It's Always Darkest Before the Fridge Door Opens: Enjoying the Fruits of Middle Age Read Online Free PDF

not, it’s true. God’s grace is amazing. And it’s for each one of us, no matter how small and insignificant our own sins look in our eyes. According to the Law, we’re all worthy of a stoning. God offers us what we don’t deserve: mercy and grace.
    The weak can never forgive.
Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
    It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows achievement and who at the worst if he fails at least fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.
Theodore Roosevelt
    1 And taken the rest of your body with you.
    2 At least, those who weren’t sitting near the speakers and still had their hearing.

Enemies:
What Would We Do Without Them?
    We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us.
Martin Luther King Jr.
    Do you have any enemies? People who are like food allergies, and every time you get close to them you break out in hives? People you can’t really tar and feather but sometimes find yourself wondering what they would look like stuck in the gooey mess? We’re not talking about the occasional rude clerk who won’t bag your groceries or that driver who cut you off on the freeway this morning while talking on her cell phone and curling her hair. We’re talking about a real enemy. Someone who seems to celebrate when something goes wrong in your life. People who would like nothing more than to see you fail, because it makes them feel better about themselves or their own shortcomings.
    If it’s any consolation, most people who have ever tried to do any good in life will have had an enemy. Some, like many of the prophets in the Bible, end up having a whole army of them. Sometimes, as was the case with brothers Cain and Abel, the enemy is a family member. Cain was jealous that God had been pleased with his brother’s sacrifice and not with his. He could have examined the reasons God was displeased with him and repented, but instead he decided to kill his brother.
    By the time Joseph came along some years later, jealousy still had not gone out of style. Joseph’s brothers were envious because Joseph was Daddy’s favorite, so they plotted to kill him but then decided to make a little cash instead by selling him into slavery. King Saul was jealous of David, choosing animosity over friendship, even though David tried his hardest to be friends. David’s own son Absalom staged a mutiny against his father with tragic results. And the list goes on. Throughout the Bible, there are plenty of accounts of good people who, sometimes for no apparent reason at all, other than the fact that they were doing good and making a difference, had to deal with enemies.
    But instead of letting an enemy get the best of you, save ‘‘the best of you’’ for those who appreciate it, and give an enemy what he or she clearly doesn’t deserve but has a shortage of in his or her life—God’s love and grace.
    Love is the only force capable of
transforming an enemy into a friend.
Martin Luther King Jr.

‘‘Blessing’’ Those Who Curse You
    The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation
but not the power of speech.
George Bernard Shaw
    It was Jesus who told us to ‘‘bless those who curse you.’’ On the surface, it seems impossible. But you can do it. The key is to be just a little creative. Remember the czar’s blessing that was given in Fiddler on the Roof ? ‘‘God