God Wants Our Best

“Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near..." Isaiah 55:6

         What would you think of a boy who kept an apple until it was rotten before he tried to eat it? What would you think of a girl who kept a rose until it wilted and faded before she tried to wear it? What would you think of a man who bought an automobile and never used it until it rusted? What would you think of boys and girls who waited until they were men and women before giving their hearts to the Lord Jesus? This is a story of a girl who did just that very thing. She thought she was not old enough, and she wished to have what she called a good time before she became a Christian. That was very foolish, as I will try to show you.
       The girl's name was Margaret, and she lived in the great city of St. Louis, where she had many friends and many places to go. One day her mother, whom she loved dearly, became ill, very ill‚and they had to call a nurse. The nurse was a very beautiful young lady and a lovely Christian, and she soon became much interested in Miss Margaret and her winning ways, and wondered why she had never given herself to the Lord Jesus. So she made up her mind that someday before she left she would talk to her about it. After her mother was much better, a friend sent in a bouquet of beautiful white carnations, and the nurse, who had been waiting for the best chance to speak to her little friend, said to her: "I think we will not take these flowers to your mother just now. They are so fresh and sweet and beautiful. Let us keep them here for a few days, and then we can take them to her room."Margaret's eyes opened wide and she looked at the nurse to see what she really meant.
       The nurse was getting the vase and the water for the flowers, and Margaret became very angry and indignant and told the nurse that she should do no such thing, but should take the beautiful flowers to her darling mother immediately. Without saying any more about the flowers and with the sweetest of smiles, the nurse put her arm around Margaret and said: " Yes, I think too that mother ought to have the flowers when they are sweetest and freshest, and we will take them to her soon; but don't you think also that God ought to have your life when it is at its best? And yet you are keeping your beautiful young life from Him and waiting until you are older, and then you think you will be willing to give Him some of the days that are not your very best."
       Do you think that was a good sermon? I know it was, but it didn't sound one little bit like a sermon, and I am not surprised in the least that Margaret immediately saw what the nurse meant and that very day gave her heart to Jesus. We are never too young to love Him, and boys and girls should learn to love Jesus just as sweetly and just as surely and just as early as they learn to love their own fathers and mothers in their own homes. Hugh Kerr

Bible Coloring Pages About Love:

• Water Lily Valentine Coloring Page
• Fern and Flower Valentine Coloring
• "Above all, be loving..."
• Color This Motherly Embrace
• Jesus loving the children . . .
  

Better Than Gold

"But Peter said, “I don’t have any silver or gold for you. But I’ll give you what I have. In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, get up and walk!” Acts 3:6

       Long, long ago there lived in Jerusalem a certain lame man. He was over forty years old, but he had never been able to walk at all. When other babies were learning to toddle he had lain still and quiet, not because he did not want to walk, but because his little feet and ankles were quite powerless. Later he had watched the boys at their merry games and longed to join them ; but his poor, useless legs would not bear him, and he was obliged just to look on and long. Then he had grown to be a man, and he had seen other men, strong and straight, go out to fight the world and earn their bread, and still he lay helpless; and as he was poor and could not work, his friends carried him daily and laid him at the Beautiful Gate of the Temple so that he might ask alms of those who were going in to pray.
       I do not know why he chose the Beautiful Gate. Perhaps because it was one of the main entrances. Many people passed that way, and he would be likely to receive a good deal of money. Perhaps it was because he liked to have something beautiful to look at, for the name seems to tell us that this gate was more beautiful than any of the others. At any rate, there he lay day after day, year after year, until he came to be a middle-aged man.

Healing more precious than gold.

       Then one morning he saw two men approaching. They were plainly clad and seemed to be poor men, but they had kind faces. Perhaps they might be able to spare him a few small coins. As they passed he stretched out a hand to ask for alms. The men stopped and looked at him steadily. This was something different from what usually happened. People had got so accustomed to seeing him there that they either passed him by unheeding or, barely glancing at him, dropped a coin into his hand. But these men stopped to look at him, and the elder one spoke. "Look on us," he said. And the lame man obeyed, expecting to receive a coin. But he was going to receive something that would be of more value to him than all the money in the world. "Silver and gold have I none," said the stranger, "but what I have, that give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk." Then he stretched out his hand to raise him up, and the lame man grasped it. Immediately strength came into his ankles and his feet, and springing up he stood and walked for the first time in his life.
       He went with the two strangers into the Temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God. And all the people who saw him were filled with wonder, for they knew that this was the man who for long years had begged for alms at the Beautiful Gate of the Temple.
       You know that this is a true story, that the stranger who healed the lame man was none other than the apostle Peter. Now, if you forget all the rest of the story, I want you to try to remember just one little bit Peter's gift to the lame man. "Silver and gold have I none," he said, "but what I have, that give I thee."
       I think most boys and girls are a little like Peter. They haven't got any silver and gold to give; sometimes they haven't even any pennies. Well, perhaps they have something better. I don't say that it is not good to give pennies if you have them, especially if you have to give up something you want in parting with them, but there are some things worth more than money.
       This story of Peter and the lame man reminds me of an incident in the life of a great Russian author and prince, Count Tolstoy.
       One day, in the streets of Petrograd, he came upon a beggar who held out his hand and asked for alms. The count felt in all his pockets, but not a single coin could he find. But he had something with him that he carried always. He went to the beggar and said, "Brother, I have nothing, but I take your hand, and I love you." And the beggar, touched by the warm kind words, looked up in the count's face and said, " Thank you, brother, that also is a gift."
       That is a gift we can all give; is it not? The gift of love and kindness and sympathy. And it is a gift more precious than gold. Rev. Hastings

If any little word of mine
May make a life the brighter,
If any little song of mine
May make a heart the lighter,
God help me speak that little word.
And take my bit of singing,
And drop it in some lonely vale,
To set the echoes ringing !
If any little love of mine
May make a life the sweeter.
If any little care of mine
May make a friend's the fleeter,
If any lift of mine may ease
The burden of another,
God give me love, and care, and strength
To help my toiling brother.

Color Wild Gourd

The wild gourd with a whole fruit, and one in section.

Description of Botanical Coloring Page: The gourd is  a  poisonous  fruit  which  grew  on  a"wild  vine"  at  Gilgal  (2  Kings 4: 38-41). Elisha who traveled much over Palestine, had with him a company of the ''sons of the prophets,'' who, at his command, filled a pot with vegetables to prepare for themselves a pottage. One found a wild vine in a field, and collected the gourds growning on it. Not knowing what they were, and supposing that they were fit for the pot, he shred  them  in.  When  the  pottage  was  served  it was  found  to  be  poisonous,  and  on  appeal  to Elisha,  he  miraculously  made  the  pottage  harmless. The  plant  that  best  fits  this  narrative  is  the colocynth,  which  has  a  stem  creeping  along  the ground,  with  triangular  leaves,  and  long  straggling tendrils  like  the  vine.  The  fruit  is  round, of  a  tempting  appearance,  mottled  with  green on a yellow ground, but it's pulpy interior has a nauseous taste, bitter as gall. It is found in sandy places near the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. To a student from Shunem or Bethel it would be an unknown but attractive fruit.
       It seems very probable that this is the plant called in Deut. 32:32 " the vine of Sodom," which bore "grapes of gall," and that the rosh frequently referred to in Scripture under the name of  "gall" was also the colocynth. The rosh was a poisonous plant (Deut. 29:18), from which was obtained "water of gall." The medical qualities of the colocynth pill are derived from a watery extract of the bitter pulp of this gourd.
       The gourd that protected Jonah was some climbing plant of the same order as the wild gourd, which grew rapidly, and perished as quickly (Jonah 4:6-10). It could not be the palm-crist or castor-oil plant, as that is not an arbor tree, and would not accord with the narrative.
       The knops (knobs) carved in cedar wood which ornamented Solomon's Temple were probably cut in the shape of the gourd, as suggested by the revisers in the marginal note to 1 Kings 6:18.

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Color the Carob Tree Plant

The Carob tree branch with separate flower, pod and two seeds.

Description of Botanical Coloring Pages:  The revisers  have  inserted  in the  margin  of  Luke  15: 16,  "the  pods  of  the  carob tree"  for  "husks"  in  the  text.  The  husks  were the  pods  of  Ceratonia siliqua,  small  tree  which grows  in  the  countries  bordering  on  the  Mediterranean. The  pods  are  from  six  to  twelve inches  long,  about  an  inch  broad,  and  of  a  shining  purplish-brown   color,   containing    several seeds,  separated  from  each  other  by  a  fleshy pulp.  From  the  large  quantity  of  sweet  mucilage they  contain,  they  form  a  good  and  agreeable food  for  animals,  and  are  largely  exported as  a  feeding  stuff  for  stock.  The  pods  are  sometimes called locust  beans  and  St.  John's  bread, from  the  notion  that  they  were  used  as  food  by John  the  Baptist;  but  this  is  an  error.

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Color the Caper Plant

Caper plant in bloom.

 

Description of Botanical Coloring Page: (R. V. Eccl. 12:5) In the remarkable description of old age (Eccl. 12:5) the revisers have put into the text "the caper-berry shall fail." and placed "desire" in the margin. The flower-bud, preserved in vinegar, is largely used as a stimulating condiment in food. The caper is an abundant shrub in parts of the Middle East, found on walls and rocks. It has ovate, smooth leaves, with two little spines at their base, showy flowers, and oval fruit. 

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A Boy Who Was a Minister

"Out of the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, to still the enemy and the avenger." Psalm 8:2

"And they said to him, "Do you hear what these are saying?" And Jesus said to them, "Yes, have you never read, "Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise;?" Matthew 21:16

        This is a missionary story. I have often read it, and I know it is true. It happened in a little village, in an out-of-the-way corner of India, where a missionary had gone to baptize sixty or seventy men and women and to form them into a Christian church.
       When the service began the missionary noticed a boy about twelve years of age, sitting away back in the corner of the building, looking very much interested and listening with all his might. After he had baptized and received into the church all the grown-up men and women who had professed their faith in the Lord Jesus as their Savior, he was surprised to see this boy come forward and stand in front of the pulpit. The missionary said to him, "What, my lad, do you want to unite with the church and sit down to the Lord's Supper?" The boy said, "Yes, sir." The missionary looked at him lovingly, and said, "But you are very young, and I know nothing about you, and no one has taught you about the Christian faith, and after a while you may grow careless and indifferent. Perhaps it will be better for you to wait. I will be here again in less than a year, and if during that time you will study hard and prepare yourself, then, if you wish to unite with the church, I will receive you gladly." The boy said nothing, but turned away to his seat with a very sad heart, and the missionary saw that he was very, very much disappointed. Before the little fellow reached his seat, the missionary saw all the people standing up and they all began to talk at once. After a little while they allowed one man to speak for the rest, and he said: "Why, sir, this boy has taught us all we know about Jesus." And what he said proved to be the truth. That boy had learned the story of the Gospel at a mission school in a distant village, and had returned to his heathen home to tell the story of Jesus to his own people and to his friends. He read to them out of the New Testament until they too gave their hearts to God and were led to Jesus. So you see this little lad was really the minister of the village.
       Of course, I do not think that boys should preach like grown-up men, but I am sure if they love Jesus and live as He would like to have them live, kind and obedient and true, that they will be able to do more for Him than they could do, even if they were able to preach great, long, eloquent sermons. You know the Bible says, "A little child shall lead them." I want you to remember this verse for the text. I have known fathers and mothers with whom ministers and Sunday school teachers and elders and deacons seemed to have no influence, who were led to Jesus by their own little boy or girl. We sing sometimes, " Jesus wants me for a sunbeam," and I think a sunbeam is the most beautiful and most useful thing in all the world. Hugh Kerr

Sometimes God chooses the very young to speak His truth.

The baby Jesus has visitors...

Description of The Coloring Page: The shepherds visit the infant Christ. Mary holds Jesus on her knees. The Ox and the Donkey wait patiently with Joseph in the barn. Nativity, Christmas and/or Advent

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Drowning in The Reed Sea Coloring Page

Description of The Coloring Page: sculpted inside of an ancient sarcophagus, A scene depicting the great escape of the Hebrews from Egypt. Left is pharaoh in his chariot, horses and beneath them are the drowning soldiers. Right is Moses with his staff. 

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Color Camphire or Henna

Camphire  or  Henna.
Separate  flower,  fruit,  and  seeds.

Description of Botanical Coloring Page: Camphire,  the  Hebrew  copher,  is  mentioned in  the  Song  of  Solomon  (1: 14),  "My  beloved  is  unto  me as  a  cluster  of  camphire  in  the  vineyards  of En-gedi; " also  in  4:13.  Camphire  is  an  old  form of  the  word  camphor.  The  revisers  have  substituted "henna"  in  those  texts.  Henna  (Lawso- nia  alba)  is  a  shrub  found  in  Northern  Africa,  and in  Asia  from  Syria  to  India.  It  bears  numerous small,  white,  sweet-smelling  flowers  in  large clusters.  But  the  plant  has  been  from  remote antiquity  famous  as  a  cosmetic,  being  used  to give  a  reddish-orange  stain  to  the  nails,  tips  of the  fingers,  palms  of  the  hand,  and  soles  of  the feet.  The  young  stems  and  leaves  are  reduced to  a  powder,  and  when  used,  are  made  into  a paste  with  hot  water,  and  applied  for  a  night  to the  parts  to  be  stained.  The  stain  of  the  henna has  been  detected  on  Egyptian  mummies.

 

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Color Lemon Grass

Lemon grass with separate spikelet.

Description of Botanical Coloring Page: Calamus was a chief spice used as an ingredient in the holy anointing oil (Exodus 30:25). It was imported into the Holy Land, and sold in the markets of Tyre (Ezekiel 27:19). If Vedan and Javan, from which it seems to have been brought, were, as is usually supposed, islands of the Mediterranean, it may have been the sweet sedge (Acorus calamus), which was probably introduced very early into Europe from India. Its underground stem is fragrant, and enters into many compounds of the perfumer. The calamus may, however, have been one of the sweet-scented lemon-grasses of India. These grasses have a strong aromatic odor. The base of the stem and roots are at the present day made into fans, or woven into screens or mats, and mush used in India and elsewhere, because they give off for a long time the fragrance of the plant.

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Color Cassia Cinnamon

Cassia Cinnamon.

Description of Botanical Coloring Page: Cassia is one  of  the  ingredients  of  the  holy anointing  oil  (Exodus  30:  24),  and  not  the  same as cinnamon,  which  was  another  ingredient.  Some, however,  hold  that  cassia  was  obtained  from another  species  of  cinnamon,  and  that  the  barks of  both  Cinnamomum zeylanicum and C. cassia were  used  in  making  the  holy  oil.  It  is  more probable  that  the  revisers  are  right  when  they suggest  in  the  margin  that  the  plant  is  costus. This  is  obtained  from  an  Indian  composite  plant called  Aplotaxis lappa,  which  grows  on  the mountains  of  the  Cashmere  Valley,  where  the aromatic  root  is  largely  dug  up  in  the  autumn, and  is  exported  to  China  to  be  used  as  an  ingredient in  the  incense  in  the  temples.  It  is specified  as  one  of  the  articles  of  Syrian  commerce (Ezekiel 27:19).  The  cassia  of Psalms 45: 8  is  the translation  of  another  Hebrew  word,  but  most probably  it  refers  to  the  same  plant. 

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Color Branches from The Chestnut Tree

Separate staminal flower with one petal, and below separate pistil with one petal.

Description of Botanical Coloring Page: The chestnut tree in the R. V. this is translated plane-tree, and there is little doubt that the Oriental plane is the tree meant. It is tall and majestic tree, growing near water in Palestine. From the globular form of the flowers and fruits it is often called button-tree.

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