Meredith Willson's musical comedy The Music Man is known for its memorable toe-tappers, but it also contains a number of perceptive lines. In one serious scene, Professor Harold Hill, a fly-by-night con artist, expresses genuine love to Marian the librarian. But she is always looking to the vague future, never quite living in today. Hill tells her, "You pile up a lot of tomorrows, and you'll find a lot of empty yesterdays." Professor Hill may have been unscrupulous, but he understood the importance of the present.

Edward Everett Hale (1822-1909), former US Senate chaplain, said, "Never attempt to bear more than one kind of trouble at once. Some people bear three kinds--all they have had, all they have now, and all they expect to have."

Jesus told us, "Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things" (Mt. 6:34). If we knew all the good things that were going to happen tomorrow, we would be overly excited today and disappointed tomorrow. If we knew all the bad things in our future, worry and fear and grief would paralyze us today.

The believer in Jesus Christ puts his faith in the God of the past, present, and future. By faith, we can walk securely, one day at a time. That day is today!  — Haddon W. Robinson