Category: Life Issues
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...
Mirror, Mirror on the Wall – Lie to Me!
It is an exercise in reluctant self-abnegation for me to show my driver’s license. I long for somebody to say, “But that’s not you!” Sadly, it is. As Popeye declares, “I yam what I yam.” And what I “yam” is looking fairly pathetic. Paul had this...
Losing Heart: The Christian’s Fierce Foe
I face an enemy daily, sometimes hourly. Perhaps you know him too. Many are his names. So ubiquitous, so pervasive, so insidious is he that the New Testament identifies him six times as “Losing Heart.” Losing Heart invites us to embrace discouragement, agree to quitting, welcome...
Justifying Ourselves Before Men
The Kingdom of God is filled with men and women who were once self-justifiers. People are always seeking to vindicate themselves before God and others. And, apart from Christ, how you talk, what you wear, what you drive, where you travel and what you fight for...
