Fw: Get a tissue for this one!

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>

> Get a tissue for this one!

>

>

>>

>>

>> In September 1960, I woke up one

>> morningwithsix hungry babies and just 75 cents in my pocket.

>> Their father was gone.

>>

>> The boys ranged from three months to seven years; their sister was two.

>>

>> Their

>> Dad had never been much more than a presence they feared.

>>

>> Whenever they

>> heard his tires crunch on the gravel driveway theywould scramble to hide

>> under their beds.

>>

>> He did

>> manage to leave $15 a week to buy groceries.

>>

>> Now that he had decided to

>> leave, there would be no more beatings, but no food either.

>>

>> If there was

>> a welfare system in effect in southern Indiana at that time, I certainly

>> knew nothing

>> about it.

>>

>> I scrubbed the kids until they looked brand new and then put

>> on my best homemade dress, loaded them into the rusty old 51 Chevy and

>> drove off

>> to find a job.

>>

>> The seven of us went to every factory,

>> storeand restaurant in our small town.

>>

>> No

>> luck.

>>

>> The kids stayed crammed into the

>> car and tried to be quiet while I tried to convince who ever would listen

>> that I

>> was willing to learn or do anything. I had to have a job.

>>

>> Still no luck. The last place we went to, just a few miles

>> out of town, was an old Root Beer Barrel drive-in that had been converted

>> to a

>> truck stop.

>>

>> It was called the Big Wheel.

>>

>> An old lady named

>> Granny owned the place and she peeked out ofthe

>> window from time to time at all those kids.

>>

>> She needed someone on the

>> graveyard shift, 11 at night until seven in the morning.

>>

>> She paid 65

>> cents an hour, and I could start that night.

>>

>> I raced home and called the

>> teenager down the street that baby-sat for people.

>>

>> I bargained with her

>> to come and sleep on my sofa for a dollar a night.

>>

>> She could arrive with

>> her pyjamas on and the kids would already be asleep.

>>

>> This seemed like a

>> good arrangement to her, so we made a deal.

>>

>> That night when the little

>> ones and I knelt tosay our prayers, we all thanked God for finding Mommy

>> a job. And so I started at the Big Wheel.

>>

>> When I got home in the mornings I woke the baby-sitter up and

>> senther home with one dollar of my tip money-- fully half of

>> what I averaged every night.

>>

>> As the weeks went by, heating bills added a

>> strain to my meagre wage.

>>

>> The tires on the old Chevy had the consistency

>> of penny balloons and began to leak. I had to fill them with air on the

>> way to

>> work and again every morning before I could go home.

>>

>> One bleak fall

>> morning, I dragged myself to the car to go home and found four tires in

>> the back

>> seat. New tires!

>>

>> There was no note, no nothing, just those beautiful

>> brand new tires.

>>

>> Had angels taken up residence in Indiana ? I

>> wondered.

>>

>> I made a deal with the local service station.

>>

>> In

>> exchange for his mounting the new tires, I would clean up his office.

>>

>> I

>> remember it took me a lot longer to scrub his floor than it did

>> forhim to do the tires.

>>

>>

>> I was now working six nights

>> instead of five and it still wasn't enough.

>>

>> Christmas was coming and I

>> knew there would be no money for toys for the kids.

>>

>> I found a can of red

>> paint and started repairing and painting someold toys. Then I hid them in

>> the basement so there

>> would be something for Santa to deliver on Christmas morning.

>>

>> Clothes

>> were a worry, too. I was sewing patches on top of patches on the boys

>> pants and

>> soon they would be too far gone to repair.

>>

>>

>> On Christmas Eve the usual

>> customers were drinking coffee in the Big Wheel. There were the truckers,

>> Les,

>> , and Jim, and a state trooper named Joe.

>>

>> A few musicians were

>> hanging around after a gig at the Legion andwere dropping nickels in the

>> pinball

>> machine.

>>

>> The regulars all just sat around

>> and talked through the wee hours of the morning and then left to get home

>> before

>> the sun came up.

>>

>> When it was time for me to go home at seven o'clock on

>> Christmas morning, to my amazement, my old battered Chevy was filled full

>> to the

>> top with boxes of all shapes and sizes.

>>

>>

>> I quickly opened the driver's

>> side door, crawled inside and kneeled in the front facing the back

>> seat.

>>

>> Reaching back, I pulled off the lid of the top box.

>>

>> Inside

>> was whole case of little blue jeans, sizes 2-10!

>>

>> I looked inside another

>> box: It was full of shirts to go with the jeans.

>>

>> Then I peeked inside

>> some of the other boxes. There was candy and nuts and bananas and bags of

>> groceries. There was an enormous ham for baking, and canned vegetables

>> and

>> potatoes. There was pudding and Jell-O and cookies, pie filling and

>> flour.

>> There

>> was a whole bag of

>> laundry supplies and cleaning items.

>>

>> And there were five toy trucks and

>> one beautiful little doll.

>>

>> As I drove back through empty streets as the

>> sun slowly rose on the most amazing Christmas Day of my life, I was

>> sobbing with

>> gratitude.

>>

>> And I will never

>> forget the joy on the faces of my little ones that precious morning.

>>

>> Yes,

>> there were angels in Indiana that long-ago December. And they all

>> hung out at the Big Wheel truck stop....

>>

>> THE POWER OF PRAYER. I

>> believe that God only gives three

>> answersto prayer:

>>

>> 1. 'Yes!'

>> 2. 'Not yet.'

>> 3. 'I have

>> something better in mind.'

>>

>> God still sits on the throne, the devil is a

>> liar.

>>

>> You maybe going through a tough time right now but God is

>> getting ready to bless you in a way that you cannot imagine.

>>

>> Prayer is one of the best

>> gifts wereceive. There is no cost.

>> Let's continue to pray for one another. Here is the

>> prayer:

>>

>> Father, I ask You to bless my friends, relatives and email

>> buddies reading this right now. Show them a new revelation of

>> Your love and power. In Jesus' name, Amen.

>

>

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> Internal Virus Database is out of date.

> Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com

> Version: 8.0.173 / Virus Database: 270.8.1/1729 - Release Date: 10/16/2008

> 7:12 PM

>

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Internal Virus Database is out of date.

Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com

Version: 8.0.173 / Virus Database: 270.8.1/1729 - Release Date: 10/16/2008

7:12 PM

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Internal Virus Database is out of date.

Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com

Version: 8.0.173 / Virus Database: 270.8.1/1729 - Release Date: 10/16/2008 7:12

PM

[Guest guest]

God bless you! What a wonderful statement of God's love. That I just

happened to open up on Thanksgiving. Who knew that coconut oil had

blessing like this? Have a wonderful day.