The dirty, old black coal bag.
Grandfather Dean reads his Bible beside the oven, drawing strength and peace from its words. When Nicky asks why, he shares a story about a coal bag, a stream, and the power of God’s Word.
Grandfather Dean is a very religious man. Every morning he gets up before daybreak. After having enjoyed his first cup of coffee, he sits next to his old AGA oven and then his day starts in the only manner that he knows: Reading his Bible.
Nicky, his four-year-old granddaughter, sits at his feet and asks him to read to her from his Bible. She listens attentively. After a long while she asks him why he reads his Bible every day. Grandfather answers that he gets his daily power from the Bible. It keeps him on the right track, empowers him, cleanses him and makes him free from within.
He sees that Nicky doesn’t understand what he is saying. He then decides to explain it by telling a story:
Once upon a time a little boy’s father sent him with an old black coal bag to the river to fetch water. He ran to the little stream and tried to fill the bag with water. With just a little bit of water, he ran back home. By the time he came home, there wasn’t any water left. Daddy sent him back again. He ran up and down about five times. Every time without any success.
Daddy then took the bag and showed him that the coal bag wasn’t black any- more but washed clean by the water. He also showed him that the water which was wasted along the road watered all the flower seed and they started to sprout. After a few weeks the most beautiful flowers appeared along the footpath.
“God’s Word is like that, Nicky. The dirty old coal bag is God’s children. Many of them are tattered and dirty from inside, full of sins. When they keep on reading the Bible and especially believe what God says, they become whole again and are washed clean.
The water which moistened the flower seed along the path, are God’s children who go out to glorify his name and proclaim his Word wherever we may go. In this way God takes care of us.”
After this Nicky not only at her grandfather’s house but also at her own home in town made sure that when somebody read from the Bible she attended.
She really wants to be a lovely, whole coal bag and not an ugly, tattered black coal bag!