The Cookie Thief 

A woman was waiting at an airport one night for several long hours before her flight. She hunted for a book in the airport shop, bought a bag of cookies, and found a place to drop. She was engrossed in her book but happened to see that the man beside her, as bold as could be, grabbed a cookie or two from the bag between, which she tried to ignore, to avoid a scene. She read, munched cookies, and watched the clock, as the gutsy “cookie thief” diminished her stock. She was getting more irritated as the minutes ticked by, thinking, “If I wasn’t so nice, I’d blacken his eye!” With each cookie she took, he took one too. When only one was left, she wondered what he’d do. With a smile on his face and a nervous laugh, he took the last cookie and broke it in half. He offered her half as he ate the other. She snatched it from him and thought, “Oh brother— This guy has some nerve, and he’s also rude. Why, he didn’t even show any gratitude!” She had never known when she had been so galled, and sighed with relief when her flight was called. She gathered her belongings and headed for the gate, refusing to look back at the “thieving ingrate.” She boarded the plane and sank in her seat, then sought her book, which was almost complete. As she reached in her baggage, she gasped with surprise. There was her bag of cookies in front of her eyes! “If mine are here,” she moaned with despair, “then the others were his, and he tried to share!” Too late to apologize, she realized with grief, that she was the rude one, the ingrate, the thief. (Author unknown.) 

 That story reminds me that sometimes in life you just have to laugh at yourself and not take yourself too seriously. Being carefree is no easy thing. There is a lot that bogs us down with the cares of the day. This is what I love about God’s Word. It can be so deep while, at the same time, so practical. “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!” But is that practical? Paul continues, “. . . Do not be anxious about anything.” I kind of like the way the King James Version expresses it: “Be careful for nothing.” That is actually a way of expressing the negative side of “rejoicing.” Paul says that the way in which we can rejoice is to be “full of care about nothing” (don’t become filled with anxiety). Jesus was getting at the same thought when He taught: 

 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?” (Matthew 6:25).
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Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

Rev. Dr. Brent L Parrish