True Strength

October 1 is also the birthday of Jimmy Carter, born in Plains, Georgia, in 1924. A successful peanut farmer, he got interested in politics after refusing to join a citizens’ group that opposed the racial integration of schools. After serving as governor of Georgia, he eventually became the 39th president of the United States. Most Sundays of his adult life, he has taught Sunday school at his American Baptist Church. Carter once said: “A strong nation, like a strong person, can afford to be gentle, firm, thoughtful, and restrained. It can afford to extend a helping hand to others. It is a weak nation, like a weak person, that must behave with bluster and boasting and rashness and other signs of insecurity.”