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Monuments
'[MY] LIFE IS WORTH NOTHING UNLESS...' ACTS 20:24
It's said that in Mount Hope Cemetery, you'll find several strange gravestones. Farmer John Davis had them erected. He began his working life as a hired labourer but eventually managed to gain a considerable fortune.
In the process he didn't make many friends. Angry with how his life had turned out he vowed not to leave anyone a penny. When his wife died Davis erected an elaborate statue which showed both her and him at opposite ends of a sofa. He was so pleased with this that he planned a second monument, with his wife kneeling at his future graveside placing a wreath. Then he had a sculptor place a pair of wings on her back. One idea led to another until he'd spent a quarter of a million dollars on monuments to his wife and himself. Whenever someone from his town asked him to contribute to something charitable like a new hospital ward the old man would say, 'What's this town ever done for me?'
After using up all his money on statues, Davis died at 92, lonely, miserable, and flat broke. His monuments...it's strange...each one is slowly sinking into the Kansas soil, fast becoming victims of time, vandalism and neglect.
There's a certain poetic justice in the fact that within a few years they'll all be gone. Oh, by the way, only one person attended Farmer Davis' funeral: Horace England, the salesman from the tombstone company. What a way to go! But not Paul: '[My] life is worth nothing unless I use it for doing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus.' Can you say that?
'[MY] LIFE IS WORTH NOTHING UNLESS...' ACTS 20:24
It's said that in Mount Hope Cemetery, you'll find several strange gravestones. Farmer John Davis had them erected. He began his working life as a hired labourer but eventually managed to gain a considerable fortune.
In the process he didn't make many friends. Angry with how his life had turned out he vowed not to leave anyone a penny. When his wife died Davis erected an elaborate statue which showed both her and him at opposite ends of a sofa. He was so pleased with this that he planned a second monument, with his wife kneeling at his future graveside placing a wreath. Then he had a sculptor place a pair of wings on her back. One idea led to another until he'd spent a quarter of a million dollars on monuments to his wife and himself. Whenever someone from his town asked him to contribute to something charitable like a new hospital ward the old man would say, 'What's this town ever done for me?'
After using up all his money on statues, Davis died at 92, lonely, miserable, and flat broke. His monuments...it's strange...each one is slowly sinking into the Kansas soil, fast becoming victims of time, vandalism and neglect.
There's a certain poetic justice in the fact that within a few years they'll all be gone. Oh, by the way, only one person attended Farmer Davis' funeral: Horace England, the salesman from the tombstone company. What a way to go! But not Paul: '[My] life is worth nothing unless I use it for doing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus.' Can you say that?
