THE STOLEN BASEBALL SIGNS from an NPR radio interview Feb. 2001

Baseball enthusiasts are divided in their opinions about whether it is fair to steal the other team's signs. This controversy erupted anew when allegations surfaced that the New York Giants stole signs from the Brooklyn Dodgers in the famous 1951 National League playoffs. That was when Bobby Thompson hit a game-winning homer off Ralph Branca.

Recently, however, it was revealed what the Giants did to obtain the catcher's signals during the home games. Apparently, a man in the clubhouse used a telescope to focus in on the catcher's hands during the game. The team had wired a button in the clubhouse to a buzzer in the home dugout which was in the line of sight of the batter. When the scout figured out what call was being made, he signaled the call to the dugout by means of a pre-arranged signal (one buzz for a fastball, two for a change up and so on). The manager then signaled the batter through subtle hand signs like tossing a ball in the air, or crossing his arms. Knowing the nature of the pitch ahead of time didn't ensure homeruns, but it did give the extra edge to the home team.

I used to believe that children were born pure and innocent. Then I became a parent. Now I believe in original sin.
When my oldest son was about three years old, I was outside doing some yard work one afternoon. I took Kevin outside to play while I trimmed the hedges. Holding his hand, I knelt down beside him so that we could look at each other face to face. Slowly and carefully I said, "Now, Kevin, you can play here in our front yard. You can go next door and play in your friend's front yard. You can ride your Big Wheel up and down the driveway. You can go in the back yard and play with the dog or play on your swing. You can go back inside and watch television. You can stay here and watch me trim the hedges. These are all the things you have my permission to do. But you can NOT go out into the street. It is very dangerous there. You cannot play in the street. Do you understand what I'm saying?" And Kevin solemnly nodded his head. "Yes, Daddy," he said. I let go of his hand and he ran straight to the curb, put one foot in the street, and then turned his head toward me and smiled, as if to say, "Foolish mortal!"
Right then and there, I knew something of the way God must have felt in the Garden of Eden. To paraphrase the country singer, what part of NO do we not understand? What is there in our genetic makeup that seems to be drawn to the forbidden, that's preoccupied with whatever is denied to us, that ignores the tremendous amount of freedom we enjoy and instead focuses on the limitations of our lives and inevitably, almost instinctively, rebels against them? We certainly don't get that from studying the life of Jesus, do we? Does the devil make us do it, as we so often claim?

QUOTE:. Opportunity may knock once, but temptation bangs on your door for years.

AMERICAN AS STEALING
According to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners each year employees steal a total of $435 billion from their employers (Moriarty 79). Hirsch Goldberg's "The Complete Book of Greed" reports that 25% of Americans cheat on their taxes each year, costing the government $100 billion annually (Moriarity 79). In 1996 42% of teenage boys and 31% of teenage girls
admitted to stealing at least once during the last year. In this kind of setting the eighth commandment-God's command against stealing--is particularly appropriate.

"The town council of Winchester, Indiana, passed an anti-pornography law, but the editors of the town's only newspaper refused to publish it on the grounds that the statute itself was pornographic. Unfortunately, a law does not take effect in Winchester until it has been published in the newspaper." (Fenton and Fowler)

QUOTE: When the president does it, that means it is not illegal. - Richard Nixon

THERE'S A BOOK? Nadine Kramer R.Digest 12/2000 p. 128

Lunching with a friend in a fast food restaurant, I was telling her about a teenager who had rear ended my car. The teen blamed me for the accident. "She even called me every dirty name in the book!" I said.

Just then I looked over to the next table where two nine-year-old boys had apparently been paying close attention to my story. One said to the other, "There's a book?"

QUOTE: The pleasures of sin are for a season, but its wages are for eternity.

MISGUIDED CRIME THEORIES Break Point 8/31/98 Chuck Colson

Sutherland argued that crime was the result of sociological factors. A generation of liberals in academia and government accepted the view that if only the evils of society – such as poverty, unemployment and racism – were overcome, crime would disappear. Former Attorney General Ramsey Clark expressed this notion when he wrote: "Healthy, rational people will not injure others." In other words, poverty is the cause of crime. A decade later, President Jimmy Carter used the same rationale to explain the widespread looting during the 1977 New York blackout. "Obviously, the number one contributing factor to crime of all kinds," he said, "is high unemployment among young people."
The facts, however, indicated otherwise. A New York study revealed that 45% of the arrested looters had jobs. Only 10% were on the welfare rolls. Furthermore, the study revealed that the looters stole things for which they had no use or nee.

As Professor Thomas Sowell of Stanford writes, "People commit crimes… because they put their own interests or egos above the interests, feelings, or lives of others." Sowell’s judgment is supported by psychologists Stanton Samenow and Samuel Yochelson in their landmark study The Criminal Personality. Samenow and Yochelson discovered that, with their subjects, crime was a moral problem. They concluded that criminals, not society, are the cause of crime.

These finds found further support in Wilson and Herrnstein’s definitive study Crime and Human Nature. The two Harvard professors concurred that crime is essentially a function of individual choice. Individuals are making wrong choices with accelerating frequency: Violent crime is up over 500% since the sixties. Juvenile crime is up 5000%.

All this demonstrates the abject failure of the secular world view. With its benign view of human nature, it is incapable of producing a moral, just, and safe public order. A recent poll found that 1/3 of all American would not want a fundamentalist living next door. But the influence of Christianity, with its emphasis on personal transformation, responsibility, and virtue, is what preserves and protects the social order.

QUOTE: Once we assuage our conscience by calling something a "necessary evil," it begins to look more and more necessary and less and less evil. – Sydney J. Harris

QUOTE: Of two evils… choose neither. – C. Spurgeon

Fifteen hundred people drowned! And yet the tragedy did not have to occur. Five times within 2 hours their ship had received danger signals. Finally, a radio operator from a nearby vessel, the California made one last attempt to warn of impending danger from icebergs. The Titanic would not listen. Instead, this message was sent: "Shut up, I am busy, I am working the cape race." Within minutes, the mighty Titanic, pride of the oceans, struck an iceberg and, within 4 hours, 1500 people perished.

The radio operators on the Titanic were too occupied with the highly profitable business of sending and receiving telegrams for the passengers to worry about icebergs on April 14, 912. Since the builders claimed the Titanic was impregnable, unsinkable, why be concerned? Thus the telegrams about the progress of ships in the Cape Sailing Regatta continued to be exchanged. That is, they continued until the ship crashed into the mountain of ice, radio contact was lost, and rescue operations became impossible.

THEY COULD FLOAT BUT THEY COULDN’T HIDE Internet Story 9/2000

Seems that a year ago, some Boeing employees on the airfield decided to steal a life raft from one of the 747s. They were successful in getting it out of the plane and home. When they took it for a float on the river, they were surprised by a Coast Guard helicopter coming towards them. It turned out that the chopper was homing in on the emergency locator that is activated when the raft is inflated. They are no longer employed at Boeing.

The mouth is probably the "dirtiest" part of the human body, a dentist or dental hygienist will tell you. It is a breeding ground for all manner of bacteria brought into the mouth in the foods we eat and air we breathe. Diseases of the mouth are among the most prevalent health problems in the world. For example, 90% of all American children already have dental decay by four years of age.

Glossitis (glo-sy-tis), tongue inflammation), gingivitis (gum inflammation), periodontal (gum disease); caries (tooth decay); canker sores (ulcerous disease of the inner mouth membrane) are but the most common diseases that fester from bacteria that enter and lodge in the mouth. The mouth is, indeed, a hangout for all manner of foul infestations.

QUOTE: Watch what you plant! The crops come in. Some people want to sow wild oats and then go home and pray for a crop failure. – Moments with Bob Harrington p. 70

THE POWER OF JEALOUSY Pulpit Resource, April – June 1983

S. J. Graybill says: "Jealousy turned Lucifer into Satan; angels into demons; made Cain a murderer; threw a javelin at David; sought to hang Mordecai on the gallows; threw Daniel into the lions’ den, and three Hebrew children into the fiery furnace; destroyed nations; dethroned kings; persecuted and killed the prophets; caused Herod to slay thousands of children; it put the thorny crown on Jesus’ head and nailed Him to the cross."

Jealousy, relates the Song of Solomon, "is cruel as the grave."

THE CURE FOR SIN Breakpoint with Chuck Colson, 8/31/1998

I stood next to prince Philip when I was at Buckingham Palace for the Templeton Prize ceremonies 2 years ago. We were surrounded by dignitaries.

"Mr. Colson, what can we do about crime here in England?" he asked.

I told him: "Send more young British children to Sunday School."

He smiled, thinking I was joking. "Not at all," I said. "Professor Christie Davies at the University of Reading conducted a study that showed when Sunday School attendance was highest in England, crime was lowest. Conversely, when Sunday school attendance declined, the crime rate increased. Send young boys to Sunday school," I continued, "so they can be taught the basics of Christian morality."

"Pretty good idea!" he replied.

Society is now reaping the bitter fruits of misguided theories about crime that began in the 1930s with the foremost criminologist of the day, Professor Edwin Sutherland of the University of Indiana.

Sutherland argued that crime was the result of sociological factors. A generation of liberals in academia and government accepted the view that if only the evils of society – such as poverty, unemployment, and racism – were overcome, crime would disappear. Former Attorney General Ramsey Clark expressed this notion when he wrote: "Healthy, rational people will not injure others." In other words, poverty is the cause of crime. A decade later, President Jimmy Carter used the same rationale to explain the widespread looting during the 1977 New York blackout. "Obviously, the number one contributing factor to crime of all kinds," he said, "is high unemployment among young people."

The facts, however, indicated otherwise. A New York study revealed the 45% of the arrested looters had jobs. Only 10% were on the welfare rolls. Furthermore, the study revealed that the looters stole things for which they had no use or need.

As Professor Thomas Sowell of Stanford writes, "People commit crimes.. because they put their own interests or egos above the interests, feelings, or lives of others." Sowell’s judgment is supported by psychologists Stanton Samenow and Samuel Yochelson in the landmark study The Criminal Personality. Samenow and Yochelson discovered that, with their subjects, crime was a moral problem. They concluded that criminals, not society, are the cause of crime.

These findings found further support in Wilson and Herrnstein’s definitive study Crime and Human Nature. The 2 Harvard professors concurred that crime is essentially a function of individual choice. Individuals are making wrong choices with accelerating frequency: Violent crime is up over 500% since the 60’s. Juvenile crime is up 5000%.

All this demonstrates the abject failure of the secular worldview. With its benign view of human nature, it is incapable of producing a moral, just, and safe public order. A recent poll found that 1/3 of all Americans would not want a fundamentalist living next door. But the influence of Christianity, with its emphasis on personal transformation, responsibility, and virtue, is what preserves and protects social order. So tell your neighbors what I told Prince Philip. If you want to do something about criminals, don’t knock Christianity. Send the kids to Sunday School. Indeed.

In a study that questions the industry's basic business model, economics professor Arthur De Vany's equations and economic modeling show that the combination of a big budget, top stars and a R rating may be the worst investment a Hollywood studio can make.

In fact, the study concludes that not only are R-rated films less than half as likely as PG releases to gross $25 million domestically, but that G, PG and PG-13 movies all generate better revenues and profits than R-rated films while keeping costs down.

Yet, according to De Vany's study, more than half of the films released in the last decade were rated R, less than 3 percent were rated G and the remainder were split about evenly between PG and PG-13 movies.

"A studio executive seeking to trim the downside risk and increase the upside possibilities could do so by shifting production dollars out of R-rated movies into G, PG, and even PG-13 movies," wrote De Vany, an economics professor at the University of California, Irvine.

Those who know something about film revenues, like box-office tracking guru Paul Dergarabedian, said the study has merit because the numbers for R-rated movies don't add up.

"If we do look over the past five years, let's say, at the top 30 (grossing) films, there's just a handful of R-rated films," said Dergarabedian, president of Exhibitor Relations Co. "Certainly, there is some validity to that study."

Ironically, the study was released after "Scary Movie," which is rated R, earned $42.5 million in its opening weekend, the biggest opening ever for a R-rated film. It cost only $19 million to make, ensuring that it will be one of the exceptions that proves De Vany's rule.

In an interview, De Vany cited actor Jim Carrey's career as proof that R-rated movies have a harder time making a profit. While Carrey has enjoyed considerable box-office success with his PG-13 rated comedies such as "The Truman Show" and "Ace Ventura," his new R-rated offering, "Me, Myself & Irene," is having a disappointing summer.

De Vany undertook the study to test a theory advanced by syndicated film reviewer Michael Medved, who criticizes R-rated films not only because they have foul language, sexual content and graphic violence, but because Hollywood is losing money by making so many of them.

NETHERLANDS EUTHANASIA Family Voice January/February 2000 p. 8

Researchers at the Center for Bioethics and Health Law at the University of Utrecht, Netherlands, surveyed doctors about the effects of the euthanasia policy, and their findings were alarming. More than 40% of mentally handicapped patients who had died in 1995 passed away only after a Doctor decided to stop treatment, increase drug dosages, or give them a lethal injection. The survey also found that doctors are killing around 15 babies a year who are born with defects or serious health problems.

I’LL DO IT MYSELF John Maxwell, The Power of Partnership in the Church

On November 20, 1988, the Los Angeles Times reported the following story:

A screaming woman trapped in a car dangling from a freeway transition road in East Los Angeles was rescued Saturday morning. The 19 year old woman apparently fell asleep behind the wheel about 12:15 a.m.. The car plunged through a guardrail and was left dangling by its left rear wheel. A half dozen passing motorists stopped, grabbed some ropes from one of their vehicles, tied the ropes to the back of a the woman’s car, and hung on until fire units arrived. A ladder was extended from below to help stabilize the car while firefighters tied the vehicle to tow trucks with cables and chains. It was quite an ordeal.

"Every time we would move the car," said one of the rescuers," she would yell and scream. She was in terrible pain."

It took almost 2 and ½ hours for the passersby, police officers, tow truck drivers, and firefighters – about 25 people in all – to secure the car and pull the woman to safety.

All through the episode, the woman continued talking, repeating a phrase over and over to rescuers. "It was kind’a funny," the fire captain recalled later. "She kept saying: ‘I’ll do it myself.’"

On his first assignment as an auto-body trainee, Stan began work on a car needing a new fender and some door repairs. He spent hours doing a perfect job, but when the owner came to pick it up, he wasn’t pleased. Baffled, Stan asked, "What’s wrong?" Pointing to the side of the car, the man complained about the paint not matching, uneven gaps between panels, and a host of other problems. He demanded an explanation and refused to pay. "Well I don’t know what to say, except that the repairs I made were to the other side of the car!"

A woman saw a little, gray old man rocking in a chair on his porch and decided to start a friendly conversation.
"I couldn't help noticing how happy you look," she said. "What's your secret for a long happy life?"
"I smoke three packs of cigarettes a day," he said. "I also drink a bottle of whiskey a week, eat fatty foods, and never exercise."
"That's amazing," the woman said. "How old are you?"
"Thirty-six."

GOD’S HATE OF SIN A. W. Tozer

God is holy and holiness (is) the moral condition necessary to the health of his universe… Whatever is holy is healthy… the holiness of God, the wrath of God, and the health of creation are inseparably united. God’s wrath is His utter intolerance of whatever degrades and destroys. He hates iniquity as a mother hated the polio that would take the life of the child.

INNOCENT GOSSIP Taprina K. Milburn in Focus on the Family 2/00

In my journey to prevent myself from gossiping, I’ve learned some things about myself.

• A gossip may be fun to listen to, but she can’t be trusted enough to build intimate relationships with.
• No matter how jolly a person seems, gossip and criticism reveal on the outside what’s going on in the inside – negative thinking and hatred.
• Gossip and criticism are used to make us feel better about our positions in life – we feel good when someone else is worse off.
• Criticism of other people will eventually spill over into my own family. The more I see wrong in people with whom I work or mingle, the more critical my eyes become at home.
• Gossip and criticism pull down your spirit. "Garbage in, garbage out," a friend’s mother used to say. Listening to gossip can be as harmful as speaking it. It changes the way you look at and feel about people.

This anonymous quote is tacked to my bulletin board… "A gossip is a person who will never tell a lie if the truth will do as much damage." Here are a few pointers

• Make a commitment with your circle of friends to lift up people instead of tearing them down.
• Firmly tell the messenger you do not want to hear gossip. Be prepared for the relationship to change.
• Examine what you fill your mind with. Does your mental diet consist of tell-all books, despondent music or television programs that portray the most sinister side of human behavior?
• Choose your friends carefully. The special part of friendship is being able to confide in each other during the rough times. This is unsafe if your friend is known to gossip. If you’re a known gossip, people will not trust you.
• Make it a daily goal to think before you say something about someone. Ask yourself: What is my motivation?

QUOTE: Someone has said that most of what the world calls peace is when people stand around reloading.

Friend of mine named Dan hates to lose at golf. He was in a foursome when his ball landed in a sand trap. Hidden from view, the rest of us could hear him as he hacked away at the ball. When he finally drove it out, and rejoined us, I asked him how many strokes that was.
"Three." he replied.
"Come on," said another member of the group. "I heard six at least!"
"Three..." replied Dan "the rest were echoes."

A man was filling out a job application. When he came to the question, "Have you ever been arrested?" he wrote, "No." The next question, intended for people who had answered in the affirmative to the previous question, was "Why?" The applicant answered it anyway: "Never got caught."

Police in Los Angeles had good luck with a robbery suspect who just couldn't control himself during a lineup. When detectives asked each man in the lineup to repeat the words, "Give me all your money or I'll shoot," the man shouted, "That's not what I said!"

QUOTE: Those who think it’s permissible to tell white lies soon become color blind. – Austin O’Malley

PROUD OF VULGARITY Time 6/21/99 p. 66-67

(Speaking of American Pie, an $11 million gross out romantic comedy that makes its debut in a week or so) "We didn’t want to talk down to teenagers," says Chris Weitz, who directed the movie with his brother Paul…. "Teenage life is not PG-13. It’s a lot more R-rated than people are willing to admit." The good people at the movie industry’s rating board thought American Pie was a bit more than R-rated. The Weitz brothers had to make 4 trips to the principal’s office before the movie was softened from a toxic NC-17 to a respectable R….

"We’re in an up period for vulgarity," says Chris Weitz. "I’m proud of our film’s vulgarity."

CHEATING IS OK… IF From Parade Magazine 10/17/99 "Fresh Voices"

"Cheating is not okay if there is a victim, as in cheating in a relationship. Cheating is morally wrong, but schools put a lot of pressure on students to succeed, and they don’t always look at a student’s effort. I only cheat in school and not in anything else." – Jason age 16 in Pennsylvania

‘Cheating is okay as long as you don’t get caught. I’m a pretty average student with generally B-pluses and A-minuses. When I come home, if I’m tired, I won’t study for a test the next day. Teachers are so stupid, you can just lay a book on the floor opened to the right page." - Will age 15 in Pennsylvania

"Cheating is never okay, and everyone who does it knows this. Still, I think that at one point in everyone’s life, they’ve had the opportunity to cheat and did. I’ll admit that I’ve cheated, and I can give a 1000 reasons why: Peer pressure, forgetting to study, the teacher’s strict rules, etc. I’m not saying I cheat a lot. But if I was too sick to study or fell asleep early, my only option is to cheat. An easy "A" is hard to pass up when it could change your whole average." – Amy 16, Massachusetts

"I don’t think cheating is right at all. I’ve cheated before, and after I cheat I always get a real bad feeling inside that doesn’t go away. You can’t really be proud of yourself. I wouldn’t be able to accept praise for that work. I always think, "What am I going to do out in the real world if the same question falls upon me?" Becky, 16, Iowa

IT WAS THE HEART, NOT THE HAND Bob Russell sermon on "Thou shall not kill"

Matt Scott was the 1^st man in the US to receive a hand transplant. He was not supposed to know the donor but he found out when the donor’s family came forward because of all the publicity. The hand belonged to a murderer. But Matt Scott will never have to worry about that hand causing him to murder another, for murder comes not from the hand but from the heart.

QUOTE: Robert Louis Stevenson wrote, All of us have thoughts that would shame Hell.

Guilt is a bully always picking fights that we can never win. It casts doubt and undermines trust.
"When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer." (Psalm 32:3,4)
Once you know right from wrong, guilt stalks us when we choose wrong. Our problem is that we know better, we just don't always want to do better.

AS HE SOWED… A true story from Associated Press, by Kurt Westervelt

At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, the president, Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal complications of a bizarre death.

Here is the story: On March 23, 1994, the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head. The decedent had jumped from the top of a ten story building. Intending to commit suicide. He left a note to that effect indicating his despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor, his life was interrupted by a shotgun blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly. Neither the shooter nor the decedent was aware that a safety net had been installed just below at the eighth floor level to protect some building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his suicide the way he had planned. Ordinarily, Dr. Mills continued, "a person who sets out to commit suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be what he intended" is still defined as committing suicide. That Mr. Opus was shot on the way to certain death nine stories below at street level, but that his suicide attempt probably would not have been successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to feel that he had a homicide on his hands. The room on the ninth floor from whence the shotgun blast emanated was occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously, and he was threatening her with a shotgun. The man was so upset that when he pulled the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the window striking Mr. Opus. When one intends to kill subject A, but kills subject B in the attempt, one is guilty of the murder of subject B. When confronted with the murder charge, the old man and his wife were both adamant. They both said they thought the shotgun was unloaded. The old man said it was his long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had no intention to murder her. Therefore, the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident, that is, the gun had been accidentally loaded. The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple’s son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident. It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son’s financial support and the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would shoot his mother. The case now becomes on of murder on the part of the son for the death of Ronald Opus. Now comes the exquisite twist. Further investigation revealed that the son was in fact Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the failure of this attempt to engineer his mother’s murder. This led him to jump off the ten story building on March 23^rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window. The son had actually murdered himself so the medical examiner closed the case as a suicide. Very tidy of him.

CONQUERING SIN Gerald L. Sittser Living Under the Cross in Discipleship Journal 3/99 p56

Augustine understood sin’s grip simply by observing his own life, which he then reflected on in his famous Confessions. He argued that though evil has nothing of value to offer us, it gives the appearance of good in order to attract us. But the good it offers is always at the wrong time, in the wrong place, under the wrong circumstances. Still, our perverted nature propels us toward such evil. Before we know it, we are bound by it. "The truth is that disordered lust is pandered to, a habit is formed; when habit is not checked, it hardens into compulsion" is how Augustine described the process.

If these habits are so destructive, why is it so hard to put them to death? Because doing so makes us feel as if we are dying, not just the sin in us. Take food, for instance. As all of us know, good food in large quantities can become habit forming. It can lead to gluttony. Gluttony concerns not merely the quantity of food we eat, which is bad enough; it also concerns our attitude about food, our preoccupation with it, our impatience when we do not get it fast enough, and our resentment when we are deprived of it. Gluttony is a nasty, ugly habit.

Imagine for a moment that you struggle with the sin of gluttony. You are a Christian, and you have confessed your gluttony to God and have received assurance of forgiveness. But you are bothered and perplexed because gluttony still rules your life. Forgiveness, in other words, has not led to change. So what should you do?
One day, while reading your Bible, you stumble across this text from the Apostle Paul:

Perplexed, you look for other texts to illumine the one you just read. A passage from Hebrews makes it clearer:

You want to die to your gluttony. You decide to say no to it. You put it to death. Of course, your gluttonous habit makes a big fuss, crying out that if you sacrifice eating as much and often as you want, then you will die of starvation and lose all pleasure in life. But in faith you tell yourself that you will not die; only the vicious habit that is hurting you will die. You choose instead, to believe Scripture – that there is joy before you, a kind of resurrection of your life. You assume that you will actually experience greater pleasure by living for God rather than for your stomach. You risk giving up the sin because you believe that, though you will suffer immediate loss, I the long run you will gain something far greater.

QUOTE: It says something about our times that we rarely use the word sinful except to describe a good dessert. – Willard D. Ferrell

TWO NEGATIVES – Wayne Smith

In English they teach us that two negatives make a positive statement. So the way I figure it, if I know I’m lying, and God knows I’m lying – I gotta be telling the truth.

When elderly Adele Gaboury turned up missing four years ago, concerned neighbors in Worcester, Massachusetts, informed the police. A brother told police she had gone to a nursing home.

Satisfied with that information, Gaboury’s neighbors began watching her property. Michael Crowley noticed her mail, delivered through a slot in the door, piling high. When he opened the door, hundreds of pieces of mail drifted out. He notified police, and the deliveries were stopped.

Gaboury’s next door neighbor, Eileen Dugan, started paying her grandson $10 twice a month to mow Gaboury’s lawn. Later Dugan’s son noticed Gaboury’s pipes had frozen, spilling water out the door. The utility company was called to shut off the water.

What no one guessed was that while they’d been trying to help, Gaboury had been inside her home. When police finally investigated the house as a health hazard, they were shocked to find her body. The Washington Post (10/27/93) reported that police now believe Gaboury died of natural causes four years previously.

THE SUB SANK ITSELF Uncle John’s Great Big Bathroom Reader (11^th edition) p. 162

The last U.S. nuclear submarine lost at sea sank with 2 nuclear weapons on board. Apparently, one of the Scorpion’s conventional torpedoes became activated and threatened to explode. To save the ship, the crew ejected it. But the torpedo "became fully armed, and sought its nearest target – the Scorpion."

HE KNOCKED HIMSELF OUT Uncle John’s Great Big Bathroom Reader (11^th edition) p. 163

In 1959, Wallitsch fought a heavyweight match against Bartolo Soni in Long Island, New York. In the 3^rd round, he took a wild swing at Soni and missed. The force of his swing made him lose his balance, and he fell through the ropes head first. His chin hit the floor so hard, it knocked him out.

Charles Swindoll in Growing Deep in the Christian Life, writes about a man who bought fried chicken dinners for himself and his date late one afternoon. The attendant at the fast food outlet, however, inadvertently gave him the proceeds from the day’s business - a bag of money (much of it in cash) along with the fried chicken.

"After driving to their picnic site," Swindoll writes, "the two of them sat down to enjoy some chicken. They discovered a whole lot more than chicken – over $800! But he was unusual. He quickly put the money back in the bag. They got back into the car and drove all the way back. Mr. Clean got out, walked in, and became an instant hero.

"By then, the manager was frantic. The guy with the bag of money looked the manager in the eye and said, ‘I want you to know I came by to get a couple of chicken dinners and wound up with all this money here.’

"Well, the manager was thrilled to death. He said, ‘Let me call the newspaper. I’m gonna have your picture put in the paper. You’re one of the most honest men I’ve ever heard of.’

"To which the man quickly responded, ‘Oh, no. No, no, don’t do that!’ Then he leaned closer and whispered, ‘You see, the woman I’m with is not wife. She’s, uh, somebody else’s wife.’"

Harder to find than lost cash is a perfect heart.

HE HIT ME BACK Michael A. Young in R.Digest 1/99 p. 78

I had broken up a fight between my two young sons, and they were both trying to tell me their side of the story simultaneously. I told them to take turns speaking. "It all started," explained Jayme, "when Michael hit me back."

WHAT KILLED THE DOG?

The story is told of a woman who invited all her friends over for a special dinner. Desiring to impress them, she hired a maid, a butler, and a chef. She purchased the best steaks she could find and a top brand of mushrooms to accompany them.

When the chef noticed that the mushrooms seemed a bit discolored, the lady suggested he feed a few to the dog, since the hour was late and there was no time to purchase more mushrooms. "If the dog eats them and doesn’t get sick, they’re probably all right!"

The dog eagerly consumed the mushrooms and showed no signs of ill-effects, so the chef completed the meal and served the guests.

Later, as the desert was being served, the maid hurried in and whispered to the lady of the house, "Ma’am, the dog is dead!" Not waiting to hear any more, she leaped to her feet and told the guests they had no time to lose! They had eaten tainted mushrooms and must rush immediately to the hospital!

Later that evening, after the lady and her guests had returned from having their stomachs pumped, she asked the maid, "Where is the dog now?" "Out in the front yard, ma’am." Replied the maid. "where he crawled after the car hit him!"

Charles Swindoll observed: "Years ago, I recall reading of the construction of a city hall and fire station in a small northern community. All the citizens were so proud of their new red brick structure - a long awaited dream come true. Not too many weeks after moving in however, strange things began to happen. Several doors failed to shut completely and a few windows wouldn't slide open very easily. As time passed, ominous cracks began to appear in the walls. Within a few months, the front door couldn't be locked since the foundation had shifted, and the roof began to leak. By and by, the little building that was once the source of great civic pride had to be condemned. An intense investigation revealed that deep mining blasts several miles away caused underground shock waves which subsequently weakened the earth beneath the building's foundation, resulting in its virtual self-destruction."

So it is with compromise in life. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, one rationalization leads to another, which triggers a series of equally damaging alterations in a life that was once stable, strong and reliable.

An applicant for a job admitted to the personnel manager that he had both good and bad traits. "What are they?" he was asked.

"Well," the man said, "on the good side I can do the job better than any man in the world. Twenty of the country’s largest companies are bidding for my services. I could probably double your business within a month, if you hire me."

"That’s very impressive," said the manager. "Now, what are your bad traits?"

"Well," replied the applicant, "there’s only one - I have been known to exaggerate now and then…."

"No, ma’am," was the reply.

"No, ma’am."

"My dad says it’s crooked," said Johnnie matter-of-factly.

SEX NOT NECESSARILY IMMORAL? Communiqué

President Clinton's pastor, Philip Wogaman of Foundry United Methodist Church, was quoted by the New York Times as stating that sexual misconduct does not automatically render a leader immoral.

I'M GOING TO HAVE GOUT 3 TIMES A WEEK Keith Downing R.Digest 11/97 p. 111

Uncle Dick noticed that every time he ate his favorite food, chitlins, his foot pained him immensely that evening. The family physician confirmed his suspicion of pork-induced gout, and when my uncle returned home from the doctor's office, my aunt asked him how the appointment had gone. Uncle Dick plopped off his shoes and replied, "The doctor said I'm going to have gout about 3 times a week."

THEY NEEDED THE BED (EUTHANASIA) R.Digest 11/97 p. 92

When Dr. Ben Zylicz examined the 50 year old woman at the clinic where he worked in Holland, he knew immediately that she did not have long to live. Cancer had spread beyond her breast to her bones, liver and lungs.

Carefully, the Polish-born oncologist explained to the woman that he could lessen her pain with drugs, and he offered her a hospital room. Zylicz sensed, however, that she was fearful of Holland's policy allowing doctors to end the lives of the terminally ill. "I am a Catholic," she said. "My religious beliefs would never allow me to accept euthanasia."

Zylicz assured the woman that he would take care of her, and finally she agreed to be admitted to the hospital. After 24 hours of morphine treatment, she was free of pain. Though she knew death was close, the woman was at ease, able to see her husband and family.

Later, however, a nurse phoned Zylicz at home with distressing news. After he left the hospital, another doctor had entered the patient's hospital room and asked her husband and sister to leave. He then ordered an increase in her morphine dosage, but refused to confirm the order in writing. Within minutes she was dead.

Zylicz demanded an explanation. "It could have taken another week before she died," his colleague told him. "I needed the bed."

... Researchers from the Center from Bioethics and Health Law at the University of Utrecht found that more than 40% of all mentally handicapped patients who died in 1995 did so after a doctor's decision to withdraw treatment, increase painkilling drugs or give lethal injections. In that same year, doctors were charged with killing 2 handicapped newborns. The courts ruled that the doctors had no option but to kill. The survey commissioned by the Dutch government reports that doctors now kill about 15 nonviable newborns a year.

HEART OF KINDNESS IN A KILLER How to Enjoy Your Life & Your Job by Dale Carnegie, p. 65

On May 7, 1931, the most sensational manhunt New York City had ever known had come to its climax. After weeks of search, "Two Gun" Crowley - the killer, the gunman who didn't smoke or drink - was at bay trapped in his sweetheart's apartment on West End Avenue.

One hundred and fifty policemen and detectives laid siege to his top floor hideaway. They chopped holes in the roof; they tried to smoke out Crowley, the "cop killer," with teargas. Then they mounted their machine guns on surrounding buildings, and for more than, one of New York's finest residential areas reverberated with the crack of pistol fire and the rat-tat-tat of machine guns. Crowley, crouching behind an overstuffed chair, fired incessantly at the police. Ten thousand excited people watched the battle. Nothing like it had ever been seen before on the sidewalks of New York.

When Crowley was captured, Police Commissioner E.P. Mulrooney declared that the 2 gun desperado was one of the most dangerous criminals ever encountered in the history of New York, "He will kill," said the commissioner, "at the drop of a feather."

But how did "Two Gun" Crowley regard himself? We know, because while the police were firing into the apartment, he wrote a letter addressed "To whom it may concern." And, as he wrote, the blood flowing from his wounds left a crimson trail on the paper. In this letter Crowley said: "Under my coat is a weary heart, but a kind one - one that would do nobody any harm."
A short time before this, Crowley had been having a necking party with his girl friend on a country road out on Long Island. Suddenly a policeman walked up to the car and said: "Let me see you license."

Without saying a word, Crowley drew his gun and cut the policeman down with a shower of lead. As the dying officer fell, Crowley leaped out of the car grabbed the officer's revolver, and fired another bullet into the prostrate body. And that was the killer who said: "Under my coat is a weary heart, but a kind one - one that would do nobody any harm."

Crowley was sentenced to the electric chair. When he arrived at the death house in Sing Sing, did he say "This is what I get for killing people?" No, he said: "This is what I get for defending myself."

The point of the story is this: "Two Gun" Crowley didn't blame himself for anything.

THEY SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN IN PRISON How to Enjoy Your Life & Your Job by Dale Carnegie, p 67

I have had some interesting correspondence with Lewis Lawes, who was warden of New York's infamous Sing Sing prison for many years, on this subject, and he declared that "few of the criminals in Sing Sing regard themselves as bad men. They are just as human as you and I. So they rationalize, they explain. They can tell you why they had to crack a safe or be quick on the trigger finger. Most of them attempt by a form of reasoning, fallacious or logical, to justify their anti-social acts even to themselves, consequently stoutly maintaining that they should never have been imprisoned at all."

SHADES OF GRAY PERSPECTIVE US News & World Report 7/14/97 p. 54

Darlene, is in love with her office mate and wants to seduce him away from his fiancée, since he's not actually married yet. "Under what ethical code could you possibly justify that?" gasps and incredulous Dr. Laura Schlessinger.

"But, isn't there a gray area?" ventures Darlene.

"It's funny how when we're the recipient of pain, we're clear that it's black and white, but when we've got something to gain there are shades of gray," Schlessinger chastises.

PATIENTS CONSISTENTLY DEAD R.Digest 8/97, p. 19

As a nursing student, I was required to take a course on medications, and dosages. After one test was scored, I was appalled to find that I missed every equation because I had used the wrong formula. Hoping to have my grade raised, I explained to the instructor that at least I was consistent with all my answers.

"Yes," she said somberly, "and all your patients would have been consistently dead."

SLIDING SIN UNDER THE DOORSTEP AFA Journal, 5/97 p. 23

Actor Michael Boatman, who plays homosexual activist Carter Heywood on another Disney/ABC sitcom, Spin City, starring Michael J. Fox, said comedies are perfect vehicles for controversial subjects like homosexuality. Boatman told TV Guide, "The best way to slide these controversial issues under America's doorstep, into their living rooms, is to have the start laughing first. Suddenly they find themselves, if not accepting new ideas, certainly more willing to discuss them."

A father of college girl was riding up in the elevator of her dorm to visit her room. While they were riding up, a few other girls in the elevator began to talk about certain girls living with their boyfriends, abortions that had taken place and other forms of depravities that caused the father to blanche. What type of den of iniquity had he delivered his daughter to?

When they stepped off the elevator, the daughter spoke to his distress: "It's ok, dad, they're just talking about their favorite soap operas."

The town of Liberal Missouri was founded originally on the precept that it outlawed churches within its city limits. Its literature boasted that it was the "only town of its size in the United States without a priest, a preacher, a church, God, Jesus, hell or devil."

Clark Braden, however, wrote an account in the "Post Dispatch" which showed that Liberal had little else than hell and devil there. His description was that it was a den of iniquity, its hotels had become brothels and that virtue was almost unknown.

Liberal was a failure. Even lifelong unbelievers, who had moved there for its advantages, left in disgust. One of them summed up the problem in these words: "An infidel surrounded by Christians may spout his infidelity, and the community may be able to stand it, but it will never do to establish a society with (the concept of the infidel) as its basis."

The year was 1789. France was a nation in turmoil and the populace was a powder keg The distress and distrust the people had toward their rulers exploded in the French Revolution and the one symbol of their oppression was the castle known as the "Bastille." This was a prison filled with dungeon rooms housing political prisoners. The crowd stormed the Bastille and flung open the prison doors freeing hundreds of captives from the darkness of their holes into the bright light of day. One prisoner, however, fell to his knees and pled with his would be rescuer to return him to his cell. His reason? The brightness of the sun was too much for him and he preferred his prison cell with its darkness to the freedom of day with its overpowering light.

The college coach was questioning a high school football star who was applying for an athletic scholarship.

"I can run 100 yards with full equipment in less than 10 seconds," the boy said. "I was named outstanding defensive player in 5 of our games. I scored 18 touchdowns and kicked every extra point. And I was on the dean' honor list."

The coach was awed. "Do you have any weaknesses?"

"Well," the youth said, "I am inclined to lie a bit."

POP CULTURE (AS OPPOSED TO SCRIPTURE)

Pop psychology - affirm your self worth.

Pop education - all should pass

Pop philosophy - I'm ok, you're ok (explain the cross)

Pop theology - man is basically good.

Pop politics - Man will work for the good of all (didn't work in communism)

My Newspaper says man is not good

My counseling says man is not good

My locked doors/offices say that man is not good.

In Japan, a group of tourists wanted their picture taken and observing another tourist carrying what looked like a camera case, they asked him if they would take their picture. Somewhat taken back, the other man quickly recovered and said, "But I've already taken your picture," and removing a Bible from the case he read from it: "Romans 3:23 says 'for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.'"

In the late 1800's into the days of the Great Depression, there was a great evangelist that caught the imagination of the people. He was known not just as a great speaker but a great baseball player... his name was Billy Sunday. One wouldn't say that he stood in the pulpit, for he would range the stage pleading with people to understand the power of God and the grace of Christ. At one point, he slid across the stage as if sliding into home plate to illustrate that becoming a Christian was much like sliding into home and God calling us safe. Speaking on sin, Sunday said:

"I'm against sin. I'll kick it as long as I've a foot, I'll fight it as long as I have a fist, I'll butt it as long as I have a head, I'll bite it as long as I have a tooth. And when I'm old, and footless and fistless and toothless... I'll gum it until I go home to Glory and it goes home to perdition!"

Calvin Coolidge was coming out of church service one Sunday when he was president to be faced by a reporter in search of a quote. "What did the preacher preach on today?" queried the man. "Sin," replied Coolidge in his notoriously spare comment. The reporter pressed on, "but what did the preacher say about sin, Mr. President?" The President stared at his questioner and replied: "he was against it."

A Methodist preacher was often spoke on the subject of sin. He minced no words, but defined sin as "that abominable thing that God hates." A leader in his congregation came to him on one occasion and urged him to cease using the ugly word. Said he: "Dr. so and so, we wish you would not speak so plainly about sin. Our young people, hearing you, will be more likely to indulge in sin. Call it something else, as 'inhibition,' or 'error' or a 'mistake,' or even 'a twist in our nature.'"

"Oh," replied the preacher, "I think I know what you mean. Come with me." And taking the church member to the kitchen, he reached under the sink and drew out a bottle of cleaning liquid which had a skull and cross bones on it and the description of the liquid as being a poison. "What you would have me do is put another label on this bottle. Not to call it poison, but something more pleasant... like wintergreen. No sir, when God calls something sin, evil, depraved or an abomination, I will call it by no other name."

There is a story of a girl who approached mother while she is preparing salad. Casually she asked for permission to go to amusement center that had a particularly bad reputation. Upon her mother's refusal, the daughter exclaimed: "All the girls are going to be there... etc." After a short silence the mother begins to reached into the sink and pulled out some of the wilted lettuce and scrapings from the vegetables and sprinkles them on the salad. Astonished, the daughter asked her mother what she thinks she is doing. To which the mother replies, "I just thought that if you didn't mind putting garbage into your heart and mind, you wouldn't mind a little garbage in your salad."

Leonardo Da Vinci once had a terrible falling out with a fellow artist just before he began work on the "Last Supper." The story is told that he determined to paint his enemy as Judas. It was a perfect likeness. But last of all, he set to work painting the likeness of Jesus. No matter how he tried, nothing seemed to please him. Finally, he realized that he could not paint the portrait of Jesus as long as his enemy had been painted into Judas's place. Once that was corrected, then the face of Jesus came easily. Neither can we paint the face of Jesus in our lives as long as we hold bitterness in our hearts.

GOSSIP'S ILL FITTINGNESS Poem

There is so much good in the worst of us,

And so much bad in the best of us

That it ill becomes any of us

To find fault in the rest of us.

INNOCENT? Ambassador William Crowe R.Digest 3/97 p. 49

In the U.S. today, you are considered innocent until appointed to a public position by the President.

AMERICA'S WAGES US News and World Report, 10/21/96

From 1970 through 1994, the gross domestic product - a measure of the economy - nearly doubled. In the same quarter century, the Index of Social Health - Fordham University's measure of America's "social well-being" - shrank by almost half to its lowest level ever. Findings in the annual index, just released by Fordham's Institute for Innovation in Social Policy:

What's Better: 5 of 16 social problems examined in the study improved in 25 years, including infant mortality by 60%, drug abuse by 18%, high school dropouts by 23%, elderly poverty by 52% and food stamp coverage by 2.5%.

What's Worse: 11 problems became more acute. Child abuse worsened by 345%, teen suicides by 95%, the aged's out of pocket health costs by 72%, child poverty by 42%, health insurance coverage by 40%, access to affordable housing by 30%, unemployment by 25%, the rich-poor gap by 21%, real wages by 16%, homicides by 15% and alcohol related road deaths by 2.5%.

This Decade: Of the 16 problems, the one that worsened most in 1990s is the gap between rich and poor. Most improved: the rate of alcohol caused highway fatalities.

Four problems of young people - child abuse, teen suicide, dropouts and drug abuse - worsened in 1994, the study's last year. "The decline in social health of children and youth tells us something about the future shape of our society," says institute director Marc Miringoff. "It's a warning sign."

THE POWER OF GUILT Max Lucado "In The Eye of The Storm" p. 193

Sarah was rich. She had inherited 20 million dollars. Plus she had an additional income of $1000 a day. That's a lot of money any day, but it was immense in the late 1800s.

Sarah was well known. She was the belle of New Haven, Connecticut. No social event was complete without her presence. No one hosted a party without inviting her.

Sarah was powerful. Her name and money would open almost any door in America. Colleges wanted her donations. Politicians clamored for her support. Organizations sought her endorsement.

Sarah was rich. Well known. Powerful. And miserable.

Her only daughter had died at 5 weeks of age. The her husband passed away. She was left alone with her name, her money, her memories,... and her guilt.

It was her guilt that caused her to move west. A passion for penance drove her to San Jose, California. Her yesterdays imprisoned her todays, and she yearned for freedom. She bout an 8 room farmhouse plus 160 adjoining acres. She hired 16 carpenters and put them to work. For the next 38 years, craftsmen labored every day, 24 hours a day to build a mansion.

Observers were intrigued by the project. Sarah's instructions were more than eccentric... they were eerie. The design had a macabre touch. Each window was to have 13 panes, each wall 13 panels, each closet 13 hooks, and each chandelier 13 globes.

The floor plan was ghoulish. Corridors snaked randomly, some leading nowhere. One door opened to a blank wall, another to a 50 foot drop. One set of stairs led to a ceiling that had not door. Trapdoors. Secret passageways. Tunnels. This was no retirement home for Sarah's future; it was a castle for her past.

The making of this mysterious mansion only ended when Sarah died. The completed estate sprawled over 6 acres and had 6 kitchens, 13 bathrooms, 40 stairways, 47 fireplaces, 52 skylights, 467 doors, 10,000 windows, 160 rooms and a bell tower.

Why did Sarah want such a castle? Didn't she live alone? "Well, sort of," those acquainted with her story might answer. "There were the visitors..."

Legend has it that every evening at midnight, a servant would pass through the secret labyrinth that led to the bell tower. He would ring the bell... to summon the spirits. Sarah would then enter the "blue room," a room reserved for her and her nocturnal guests. Together they would linger until 2:00 a.m., when the bell would be rung again. Sarah would return to her quarters; the ghosts would return to their graves.

Who comprised this legion of phantoms?

Indians and soldier killed on the U.S. frontier. They had all been killed by bullets from the most popular rifle in America - the Winchester. What had brought millions of dollars to Sarah Winchester had brought death to them. So she spent her remaining years in a castle of regret, providing a home for the dead.

To see what unresolved guilt can do to a human being, you don't have to go to the Winchester mansion. Lives imprisoned by yesterday's guilt are in your own city. Hearts haunted by failure are in your own neighborhood. People plagued by pitfalls are just down the street... or just down the hall.

POEM - SIN'S EMBRACE Alexander Pope

Vice is a monster of so frightening mien,

As to be hated needs but to be seen;

Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,

We first endure, then pity, then embrace

ALLOWING THIS WILL BRING MORE Bits and Pieces 3/2/95 p.1

When the federal income tax was signed into law in 1913, a senator speaking in opposition to the bill stated: "If we allow this 1 percent foot in the door, at some future date it might rise to 5 percent."

DRUG LEGALIZATION FOOLISHNESS-Daniel R. Levine for R.Digest 2/96 p. 74&75

Drug legalizers often tout "the European model" for relaxing drug enforcement. Throughout the Netherlands, for example, marijuana and hashish are openly sold and consumed in so-called "coffee shops." But the results are increasingly problematic. Dutch adolescent marijuana use, for example, nearly tripled between 1984 and 1992, while the flow of drugs into bordering countries has grown. At the same time the Netherlands is ranked No.1 in Europe for forcible assaults, up 65 percent since 1985.

Legalization of hard drugs has produced similar results. In 1989, the Swiss city of Zurich instituted a harm reduction program that allowed the use and sale of drugs in a downtown park. It was quickly dubbed "Needle Park" because addicts were given free needles, condoms, medical care, counseling and the opportunity for treatment. The number of regular drug users in the park swelled from a few hundred to thousands. By 1992 the operation had to be shut down because of a sharp rise in drug-related violence and deaths. Today, Switzerland is left with Europe's highest per capita rate of drug addiction and second highest rate of HIV infection.

"Legalized marijuana in the United States would be a disaster," says Columbia's Kleber. "It would create a pediatric epidemic for which we would pay a dreadful price in terms of more damaged children and more damaged adults when they grow up."

In 1787, after twenty years' work, Gibbon completed his masterful book, "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." The five reasons he gave for the fall of that Empire were:

1. The rapid increase of divorce and the undermining of the dignity and sanctity of the home, the basis of human society.

2. Higher and higher taxes and the spending of public monies for free bread and circuses for the populace. Pierce Harris said: "While we strengthen an outer bulwark, we should look at our crumbling inner walls."

3. The mad craze for pleasure-sports becoming more exciting and attractive to millions.

4. The building of gigantic armaments when the real enemy was within.

5. Religion decayed-falling into mere form and becoming impotent to guide the people.

The Empire was not conquered-it collapsed.

The invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1943, owed much of its success to the most remarkable practical joke in history.

As the Allies feared up for D-Day, they knew it would be impossible to conceal their invasion plans from the Germans. But they could mislead them as to the time and place of the offensive. In the spring of 1944. German surveillance cameras photographed widespread "covert" military operations in southeastern England - bustling army bases half-hidden in the woods, large-scale movements of jeeps and tanks. and an oil refinery under construction at Dover, across the English Channel from Calais, France. The Germans also monitored "secret" radio transmissions concerning new troop concentrations near Dover. It all added up to a single unmistakable conclusion: the Allies would invade Europe through Calais, probably in late July.

But the Nazis were mistaken. The oil refinery was made of old sewage pipes and canvas, built by movie set designers. The combat vehicles were inflatable rubber, the military bases were dummies. The radio messages were fake - and the real invasion was planned not for Calais in late July, but for Normandy in early June. Nor did the deception cease once the invasion was under way. While Allied troops were storming the beaches at Normandy, two decoy fleets accompanied by British air squadrons were crossing the Channel toward Calais. The decoy ships carried electronic devices that amplified and returned the pulses of the Germans' radar equipment, and the squadrons overhead released strips of metal foil. Both maneuvers gave the illusion on Nazi radar screens of a massive air and sea attack. Meanwhile, scores of dummy paratroopers - equipped with recordings of gunfire and soldiers' cries - were dropped on the beach south of Calais.

The elaborate ruse lured Hitler into spreading his troops dangerously thin, and the Allies got their foothold in Europe. Even after D-Day, the Fuhrer remained convinced that the real invasion was still planned for late July. By the time he got it straight, Germany was on the road to defeat.

THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA Sword of the Lord. 5/8/81

In ancient China the people desired security from the barbaric hordes to the north so they built the Great Chinese wall. It was so high they thought no one could climb over it and so thick that nothing could break it down They settled back to enjoy their security.

During the first hundred years of the wall's existence, China was invaded three times Not once did the barbaric hordes break down the wall or climb over the top. However, another way was found. Each time the enemy bribed a gatekeeper and then marched right through the gates. The Chinese were so busy relying upon the walls of stone that they forgot to teach their children integrity.

WHISTLING OUT OF TUNE Let Me Illustrate by Donald Grey

Some years ago, musicians noted that errand boys in a certain part of London all whistled out of tune as they went about their work. It was talked about and someone suggested that it was because the bells of Westminster were slightly out of tune. Something had gone wrong with the chimes and they were discordant. The boys did not know there was anything wrong with the peals, and quite unconsciously they had copied their pitch.

So we tend to copy the people with whom we associate; we borrow thoughts from the books we read and the programs to which we listen, almost without knowing it.

God has given us His Word which is the absolute pitch of life and living. If we learn to sing by it, we shall easily detect, the false in all of the music of the world.

Dr. A. C. Dixon used to tell of a lady who had a very spoiled and willful youngster. One day when a wasp flew in the window, the boy, seeing its brilliant colors began crying for it. At last the mother called to the servant who was tending the child "What is the boy crying for? Will you please let him have it?" A few minutes later she was startled by a loud scream "What's the matter?" the mother exclaimed in alarm." He got what he wanted" was the servant's calm reply.

In a painting of the Crucifixion by the famous Dutch artist, Rembrandt, our attention is drawn immediately to the Cross and to Him who hangs there. Then looking at the crowd gathered around the Cross, we note the attitudes and actions of these people. As our eyes drift to the edge of the picture, we see another, figure standing in the shadow.

This is Rembrandt himself - Rembrandt helping to crucify Jesus! How true that is according to Isaiah 53:5 "He was wounded for my transgressions."

'Twas I that shed the sacred blood,

I nailed Him to the tree,

I crucified the Christ of God,

I joined the mockery!

I looked again and in the shadows with Rembrandt, I too am there!

ZEBRAS AND CAPE DOGS OF SIN Basic Youth Seminar Circular

The zebra is distinct from all other members of the horse family because of its startling color pattern and its resistance to being trained. Zebras are strong, swift, and fierce fighters. They are alert to their chief foe, the lion. However, they often underestimate the danger of an even more destructive enemy: cape hunting dogs.

One cape hunting dog is not large enough or strong enough to bring down a zebra, so these dogs form brutal packs of twelve to twenty members and stalk the zebra.

The hunt begins with each pack member following the lead dog in single file. They move slowly at first, but as a victim is separated from the rest of the herd, the dogs gradually pick up speed. A pack of cape dogs can maintain a steady pace of up to thirty miles an hour.

As the lead dog catches up to its tiring prey, it locks its jaws into any flesh it can reach and tenaciously hangs on. The clinging predator slows down the zebra and further weakens him. Other dogs soon catch up and find vulnerable spots on which to clamp their jaws. Eventually the entire pack converges on the struggling zebra and pulls him to the ground. The cape dogs begin to feed immediately, often before their victim is dead. Once down, a complete zebra may be devoured by a pack of cape dogs in less than thirty minutes.

*Feelings of inferiority?

If you could change anything about your appearance, family, or other "unchangeable features," would you do it?

*Guilt over past failures?

Are there things in your past that you wish had never happened, and every time you remember them, they bring guilt and shame?

*Bitterness for hurts?

Have you been deeply hurt by others and find that you are unable to fully forgive them?

*Destructive habits?

How many "battles" are you fighting in your moral life: impure thoughts? sensual actions? enslaving habits?

*Lack of purpose in life?

Can you answer life's three big questions: Where did I come from? Why am I here? Where am I going?

FILLING ONE HOLE WITH ANOTHER'S DIRT by ConWolfe

They're digging a hole! In fact, they're digging 2 holes! This place is getting more 'holey' all the time! (Sorry, I couldn't resist) One hole is to take out the old tank since all the heat at the church is grass now. The other hole is for the new sign/bell tower, I don't know if tower is the right word for a 5 foot tall platform but it sounds okay.

The interesting part about it is they are using the dirt from one hole to fillup the other hole, I've tried to do that before, You dig a hole and need a place to put the dirt so you dig another hole to bury the dirt from the first hole. It works great but then you have to dig another hole to bury the dirt from the second hole. But then there's the dirt from the third hole but that's no real problem because you simply dig a fourth hole for the dirt from the third hole. This is a pretty good job if you are paid by the hour.

I think you can begin to see the problem, You're never done digging holes to bury the dirt from the previous hole. The same is true when we start trying to change our life and our attitude without God, We are simply shifting a problem from one hole to another. The problem with most self-help programs is that they create more problems than they solve, (Ever notice how you can never get all the dirt back into a hole? I think it grows when released.) A person decides they are too passive so they become assertive, aggressive or any other word that means bossy, and discover they are not happier, They simply have less friends to encourage them.

So how can we get by here with putting the dirt from the sign into the oil barrel hole? We took out the oil barrel ! When we try to make our changes with God's help, He removes the sin so there's room for change. That way it can be replaced by what we want, or better yet, what God wants for our life. It can be done once and the job is finished. No more shifting the dirt in our lives from one hole to the other. Now God can finish His work in us and bring us to completion.

You can learn a lot from a hole in the ground.

Legendary athletes are honored when their number is retired with them. Just ask Dave

("Spuds") Bresnahan, the never-to-be-forgotten second-string catcher for the Williamsport (Pa.) Bills, a class AA team. His immortal feat on the diamond last year prompted 2.700 of his fans to gather at Bowman Field last week to pay him a belated tribute and to paint his number, 59, on the outfield fence.

With his hapless team 27 games out of first place and losing as usual, Bresnahan had fired an errant pickoff throw over the third baseman's head. As the runner came home, Dave triumphantly tagged him out: he had held onto the ball while tossing an Idaho potato carved to look like a baseball.

Unamused, the umpire ruled that the run had scored. Dave's angry manager got him kicked off the team. Last week Bresnahan, now a real estate sales man was vindicated. "Gehrig had to hit .340 and play in more than 2,000 consecutive games to get his number retired he boasted. "All I had to do is hit less than .150 and throw a potato."

NEHUSHTAN - HOW MANY LEGS DOES THE COW HAVE? Ancil Jenkins

The footnote in the New International Version at II Kings 18:4 is most interesting. When Hezekiah found the brazen serpent made by Moses in the wilderness still being worshipped, he destroyed it. The NIV says, ". . . he called it Nehushtan." The footnotes explain the meaning-"a serpent made of brass."

One is made to wonder how such an idol could have existed so long. It would seem that in the reformation movements of one of the judges or kings, it would have been destroyed. My opinion is that it was not recognized as an idol and hence was preserved. Perhaps they justified it by not calling it an idol. Hezekiah, however, came and called it what it really was a brass image of a snake.

How often we justify sin by calling it a different name! Some call adultery. "a meaningful relationship." We excuse covetousness by calling it "prudence" or "economy." A life of sensual pleasure is "living with gusto."

In answer to a critic, Abraham Lincoln asked, "How many legs does a cow have?" "Four," was the reply. "If you call her tail a leg, how many does she have?" asked Lincoln. "Five," was the answer. "No," Lincoln said, "Just calling a tail a leg, doesn't make it a leg."

Have we made a similar mistake? Do we think that sin is not sin, just because we do not call it by its right name?

FREELOADING ON GOD Maurice C. Hall Whittier. CA

Have you ever been driving along the road when suddenly you saw a hitchhiker ahead? His thumb signal is giving a message loud and clear, "If you will furnish the car, the gasoline, the time and do the driving, I'll ride with you, but, you're 'nuts' if you think that I'm gonna chip in with any gas money; by the way, if you have an accident and I'm injured, I'll sue you for everything you have."

In just about every congregation you'll find this very same kind of attitude. Yes, there are hitch-hikers in the Lord's church! They say in one way or another, " If you supply an attractive building. lights, heat and air conditioning, so that I will be comfortable as I listen to the preacher, I'll ride along with you for awhile. But you're crazy if you think that I'm gonna chip in with any real financial support. Nor will I be involved with personal work, visitation, benevolence, etc., etc. By the way, if anything happens that irritates me, you'll hear from me! So, on my own terms, I'll ride along with you."

We may kid ourselves, but never the Lord! Are your hands busy in the Lord's work or are you thumbing a free ride?

A preacher had on his desk a special book labeled, "Complaints of Members Against One Another." When one of his members called to tell him the faults of another, he would say, "Well, here's my complaint book. I'll write down what you say, and you can sign it. Then when I have to take up the matter officially, I shall know how I may expect you to testify." The sight of the open book and ready pen had its effect, "Oh, no, I couldn't sign anything like that!" was the common remonstrance and no entry was subsequently made.

The preacher said he kept the book for 40 years, opened it probably a thousand times, and never wrote a line in it.

Some scientists took a frog and dropped him in hot water. The frog hopped but - fast! They dropped him in a second time. Same result. Then they dropped him in a vat of cold water and he relaxed. What the frog didn't know was that the vat of cold water had a fire beneath it. While the frog relaxed the - water was heated ever so gradually. The frog sat there, the temperature of the water rose slowly, and before long the frog had been boiled to death.

Isn't that a parable all of us need to hear? We don't know how it is in the frog world but in our world it fits us to a T. Mediocrity is the fire. Man, represented by the frog sits and relaxes until his mediocre ways destroy him. Let him stay content without goal and motivations just so long, and one day he will no longer care to move.

A Toronto newspaper carried an account of an Arab woman brought to a hospital emergency unit screaming and pulling her hair. She spoke no English and no interpreter was available. The doctor examined her, then admitted her to the hospital's psychiatric ward. Three days later she died. An autopsy revealed a malignant tumor in an advanced stage. The doctor had made a wrong diagnosis!

A child asked a man to pick a flower for her. That was simple enough. But when she said, "Now put it back," the man experienced a baffling helplessness he never knew before. "How can you explain that it cannot be done?" he asked. "How can one make clear to young people that there are some things which when once broken, once mutilated, can never be replaced or mended?"

Falling into sin doesn't condemn anybody, but staying in it does. A visitor at a fishing dock asked an old fisherman who was sitting there, "If I were to fall into this water, would I drown?"

It was a queer way of asking how deep the water was, but the fisherman had a good answer. "Naw," he said. "Fallin' into the water doesn't drown anybody. It's staying under it that does."

Recently a huge tree in Colorado fell to the ground with a resounding crash after having stood majestically on a hill for more than 400 years. A mere sapling when Columbus landed in San Salvador, over the centuries it had been struck by lightning 14 times, braved great windstorms, and even defied an earthquake. In the end, however, it was killed by some little beetles. Boring under the bark, they chewed away its mighty fibers until one day that lordly king of the forest came thundering down. So, too, apparently insignificant sins often make substantial inroads into our spiritual lives, and if left unchecked may cause our downfall.

THE 'WAIT A BIT' BUSH -- From "Our Daily Bread"

A.C. Cappy from England sent me this incident illustrating Satan's delaying tactics: "While traveling in Jamaica, a man notices a curious shrub growing near the roadside. His companion informed him that the island people called it the 'wait a bit' bush. When he inspected it closely, his clothes touched it, and he found himself snared by thorns which resembled fishhooks. The more he tried to free himself, the more he became entangled by its barbs. Finally he had to rely on his friend to release him from his hopeless situation."

The words of Dag Hammarskjold -- Secretary General of the UN in the mid and late 1950's throb with wisdom:

You cannot play with the animal in you without becoming wholly animal, play with falsehood without forfeiting your right to truth, play with cruelty without losing your sensitivity of mind. He who wants to keep his garden tidy doesn't reserve a plot for weeds.

THE HIDDEN BOMB -- Moody, 5-5-91

London held its breath in June 1987. While working on a building site, a construction foreman thought his workers had hit a cast iron pipe while using a pile driver. After picking up and then dropping the huge object, they realized the pipe looked like a bomb. It was -- a 2,200-pound World War II bomb, one of the largest the Germans dropped during the blitz which killed more than 15,000 Londoners. After evacuating the area, a 10-man bomb disposal unit worked 18 hours before deactivating the seven-foot device.

Unconfessed sin, like an unexploded bomb, can rest in the heart of an individual -- or in a church. Unless it's deactivated through forgiveness, it can detonate and cause great damage.

In December 1985 a 70-foot-wide sinkhole swallowed one home and a carport and forced the evacuation of four homes in a retirement community in Florida. The hole was about the size of a pickup truck when it was discovered. Within three hours it had grown to 30 by 40 feet and had swallowed half of a small house. Two hours later the house was gone. The owners escaped with only their coats, glad to be alive.

Without Christ, the human heart is like a sinkhole -- and the results are just as catastrophic.

Phillip Myers, in "Rome, Its Rise and Fall," made this observation on the Romans: "Almost from the beginning, the Roman stage was gross, and immorality was one of the main agencies to which must be attributed the undermining of the originally sound moral life of Roman society. So absorbed did the people become in the indecent representations of the stage that they lost all thought and care of the affairs of real life."

When the drone of airplanes sounded over Germany's ancient town of Freilburg the night of May 10, 1940, scarcely a person looked up. Their city was, they knew, of no military significance. Suddenly bombs whistled down. Freilburg's picturesque "old city" was heavily damaged. The next day Adolph Hitler screamed that the Allies had violated an agreement to spare open cities. He vowed, "Five German bombs will fall for every enemy bomb!" and tried to live up to it. Nazi planes wiped out Rotterdam, swept across the Channel to pulverize Dover and Portsmouth and leave London's inner city and the cathedral city of Coventry in flaming rubble. The words "blitz" and "total war" were added to military language. Now after prolonged insistence by the Western Allies who said none of their planes were near Freilburg that fateful night the truth has emerged. German officials digging into archives of the Institute of Current History at Munich found that the bombers that hit Freilburg were German. Field Marshal Herman Goring had ordered them from Landsburg for a raid on Dijon, France. Lost in heavy clouds, Goring's bombers had dumped their load on Freilburg by mistake. Goring and Hitler had covered up the facts and used the incident to help justify the ruthless Nazi invasion of the Low Countries.

People Magazine issued a lengthy questionnaire on Jan. 13, 1986 aimed at defining just what, in the 80's, Americans regard as sinful. One thousand responses were selected at random for analysis. The following list places the sins of the survey in rank from "guilty to the max" to "blameless."

1. Murder 18. Hypocrisy 35. Explicit rock

2. Rape 19. Atheism lyrics

3. Incest 20. Homosexuality 36. Idle gossip

4. Child abuse 21. Abortion 37. Jealousy

5. Spying against 22. Revenge 38. Laziness

your county 23. Parking in 39. Tattling

6. Drug dealing handicapped zone 40. Living together

7. Embezzlement 24. Killing to protect without marriage

8. Pederasty your property 41. Capital

9. Spouse swapping 25. Greed punishment

10. Adultery 26. Cheating on your 42. Premarital sex

11. Industrial spying income tax 43. Lust in your

12. Bigotry 27. Selfishness heart

13. Suicide 28. Cutting into lines 44. Smoking

14. Not helping 29. Mercy killing 45. Swearing

someone in danger 30. Unwed parenthood 46. Telling a

15. Sexual harassment 31. Calling in sick when white lie

16. Misrepresenting you're not 47. Not voting

something you're 32. Overeating 48. Masturbation

selling 33. Reading/Viewing 49. Drinking

17. Taking drugs pornography alcohol

34. Divorce 50. Nude sunbathing

51. Taping off TV or radio

SIN - HOW TO DO IT From the Water Valley, MS 1st Baptist Church bulletin

The Special Study Group that meets tonight in the conference room will begin a study on prayer - what it is and how to do it. Next, we will move into a study of sin - what it is and how to do it."

There is an old story of a ship that was traveling across the Mediterranean, and one of the passengers cut a hole through the side of the ship. The sailors came and demanded to know what he was doing. "What difference does it make to you?" he asked. "The hole's under my own bunk."

PUZZLE PUT TOGETHER IF MAN PUT BACK TOGETHER -- Charles Swindoll, Strengthening Your Grip

A bone-weary father dragged into his home dog tired late one evening. It had been one of those unbelievable days of pressure, deadlines, and demands. He looked forward to a time of relaxation and quietness. Exhausted, he picked up the evening paper and headed for his favorite easy chair by the fireplace. About the time he got his shoes untied, plop! into his lap dropped his five-year-old son with an excited grin on his face.

"Hi, Dad. Let's play!"

He loved his boy dearly, but his need for a little time all alone to repair and think was, for the moment, a greater need than time with Junior. But how could he maneuver it?

There had been a recent moon probe and the newspaper carried a huge picture of earth. With a flash of much-needed insight, the dad asked his boy to bring a pair of scissors and some transparent tape. Quickly, he cut the picture of earth into various shapes and sizes, then handed the pile of homemade jigsaw puzzle pieces to him.

"You'll tape it all back together, Danny, then come on back and we'll play, okay?"

Off scampered the child to his room as dad breathed a sigh of relief. But in less than ten minutes the boy bounded back with everything taped perfectly in place. Stunned, the father asked: "How'd you do it so fast, Son?"

"Aw, it was easy, Daddy. You see, there is this picture of a man on the back of the sheet. And when you put the man together, the world comes together."

One day, to everyone's surprise, a young businessman was charged with embezzlement. According to P. W. Philpott in a Moody Monthly article, the father of the accused man was a successful and highly respected Christian businessman.

At his trial the son appeared nonchalant and arrogant about his sinful actions. When the judge told him to stand up for sentencing, a slight shuffling noise on the other side of the room was heard. The young man turned and saw that his father had also risen. The head and shoulders of that honest man were now bowed low with shame. He had stood to be identified with his boy and to receive the verdict as though it were being pronounced on him. Suddenly tears welled up in the son's eyes as he realized the terrible grief he was inflicting on his father.

BABY MONITOR EAVESDROPPING R.Digest 12/94 p. 80

My sister Susan and her husband, Frank, were entertaining for the first time since the birth of their baby. Everything ran smoothly until one of Frank's buddies arrived with his new girlfriend - a woman Susan did not particularly care for.

Susan beckoned her husband upstairs with the excuse that they had to check on the baby. In the privacy of the nursery, she spoke freely of her disdain for the new guest.

When they went downstairs to rejoin the party, they were greeted with an awkward silence - except for the occasional murmurings of the sleeping baby that came from the infant monitor sitting on the table.

KEEPING THE WRONG TYPE OF BAGGAGE Our Daily Bread

In her remarkable book "Teaching a Stone To Talk, Annie Dillard tells about the

ill-fated Franklin Expedition of 1845. The explorers sailed from England to find the Northwest Passage across the Arctic Ocean. They put aboard their two sailing ships a lot of things they didn't need: a1,200-volume library, fine china, crystal goblets, and sterling silverware for each officer with his initials engraved on the handles. Amazingly, each ship took only a 12-day supply of coal for their auxiliary steam engines.

The ships became trapped in vast frozen plains of Arctic ice. After several months, Lord Franklin died. The men decided to trek to safety in small groups but none survived.

One story is especially heartbreaking. Two officers pulled a large sled more than 65 miles across the treacherous ice. When rescuers found their bodies, they discovered that the sled was filled with "a great deal of table silver."

By carrying what they didn't need, these men contributed to their own failure. But don't we do the same? Don't we drag baggage through life that we don't need? Evil thoughts that hinder us? Habits that drag us down? Grudges that we won't let go? Let's determine to "lay aside every weight."

An old story that could only come from England appeared in the British Weekly (April 2. 1982) in an article for children - by Nigel Cameron and Andrew Knowles. It seems the Master at a Cambridge college had a dog, but dogs were not allowed at the school. This caused some consternation among the professors until they reached a truly academic solution. The dog was "deemed" to be a cat.

This sheds some light on the atoning death of Christ, say Cameron and Knowles. Paul says that Jesus, the sinless one, was "made sin for us" (2 Cor. 5:21). This "goes rather further than the story of the dog and the cat," because we're not dealing with academic nitpicking. We're dealing with the real judgment of God. God wasn't just pretending that Jesus was a sinner-Jesus was actually made sin for us.

This is the mystery that won our salvation. "Jesus...was cut off from God so completely that he could cry.... 'My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me', so that we may today cry. 'Abba. Father!' "

JUDAS SOLD HIMSELF Hester H. Cholmondeley

Still as of old, men by themselves are priced -

For 30 pieces Judas sold himself, not Christ.

RUNNING TO A DIFFERENT DOORBELL R.Digest 4/94 P. 109

My friend Margaret has a dog named Bentley. He barks wildly and runs to the door whenever the doorbell rings. When he hears bath water running, however, he hides under the bed.

To make life easier at his bathtime, Margaret's husband, Bob, goes outside and rings the doorbell. When Rentley comes running, Bob grabs him.

He that covereth his sins shall not prosper. Proverbs 28:13

An Indianapolis patrolman ran into trouble while investigating a routine traffic mishap. His problem began after he had interviewed witnesses, arrested one of the drivers, and written up the accident report. He suddenly noticed that the offending motorist was chewing on something that wasn't gum. He was eating the report! The officer reached for the disappearing paper, only to get his hand caught in a bite that lasted about 2 minutes. Despite his efforts to retrieve the report, it was destroyed. But the delay was only temporary. The patrolman tracked down the witnesses again and recompiled the damaging evidence.

The resistance and cover up that this Indiana officer encountered is similar to what Isaiah saw in the people of Israel centuries ago. The prophet was grieved as he watched his countrymen try to conceal the evidence of their sin with everything but the gracious provision of God. He saw them attempt to cover their tracks by running to hide in the "shadow of Egypt." They, in effect, stuck their fingers in their ears while the Lord spoke, and they encouraged their prophets to tell them only what they wanted to hear. They would rather hide than seek the mercy of God. Consequently, the Lord had to put an end to all of their attempts at concealment by sending judgment upon them.

"Only acknowledge thine iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against the Lord." Jeremiah 3:13

The well-loved author Corrie Ten Boom, in her autobiography, The Hiding Place, made a keen observation about the futility of rationalizing our sins. She said, "The blood of Jesus never cleansed an excuse." Although we are fully justified as Christians, we must honestly acknowledge wrongdoing for what it is-sin against a holy God. If we hide behind excuses, we will neither sense His forgiveness nor gain the victory over evil habits.

A woman said to her pastor, "I'm deeply troubled about a problem I know is hurting my testimony: I exaggerate. I always seem to enlarge a story until it's all distorted. People know they can't trust me. Can you help me?" The minister said, "Let's talk to the Lord about it." She began to pray, "O God, Thou knowest1 have a tendency to exaggerate..." At this point the preacher interrupted, "Call it lying, ma'am, and you may get over it!" The woman began to weep, because she knew he was right. She had been trying to make "lying" acceptable, and her excuse-making had made praying about it nearly impossible.

HERE KITTY KITTY R.Digest 9/95 p. 73

My father's secretary was visibly distraught one morning when she arrived at the office and explained that her children's parrot had escaped from his cage and flown out an open window.

Of all the dangers the tame bird would face outdoors alone, she seemed most concerned about what would happen if the bird started talking. Confused, my father asked what the parrot could say. "Well," she explained, "he mostly says, 'Here, kitty, kitty.'"

QUOTE: Some people change their ways when they see the light; others when they feel the heat. - Caroline Schoeder R.Digest 11/94 p. 169

THE TRUTH ABOUT SUICIDAL ARGUMENTS USA NEWS 4/25/94 p.31ff

"Physicians are always tired by patients slipping or not getting better," says Kass. "Once they think of death as a treatment option, then physicians simply give in to their weaknesses."

For proof, Kass points to the Netherlands. An informal, de facto arrangement with prosecutors some 20 years ago allows physicians there to help patients die and avoid litigation, as long as certain safeguards are followed. The patient, for example, has to be terminally ill, in considerable pain and mentally competent and must repeatedly express a wish to die. The system is popular with the Dutch and a model for euthanasia's supporters around the world.

But there is a dark side to the Dutch practice. In slightly more than half of euthanasia cases, for instance, doctors kill without the patients' knowledge or consent. That figure comes from the government's own pro-euthanasia report in 1991, which noted that there had been12,300 cases of doctors killing patients upon request in the preceding year and an additional 400 in which doctors provided pills or other means for suicide. An additional 1,040 people were killed by doctors who, acted on their own, without a request from the patient. Of these, 72 percent had never indicated they wanted their lives terminated. Further, notes Rita Marker of the International Anti-Euthanasia Task Force, in 8,100 deaths not reported as euthanasia, doctors deliberately gave overdoses of drugs - not primarily to relieve pain but to bring death. And 4,941 of these occurred without the patient's consent. Dutch doctors defend their actions by saying they did what they believed a