By Rev. Larry W. Greiner

The mother of a nine-year-old boy named Mark received a phone call in the middle of the afternoon.  It was the Mark's teacher.   

"Mrs. Smith, something unusual happened today in your son’s third grade class. He did something that surprised me so much that I thought you should know about it immediately. Nothing like this has happened in all my years of teaching.

"I was teaching a lesson on creative writing and as I always do I told the story of the ant and the grasshopper:

"The ant works hard all summer and stores up plenty of food, but the grasshopper plays all summer and does no work. Then winter comes, and the grasshopper begins to starve because he has no food. So he begins to beg, 'Please, Mr. Ant, you have much food, let me eat, too.'

"Then I said, 'Boys and girls, your job is to write the ending to the story.'  Your son, Mark, raised his hand. 'Teacher, may I draw a picture?'

"'Yes, Mark, if you like. But first you must write the ending to the story.'     

"As in all the years past, most of the students said the ant shared his food through the winter, and both the ant and the grasshopper lived. A few children, however, wrote, 'No, Mr. Grasshopper, you should have worked in the summer. Now, I have just enough food for myself.' Then they wrote, 'So the ant lived and the grasshopper died.' 

"But your son ended the story in a way that was different from that of any other child. He wrote, 'So the ant gave all of his food to the grasshopper; and the grasshopper lived through the winter, but the ant died.' Then at the bottom of the page, Mark drew three crosses."  

There is no doubt that Mark's mother was responsible for Mark's response that day. I, too, was blessed to have a mother who told me repeatedly about Jesus’ love and how He died for me on the cross.  At the age of five, at my mother's knee, I prayed the sinner’s pray and accepted Christ during that Christmas season.  Thank God for the many mothers He has used over the centuries as missionaries to their own children.  Pray that God would send more missionary Moms!   

Cancer is limited . . . It cannot cripple love, it cannot corrode faith, it cannot eat away peace, it cannot destroy confidence, it cannot kill a friendship, it cannot shut out memories, it cannot silence courage, it cannot invade the soul, it cannot reduce eternal life, it cannot quench the spirit, it cannot lessen the power of the resurrection. --Charles Swindoll