{"product_id":"9781469112190","title":"Whatsoever Means Anything","description":"\u003cp\u003e Should miracles all be taken with a grain of salt or be accepted without a trace of doubt? What if Jesus was taken literally when He said, “You haven’t asked Me for anything yet. Ask for whatsoever you want, and I will do it for you so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.” And what if Jesus responded instantly to such requests? And what if Jesus started answering questions plainly, and it became next to impossible to not recognize a Christian?\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Hasn’t a story got room for more than one miracle? If you answered to that was no, then this book is not for you; however, if your answer was yes, then this is the book for you. The story is crowded with people like yourself, except for the awesome adventure in which they find themselves.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Here’s a sampling from a couple of chapters.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Irving Samuels pulled his coat collar tighter about his neck and ducked his head into the wind as he pressed on toward home. “I wish that I didn’t have to face Maria tonight,” he thought. “Why does she have to nag me all of time, anyway? She wasn’t that way before we got married. Sometimes I wish that I had stayed single.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Irving patted his breast pocket to verify to himself the presence of his paycheck. He fervently hoped that it would go further than it usually did. It might be a long time before he would get another paycheck, because he had just been laid off along with five hundred of his fellow employees. “They could have given us more warning,” he thought. “On the other hand, what would I have done if they had given me two weeks notice? So many people are out of work that there aren’t any jobs open anyway, especially in my field. Oh well, in a couple of weeks, I can draw unemployment.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Irving sighed deeply. Lately things hadn’t been going at all well for him. Suddenly he stopped and spun around, “You dummy!” he admonished himself. “You walked right past the bank.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e He quickly retraced his steps past three stores and entered the front door of the American National Bank. He was pleased to find that there were only two people in line at the teller’s window. A few minutes later, his check was cashed, and he was pocketing the money. Somehow his week’s pay of $480 didn’t seem to measure up to his usual high regard for his paycheck. “A good stiff drink or two might help me feel better,” he decided. “Ha! It might even help me to face Maria!”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e A few steps more brought him to Mickey’s Tavern. Irving walked inside, blinked his eyes to adjust to the gloom, and yelled at the bartender, “Hey, Mick! Give me a bourbon! Better yet, make it a double.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “Hey yourself, Irving! What’re you doing in here so early?”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “Got laid off!” answered Irving. “Boy, nothing’s going right lately.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Just then, the newscast on the radio behind the bar caught Irving’s attention. “The Dow Jones Industrial Averages plunged another 522 points today to establish a 15 Year low. Brokers attribute much of this drop to . . .”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “Oh no!” groaned Irving. “First my job, and now this!”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“It can’t be that bad,” said Mickey as he put the bourbon down in front of Irving.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Irving tossed the drink down neat and grimaced before answering , “My stock hasn’t done anything but go down since I bought it. On top of that, it follows the Dow like it was glued to it. I bought right at the peak, and if that isn’t bad enough, I bought 500 shares on margin. I kept waiting for it to go up, and now I’ve waited too long. Now I will have to put up some more cash. With my job gone, I just can’t afford it. Give me another double.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Irving gulped down the second drink, threw a couple of bills on the bar, and walked out.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “What a stupid mess,” he thought. “Why couldn’t Dad have been a rich Jew? Then he could help me. But no, not him. Oh no, he had to marry a gentile and get himself disinherited. Mom’s all right, but if it had been me, I wouldn’t have thrown all of that loot away for love! No, it wasn’t love either; it was religion. What a farce!”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Irving looked up and suddenly noticed that the gusty wind which had been blowing earlier had quit. “Can’t count on anything any more,” he grumbled. “Even the wind fools you.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e At any other time, Irving would have laughed at such a thought, but the liquor was starting to work on him, and his depression was \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003edeepening.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “Don’t know why I have to go home to Maria anyway,” he thought. “I could go back to the bar and really get drunk. But no, I’d better not do that. I’ve got to hang onto my money. On the other hand, I don’t even have enough to cover my loss in the stock market. I can’t borrow on the house. Maybe I should just kill myself.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe thought came so suddenly that it startled Irving. He stopped and rested a moment against a parking meter.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “What would that accomplish?” he argued. “Well, for one thing,” he answered himself, “Maria would get the insurance money. Another thing, Maria wouldn’t nag me any more. I wouldn’t have to look for\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eanother job, and ... why is everything so fuzzy? Maybe I need another drink? No, I’ve got to kill myself first.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Irving pushed himself away from the parking meter and trudged on. The average passerby wouldn’t have given Irving a second look. Irving was an average looking man with dark brown, straight hair, brown eyes, and a medium paunch. He stood five feet nine inches tall and weighed about 185 pounds. He dressed in what used to be called a conservative fashion. He had a round face with a weak chin and a pug nose. His personality was less than winning, and he had very few friends. If he was really hard pressed, he would have had trouble naming a best friend. He didn’t know of a single friend that he thought would help him if he was in real trouble.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “Well, trouble’s here,” he thought, “And just like I’ve told Maria time and again, there’s no one to turn to. Wait a minute, if I’m going to kill myself, how am I going to do it?”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Even though Irving had previously faced many unpleasant things, he had never before considered suicide as a solution; therefore, he had never played that depressing little game of trying to choose the best method of suicide. In his search for an idea, Irving stopped and looked around. A few yards ahead, he noticed a traffic sign saying that the 2nd Street Bridge was closed for repairs.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e “That’s what I’ll do,” he thought. “I’ll go over and watch them work on the bridge. When they quit, I’ll get up on the bridge and jump off. Since I can’t swim, I’ll drown even if the fall doesn’t kill me.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e With his plan now established, Irving started walking briskly toward the bridge, now only six blocks away. As he hurried along, someone thrust something into his hand and said, “Jesus is the answer.” Irving just hurried on unconscious of the leaflet clutched in his hand.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Ten minutes later, Irving was peering through a “Sidewalk superintendent’s\" window at the workmen moving about on the 2nd Street Bridge. After watching for what seemed like only 15 minutes, Irving reached up to wipe his brow and almost poked himself in the eye with the leaflet. Now that it had finally caught his attention, Irving started reading it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e The main headline at the top of the first page was like a slap in the face to Irving. It fairly screamed, “WHERE WILL YOU SPEND ETERNITY?”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e His body jerked hard just once in reaction, and a vert\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Xlibris Corporation","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47179448418544,"sku":"9781469112190","price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781469112190_p0.jpg?v=1763698580","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781469112190","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}