A cartoon shows two boys walking to school, discussing their parents. One of them says to the other one, "I've figured out a system for getting along with my Mom. She tells me what to do and I do it."
 

I've had days like this: A couple of country bumpkins were tramping along the railroad tracks when they found a human leg.

"You know what that looks like?" one boy said to the other. "That looks like Joe Bob's leg."

After looking at it a few minutes, the boys agreed that it was Joe Bob's leg.

They resumed their walking, but soon came upon a tattooed arm.

"Funny thing," one boy remarked. "This looks an awful lot like Joe Bob's arm."

"It do indeed," his friend answered.

Later on down the tracks, they found a head.

"Now I'm fer certain that that's Joe Bob's head," one boy asserted.

The other boy reached down and grabbed the head by the ears, shook it, and yelled, "Joe Bob! Joe Bob! Is you hurt?

I like the story of the little boy who came to his father and asked him, "Dad, who made God?" The father, engrossed in the evening paper, responded, "Beats me, son." The little boy would not be put off. "Dad, why is the earth round?" The dad answered, "I don't know, son." The boy played for a minute, then asked, "Dad, is there life on other planets?" The father patiently answered, "Nobody knows the answer to that." Finally, the boy asked his father, "Dad, do you mind me asking you all these questions?" The father put down his paper, "Why, not at all, son," he said, "How else are you going to learn?"

Another version:

One father was trying to read the paper. He was asked by his little daughter a whole series of questions-difficult questions which children ask: "Where did God live before he created the earth? What makes the leaves green? Where do butterflies get their wings?" At the end of each question, the father would simply say, "I don't know." Finally the little girl said, "Am I bothering you with my questions?" The father smiled, "Not at all, how are you going to learn if you never ask!"

A boy was sitting on a park bench with one hand resting on an open Bible. He was loudly exclaiming his praise to God. "Hallelujah! Hallelujah! God is great!" he yelled without worrying whether anyone heard him or not.

Shortly after, along came a man who had recently completed some studies at a local university. Feeling himself very enlightened in the ways of truth and very eager to show this enlightenment, he asked the boy about the source of his joy.

"Hey" asked the boy in return with a bright laugh, "Don't you have any idea what God is able to do? I just read that God opened up the waves of the Red Sea and led the whole nation of Israel right through the middle."

The enlightened man laughed lightly, sat down next to the boy and began to try to open his eyes to the "realities" of the miracles of the Bible. "That can all be very easily explained. Modern scholarship has shown that the Red Sea in that area was only 10-inches deep at that time. It was no problem for the Israelites to wade across."

The boy was stumped. His eyes wandered from the man back to the Bible laying open in his lap.The man, content that he had enlightened a poor, naive young person to the finer points of scientific insight, turned to go. Scarcely had he taken two steps when the boy began to rejoice and praise louder than before. The man turned to ask the reason for this resumed jubilation.

"Wow!" exclaimed the boy happily, "God is greater than I thought! Not only did He lead the whole nation of Israel through the Red Sea, He topped it off by drowning the whole Egyptian army in 10-inches of water!"

I heard a story recently about a little boy who went to a grocery store and asked the clerk for a box of Tide detergent. The clerk said, "Son, what do you need detergent for?" The little boy said, "I want to wash my dog." The clerk said, "Ell, son, that Tide detergent is pretty strong for washing a little dog." The little boy said, "That's what I want." The clerk said, "Alright," and he sold him the Tide and he said, "Now, you be careful when you wash your dog. That detergent is very strong; it might kill him." the little boy said, "I'll be careful." He took the box of detergent home. About a week later the little boy came back to the store and the clerk recognized him and said, "Son, how's your dog." And the little boy said, "I'm afraid he's dead." and the store clerk says, "Oh, I'm sorry, but I did try to warn you that the Tide was pretty strong to wash your dog with." And the little boy shook his head and said, "I don't think it was the Tide that killed him. I think it was the rinse cycle that did it."

Sometimes we feel like we have been through the rinse cycle, don't we?

There's a story about a kindergarten teacher who asked a boy what he was drawing. Without pausing to look up, he said, "A picture of God." The teacher smiled and responded, "But nobody knows what God looks like."

The boy carefully put down his crayon, looked her squarely in the eye, and declared, "After I'm finished here they will."

A little boy came to his teacher with tears in his eyes and told her that he could not find his snow boots. The teacher took his hand and led him to the coat room. "There are your boots!" his teacher joyously exclaimed as she pointed to the only pair of boots that were there. "But those boots are not MINE!" the little boy cried. "How can you be so sure those are not your boots?" the teacher asked.

"I'm sure!" he sobbed. "Mine had SNOW on them!"

Three boys are in the school yard bragging about their fathers. The first boy says, 'My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a poem, they give him $50.'

The second boy says, 'That's nothing. My Dad scribbles a few words on piece of paper, he calls it a song, they give him $100.'

The third boy says, 'I got you both beat. My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a sermon, and it takes eight people to collect all the money!'

A little boy is asked by his kindergarten teacher where his heart is. He points to the seat of his pants. "Why do you say that is where your heart is?" asks the kindergarten teacher. "Because," said the little boy, "My grandmother is always patting me there and saying, 'Bless your little heart.'"

A little boy was spending his vacation at his grandmother's house in Wyoming. This was the first time in his life that he had seen real cowboys, and he couldn't control his excitement. He blurted out, "Look, Grandma, those cowboys are bowlegged!" The grandmother, being a very genteel lady, was deeply embarrassed by his rough language. She dragged her grandson home and worked all day on improving his vocabulary. The next day, the boy was eager to show that he had learned his lesson. As they passed by a group of cowboys, the boy remarked, "Grandma, what manner of men are these who wear their legs in parentheses!"

A third grade Sunday School teacher was making the point with her class that God was omnipotent that He was able to do anything. She asked the class, "Is there anything that you can think of that God cannot do?" There was silence.

Then one little boy held up his hand. Somewhat frustrated that the point had been lost on this little boy, she asked, "Well, just what is it that God can't do?"

"Well," replied the boy, "He can't please everybody!"

A small boy sat in church with his mother and listened to a sermon entitled “What is a Christian?” Every time the minister asked the question, he banged his fist on the pulpit for emphasis.

The tension produced by the sermon built up in the boy and he finally whispered to his mother, “Mama, do you know? Do you know what a Christian is?”

“Yes, dear,” she replied. “Now sit still and be quiet.”

Finally, as the minister was winding up the sermon, he again thundered, “What is a Christian?” and banged especially hard on the pulpit. This time it was too much for the little boy, so he jumped up and cried out, “Tell him, Mama, tell him!” 

The story is told of a young boy who wanted a new suit of clothes, and he asked his mother if she would ask his father to buy it for him. The mother suggested that it might be better if the boy would ask the father himself. The response of the boy was, "Well, I would, but you know him much better than I do."

An author was due to deliver the first speech of his lecture tour. "I'm such a miserable speaker," he confessed to his agent, "that I know they'll all walk out on me before I finish."

"Nonsense!" retorted the agent. "You are an excellent speaker and will keep the audience glued to their seats."

"Oh, I say," cried the author, "that is a wonderful idea! But do we dare?"

Any of you who have ever tried speaking in front of people will appreciate the predicament that Dr. Ralph D. Nichols of the University of Minnesota found himself in. He was addressing a high school commencement when suddenly a child began to cry. Then another child added his loud voice. A small boy galloped up and down the aisle, chased by another. With the sinking feeling only a public speaker knows, Nichols realized he had lost his audience.

Nichols tried every trick of the speaker's trade. He spoke more loudly, told a funny story, walked around the stage, peered intently and disapprovingly at the area of disturbance. But all was to no avail.

Then he tried his last desperate trick. He found one good listener - an elderly gentleman in the first row that was looking up, smiling, and nodding his head approvingly. Concentrating all his attention on this one listener, the speaker gradually salvaged the situation and the speech.

During the refreshment period that followed, Nichols asked the school superintendent to introduce him to the old gentleman who had sat on the front row.

"Well...I'll try to introduce you," said the superintendent, "but it may be a little difficult. You see the poor old fellow is stone-deaf."

I like the story of the little boy who was taken to the dentist. It was discovered that he had a cavity that would have to be filled. "Now, young man," asked the dentist, "what kind of filling would you like for that tooth?" "Chocolate, please," replied the youngster.

A little boy went to a doctor for a throat checkup and noticed a religious painting on the doctor's wall.

"What's that for?" the boy asked.

"That reminds me that someday I'm going to heaven," the doctor replied. "Wouldn't you like to go to heaven?"

"Sure," the boy answered. "Well, now, what do you think we must do to get there?" the doctor asked.

"We must die," the boy responded. "That's right," the doctor smiled, "but what must we do before that?"

The boy pondered and then said, "We must get sick and send for you."

A young boy enters a barber shop and the barber whispers to his customer, 'This is the dumbest kid in the world. Watch while I prove it to you."

The barber puts a dollar bill in one hand and two quarters in the other, then calls the boy over and asks, "Which do you want, son?"

The boy takes the quarters and leaves the dollar. 

"What did I tell you?" said the barber. "That kid never learns!"

Later, when the customer leaves, he sees the same young boy coming out of the ice cream store and says, "Hey, son! May I ask you a question? Why did you take the quarters instead of the dollar bill?"

The boy licked his cone and replied, "Because the day I take the dollar, the game's over!"

Every Christian should be like the little boy who ran into a man who was lost on a country road. The man stopped his car and approached the boy to ask, "Son, do you know where Fairview is?" The boy said, "No," The man said, "Do you know where Interstate 40 is?" He answered "No ""Then do you know where the intersection of Bear Wallow Road and Grinder's Switch is?" "No," the little fellow replied."Well, "the man said, "You are about the most ignorant person I have ever met. You don't know much of anything, do you?" The small boy looked into his eyes and said, "Mister, I know one thing, I know I ain't lost"

There is a story about a little boy who was praying: "Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep." Then there was a long pause. He couldn't remember what came next. His mother sought to prompt him from the doorway. "If," she said quietly. The little boy prayed, "If...if..." Then he brightened up and said triumphantly, "If he hollars let him go, Eeny, meeny, miny, mo!"

Dr. Peter Rhea Jones tells the story about a trapper who lived in the woods. He had his wife out there in the far wilderness and they had a little baby son. After the child was born, unfortunately, the wife abandoned her son and her husband and left them out in the wilderness and returned to life in a more civilized setting. The father and the son continued to live out in the far wilderness. They never went into town. Because of his wife's betrayal, the man became increasingly bitter toward women. He never told his boy about the opposite sex and the boy never saw any girls. Finally at age twenty the necessity came for them to travel some distance to a city to buy some goods. As they were coming into the city the boy began to notice something he had never seen before all those pretty girls. And he said, "Pa, what are those?" His father, who was hostile toward women, said, "Aw, son, they're just silly gooses." They went on doing their work and buying their supplies. When they were ready to go back home, the father generously said, "Son, we're going to go back and won't be returning for a long time. I'll buy you anything you want." The boy said definitely, "Pa, how ''bout one of them gooses?"

There are some people who never let anything get them down. They are like the little boy who kept bragging to his father about what a great hitter he was. Finally the father said, "All right, son, show me!'' So the little boy got his softball and his hat and they went out in the back yard. The father stood over to the side while the boy tossed the ball up into the air and then swung the hat with all his might. "Strike one," said the little fellow after he had missed the ball completely. "Strike two," he said as he missed the ball again. "Strike three," he said as he missed a third time. Then he turned to his father with a determined glow on his face. "Boy, am I a great pitcher!"

Did you read about the little boy who returned home after his first Sunday school class? His mother asked, "Who was your teacher?' and the little boy answered, "I don't remember her name, but she must have been Jesus' grandmother because she didn't talk about anyone else."

Does our conversation reflect our love of Jesus? Would our words give away our relationship with him?

A little boy asked his mom one day if she knew what Goliath said when David hit him with a stone.

"Why, I didn't know Goliath said anything," his mom replied.

The little boy nodded his head knowingly and said, "Sure he did. When David put that stone in his sling and whipped it around, and let it go and hit ol' Goliath right between the eyes, Goliath said, "Hmmmm, nothing like that has ever entered my mind before.''"

Scowling over a report card, a small boy told his dad, "Naturally, I seem stupid to my teacher; she's a college graduate."

A cartoon in THE CHURCHMAN magazine sometime back showed a small boy standing before a very large church door, and asking the minister in the doorway, "Is God home?"

It makes a difference when it's you. Said one doctor to his patient: "You have had a slight coronary, but I wouldn't worry about it."

Responded the patient: "Really, doc? Well, if you had a slight coronary I wouldn't worry about it either."

Dr. Thomas Hilton tells a story of a man with the odd name of Horville Sash. Horville had a very humble job in a certain company, a job in the lowest basement of a building. He was a mailroom clerk. As mailroom clerk, there was no one who was lower than he was.

One day he came across a bug scurrying across the floor. Horville may have the lowliest job in the whole company, but he was bigger than the bug! So he raised his foot to flatten the hapless bug.

But this story is a fable, and the bug speaks. "Spare me," said the bug, "and I will grant you your fondest wishes." Horville spared the bug. His reward: a wish. "I wish to be promoted to the second floor." And his wish was granted. Zap! He found himself working on the second floor.

But wait. Horville heard footsteps on the ceiling of floor number two. A higher level meant higher wages. The next day, Horville rose to the third floor job of sales coordinator. But that didn't end his ambition. He wished for still more promotions. He went to the tenth floor, then to the twentieth the fiftieth the seventieth. Still he was not satisfied.

Horville was sitting by the indoor pool on floor ninety-six, when he discovered a stairway leading up...to another floor? He scrambled up the stairs, and found himself on the roof. At last, he was the highest, the greatest. Finally content, he headed for the down stairway, when he came across a boy on the edge of the building with his eyes closed.

"What are you doing?" asked Horville.

"Praying," whispered the boy.

"To whom?"

The boy pointed a finger skyward, and replied, "To God."

Panic gripped Horville. Was there a floor above him? He couldn't see it, and he couldn't hear any footsteps shuffling around up there. Just clouds. "Do you mean that there's somebody above me? Someone greater than I?"

"Yes," said the boy.

The bug was promptly summoned. "Make me God. Make me the greatest. Put me in the type of position that only God would hold if He were on earth."

The very next day, Horville began work in the basement as a mailroom clerk. Fable attributed to Doug Patterson, Clergy Journal, March 1986, page 10

A minister was making a wooden trellis to support a climbing vine. As he was pounding away, he noticed that a little boy was watching him. The youngster didn’t say a word, so the preacher kept on working, thinking the lad would leave. But he didn’t. Pleased at the thought that his work was being admired, the pastor said, “Well, son, trying to pick up some pointers on gardening?” “No,” replied the boy, “I’m just waiting to hear what a preacher says when he hits his thumb with a hammer.”

Boy to friend on school bus: "This morning I woke up with chills, sore throat, headache, and an upset stomach."

Friend: "So what!"

Boy: "Nothing, I guess except that it didn't work."

The scene is a classroom. A fourth-grader is standing nose-to-nose with his teacher, both frowning. Behind them is a chalkboard full of unsolved mathematical problems. You can feel the frustration as the boy has worked, erased, struggled, and strained to perform before his class. Quite likely his teacher had just announced in front of everyone that he should have been able to solve the problems. Perhaps she labeled him an underachiever. With a fair measure of perception, the boy is answering back, "I'm not an underachiever you're an overexpecter!"

Obviously, advertising is a prime field for humor: The new office boy had been caught lying and the boss was in a rage over it.

"Do you know where liars go in this business, kid?" he asked.

The boy grinned, "Why, yes, sir. They perfect the art to such a degree that they are transferred to advertising."

The story is told of a man who received a call from an employment agency in Florida. They said, "We think we have found you a job, but there is one question. Can you pick lemons?"

He said, "Boy, can I. I have been married five times."

A little girl was asked to bring her birth certificate to school one day. Her mother wisely cautioned her about the important document and told her not to lose it. The child forgot and lost it. When she became aware of her loss, she started crying. When asked why she was crying, she answered, "I lost my excuse for being born!"

Ben Franklin once told about a boy who was so smart he could name a horse in nine languages, but so ignorant he bought a cow to ride on.

A little boy and his younger sister were riding a hobby horse together. The boy said, “If one of us would just get off this hobby horse, there would be more room for me.”

Pity the little boy watching his Dad squeeze into a new dinner jacket. "Please don't wear that suit," the little boy pleaded. "It always gives you a headache the next day."

A new boy from way up in the hills came to school. He was eager to learn and asked questions about everything he saw.

In the new school he saw some electricians at work.

"What are those men doing?" he asked his teacher.

"They are putting in an electric switch."

The boy started up in alarm.

"I'm going back to the hills," he exclaimed. "I won't stay in a school where they do the switching by machinery."

A teacher had just given her second-grade class a lesson on magnets. Now came the question session, and she asked a little boy, "My name starts with an M and I pick up things. What am I?" The boy replied instantly, "A mother."

A small boy badly wanted a baby brother, so his dad suggested he pray every night for one. The boy prayed earnestly, night after night, but his prayers seemingly weren't answered. After a few weeks, he didn't bother to ask anymore.

Some months later, his dad said they were going to see Mom in the hospital and he was going to get a big surprise. When they got to the room, the little boy saw his mother holding two babies.

"Well, what do you think about having twin brothers?" his dad asked.

The little boy thought for a moment and replied, "It's a good thing I stopped praying when I did."

The young boy was showing off to his father what a hitter he was; three times he tossed the ball into the air and swung at it and missed each time. At the third miss he said, "Boy, what a pitcher I am!"

A Sunday school teacher pointed to a large plant in the room and asked her young pupils, “Who made those beautiful flowers grow?”

A boy quickly answered, “God did!”

The teacher was pleased by the response, but before she had a chance to comment, another boy shouted, “But fertilizer sure helps!”

Three burly fellows on huge motorcycles pulled up to a highway cafe where a truck driver, just a little guy, was perched on a stool quietly eating his lunch. As the three fellows came in, they spotted him, grabbed his food away from him and laughed in his face. The truck driver said nothing. He got up, paid for his food, and walked out. One of the three cyclists, unhappy that they hadn't succeeded in provoking the little man into a fight, commented to the waitress: "Boy, he sure wasn't much of a man, was he?" The waitress replied, "Well, I guess not." Then, looking out the window, she added, "I guess he's not much of a truck driver, either. He just ran over three motorcycles."

Children's Prayer

3-year-old Reese: Our Father, Who does art in heaven, Harold is His name. Amen.

A little boy was overheard praying: 'Lord, if you can't make me a better boy, don't worry about it. I'm having a real good time like I am.'

One particular four-year-old prayed, “And forgive us our trash baskets as we forgive those who put trash in our baskets.”

A woman in a grocery store happens upon a grandfather and his poorly behaved 3 year-old grandson. It's obvious to her that Gramps has his hands full with the child screaming for candy in the candy aisle, cookies in the cookie aisle; same for fruit, cereal and soda in their respective aisles. Meanwhile, Gramps is working his way around, saying in a controlled voice, "Easy, Albert, we won't be long; easy, boy." Another outburst, and she hears Gramps calmly say, "It's okay, Albert, just a couple more minutes and we'll be out of here. Hang in there, boy." At the checkout, the little terror is throwing items out of the cart, and Gramps again in a controlled voice is says, "Albert, Albert, relax buddy, don't get upset. We'll be home in five minutes; stay cool, Albert."

Very impressed, the woman goes outside where Gramps is loading his groceries and the boy into the car. "You know, sir, it's none of my business, but you were amazing in there. I don't know how you did it.. That whole time, you kept your composure, and no matter how loud and disruptive he got, you just calmly kept saying things would be okay. Albert is very lucky to have you as his grandpa."

Thanks, lady," said Gramps, "But, I'm Albert. The little brat’s name is Steve."

There was one little boy who wanted to be prepared for any eventuality. His father took him to the zoo. They stopped to look at the lion. "He's the king of the beasts," said the father.

"Why do they call him that, Daddy?" asked the boy.

"Well, it's because he is the most ferocious animal in the jungle. He's a real man-eater, too!" said the father dramatically.

"Would he even eat you?" asked the little boy.

"I guess he would if he got out." The little fellow studied the lion with interest, then turned to his father and said, "Daddy, if he does get out, what bus should I take home?"

A certain little boy was late for Sunday school. His teacher, seeing him slip in, asked him the reason. The boy shuffled his feet uncertainly for a moment, then blurted out: "I started out to go fishing instead, but my dad wouldn't let me."

The teacher beamed broadly, "He was quite right not to let you go fishing on a Sunday. Did he explain to you why?"

The little boy nodded. "Oh yes, sir. He said there wasn't enough bait for the two of us."

A little boy was riding his tricycle furiously around the block, over and over again. Finally a policeman stopped and asked him why he was going around and around. The boy said that he was running away from home. Then the policeman asked why he kept going around the block. The boy responded, “Because my mom said that I’m not allowed to cross the street.”

In one GARFIELD cartoon strip, Garfield is lying around thinking to himself, "Boy, am I bored!"

Just then, Jon comes running into the room, all excited, and says, "Hey, Garfield! Let's go to the store and try on socks."

Garfield, with a resigned look on his face, thinks, "Every time I think I've hit bottom, somebody throws me a shovel."

Mom and Dad were trying to find a birthday gift for their wildly rambunctious little boy.

"Do you think that getting him a bike might improve his behavior?" asked Dad.

"I doubt it," Mom sighed. "But at least it will spread it over a wider area."

There was a news story in the papers about a year ago. It was about a 5-year-old Texas boy who was accidentally left behind at a Nashville, Tennessee, service station. Tyler Payne got out of the family station wagon to use the rest room, then couldn't get out of the building because the door had become stuck. His family continued their trip not realizing the boy was missing. About two hours later, at a Wendy's restaurant in Jackson, his parents, five brothers and a sister noticed he was missing. They drove back to the station as fast as they could

Back in Nashville, a woman had heard Tyler screaming and opened the bathroom door for him. The boys sobs sobs turned to smiles when Tyler saw his family. He showed his brothers and sister the teddy bears, coloring books and candy given him by detectives in Nashville's Metro Youth Guidance Center while he waited for his parents.

"I told you your parents would come back," said Mary Brown, who was working at the service station and who comforted Tyler after he was found in the rest room. "We normally have a head count, but this time we didn't," Glenn Payne said. "We were tired." After leaving the service station, Kris Payne drove while her husband and the children dozed.

When the family was finally reunited, the boy hugged his mother and told her, "I'm never going to the bathroom again."