Purpose: To show family members that faith is the force for all human actions.

The Lesson

"Little by little we subtract Faith and Fallacy from Fact, The Illusory from the True, And starve upon the residue." Rag-Bag, II, Observation Stanza I

"Faith is the substance Of things hoped for, The evidence Of things not seen." Hebrews XI, 1

If you see a beautiful apple high in a tree, do you climb up and get it?

Well, if you are a twelve-year-old boy and half monkey, you climb the tree and get the apple.

If you're an old man with a cane, you just sit under the tree and wait for it to fall down.

So what's the difference?

The difference is faith.

The young boy knows he can climb the tree. He has a ton of faith in himself. In fact, he knows he can get the apple if he doesn't have to reach too far for it.

The old man once could climb trees like the boy. But now he is too old to climb. He hopes the wind will come and shake the tree, causing the apple to fall to the ground so that he can eat it. He has no faith in his ability to climb. In fact, at some point in time he lost his faith in his ability to climb. Perhaps back then, he could still climb the tree. That is, he still could have made it. But he lost his faith and negated his ability to climb.

Faith promotes action.

The boy climbs the tree, grabs the apple and puts it in his pocket, then climbs down the tree. On the ground, he enjoys the fruits of his faith and labor. He eats the apple.

The old man waits for the wind. He looks mournfully at the beautiful red apple. The wind does not come and the apple does not fall. The old man goes hungry.

Yes, there was a time in the old man's life when he could still climb the tree, but even then he would have gone hungry because he had lost faith in his ability to climb.

Thomas Edison

Thomas Edison was a brilliant scientist even though he was not highly educated in science. He made numerous discoveries and filed many patents because of what? Well, for one thing, he had imagination. The other thing that he had was FAITH.

Consider the light bulb. He envisioned that electricity could be used to light the homes, factories, and streets of America. He quickly learned that a vacuum was needed to protect the filament in the light bulb. He knew