Tina and the Temptation

We grew up reading Uncle Arthur's Bedtime Stories and having them read to us. They were truly a treasure trove of material. There wasn't a situation in life that you couldn't find an Uncle Arthur story to give you guidance.

Billy and the Bees
Horace and the Hogs
Dennis and the Doorhandle
Fred and the Firecrackers
Pearlie's Pennys
Disappearing  Donald

Classics, all of them. Oddly enough, the stories that were most often read to us had to do with disobedience. Strange, that...

But there was one story that stood out to both Noni and me. One we have remembered through the years and occasionally bring up to each other, always ruefully.

It involved two happy little girls, left home by Mother for the afternoon, with special permission to make a batch of penuche. They worked together happily (at least that's what the story claims) and were just drooling over the batch of cooling fudge when they happened to look out the window.

There, coming up the walk was one of their little friends and her mother.

"Oh, what shall we do. They are coming to call and Mother isn't here! We have all this lovely fudge and you know how Sally eats!"

"I know, we'll hide it until they leave. Then we won't have to share any of our treat."

So they quickly hid the candy under the bed just as the doorbell rang. And as soon as the door closed on the backsides of their company, they dashed back to the bedroom to get their treat.

But alas, while they'd been visiting the family dog had crawled under the bed and eaten all the treats. So, because they were greedy and didn't want to share some, they didn't get any.

Noni and I have been caught out on this many times through the years. In fact, it seems that whenever we get a little greedy, we can expect God to send us a lesson to go along with it. This evening it happened to me again.

I made fruit toast for supper, a wonderful gloppy dish made by heating and thickening canned fruit then serving it over toast. I usually add canned pineapple, and since I buy the kind canned in pineapple juice, I also usually get the juice.

Tonight, as I was about to pour it into my cup I thought---just for a millisecond---about sharing with Caleb. "Nah," my greedy little heart said. And I even hurried to pour it out and drink from the glass before he could get into the kitchen and ask for some.

But something was wrong. It didn't taste very good. In fact, after a few swigs, it really just tasted of tangy sugar. After a couple more taste-tests I was pretty sure that is was in fact...yes, a trip to double-check the can confirmed it.....HEAVY SYRUP. And Caleb was there to laugh at me when I sourly dumped my "treat" down the sink.

Oh, if only I HAD shared with him.