January 10 Minute Message

Jan 10, 2019Tom Ellsworth

Many countries recognize holidays with unique cultural celebrations. We would associate fireworks with the Fourth of July and gifts of flowers and candy on Valentine’s Day. Hi, I’m Tom Ellsworth from Sherwood Oaks Christian Church with a minute message.

In Denmark there is a unique custom that marks the beginning of each New Year. During the preceding twelve months, Danish families save up all their chipped, cracked and unusable dishes. Then on New Year’s Day the discarded dishes are tossed on a friend’s doorstep. The more broken dishes you find on your front porch, the more friends you have.

It may be a quaint custom in Denmark, but…waking up to shattered dishes on my front steps is just not quite my idea of friendship. Worse still, I guess, would be waking up and finding no broken dishes at all. In this first month of 2019, determine that this year you will do more to be a friend than you have in the past. The word friend or friendship appears more than 170 times in Scripture; and in Proverbs we are reminded that a friend loves at all times. So, don’t wait for a cracked dinner plate to let a friend know how much you care.