STORY: Training By Example by Bert Balling

Story title: Training By Example
By: Bert Balling

      Albert Schweitzer is known all over the world as a theologian, a philosopher, a medical doctor, and a musician; but most of all, as a dedicated missionary who spent more than 50 years nursing lepers in the jungles of Lambarene  in West Africa.
     Once when he was on home leave back in Europe, some of his relatives asked him for some advice

STORY: Solving Troubles by H. Middle Swarth

Story title: Solving Troubles
By: H. Middle Swarth

   A barefoot boy of four was walking along the street eating an ice cream cone. Suddenly some bigger boys rushed around a corner and knocked the boy and his ice cream to the ground. The boy sat there glaring at the tragedy before him. Just then an old lady, who had seen it all happen, walked over to the child and said, "Laddie, the very worst thing has happened to you. But stand up, and I'll show

STORY: White Less Defined by Reader's Digest

Story title: White Less Defined
By: Reader's Digest


   Lillian Carter, the lively mother of President Jimmy Carter, had set up an interview with an aggressive woman reporter who made it clear with her very first question that she intended to take measure of this sharp tongued little woman and her upstart son.
    "Your son," the reporter began, "has been traveling the United States, telling people not to vote for

STORY: Playground Inspiration by Irene Sax in Newsday

Story title : Playground Inspiration 
By: Irene Sax

      Jane Nidetch was a 214 pound housewife. She was desperate to lose weight. After two steady months of dieting, she was still 50 pounds overweight. So she invited six overweight friends to her house to share her diet and talk about how to stay on it.
     Today, 28 years later, one million members attend 25,000 Weight Watchers' meeting in 24 countries every week.
     Mrs. Nidetch says she got her inspiration to help people take control of their lives, from a childhood

STORY: How God Hears All Prayers by Arthur Tonne

Story title: How God Hears All Prayers 
by Arthur Tonne


     "In the synagogue I heard different men praying men praying," said a puzzled little boy. " I must be awfully hard for God."
    "Why? What do you mean?" asked the rabbi gently.
    "Well, the woodcutter was praying for cold weather. The fruit seller was praying for mild weather.

STORY: The Grand Total Of It All by Willi Hoffsuemmer

Story title: The Grand Total Of It All 
By: Willi Hoffsuemmer

    They tell the story of an intelligent young king who ordered all the learned professor of his kingdom to gather and write down all the wisdom of the world. They got right down to work and forty years later, they had a thousand books packed with wisdom. The king, who had meantime reached sixty years of age, told them, "I cannot possibly read a thousand books. Reduce all that wisdom to basics."
    After ten more years the professors reduced the world's wisdom to a hundred volumes. "That's still

STORY: Happy Family Life by Willi Hoffsuemmer

Story title: Happy Family
by Willi Hoffsuemmer


     A poor woodcutter lived contentedly in a little house at the edge of the forest. He earned his daily bread by chopping down trees. But no matter how tired he was, he and his family always ended the day with laughing and singing.
     Every evening the king passed by this happy household as he was walking back to his castle. It

STORY: Identity Crisis by Carlos Valles

Story title: Identity Crisis
by: Carlos Valles

   They tell the story of a really "bushy" farm boy from way outback who had come into a big town for the first time in his life. He felt completely lost among the crowds that shoved him around the stores and supermarkets. The outdoor vegetable market was open even at night and so when our farm boy got sleepy, he found a hidden spot under one of the tables and laid himself down to sleep.

STORY: Albert Einstein's Old Clothes by Bert Balling

Story title: Albert Einstein's 
By: Bert Balling

   The genius of our century, Albert Einstein, had an innate dislike for new clothes. Not that he couldn't afford them or enjoy the new styles. No; it was just that he felt more comfortable in old clothes. And how he hated shopping for clothes: comparing them, trying them on, being measured for them.
    But his wife kept pestering him to get rid of his threadbare suit and go out and buy a new one. So

Christmas Story by James A. Feehan

Story title: Christmas Story
By: James A. Feehan

    One Christmas morning, a very upset mother came to a pastor and told him that her little boy of six was missing. Before doing anything, he listened to her story.
    The child had been writing to Santa Claus for a wheelbarrow. And, of course, it duly arrived on Christmas morning along with the other gifts. He disappeared with the wheelbarrow while his mother

Story: Rash Judgement by Willian Barclay

Story title: Rash Judgement
By: William Barclay


     One day, we boys were flying kites on an open lot in town. Mine took a dive into a garden surrounded by a high fence. I had heard all kinds of weird stories about the wicked old man who lived in the big house behind the fence. They said that if he caught children in his garden, he would torture them and lock them in a cave.
    Despite it all, I decided to go over that fence and get my kite. So my friends helped me to climb

STORY: Sharing And Sharing Alike by Willi Hoffsuemmer

Story title: Sharing And Sharing
By: Willi Hoffsuemmer

    We were playing cowboys and Indians. At supper time Joe's mother let him bring his place of rice out to tent, so he could eat as Indians do. So he crawled under his tent made out of a blanket and the four of us sat there watching him eat.  We would't be getting anything for another two hours.
    After downing his second spoonful, Joe suddenly remarked that real Red Indians did not only

STORY : Criticizing The Lord from Reader's Digest

Story title: Criticizing The Lord
from Reader's Digest


Mother Teresa of India often gives people unexpected advice. When a group of American teachers visited her in Calcutta, they asked her for some practical points to take home to their families.
   "Smile at your wives,"she told them. "Smile at your husband."
    Thinking perhaps that the advice was a bit too simplistic, coming from an unmarried person, one of them asked, " Are you married?"

STORY : The Lesson Of The Bicycle Wheel by Bert Balling

Story title: The Lesson Of The Bicycle
By: Bert Balling


    The abbot of a large monastery was asked by some visitors how so many monks of such different origins and different talents and personalities could live and work so harmoniously under one roof.
    He thought it over for a moment and then explained, "we are like a bicycle wheel. It has a rim, spokes and a hub in the middle. The rim is like the monastic wall around us. But that only keeps us together externally. Now from the rim a whole series of spokes together. We members of the

STORY: For A Favor, Ask Busy People by Peter Spangenberg

Story title: For A Favor, Ask Busy People 
By: Peter Spangenberg

    There was once a little flower standing alone in the desert. It was surrounded on all sides but sand and stones. The little flower dreamt daily of feeling some raindrops. She had been told how refreshing and important rain is. But none ever came. And so the little flower began to wilt. It was deathly afraid of the sizzling heat, of the loneliness, and of the howling wind.

STORY: Preachers' Problems by Gems of Thought

Story title: Preachers' Problems
by Gems of Thought


    A famous clergyman was preaching one Sunday in the summertime and noticed that many of his audience were drowsing. Suddenly he paused, and then in a very loud voice, related an incident that had no connection whatever with his sermon.
   It went like this:" I was once riding along a country road and came to the house of a farmer. I stopped for a bit when I saw something stranger that I had ever seen in my life. There was a sow

What Is A Real Christian by Bruno Horst Bull

Story title: What is A Real Christian
by: Bruno Horst Bull

    The new pastor chose as the topic for his first sermon:"What is a real Christian?" He climaxed each point of the sermon with the same question. And sometimes he nailed it down by slamming his fist onto the pulpit. He kept asking the question without answering it, hoping that each of the  parishioners would do that personally.
    On that particular Sunday, there was a little boy attending church with his mother, and the more often he heard that unanswered question, the more unsettled and nervous he became about it. At one

STORY: Johnny, The Walker by George Will

Story title: Johnny, The Walker
by: George Will

  Let us consider the virtues of walking. It is wine of life, good for body and soul, as many well-known people agree.
    Samuel Johnson walked 52 kilometers of muddy road out of Birmingham, England, every day. The philosopher Immanuel Kant walked so regularly through town that the shopkeepers set their clocks by

STORY: Marriage Problems Solved by B.A.Botkin

Story title: Marriage Problems Solved
by: B.A.Botkin


I have a neighbor in Kentucky who is 99 and still going strong. Some year ago, when he was a young man of 92, he was vigorous physically and mentally, did a full day's work, and walked as straight as a Red Indian. So I asked him, "What makes you so healthy and strong?"
    "Well, " my old friend answered, "before my wife and I were married, we entered into an agreement. Anytime I got angry with her or scolded her, she would take up here knitting, go out to the

STORY: How To Make A Job Easy by Corinne Updegraff Wells

Story title: How To Make A Job Easy
by: Corinne Updegraff Wells


When I was small, my brothers and I were expected to keep the vegetable garden weeded. Of course, we hated the job and we would put it off as long as possible and usually we ended up using a precious Saturday catching up on our work.
    One day a visiting uncle rambled into the garden and saw us there scowling at our work. He stopped and asked, "Do you boys know why you're pulling those weeds? It's because they are

STORY: A Home Is Where

Story title: A Home Is Where

    A real estate agent met a very modern woman, who had grown up in a big city. He tried to interest her in buying a new home.
    "A home!" she snapped."Why do I need a home? I was born in a hospital, grew up in boarding schools, was educated in a college, did my company keeping in automobiles, and was married in a church.

STORY: Learning To Fall by Rev Wm Phifer

Story title: Learning To Fall
by : Rev Wm Phifer


     What we today call the youth culture is really not new. Through the ages, young people have made significant contributions. Consider the accomplishments of these"kids":
    Alfred Tennyson wrote his first classic at 18.
    Napoleon had conquered Italy when he was 25.

STORY: Sunday Collection by Douglas Woodruff

Story title: Sunday Collection
By: Douglas Woodruff

    They tell the story about two English coins: the red penny and the valuable half crown. As they were being manufactured in the Royal Mint, they got acquainted. They passed along the assembly lines near one another, and as they left, to be put into circulation in the country, they decided to keep in touch and tell the story of their adventures whenever they met.

STORY: One Day At A Time by Les Stanwood

Story title: One Day At A Time
By: Les Stanwood

      When 52 Americans were held hostage at the embassy in Teheran, Iran, Thomas Schaefer was the senior military officer of the group. Of a total of 444 day in captivity, he spent more than 100 in solitary confinement.

STORY: Yesterday, Today, Tommorow by Gems of Thought

Story title: Yesterday, Today, Tommorow
by Gems of Thoughts

Today is in the full bloom of life,

The petals of yesterday have shriveled into the past.

Tomorrow is an unopened but.

Today is a gorgeous blossom of beauty and fragrance.

It is yours-for today.

Today is a new page in the book of life.

It awaits your pen.

STORY: Blacks And Whites by Dr. Fredrik Schlotz

Story title: Blacks And Whites
By: Dr. Fredrik Schlotz

    Some years ago a missionary revisited a congregation in Tanzania. After the service, the pastor called upon the oldest member of the congregation to present the gift they had for the visitor. Barefoot and dressed in tattered clothes, the man carried in his crippled hands a baton carved from ebony wood and wrapped in an old newspaper. Ebony is normally very black, but there may be light spots where branches have grown out of the tree's trunk. The baton had a sizeable light spot at one end.

STORY A Long Letter From God by Bert Balling

Story title: A Long Letter From God  by Bert Balling     In the third century, a monk called Antony lived a lifetime all alone in the endless desert of Egypt. Despite his isolation, he kept up a lively correspondence with many of the prominent personalities of the day. Emperor Constantine would write to ask for his advice. Other hermits would write asking for his prayers.

STORY Fatherhood by Edgar Guest

Story title: Fatherhood 
by Edgar Guest

Someday the world will need a man

of courage in a time of doubt,

And somewhere as a little boy,

that future hero plays about.

Within some humble home, no doubt,

that instrument of greater things

No climbs upon his father's knee

of to his mother's garments clings.

And when shall do God's mission here

may be your little boy or mine.

STORY Why Burial Is Better After Death by Ken Wall

Story title:  Why Burial Is Better After Death
by: Ken Wall


    The Wilkinsons of Sussex, England, received what they thought was
a gift package of herbs from Austrilian relatives. So they stirred the
contents into a traditional Christmas cake, ate half of it, and put the
remainder in the refrigerator.

STORY: The Cheeky Student

Story title: The Cheeky Student

The college professor had given a long lecture. When it was over, the asked for questions. One student stood up and demanded documentary proof for every statement which the professor had made in the lecturer.

Story : The Problem Of Youth by William Barclay

Story title: The Problem Of Youth
By: William Barclay

    Someone has tried to compare the problems of young people to those of the flying fox or fruit bat.
    When the world was created, the flying fox found no other creature quite like himself. He wanted some companionship and so he made his home with some birds.
    This was all right for a time, but one day one of the birds said to him, "Why do you live with us? We are birds, but you don't seem to be one of us even though you can fly. You look very much like a mouse. Don't you think you'd be happier living with the mice.?"

Story : Misjudging Wrongs by Arthur Tonne

Story title: Misjudging Wrongs
By: Arthur Tonne

    A man who had lost his hat decided that the simplest way to replace it was to go to church and steal one from the entry.
   once inside, he heard a sermon about the ten commandments. Coming out, he was greeted by the minister and said to him, "I want you to know, sir, that you saved me from crime today. I came here with

Story: How To Win In Court by Jacob Braude

Story title: How To Win In Court
by: Jacob Braude

    There is an old Jewish story which goes like this. A certain man had three friends. He liked two of them; but had little use for the third. One day he was ordered to appear in court. Alarmed, he looked around for someone to defend him. He immediately thought of his two favorite friends. One said, " No way! I'am not going into any court."The second said, "I'll go as far as the king's gate, but no farther, " In despair the man then asked his least loved friend for help. He said, "Sure, I'll come." And he did come, and he defended the man so well that he won his case.

Story: Good Example by Tony Castle

Story title: Good Example
By: Tony Castle

    A blind man visited his friends. It was dark when he left and so they gave him a lantern. "Thank you, "he said, "but I don't need one. Light or dark, it is all the same to me."

FREE STORY: Faith In People by William Barclay

     A boy was misbehaving in class and the teacher sent him to the principal's office. After hearing his story, the principal took out a blank notebook and wrote the boy's name on the cover. While he was writing, he said to the lad, "You have not been sent to me before. Now, I don't know you; you might be a

STORY: God In Nature by Alexis Carrell

    Just take a look at a little honeybee. He organizes his own little city. He builds 10, 000 cells for storing honey, 12,000 cells for eggs. and a holy of holies for the queen bee.
    If the bee notices the temperature rising, it worries about the honey melting. So it sets up a cooling

Story : Truth Can Be Tested by Tony Castle

    A Chemist at Queensland University in Australia pours certain quantities of various acids or compounds or elements into a laboratory test tube and then he heats the mixture. He gets a certain result. He then writes down a very accurate report of exactly what he did and how he did it. This is published in a scientific journal in London.

Story : The Many Hands In Government by Bruno Hagspiel

    Emperor Frederick the Great of Germany had a hard time balancing his country's budget. He invited a group of financial experts to a banquet to discuss the situation. He said he could not understand why even with very high taxes, not enough money was coming into the government treasury.

Story : You Are A Road by William Barclay

    In Malaya during the Second World War, a sympathetic farmer was helping an escaping prisoner of war to make his way to the coast, and from there to freedom. The two were stumbling through a virtually impenetrable jungle. There was no sign of human life and not even the slightest trace of a path.

Story Of A Laugh At Hell by Tony Castle

    It was in the center of Africa and the pastor had just delivered himself of a fire and brimstone sermon on hell. In order a visual dimension to his words, he dug a poster card picture out of his collection and hung it on the church bulletin board. It was an ultra realistic painting of the pains of hell by that famous French Bible illustrator called Dore.