A few days ago, I posted the following quote on my Facebook profile: “Jesus said, ‘Go… and make disciples,’ not converts to your opinions.” – Oswald Chambers A friend wrote in the comments, “How do you know what Jesus said?????” It is a good question, and worthy of a thoughtful, honest answer. I responded, “By studying the Bible. He said plenty in there, and it’s the only way we can know what He did say.” As it turns out, it…
Yes! It’s time to wake up. Wake up to what is going on around us, if you haven’t already. Wake up to what it means for our own lives, and for our children and grandchildren if we don’t at the very least speak into their lives the truths of God’s Word. By nature, I am a quiet homebody, getting well into my senior years. I would be perfectly content to live out the rest of my days reading, writing, playing…
As a starry-eyed teenager, I loved the song, “Young Love,” as sung by Sonny James on a record album we had in our home when I was when I was growing up. Some years ago, I came across another song, sung by Sonny James. It is beautiful in a different way. Not about young love, but at the other end of the spectrum… mature love, filled with memories and appreciation of all the shared years. When I found the song,…
THE NIGHT IN QUESTION Saturday, December 12, 2009. THE FACTS A young man worked his full shift at Independent grocery store, finishing at 11:30 pm. He He left town for a drive in the country, as was his usual practice, to go for a short drive to unwind before going home. The air very cold and crisp, but clear, in town. He did not know about the patches of heavy, thick ice fog here and there along the route he…
Two big things happened in my life during the past month. I’ll share the second one in a separate post, but the first one was the discovery of Preptober. “What is Preptober?”, you ask. Why, it’s October, the month of Preparation for NaNoWriMo, of course. NaNoWriMo NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month, a yearly event. Aspiring authors commit to writing 50,000 words of a new novel, during the month of November. This is my 19th consecutive year of participating….
“The new is in the old concealed; the old is in the new revealed.” – St. Augustine I first heard that quote when I was a teenager, and it stuck with me. It refers to the Old and New Testaments of the Bible, and the fact that God’s covenant of grace is evident throughout both. There are many prophecies and symbols of Christ’s death and resurrection, in the Old Testament, but the prophecies were not made clear until the New…
What do you do when get the worst news you can imagine, and your world falls apart? Tim Challies is a blogger and author, and an elder at Grace Fellowship Church in Toronto, Ontario. He and his wife, Aileen, were blessed with two daughters and a son. On November 3, 2020, their son, Nick, died very suddenly and unexpectedly, while participating in a sports activity at his college. The cause remains unknown. Tim’s struggle in the loss of his son…
Every year at this time, I am reminded that December is not a joyous month for everyone. And every year at this time, I am reminded of the worst December ever, for our family. December 2009 is when we lost our beloved son and brother, James. The night before James died, our whole family got together to celebrate the marriage of our oldest daughter, Irene. We did not know it was the last time our family would be all together….
“The Bible talks about a false Jesus and a false Gospel. Jesus Himself speaks of this in Matthew 24:4-5 and Paul speaks of this in the beginning of his second letter to the Corinthians and warns of a ‘false gospel’ in his letter to the Galatian people. Which Jesus do you follow?” – Melissa Dougherty Had you asked me ten years ago if I’d ever been taken in by New Age teaching, I would have responded with a resounding, “No!”…
Toddlers, Teens, and the Twilight Years What do they have in common? To name a few…They can do things they have never done before, or can’t do things they’ve always done before.They are misunderstood by those around them.They don’t understand themselves or what is happening to them TODDLERS We had seven children, but we never experienced the “terrible two’s”. One evening at supper, fourteen-month-old James began smashing his mashed potatoes with his spoon, splattering them all around. I thought he…