after hearing my tale of persecution. He then went on to explain to the class that although the last beatitude says we are blessed if we are persecuted for His sake, when it is happening, we won’t feel too blessed. While I was experiencing the worst of the persecution, I found the psalms to utter what I could not express to God in my prayers—the pain and alienation was too great. Within the psalms, those who are persecuted will find an echo of their deep emotions.

Seventy-two psalms, almost half of the book, are about persecution at the hand of enemies. If you are a Christian and doing God’s bidding, you will experience persecution. The persecution is never enjoyable, but Jesus did promise us we would be blessed. How? One of the ways is through the closeness of Christ during these dark days. I do not want to experience the pain of persecution again, but I am almost willing to do so, if I could be that close to Him again.

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Waiting

By Caroline T. Jackson

The dictionary (yes, I still use one) defines waiting as “a period in which one waits.” Now that explains it all, doesn’t it? It leaves out the element of anticipation, excitement and, yes, even dread when you are waiting on some event to take place in your life. We had made plans for an extensive road trip and already packed and ready to roll when the doctors decided it was necessary to do some extensive testing on a recent and recurring medical issue my husband was experiencing. The doctors involved didn’t know what was wrong and finding out that we were going to be gone longer than a week, decided that they better test now rather than later. That way we wouldn’t have to wait! I find it necessary to share with you that the so called patient is not a patient man…having spent a life time in a very precise occupation.

 As we all know, the wheels of medical testing don’t always run on the fast track and I can attest to the fact that we felt like we were on the side track. The MRI’s or the CAT scans were done on a Thursday afternoon two weeks in a row and ,of course, no results would be available before the following Monday. The following week a biopsy was again performed on a Thursday with the promise of results the following Monday. I thought all doctors took Thursday afternoons off! Yesterday was Monday and when finally pinned to a wall, the nurse responded that it might be 5 to 7 days before we heard!  What was it I said about waiting?

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