ONCE UPON A TIME.....
As a little girl most of the childhood stories began with "Once upon a time". Usually the story ended with "And they lived happily ever after". I had my favorites and I would read them over and over again. Some were scary and some were adventurous but mostly I read the stories where the prince would find the princess in distress. They would fall in love and he would carry her away. How romantic! For a time in my young adult life I would read stories that were classified as ‘gothic’. They usually found the heroine being held in the mansion which was run by the austere landlord who turns out to be wonderfully misunderstood. They fall in love and of course lived happily ever after. At some point, I discovered that even though I couldn’t put a book down until I finished it, I often did not read and re-read it again. Perhaps that was when I fell in love with God’s word, because that was when everything changed for me.

In the 4th or 5th grade I discovered a little book called "The Boxcar Children". I would check it out of the library and I must have read it many, many times. Then I grew up! Through the years I would look for this book so I could read it to my children but decided it was out of print. About six years ago for my birthday, Jennifer gave me four little books. Book #1 was "The Boxcar Children" and the other three were more adventures of The Boxcar Children. I was so thrilled and surprised! In my 60's, I read the book, The Boxcar Children again.

Today, I find it difficult reading fiction and somewhat difficult reading Christian fiction. I love reading true short stories that reveal God. Throughout my adult life I have found that being in God’s word and teaching God’s word has the same affect on my soul as food is nourishment to my body. With God’s word I find myself going back to the same passages and reading it again and again and each time I do I am refreshed and excited because it is always as though I just read it for the first time. Something new jumps out at me and I continue to learn..

A few years ago I discovered the key to the scriptures. I had memorized this verse as a child and probably it is the most memorized verse in all of Christendom, outside of John 3:16. Genesis 1:1; "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth". If you only read the first four words it gives a whole different perspective to this verse. "In the beginning God!"

These first four words are the key! We must first believe and have faith that God is! If we do not truly believe that God is, there is no way we can believe God’s word. When we read Psalms 19:1 where it says; "The heavens are telling the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims His handiwork" and do not believe that God is, we fall into the hands of the evolutionist. When we read Hebrews 11:3; "By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear" and do not believe God is, these words are worthless and we begin to believe in the ‘big bang theory’. Psalms 14:1 says; "The fool says in his heart, there is no God"! The truth is that you decide, "there is no God". You are not born that way regardless of what the Atheist says.

John 1:1 says; "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God". He was with God in the beginning! In verse 14 it continues with; "The Word became flesh and lived for a while among us". In our minute minds it is hard to comprehend, Jesus has always been alive and is Himself God. In fact Jesus created everything - nothing exists that He didn’t make. Even eternal life is in Him! God has made it possible for us to know Him. Through His creation, His Word and His Son. To know God is to love Him! If you want to live happily ever after, you must believe that God is and not just once upon a time.
By Jane Ann Crenshaw 5/9/08