O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America! God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

(from America, the Beautiful by Katharine Lee Bates)

For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.

(John 1:16 -- ESV)

We love him, because he first loved us.

(1 John 4:19 -- KJV)

“Even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning.”

(Joel 2:12 -- NIV)

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, ²⁵ not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

(Hebrews 10:24-25 -- ESV)

Praise the Lord, my soul,
    and forget not all his benefits—
³ who forgives all your sins
    and heals all your diseases,
⁴ who redeems your life from the pit
    and crowns you with love and compassion,
⁵ who satisfies your desires with good things
    so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

(Psalm 103:1-5 -- NIV)

 “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. ³³ Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. ³⁴ It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with their assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch.
³⁵ “Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. ³⁶ If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. ³⁷ What I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!’”

(Mark 13:32-37 -- NIV)

"Oh, Lord, didn’t you deliver Daniel from the lion's den,

Also delivered Jonah from the belly of the whale and then

Three Hebrew children from the fiery furnace,

So the good book do declare?

Now, Lord, if you can't help me,

For goodness sake don't you help that bear!"

 

(Refrain from “The Preacher and the Bear” by Joe Arzonia)

 

 

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.
(Hebrews 4:15 -- ESV)





Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted. 
(Isaiah 53:4 -- ESV)

www.StevertS.com

Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
² In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you.  I go to prepare a place for you.
³ And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.

(John 14:1-3 -- KJV)

And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: ¹³ I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. ¹⁴ Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, ¹⁵ I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind.  Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. ¹⁶ Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”
¹⁷ So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”

(Genesis 9:12-17 -- NIV)

Photo:  https://www.istockphoto.com/photo/double-rainbow-gm535511370-94977029

Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said,

“Never will I leave you;  never will I forsake you.”

⁶ So we say with confidence, “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid.  What can mere mortals do to me?”

 

(Hebrews 13:5-6 -- NIV)

 

 

A voice says, “Cry out.”
    And I said, “What shall I cry?”

“All people are like grass,
    and all their faithfulness is like the flowers of the field.
⁷ The grass withers and the flowers fall,
    because the breath of the Lord blows on them.
    Surely the people are grass.
⁸ The grass withers and the flowers fall,
    but the word of our God endures forever.”
 

(Isaiah 40:6-8 -- NIV)

 

Happy trails to you, until we meet again.
Happy trails to you, keep smilin' until then.
Who cares about the clouds when we're together?
Just sing a song and bring the sunny weather.
Happy trails to you, 'till we meet again.

Some trails are happy ones,
Others are blue.
It's the way you ride the trail that counts,
Here's a happy one for you.

Happy trails to you, until we meet again.
Happy trails to you, keep smilin' until then.
Who cares about the clouds when we're together?
Just sing a song and bring the sunny weather.

Happy trails to you, 'till we meet again.

(by Dale Evans Rogers)

The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness.  Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
(2 Peter 3:9 -- NIV)

Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.
(Colossians 3:2 -- NIV)

But our citizenship is in heaven, and we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ,
(Philippians 3:20 -- NIV)

I have seen everything that is done under the sun,
and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.

(Ecclesiastes 1:14 -- ESV)

New CAREtoons & CAREpixx collection (1201-1300) video on YouTube . . .
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For more videos, see . . .
(1-100) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H_iO...
(101-200) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgUBc...
(201-300) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCp6B...
(301-400) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnRTO...
(401-500) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NBhv...
(501-600) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jyoi7...
(601-700) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHm77...
(701-800) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95zix...
(801-900) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXdA3...
(901-1000) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dInLG...
(1001-1100) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gALOiicJg0o
(1101-1200) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZSdU...

(Christmas) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEhQm...
(Easter) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTaiB...
(Jesus is Here) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gJYvnQnIhA

 

Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, ²³ but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles,
(1 Corinthians 1:22-23 -- NIV)

Go to the ant, you sluggard;
consider its ways and be wise!  ⁷ It has no commander, 
no overseer
or ruler, ⁸ yet it stores its provisions in summer and gathers its food at harvest.

(Proverbs 6:6-8 -- NIV)

For they eat the bread of wickedness
    and drink the wine of violence.
¹⁸ But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn,
    which shines brighter and brighter until full day.
¹⁹ The way of the wicked is like deep darkness;
    they do not know over what they stumble.

(Proverbs 4:17-19 -- ESV)

The child grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham held a great feast. ⁹ But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking, ¹⁰ and she said to Abraham, “Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac.”
¹¹ The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son. ¹² But God said to him, “Do not be so distressed about the boy and your slave woman.  Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned. ¹³ I will make the son of the slave into a nation also, because he is your offspring.”
¹⁴ Early the next morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar.  He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy.  She went on her way and wandered in the Desert of Beersheba.
(Genesis 21:8-14 -- NIV)

By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

(Hebrews 11:3 -- NIV)

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

(John 3:16 -- NIV)

Stuck in the middle of the road with the yellow lines and dead skunks? 

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— ²² the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.  For there is no distinction: ²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴ and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, ²⁵ whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.  This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. ²⁶ It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

(Romans3:21-26 -- ESV)

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. 
(Romans 12:2a – NIV)

So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking.   (Ephesians 4:17 – NIV)

Unfaithful creatures!  Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?  Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.  

(James 4:4 – RSV)

Do not love the world or anything in the world.  If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. 

(1 John 2:15 – NIV)

“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. ²⁵ The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. ²⁶ But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. ²⁷ The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”
(Matthew 7:24-27 -- NIV)

As [the movie] “42” opens, we see Jackie Robinson sitting in the office of Brooklyn Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey as he hears the incredible news that Rickey wants him to play for the Dodgers.  Then Rickey acts out the vicious varieties of bigotry Jackie will face from white hotel managers, restaurant waiters, and fellow ballplayers — insults he will have to face with dignity.
How much more dramatic this scene would have been had “42” told the whole story.  Rickey knew that Robinson shared his Christian faith, and wanted to reinforce the spiritual dimensions of the battle both men were sure to face. Rickey pulled out a copy of a book by Giovanni Papini, “Life of Christ.”  He flipped to the passage in which Papini discusses the Sermon on the Mount.  There he referred to Jesus’ call to “turn the other cheek” as “the most stupefying of [Jesus’] revolutionary teachings.”
(Eric Metaxas)

Photo:  http://www.istockphoto.com/photo/baseball-on-carpet-gm693681374-128118585