ANGER

Do you think it possible to have perfect happiness here on earth? Yes.... Where? In the movies? That isn't perfect because it has an end. The answer is no. You cannot have perfect happiness here on earth. This is a vale of tears. "We have not here a lasting dwelling place." Captain Crabby is next in line. He is the one in Satan's crew who stands for anger. You all know what anger is. It means grumbling and losing your temper and the like.

I have in my hand a small rose. Can you all see it? I am going to tell you a story about its grandfather. Grandfather Rose was a King Edward Tea Rose, and a real beauty he was too. But when he was very young, just a little shoot, he was dropped into the ground. He didn't like it one bit. He kept shouting, "Let me out. I'm being buried alive. Help me." But no one came to help him. Instead they came and poured water over him. "Woe is me!" he cried, "Will trouble never cease? Now they are trying to drown me." Still no one came to help him and he was left underground to grumble all by himself. Autumn came and the leaves fell to earth, "Go away. Do you want to smother me?" said Grandfather Rose. Then came the winter and the snow and ice. Said Grandfather Rose, "Ah, me! I'll never get out of this dungeon alive. What have I done to deserve this?" The spring came and the snow melted. The melted snow began to seep into the ground and the Grandfather Rose had to drink it. "Now they are poisoning me. What a life." Soon after that the skin on the stem began to break open. "Now look what they've done. I'm dead for sure this time." He began to grow up and up until his head was above the ground. "You get me out of here," he said to the gardener. But the gardener came along with a pair of scissors and cut off one or two leaves. I won't tell, you what Grandfather Rose said that time. But he kept growing and growing until last year he won a prize in a flower show.

Now tell me the lesson hidden in that parable. Don't grumble. Yes. You are all little roses planted in the soil of this life, destined to climb up through the mud to heaven. The pains of this life are the price we pay for the joy of the next. So when you are told to go to bed early don't be a surly old plant and murmur, "They're trying to make a sissy out of me," or when you are told to do your homework, don't say, "They take all the fun out of life." You are being trained just as Grandfather Rose Was. You can suggest your own little task for this week. Do your homework. That is a good idea. And remember that the rose which gets the most care wins the prize at the flower show. So there is not much sense in being Captain Crabby around the house. How much nicer to be the opposite to him. Who is the opposite to Captain Crabby, do you remember? He is the one you are to be like around the house. His name is Captain Cheerful.

                                                                                                  - Heavenwords, Imprimatur 1941 -

 "If  anyone thinks himself to be religious, not restraining his tongue but deceiving his own heart, that man's religion is vain."

Snappo was a snapping turtle who lived in a muddy pond. Baldy was an eagle who came down to the pond to catch fish. Snappo was sitting in the mud one day when his friend Baldy came down for lunch. He would not eat Snappo because his shell was too hard. Snappo said to Baldy, "Aren't you the lucky one to be able to fly wherever you wish! I have to stay here stuck in the mud. What is it like above the clouds?" Baldy felt sorry for his poor
friend Snappo and said, "If you really want to see what it is like above the clouds, I can take you up there. But on one condition. You must not say a word for the whole trip."

"I'll do anything you say," said Snappo, "because I want to see what it is like above the clouds."

Baldy went off and flew back with a branch from a tree from which he had plucked off all the leaves with his claws. He told Snappo, "You snap onto this with your strong jaws and I will hold the other end with my strong claws and carry you above the clouds." Snap went Snappo. Grab went Baldy. And off they went flying high in the air. It was wonderful. Snappo could look down on the pond with all the mud in it and all the other turtles watching him from the mud. Then he said, "What dopes they are, to stay in the mud." As soon as he opened his mouth to say this, he lost his grip on the stick and began to fall. Baldy was flying along with a stick with no turtle on the end of it. Snappo landed with a plop right in the middle of the mud. When he got his breath back, he looked up to where Baldy was flying and said, "I'd still be up there if I had kept my mouth shut."

St. James in this morning's Epistle gives us a warning. "If anyone thinking himself to be religious, not restraining his tongue but deceiving his own heart, that man's religion is vain."
The tongue can be the source of great evil. That is why God has placed two gates in front of it. A red gate and a white one. The lips and the teeth. Both of these gates have to be opened before the tongue can speak.

Think twice, then, before you open these gates and let any word of yours harm someone's good name. Think twice before you open the gates and let the tongue tell a falsehood. Think twice before you open the gates and let the tongue take the sacred Name of Jesus in vain. Why fall into the mud from above the clouds as Snappo did and have to say, as he did, "I'd still be up there if I had kept my mouth shut"?
                                                          - "Heirs to the Kingdom," Imprimatur 1949 -