It was time to open the envelope with the next clue in the quest for the secret recipe for candy-flavored pop! Trixie was squealing with delight and jumping up and down, Leapfrog was singing a chorus of “The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round”, and Toenail cleaning out his ears!
They tore the envelope open, and a piece of green paper fell out, it said, “Travel to the Smokey Mountains and look for a normal person wearing bright red socks. That person can tell you where the Candy-Flavored Pop factory is located.”
Our three super-heroes sprang into instant action. Toenail ran around in circles to test out his new jogging shoes, Trixie smiled and looked cute, and Leapfrog went to a used car lot. He needed to trade in his one rollerblade for some better transportation. He ended up getting a used skateboard! It was turbo-charged, painted green with pink racing stripes, and it had anti-gravity marshmallows!
They planned to ride on a bus to the Smokey Mountains and then find that normal person wearing bright red socks. Leapfrog decided to take a fishing pole with him so that they could catch some fish. Leapfrog was giving Trixie a piggyback ride when it happened!
Suddenly, a fly went by, the fly was being chased by a frog, the frog was being chased by cucumber, the cucumber was being chased by a loose fingernail, the fingernail was being chased by a cloud, and the cloud was being chased by a goose!
The goose got his feet tangled in the string on the fishing pole, and the goose began pulling Leapfrog, who still had Trixie on his back! Leapfrog thought quickly and jumped onto his skateboard as they were going past it! Away they went toward Canada! They were going the wrong way!
Toenail wanted to see where they were going, so he began jumping on a trampoline, he jumped higher and higher, but could not see where the fly, frog, cucumber, fingernail, cloud, goose, Leapfrog and Trixie had gone. Toenail decided that he was not jumping high enough, so he exerted his maximum super-hero strength and jumped higher than ever, he went so high that ran into a kite and got tangled in the string. The string broke just below Toenail, so he and the kite were flying free headed toward Texas, he was going the wrong way too!
Meanwhile the fly, frog, cucumber, fingernail, cloud, goose, Leapfrog and Trixie were almost to Canada when an absolutely, weird, goofy, and impossible thing happened! The cloud decided that it wanted to become a snowstorm. It began to thunder with lightning, and a blizzard started to come out of it. The goose could not see anything because his eyelashes had frozen together! He decided to fly south for the winter! The snow cloud decided to chase the goose, the fingernail decided to chase the cloud, the cucumber decided to chase the fingernail, the frog decided to chase the fingernail, and the fly decided to chase the frog! They headed toward Texas at maximum speed and sooner than a gerbil can count to ten, the goose ran into Toenail’s kite! The kite got tangled up with the goose, the goose got confused, and they all flew east toward the Smokey Mountains!
When they got to the Smokey Mountains it happened! The fly caught the frog and ate it! The goose was so terrified he let go of the kite and the fishing pole. Toenail was falling toward the ground at a terrifying speed! It looked like certain death! But Trixie saved him by catching him by the ear as he went by!
They were finally in the Smokey Mountains! All they had to do was to find a normal person wearing bright red socks! The very first person that they saw was wearing bright red socks. Toenail said, “That could not be the right person, he is not normal, he is taller than me!”
An hour later they saw another person with bright red socks. This time Leapfrog said, “That could not be the right person, he is not normal, he is not as thin as me.”
Soon they saw another person with bright red socks, Trixie said, that person is not normal either, his hair is not the same color as mine!
The next day began no better. They saw a man with bright red socks and Toenail said, “This person is not normal, he is not as sweaty as me!” The next man with bright red sock was no better, Leapfrog pointed out that his eyes were not purple and green! Trixie pointed out that the next person with bright red socks did not have an umbrella or cheese curds!
They simple could not find a person with bright red socks that was normal! They began to get very hungry; they could not find any stores or a McDonalds. There were plenty of Dairy Queens, but super-heroes only eat at Dairy Queens on Thursdays in April when the wind is not blowing, so they could not eat there. They were so hungry one day that they just had to sit down under a tree because they were too hungry to go on. Suddenly something happened! Something landed with a thump on the pizza box on top of Toenail’s head! It was an orange bird with three purple wings! Everyone knows that orange birds that have three purple wings eat pizza boxes, but they do not like to eat pizza. This bird was going crazy trying to eat the pizza box that was glued to Toenail’s head! As the bird tore the box to pieces and ate it, our befuddled heroes saw an amazing thing; there was a pizza in that box! They had had a pizza with them the whole time! After the bird had finished the box, Leapfrog, Toenail, and Trixie had great meal eating that pizza! Now they were thirsty! All three of them got onto Leapfrog’s skateboard and rode it down a mountain to get to a spring-fed lake. There were trees all the way down the mountain, but they closed their eyes so that they would not hit the trees!
When they got to the lake, Leapfrog decided to show Toenail and Trixie the proper way to drink water from a lake! He climbed a tree, went out on a limb over the lake, turned upside down and hung by his feet, and tried to scoop water into his mouth with his hands. Of course, the tree limb broke, and Leapfrog fell into the water with his mouth open, he got a big drink that way! When Trixie saw how Leapfrog did it, she immediately climbed the tree; hung upside down from a limb, opened her mouth, and fell into the water. Toenail also climbed the tree, hung upside down from a limb, opened his mouth and fell. Unfortunately, he did not have enough sense to pick a tree limb that was over the water, so he fell onto the ground, and rolled into the water.
When they finally had enough to drink, they got out of the lake, and there on the shore was an old man wearing yellow shorts, an orange T-shirt, and bright red socks! Toenail said, “That could not be the person we are looking for, he is too old, his eyes are the wrong color, his hair isn’t like mine, and I do not think he can sing during a tornado!”
Trixie said, “Uh Toenail that old man is my Grandpa!” Trixie’s Grandpa came up to them and said, “What is wrong with the three of you? This was so easy! I have been right in front of you for days and days wearing different costumes with bright red socks, and you never thought I was normal! You always compared me to yourselves and judged me because I was not just like you! I would have given you the recipe for Candy-Flavored Pop, but since you treated me so bad, I am going to make you go to the pop factory to get the recipe!”
Leapfrog asked, “Where is the pop factory?” Trixie’s Grandpa replied, “It is on the Mississippi River!” Then he turned and walked away. Toenail said, “Let’s go to the Mississippi River!”
Leapfrog replied, “Before we go, we need to…….”
Application:
In the Bible in Matthew 7:1-5 Jesus says:
Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. For you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging is the standard by which you will be judged. And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.
Leapfrog, Toenail, and Trixie were supposed to be looking for a normal person with bright red socks, but they could not find that person for several reasons:
- They compared (judged) everyone they met to themselves
- Nobody was exactly like them, so they did not accept any of the people they met.
- Leapfrog, Toenail, and Trixie thought they were better than all the people they met.
- They did not get the recipe because they did not accept other people
We do the same thing!
- We judge other people, by comparing them to ourselves
- We overlook our faults, and exaggerate the faults of other people
- Nobody is like exactly us, so we think we are better than other people
- We miss out on a lot of good things in life because we waste so much time judging other people
Jesus said that we are not to judge other people.
- We should never put other people down because they are not like us.
- We should compare ourselves to Jesus, then we will see that all of us (including ourselves) fall so short of His standards. We truly do not have anything to brag about.
- We need to let Jesus take care of the problems in our own life before we even think about trying to help someone else!