1. Help with Illness: Do you get sick frequently? Studies have shown that pet owners make fewer doctor visits, have shorter hospital stays and take less medication than folks who don’t have pets! Pet interaction also helps reduce the pain of arthritis, minimize the side effects of cancer, and even helps with Alzheimer’s Disease!!

2. Help with Heart Attacks: Want to get well faster after a heart attack? Dog owners are 8 times more likely to survive for more than 1 year after a heart attack than those who don’t have dogs! Increased survival rates are based on owning a dog, not on any other physical, psychological or social factor!

3. Help with Blood Pressure: Want to bring your blood pressure down? Before taking another pill, reach for your pet. Interacting with animals helps lower and balance blood pressure problems. Petting an animal is soothing to mind, body and spirit. We become more focused on loving and being loved which increases mood improving brain chemicals like serotonin and oxytocin.

4. Help with Weight Problems: Are you constantly on a diet? When you get hungry, play a game or going for a walk with your pet. Dozens of studies link higher levels of oxytocin with lower blood pressure, lower cortisol (the hormone associated with stress and weight gain), more positive social interactions, increased pain tolerance and faster wound healing.

5. Help to Live Longer: Animals can even help lengthen life, and they certainly add to the quality of that life. In a study of nursing homes, when pets were included as part of the program, mortality rates were 25% lower than at facilities that didn’t include pets!

6. Help with Self Improvement: Do you need a master teacher, love guru or role model? Your animal companions know a lot about health and healing, loving and living life well. They are not bashful about asking directly for what they need or want. They take naps when they’re tired. And they know how to discharge energy through exercise and play.

7. Help with Fatigue and Depression: Are you isolated or feeling depressed, fatigued or sad? Studies have shown that the more true friends and companions we spend quality time with, the less ill, depressed and fatigued we are. If you have a minimum of 10 in your circle of friends, then statistics show that you won’t get fatigued or depressed nearly as much.

If you want an excellent reference for your pet’s health you can visit Little Big Cat Website and subscribe to their newsletter.

It is simply me, sitting at my computer, looking out the window and thinking about how easy it is to take all that we have for granted. It could all be gone so quickly. People can die, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes can wipe out possessions, economic crashes can demolish life savings and investments and jobs. My mind whirls with a variety of thoughts about the fragility of life………what kind of attitude do I have toward inconveniences; am I a complainer or am I thankful for all that I have been blessed with; what would I have left if all that I put so much dependence in was gone???

Is there anything that is eternal, lasting, imperishable? And if there is more to life than what we see and touch, then am I the kind of person who will be deserving of participation in that kind of world?

I believe there is a God who is eternal, and that there is a life beyond this one. I want to be the kind of person God would want with Him in that life, and I am trying to be that kind of person with His help. I need to have a stronger determination to pour out gratitude every day for the overwhelming blessings in my life; to love the people precious to me while I have them; and not to take for granted my hot water heater, toilet paper, my imperfect job, or the ability to see through these reading glasses I wear.

Thanksgiving……it’s not a day, it’s a way of life.

Then the long friendship fell apart. It began with a small misunderstanding over someone not re-filling the gas can they used to mow the grass, and it grew into a major fight. Finally, it exploded into an exchange of bitter words followed by weeks of silence and avoiding each other.

One morning there was a knock on John’s door. He opened it to find a man with a carpenter’s toolbox. “I’m looking for a few days’ work,” he said. “Perhaps you would have a few small jobs here and there I could help with? I would be glad for the work.”

“Yes,” said the older of the 2 friends. “I do have a job for you. Look across the ravine there to the property on the other side. That’s my neighbor Sam Brown’s place. In fact, he was once my best friend! Last week there was a pretty woodland in there. But he recently took his bulldozer in and wiped out the trees and created that ravine between us.  Well, he may have done this to spite me, but I’ll do him one better. See that pile of lumber by the barn? I want you to build me a fence – an 8-foot fence, so I won’t need to see his place or his face anymore.”

The Carpenter said, “I think I understand the situation. Show me the nails and the post-hole digger and I believe I’ll be able to do a job that pleases you.”

John had to go to town, so he helped the Carpenter get the materials ready and then he was off for the day. The Carpenter worked hard all that day — measuring, sawing, pounding and nailing. About sunset when John returned from town, the Carpenter had just finished his job.

John’s eyes opened wide, his jaw dropped. There was no fence there at all.

Instead there was a bridge…. A bridge that stretched from one side of the ravine across to the other! A fine and beautiful piece of work, handrails and all! And his friend Sam, was coming toward them on the bridge, his hand outstretched….

“You are quite a fellow to build this bridge after all I’ve said and done,” Sam said. I am really sorry about my part in all this foolishness. Nothing is worth destroying a friendship as valuable as ours.

The two friends stood at each end of the bridge, and then they met in middle, taking each other’s hand. They turned to see the Carpenter hoist his toolbox onto his shoulder.

“No, wait! Stay a few days. I’ve a lot of other projects for you,” said John.
“I’d love to stay on,” the Carpenter said, “but I have many more bridges to build.”

Author Unknown

A wealthy man and his son loved to collect rare works of art. They had everything in their collection, from Picasso to Raphael. They were very close and would often sit together and talk and admire the great works of art.  When the Gulf war conflicts began, the son went to war. He was very courageous and died in battle while rescuing another soldier. The father was notified and his grief was deep and devastating at the loss of his only child.

About a month later, just before Christmas,There was a knock at the door. A young man stood at the door with a large package in his hands. He said, ‘Sir, you don’t know me, but I am the soldier your son took a bullet for. It should have been me who died that day, but he was carrying me to safety when a bullet struck him in the heart and he died instantly.

He often talked about you, and your love for art.’ The young man held out this package. ‘I know this isn’t much. I’m not really a good artist, but I think your son would have wanted you to have this.’  The father opened the package. It was a portrait of his son, painted by the young soldier. He stared in awe at the way the soldier had captured the personality of his son in the painting. The father was so drawn to the eyes that his own eyes welled up with tears. He thanked the young man and offered to pay him for the picture. ‘Oh, no sir, I could never repay what your son did for me. It’s a gift if you like it well enough to have it.’

The father hung the portrait over his mantle. Every time visitors came to his home he took them to see the portrait of his son before he showed them any of the other great works he had collected.  It was very special to him for all that it represented.

The father died a couple years later and there was to be a great auction of his paintings. Many influential people gathered, excited over seeing the great paintings and having an opportunity to purchase one for their collection.
On the platform first sat the simple painting of the son painted by his fellow soldier.

The auctioneer pounded his gavel. ‘We will start the bidding with this picture of the son. Who will bid for this picture?’  There was silence…….Then a voice in the back of the room shouted, ‘We want to see the famous paintings. Skip this one.’  But the auctioneer persisted. ‘Will somebody bid for this painting? Who will start the bidding? $100, $200?’  Another voice angrily. ‘We didn’t come to see this painting. We came to see the Van Gogh’s and the Rembrandts. Get on with the real stuff so we can bid!’

But still the auctioneer persevered. ‘The son! The son! Who’ll take the painting of the son?’  Finally, a voice came from the very back of the room. It was the longtime gardener of the man and his son. ‘I’ll give $10 for the painting. ‘ Being a poor man, it was all he could afford, but it saddened him to see this painting of his beloved young master so ignored.  ’We have $10, who will bid $20?’  ’Give it to him for $10. Let’s see the true masters.’  The crowd was becoming angry. They didn’t want the picture of the son.
They wanted the more worthy investments for their collections.  The auctioneer pounded the gavel…. ‘Going once, twice, SOLD for $10!’  A man sitting on the second row shouted, ‘Now let’s get on with the collection!’ The auctioneer laid down his gavel. ‘I’m sorry, the auction is over.  ’What?!’What about the paintings, they yelled?’  ’I am sorry, said the auctioneer. When I was called to conduct this auction, I was told of a secret stipulation in the will. I was not allowed to reveal that stipulation until this time. Only the painting of the son would be auctioned. Whoever bought that painting would inherit the entire estate, including the paintings.  The man who took the son gets everything!’

God gave His son 2,000 years ago to die on the cross. Much like the auctioneer, His message today is: ‘The son, the son, who’ll take the son?’  Because, you see, whoever takes the Son gets everything.

THE BENT, RUSTY BUCKET

Our house was directly across the street from the clinic entrance of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore . We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs rooms to out-patients at the clinic.

One summer evening as I was fixing supper, there was a knock at the door. I opened it to see a truly awful looking man. “Why, he’s hardly taller than my 10-year-old,” I thought as I stared at the stooped, shriveled body. But the appalling thing was his face, lopsided from swelling, red and raw.
Yet his voice was pleasant as he said, “Good evening. I’ve come to see if you’ve a room for just one night. I came for a treatment this morning from the eastern shore, and there’s no bus ’til morning.”

He told me he’d been hunting for a room since noon but with no success, no one seemed to have a room. “I guess it’s my face …. I know it looks terrible, but my doctor says with a few more treatments …..”

For a moment I hesitated, but his next words convinced me: “I could sleep in this rocking chair on the porch. My bus leaves early in the morning.”
I told him we would find him a bed, but to rest on the porch.. I went inside and finished getting supper. When we were ready, I asked the old man if he would join us. “No, thank you. I have plenty.” And he held up a brown paper bag.

When I had finished the dishes, I went out on the porch to talk with him a few minutes. It didn’t take a long time to see that this old man had an oversized heart crowded into that tiny body. He told me he fished for a living to support his daughter, her 5 children, and her husband, who was hopelessly crippled from a back injury.

He didn’t tell it by way of complaint, in fact, every other sentence was prefaced with a thanks to God for a blessing. He was grateful that no pain accompanied his disease, which was apparently a form of skin cancer. He thanked God for giving him the strength to keep going…..

At bedtime, we put a camp cot in the children’s room for him. When I got up in the morning, the bed linens were neatly folded and the little man was out on the porch. He refused breakfast, but just before he left for his bus, haltingly, as if asking a great favor, he said, “Could I please come back and stay the next time I have a treatment? I won’t put you out a bit. I can sleep fine in a chair.” He paused a moment and then added, “Your children made me feel at home. Grownups are bothered by my face, but children don’t seem to mind.”

I told him he was welcome to come again.
And, on his next trip, he arrived a little after 7 in the morning. As a gift, he brought a big fish and a quart of the largest oysters I had ever seen! He said he had shucked them that morning before he left so that they’d be nice and fresh. I knew his bus left at 4:00 a.m. and I wondered what time he had to get up in order to do this for us.

In the years he came to stay overnight with us, there was never a time that he did not bring us fish or oysters or vegetables from his garden.
Other times we received packages in the mail, always by special delivery; fish and oysters packed in a box of fresh young spinach or kale, every leaf carefully washed. Knowing that he must walk 3 miles to mail these, and knowing how little money he had made the gifts doubly precious.

When I received these little remembrances, I often thought of a comment our next-door neighbor made after he left that first morning.
“Did you keep that awful looking man last night? I turned him away! You can lose roomers by putting up such people!”

Maybe we did lose roomers once or twice. But, oh!, if only they could have known him he would have made them richer. Perhaps their illnesses would have been easier to bear could they have seen how he bore his.

I know our family always will be grateful to have known him; from him we learned what it was to accept the bad without complaint and the good with gratitude to God.

Recently I was visiting a friend, who has a greenhouse. As she showed me her flowers, we came to the most beautiful one of all, a golden chrysanthemum, bursting with blooms. But to my great surprise, it was growing in an old dented, rusty bucket. I thought to myself, “If this were my plant, I’d put it in the loveliest container I had!”

My friend changed my mind. “I ran short of pots,” she explained, “and knowing how beautiful this one would be, I thought it wouldn’t mind starting out in this old pail. It’s just for a little while, till I can put it out in the garden.”

She wondered why I laughed so delightedly, but I was imagining just such a scene in heaven. ”Here’s an especially beautiful one,” God might have said when he came to the soul of the sweet old fisherman. “He won’t mind starting in this small wounded body.”

All this happened long ago….. but I imagine in God’s garden, how tall this lovely soul must stand.

The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” (1 Samuel 16:7b)

For some of us it is simply the presence of family, for others it is the fabulous variety in pretty lights and glitter. Many people look forward to a long awaited gift, and some just enjoy time off from work.

But is there a deeper meaning to Christmas? Obviously each of us is free to acknowledge, ignore, celebrate, worship or whatever we wish to do on any day of the year. But isn’t Christmas an opportunity to slow down and consider what is truly important in life? Even if you do not share the Christian belief that Jesus was God’s Son who came to this world to save us, it is still a good time to examine what you are living for.

It is so easy to get caught up in the busyness of life and forget our mate, children and the relationships that give our lives meaning. It is common for people to get so stressed by life that they forget to be thankful for all they have. It is not hard to lose our values in the race to get ahead.

Make this Christmas the one where you determine to prioritize your life according to what matters most. May God bless each of you this Christmas and as we enter a New Year!

The following was written by 8 yr. old Danny Dutton from Chula Vista, Ca. as his 3rd grade homework assignment.

EXPLANATION OF GOD:

‘One of God’s main jobs is making people. He makes them to replace the ones that die, so there will be enough people to take care of things on earth. He doesn’t make grownups, just babies. I think because they are smaller and easier to make. That way he doesn’t have to take up his valuable time teaching them to talk and walk. He can just leave that to mothers and fathers.’

‘God’s second most important job is listening to prayers An awful lot of this goes on, since some people, like preachers and things, pray at times beside bedtime. God doesn’t have time to listen to the radio or TV because of this. Because he hears everything, there must be a terrible lot of noise in his ears, unless he has thought of a way to turn it off.’

‘God sees everything and hears everything and is everywhere which keeps Him pretty busy. So you shouldn’t go wasting his time by going over your mom and dad’s head asking for something they said you couldn’t have.’

‘Atheists are people who don’t believe in God. I don’t think there are any in Chula Vista . At least there aren’t any who come to our church.’

‘Jesus is God’s Son. He used to do all the hard work,like walking on water and performing miracles and trying to teach the people who didn’t want to learn about God.. They finally got tired of him preaching to them and they crucified him . But he was good and kind, like his father, and he told his father that they didn’t know what they were doing and to forgive them and God said O.K.’

‘His dad (God) appreciated everything that he had done and all his hard work on earth so he told him he didn’t have to go out on the road anymore. He could stay in heaven. So he did. And now he helps his dad out by listening to prayers and seeing things which are important for God to take care of and which ones he can take care of himself without having to bother God. Like a secretary, only more important.’

‘You can pray anytime you want and they are sure to help you because they got it worked out so one of them is on duty all the time.’

‘You should always go to church on Sunday because it makes God happy, and if there’s anybody you want to make happy, it’s God!

Don’t skip church to do something you think will be more fun like going to the beach. This is wrong. And besides the sun doesn’t come out at the beach until noon anyway.’

‘If you don’t believe in God, besides being an atheist, you will be very lonely, because your parents can’t go everywhere with you, like to camp, but God can. It is good to know He’s around you when you’re scared, in the dark or when you can’t swim and you get thrown into real deep water by big kids.’

‘But…you shouldn’t just always think of what God can do for you. I figure God put me here and he can take me back anytime he pleases.

And…that’s why I believe in God.’

And if you don’t have somewhere to be or just don’t want to cook, there are still a couple of alternatives for a delicious meal and some weekend fun:

Benjamin’s at The Pointe Restaurant is now open weeknights from 5-9pm, and 8am-9pm Saturday and Sunday.  Call 540-297-4900 for more details on weekly specials and events, including the 2 for $20 specials and the Thanksgiving Buffet (Noon until 6 p.m. Thanksgiving Day).

Mayberry Diner: Will be open for Thanksgiving feast including turkey and all the trimmings. Hours will be from 11am. until 4pm.  Located at 1696 White House Road in Moneta, Va. Call 540-296-1480 for more info.

The Holiday Reunion Show featuring The Embers, The Original Royal Kings, The OriginalRhythm Doctors and special guests The Breeze Brothers.  Hotel Roanoke, Friday November 26, 2010, 7:00pm-11:30am.  Ticket locations:  Hotel Roanoke, Amrhein’s Jewelers, Bob’s Restaurant (Vinton).  Information:  www.keausa.com 540-989-5464.

A professor stood before his philosophy class with several odd items in front of him. When the class began, without a word he picked up a super-sized empty mayonnaise jar and start filling it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of small stones and pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. Though more wary now, they still thought it was full.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up the tiny open spaces. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students answered a confident yes.

The professor then produced two cups of tea from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling everything that was left of any space in the jar. The students laughed this time.

At this point the Professor told the class the point of his demonstration. I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life, he said.

The golf balls are the important things – God, family, friends and health. These are the things that really make your life meaningful and rich. If everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the things that are secondary in importance such as your job, your home and your goals and dreams. These things matter, but life would go on without them.

The sand is everything else — The small stuff.

‘If I had put the sand into the jar first,’ he continued, ’there would have been no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for your life.

If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, You will never have room for the things that are the most important. Then some day when you lose the golf balls, you will be devastated as you realize how you squandered precious time.

So…
Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness.
Play with your children.
Make healthy food choices.
Take your mate out to dinner.
There will always be time to clean the house, go to work, exercise and watch tv.

‘Take care of the golf balls first – The things that really matter.
Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.’

Then a girl in the class raised her hand and
asked what the tea stood for.
The Professor smiled and said he was glad
she had asked.

The tea is to remind us that no matter how
busy we are, there is always time for a drink
and a chat with our friends.

The Concert

When the house lights dimmed and the concert was about to begin, the mother returned to her seat and discovered that her child was missing.

Before she could panic, the lights dimmed, the curtains parted and spotlights focused on the impressive Steinway piano on stage. To her horror, the mothersaw her little boy sitting at the keyboard, innocently picking out the tune to”Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.”

At that moment, the great piano master made his entrance, quickly moved
to the piano, and whispered in the boy’s ear, “Don’t quit . . . Keep playing.”

Then, leaning over, Paderewski reached down with his left hand and began filling
in a bass part. Soon his right arm reached around to the other side of the child,
and he added a running obbligato. Together, the old master and the young novice
transformed what could have been a frightening situation into a
wonderfully creative  and beautiful experience.

The audience was so mesmerized that they couldn’t recall what else
the great master played. Only the classic, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.”

Perhaps that’s the way it is with God.

What we can accomplish on our own is hardly noteworthy.

We try our best, but the results aren’t always graceful flowing music. 

However, with the guidance of the Masters Hands, our life’s
work can truly be beautiful.

The next time you set out to accomplish something, listen carefully for the Masters
direction. You may hear his voice, whispering in your ear, “Don’t quit . . . Keep playing.”

Know that His hands are there, willing to help you to do His Will and turn your feeble
attempts into true masterpieces.

So………….”Don’t quit . . . Keep playing.”