OUR DAILY BREAD             Sat., June 17, 1995  
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READ: Ecclesiastes 7:1-6 

                
                    LAUGHING GAS 

      "Sorrow is better than laughter, for by 
     a sad countenance the heart is made better."

                                 -- Ecclesiastes 7:3

Laughing gas, or nitrous oxide, is used to reduce the 
pain of surgery.  Because it produces an insensitivity to
physical suffering, its effects are usually pleasurable.
Patients under its influence have been known to sing and
laugh hysterically before losing consciousness.

A person's deceitful heart can also anesthetize him to 
the effects of sin, giving him the delusion of well-being.
Although giving the impression of strength and exhil-
aration, his lightheartedness represents only a brief
evasion of tragedy.

Such a condition was described by the author of
Ecclesiastes, who explained that just as the crackling
of thorns in a fire is a sign of their destruction, 
so the gaiety of the sinner's conduct reflects his
shallowness and the certainty of his doom (7:1-6).
He is not aware of the sacredness of life nor of the
inevitability of God's judgment upon his wrongdoing.

Have you been unwilling to admit your guilt before
God, laughing away your time by seeking the immediate
pleasures of life?  If so, you need to visit the 
"house of mourning" (vv. 2, 4) and acknowledge your 
desperate, sinful condition.  Trust the Lord Jesus
Christ for your eternal salvation.  Then your foolish
laughter can be turned into true joy.

                        -- Martin R. De Haan II

        Better is the wail of mourning
        From repenters who are grieving
         Than the gaiety and laughing
        Of doomed sinners disbelieving.

                        -- Sper
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           THOUGHT FOR THE DAY
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       We learn more from sorrow 
           than from laughter.
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THE BIBLE IN ONE YEAR:  Psalms 70-72

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