Category: Life Issues
Seven Causes, and Remedies, for Joylessness
Why are you not more joyful? Oh, I know. You are warm and friendly, even bubbly at times. You are always enthusiastic when singing with your church. You smile a lot. You even handle troubles and trials with a positive attitude. But why are you not...
Selected Proverbs Regarding the Tongue
10:11 – The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life, but the mouth of the wicked conceals violence. 10:18 – The one who conceals hatred has lying lips, and whoever utters slander is a fool. 10:19 – When words are many, transgression is not...
Regarding Thursday: Comfort for Christians Facing Illness and Uncertainty About the Future
“Regarding Thursday,” I wrote to a friend, “please do not be worried.” She was a few days away from exploratory surgery which might reveal anything from a clean bill of health to cancer. In her email to me she had admitted her trepidation and asked for...
Reflections from a Week of Sickness
It was 3 a.m. and I was shivering. The problem? It was hot outside, and I was in a home without air conditioning. I was also far from my home because I was teaching at a church in another state for the weekend. As quietly as...
Preparing for the Funeral
My aged aunt suffered from a series of small strokes impairing her former elephantine memory. We cherish the story of the time she attended the funeral of her uncle William. On the way back the car passed the home of the deceased uncle. Her contemplative voice...
No Lay-up Shot: A Lesson from the Master
For some reason unknown to humankind, my older brother got to play golf on the distinguished Augusta National Golf Course, the course where perhaps the best tournament of the year is held—The Masters. It was there that the following life-shaping event took place. He was playing...
On Stumbling
Now as they were eating, He said, “Assuredly, I say to you, one of you will betray Me.” Jesus said to him, “Assuredly, I say to you that this night, before the rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.” Then Jesus said to them, “All...
Obtaining the Inheritance: The Big Story
It was a starry night when God told Abram, soon to be Abraham, that he would have as many descendants as the stars of the sky. On that same night He told him that the land he was on would be his also. I am the...
Moving to the Head of the Line
My dad had two fears: the nursing home and a long-winded speaker at his funeral. He avoided the first; the jury still debates the second. The call from his apartment building came unexpectedly on Thursday morning. “Your dad has passed out and has no blood pressure.”...
More Joy
God has graciously given me 41 years to walk before Him (Gen 17:1), to walk with Him (Gen 5:22), and to walk after Him (2 Kg 23:3). What an incredible privilege God gives His sons and daughters. Looking back now, with terminal cancer for the past...
