Small Ball

Photograph, “Jackie Robinson in his Brooklyn Dodgers uniform” Record Group 306. Still Pictures Identifier: 306-PS-50-7551. Rediscovery Identifier: 11261

Small Ball

Get ’em on

Get ’em over

Get ’em in

Jimmie Aaron Kepler
2012

Photo Source: United States Information Agency [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Prayers for the Chronically Ill: 60 Prayers – Kindle Edition – Free on Amazon

Prayers for the Chronically Ill: 60 Prayers – Kindle Edition 

The Kindle eBook “Prayers for the Chronically Ill: 60 Prayers” is available for free on Amazon. Click FREE BOOK to get your copy.  Please share with your friends that they can get a copy of the book at no cost. It is free through Sunday, September 29, 2019, 11:59 PM PDT.

Book Info: Prayers for the Chronically Ill

What do you do when the future you had planned for yourself, your child, or with your spouse is suddenly erased?

A person confronting a chronic illness may feel uncertain about the future. Their hopes and dreams may be placed on hold or have to be altered. They may feel hopeless and helpless.

Prayers for the Chronically Ill is a resource to help persons connect with the perfect love which casts out all fear, the love of Jesus Christ.

The follow-up book, “Caregiving: Biblical Insights From a Caregiver’s Journey” will be out in November 2019.

Click FREE BOOK to get your copy.  

As of this writing, Prayers for the Chronically Ill is  # 2 on the Amazon Best Sellers List in Physician & Patient Caregiving Category.

Free Kindle eBook

Prayers for the Chronically Ill: 60 Prayers – Kindle Edition 

The Kindle eBook “Prayers for the Chronically Ill: 60 Prayers” is available for free on Amazon. Click FREE BOOK to get your copy.  Please share with your friends that they can get a copy of the book at no cost. It is free through Sunday, September 29, 2019, 11:59 PM PDT.

Book Info: Prayers for the Chronically Ill

What do you do when the future you had planned for yourself, your child, or with your spouse is suddenly erased?

A person confronting a chronic illness may feel uncertain about the future. Their hopes and dreams may be placed on hold or have to be altered. They may feel hopeless and helpless.

Prayers for the Chronically Ill is a resource to help persons connect with the perfect love which casts out all fear, the love of Jesus Christ.

The follow-up book, “Caregiving: Biblical Insights From a Caregiver’s Journey” will be out in November 2019.

Click FREE BOOK to get your copy.  

How to Have a “Yes” Attitude

How to Have a “Yes” Attitude

The idea for this article comes from my notes from my Bible fellowship class from way back on December 1, 2001. John West, then Associate Pastor of Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas, was the teacher. John is retired. He lives in Greenville, South Carolina. He is also the former athletic director at both Furman University and the University of South Carolina. To John goes the credit for the idea for the article.

A “Yes” attitude is one of the most valuable assets a person can have in life. Your positive attitude will enable you to accomplish so much more with your life. Not only does the future look bright, when the attitude is right, but the present is much more enjoyable, too.

Having a “YES” attitude will make the difference.

It’s your attitude, not your aptitude that will determine your altitude.

When your attitude outdistances your abilities you find the impossible being achieved.

Basic Principles Regarding Your Attitude

  • Your attitude is your most import asset.
  • If you have a bad attitude, no one will want to follow you.
  • We are responsible for our own attitude.

Help people believe they are better than they are and they will be better. Here we are talking about helping them achieve their God-given potential.

How to Have a “YES” Attitude

1. Raise Your “Want To” Level.

Philippians 4:13 English Standard Version (ESV), “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”

Here you remember how bad you want to achieve your goals in Christ. Then do the preparation and work to achieve them.

2. Put Some Gratitude in Your Attitude

1 Thessalonians 5:18 (ESV), “give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

3. Think On The Good Things

Philippians 4:8-9 (ESV), “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.”

      • You are what you think.
      • To quote the late Zig Ziglar, “Get rid of your “stinking thinking!”

4. Do The Right Thing

Philippians 2:2-4 (ESV), “complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests but also to the interests of others.”

5. Be The Real Thing

Philippians 2:5-8 (ESV), “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

Genesis 1:27 (ESV), “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

      • God created you with special gifts and talents.
      • Be more Christlike!

Photo Source: Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Winter Nights

Poetry Reading

Here’s a photo of me reading my poem “Winter Nights” at Barnes & Nobles Kitchen in Legacy West, Plano, TX.

Here’s the poem:

Winter Nights

The frigid nights fall earlier
On these chilly winter days
And the moon-man mounts the sky
Veiled in Metropolis haze

The mornings all break later
So slow the new day’s dawn
The bitter blanket lingers
For the winter nights are long

Stars spangle the satin sky
As the moon-man dips down low
Twinkling winks from a million worlds
And here we are, do they know?

Oh I wish the night would never end
Yes, I wish the night would never end

February 2017
Jimmie Aaron Kepler


Thank you Storm Ricamore for reading and your suggestions on the poem.


Photo Source: Storm Ricamore picture of me speaking, the other photo Image by cocoparisienne from Pixabay

Never Too Late

Jeremiah 33:3. It reads, “Call upon Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know!” Has God placed in your heart the desire to share His truth through writing?

God has never called a person without providing him or her with the ability to complete the task or the place to exercise the call. Maybe, like me, you have a few years of life experience under your belt (code for getting up there in years).

It’s never too late to begin. Here are a few examples of older people who made a big impact or accomplished remarkable things (with a few years under their belts).

“The world stands aside,” said David Jordan, “to let anyone pass who knows where he is going.” Having a goal or dream applies to those, who learn where they are going late in life as well as for the young.

At age 40, James Michener published his first book. He authored more than 50 titles – 26 historical fiction novels, 31 nonfiction books, and 13 of his works were adapted into TV mini-series or made into movies.

At age 53, Margaret Thatcher became Britain’s first female prime minister.

At age 65, Winston Churchill became British prime minister for the first time and started the epic struggle against Hitler. Churchill received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953 at age 79 for his many published works, especially his six-volume set The Second World War. He wrote the six-volume set when he was in his 70s without any assistance or ghostwriters. The photo is of Sir Winston Churchill.

At age 69, Ronald Reagan was elected President of the United States. He served two terms. He was 77 years old when he completed his second term in office.

At age 70, 80 and again at 90, former President of the USA George H.W. Bush parachuted out of an airplane.

At age 72, Golda Meir became prime minister of Israel.

At age 75, Ed Delano of California bicycled 3100 miles in 33 days to attend his 50th college reunion in Worcester, Massachusetts.

At age 80, Grandma Moses, who had started painting in her late 70s, had her first one-woman exhibit.

At age 80, Winston Churchill returned to the House of Commons as a member of parliament and also exhibited 62 of his paintings.

At age 81, Benjamin Franklin skillfully mediated between disagreeing factions at the U. S. Constitutional Convention.

At age 90, Sarah had a son named Issac. God found Sarah and her husband Abraham useful to His cause. See Genesis 17:17 KJV, “Then Abraham fell upon his face, and laughed, and said in his heart, Shall a child be born unto him that is a hundred years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear?” God promised Abraham and Sarah that they would have a son, and Isaac was born.

At age 96, George C. Selbach scored a 110-yard hole-in-one at Indian River, Michigan.

On his 100th birthday, ragtime pianist Eubie Blake exclaimed, “If I’d known I was going to live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself.”

How about you? Have you slowed down, packed it in, given up, and checked out? If I know the Heavenly Father, I know that He has something wonderful still in store for you! It’s never too late. Why don’t you call God up and ask Him what that might be? His number is found in The Bible in Jeremiah 33:3. It reads, “Call upon Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know!”

Encourage your friends, keep reading and writing.
Jimmie A. Keple
r

Picture Source:
Churchill V sign HU 55521.jpg This artistic work created by the United Kingdom Government is in the public domain. This is because it is one of the following: 1) It is a photograph created by the United Kingdom Government and taken prior to 1 June 1957; or 2) It was commercially published prior to 1961, or 3) It is an artistic work other than a photograph or engraving (e.g. a painting) which was created by the United Kingdom Government prior to 1961.

Urban Pigeons

Urban Pigeons

White clouds
Fill the Columbia blue sky,
Like hundreds of cotton balls.
The brilliance
Of the summer sun,
Reflected even brighter
Off of the clouds.
The clouds remain
Suspended in the sky
With little movement.
A flock of pigeons,
Land on an adjacent building.
They stand on the edge
Of the ten-story structure,
Peering downward
Looking
For some crumb or morsel of food.
They also eye the sky
And the roof,
Of a neighboring building.
The birds are watchful
As a red hawk
Is perched waiting,
Waiting,
Waiting
For one of the pigeons
To let its guard down
And become his next meal.
The sounds of cars,
Trucks
And an occasional motorcycle
Fill the air
As they travel
From their point of origin
To their destination
Using the freeway
That passes
Through the building’s shadow.
A panhandler
On a nearby corner
Looks up at the sky
Shielding her eyes
From the bright sun.
She looks to see
What the airborne commotion is about.
The sun temporarily blinds her
With its brilliance
And then she sees
Dozens of feathers
Slowly descending to the ground.

August 2009

Photo Source: Image by Wolfgang Claussen from Pixabay

Kepler, Jimmie A. “Urban Pigeons,” vox poetica, August 26, 2012, Retrieved August 27, 2012, from http://voxpoetica.com/words_to_linger_on.html and August 29, 2012, Retrieved from http://poemblog.voxpoetica.com/2012/08/29/urban-pigeons.aspx.