Your reputation is what people think of you; your character is what God knows you to be, the mental and moral qualities that are distinctive to an individual. Someone once said that you can easily judge the character of a person by how he or she treats those who can do nothing in return--how he treats those who are not in a position to retaliate or reciprocate.

"Pastors need prayer, too," contends Will Bruce in an article by the same title. The following is what he wrote, which I consider so important that, with his permission, I'll share it with you.

            "We expect our pastors to take prayer interest in our problems and needs.  Rightly so.... But who prays for his needs?  He is human too and he needs our prayer.... A delegation of American pastors asked Charles Spurgeon the secret for his success.  In response, Spurgeon led them to the lower level of his meeting house and quietly opened the door.  The visitors saw over 400 people praying for God's blessing and power to rest upon their pastor, who would stand in the pulpit to preach the Word of God that night.  ‘There, gentlemen, is the secret for my success.’

There is a line from a song which goes, “If the Lord be willing, and the creek don’t rise.”  While it was neither an English major nor a theologian who wrote those lines, it does bring a powerful question into focus:  “To what extent does God will that the creek not rise?”  And there’s a second, “Why doesn’t God stop it when the creek turns into a river which turns into a flood?”

One of the differences which distinguish man from lower forms of life is that man, made in the image of God, worships a god who is greater than he.  Worship is a universal act of adoration no matter where men and women are, no matter what their culture or background.  The worship of the true God begins when sinful man encounters a holy, righteous God. 

A young man invested his life savings in a new Ferrari sports car, and having made the investment of his life, felt that he ought to have someone bless his car‑‑just to be on the safe side.  Unsure of whom to call, he phoned the local Catholic priest, who said, "Yes, it's a bit out of the ordinary but I do baptize things for people"; but then he added, "Oh, by the way, what's a Ferrari?"

Do you find yourself caught up in the rush of living until you scarcely can remember which day of the week this is?  You jump out of bed in the morning, gulp down a cup of coffee and hurry to work.  Then you rush home, eat dinner quickly so that you can get to an evening appointment.  And then you're off to bed so that you'll be able to get up in the morning, gulp down your coffee and hurry to work again.

Rejoicing in another’s good fortune never comes easy!  When your best friend marries the girl you dated, it’s hard to get excited.  When the employee whom you hired gets promoted, leap-frogging over you, you may wish him luck and be polite, but inwardly you’d probably like to put a dagger in his back.  Your neighbor wins the lottery—not you.  How do you handle other people’s good fortune?  Are you glad for them, or do you detest their good fortune, wishing it had happened to you?  There’s a part of human nature which remains the same, year after year, generation after generation.

What is it that can bring down empires, can literally shake down a craggy granite peak, yet has the power to heal a wound and change a life?  Described as the greatest power on earth by some, that force is TIME.  It was time that defeated Napoleon's forces at the gates of Russia's wealth.  It is the erosion allowed by time's forces that will eventually split the granite peak and bring it crashing to the floor of the valley.  It is time which allows healing of the human heart when the heart has been broken by loss and grief.  Time has been described as the most powerful force on earth, for it ultimately brings down the mightiest of men.  Some 200 years ago Benjamin Franklin wrote, "Dost thou love time?  Then use time wisely, for that's the stuff that life is made of."

An eighteen-year-old fathers a child and then walks away saying, “How do I know that I’m the only one who could have done this?”  A widow with a considerable bank account is overwhelmed with the personal interest shown to her by a man young enough to be her own son.  Following a romantic fling, she marries him.   Her family is quite certain that the man is more interested in her money than in her.  A father of three children, a great musician whose worship choruses are sung all over the world, walks out on his family, saying, “I don’t want to be married any more!”

When a reporter interviewed a prostitute on a late night TV show, he noticed that she was wearing a small cross on a gold chain around her neck.  “Are you a religious person?” he asked commenting on her cross.  Somewhat embarrassed, she quickly said, “Oh, not at all.  I got away from all of that.”  She then told how she had gone to Sunday school as a girl, but then as a teenager she strayed far from the teaching of the little church she once attended.