January 2012
4 posts
Watch out for Christians and politics
I always get nervous when election time comes because of how some Christians act. Many people believe that conservative Christians and evangelicals are nothing but a bunch of hypocrites and a right wing voting bloc for the Republican Party. On the other hand many believe that liberal churches and black churches are simply Democratic voting blocs. Unfortunately our actions often feed these...
As Captain Don't Abandon Your Ship
By now we have all heard the story and seen the pictures of the Italian cruise ship Costa Concordia running aground in Italy. It is hard to imagine how the captain could have intentionally sailed four miles off course and brought the boat so close to land. Now there are many reports of the captain abandoning ship and refusing the direct order to go back on board and lead. Last night on TV I heard...
I'm Sure God Wants Me Happy
Years ago Sam, (not his real name), sat in my office. He told me all about his unhappy marriage and his uncaring and unresponsive wife. He realized that he had been unhappy for years. Now he had met someone new at work. She was everything that his wife was not and since he started having an affair with her he was happier than he had been in a long time. He told me, “I know God wants me happy and...
Don't Let the Urgent Crowd Out the Important
Most everyone I know uses some sort of to-do list to keep things organized in their life. One of the frustrating challenges many of us face on a daily basis is figuring out how in the world can we get done all that needs to be done. My to-do lists grow and grow and there never seems to be enough time. Some folks get frustrated and just give up and do whatever hits them that day. Unfortunately that...
December 2011
3 posts
It WillBe a Different Christmas for Us This Year
The Christmas season is one of my favorite seasons of the year. I love the lights, music, trees, smells, and parties with friends, and let’s not forget the food. I really love getting with family. Most of all I love the worship and focus on Christ as our Savior and Lord. And there is something special about Christmas and children. I still remember our boy’s faces when they were preschoolers as...
The Wrong Crowd Got In On Christmas
While we often read the gospel of Luke at Christmas the gospel of Matthew offers some interesting insights. Matthew starts with the genealogy of Jesus. He was trying to convince Jews that Jesus was the Messiah that they have been waiting to come for over 1000 years.
If I’m honest I usually jump right over this long list of names of so and so was the father of whoever. I quickly recognize some of...
Same Christmas Truth, Different Perspective
The Christmas story is one of the best known in all of human history. Most everything we know about that first Christmas we know because we read it in the Bible. What is interesting is that in the gospels, the early recorded histories of the life of Christ, each tells the story in a different manner. Why would God have done it that way?
Many today believe there is just one way to share the...
November 2011
4 posts
Thanksgiving can be frustrating and great
George dreaded Thanksgiving with this wife’s family. Sure he liked all the turkey and fixings, but it was all the people and emotional drama that drove him nuts. He did not like the condescending way they treated his wife. Even though she was in her mid thirties and had two children they sometimes treated her like she was still an immature college student who did not know how to use a knife to cut...
Good News and Friendship that Last a Lifetime
It is always a relief to get good news. This Wednesday Deb and I walked into the surgeon’s office 22 months after she found lung cancer and removed the upper right lobe of my lung. Thankfully she told us today there are no signs of cancer at this time. Unfortunately because of my sarcoidosis, which is the other condition that causes cysts to form in my lungs and lymph system, they can’t say with...
Don't Cram it Down Their Throats
It was going to be a battle to get these big white pills down Rudy’s throat, but that is what the vet said he needed and somehow it became my job. Rudy was our usually affectionate beagle mutt. He had a sweet adorable face and sad eyes that stole Deb’s heart when she first saw him at the pound. Our boys were young at that time and over my better judgment we brought him home and the boys loved him....
We Need Courage
These are difficult days for us as a nation. We are technically not in a recession anymore, however, we are still in bad shape. There are ongoing fears of a “double dip” recession. For many people it feels like we never got out of the first one because job growth and the recovery has been so slow. We now have Occupy Wall Street protesters all over the nation and anger and frustration are bubbling...
October 2011
2 posts
Have Fun on Halloween, but use caution
Halloween has changed. When I was a kid back in the ancient days of the 1960’s, I don’t remember any parents running around with their children. Kids ruled the streets. For one night my neighborhood was full of ghosts, pirates, ballerinas, and princesses going from house to house looking for loot.
Our goal for the night, grab as much candy as one kid could possibly carry. This was a big deal in...
Singles need dating and courting.
Back in 1997 Joshua Harris wrote a book, ³I Kissed Dating Goodbye,² where he challenged the modern notion of romantic dating just to have a good time and encouraged singles to court instead. He has some great points and challenged singles to reflect on the biblical concepts of respecting the opposite sex and remaining sexually pure until marriage. While I agree with many of his arguments I have...
September 2011
5 posts
A Watered Down Faith
Billy is a good kid who lives just outside the Burlington city limits. His parents are really proud of him. He gets good grades in high school and he attends his church youth group. His parents, both leaders in church, are committed to their faith and are glad that Billy appears to be following their footsteps. Billy claims to be a Christian, as do the vast majority of the kids in our local high...
Pat Robertson is Wrong Again
I thought I had heard enough crazy, unbiblical, and unthinking remarks from Pat Robertson that nothing he said would surprise me. I was wrong. I¹m sure most of you have heard about the 700 Club viewer who asked Robertson about a friend leaving his wife who had Alzheimer¹s. Pat Robertson said, “I know it sounds cruel, but if he¹s going to do something, he should divorce her and start all over...
Some Christian Preachers are not Christian
I was driving my wife nuts again by rapidly flipping through the TV channels when I stopped on the Christian TV channel on our Time Warner cable service. There I heard the pastor tell a huge audience that each one of us is a prince or princess, a child of the king. God wants you to have this great life of health, wealth, prosperity, and fun, happy living. How? If you will just live right and pray,...
9 /11 Ten Years Later Have we Changed?
There are certain defining moments in a nation¹s existence that everyone alive will remember for the rest of his or her life. My parent¹s generation talked about where they were when Pearl Harbor was attacked. I remember exactly where I was in elementary school when my classmate Maria ran into the classroom screaming that President Kennedy had been shot. 9/11 was one of those days of infamy. Our...
What I wish I had known about marriage 35 years...
The last time some of us had been together over 30 years ago we were young, newly married seminary students. Now, 35 years later, most of us have been married for over three decades and have grandchildren. At our seminary reunion this summer we found out that some of the biggest changes many of us have experienced over these decades is in the way we have grown in our understanding of the roles of...
August 2011
4 posts
What I Wish I Had Known About God 35 Years Ago
In some ways it seems like yesterday I walked across that stage in Fort Worth Texas to receive my Masters of Divinity degree from Southwestern Baptist Seminary, and in some ways it seems like a million years ago. I was ready to attack hell with a water gun and take on all challenges. I had a college degree, a seminary degree, and a strong faith. As a 24-year-old I had life, God, and the Bible...
35 Years Later and Still Good Friends
We had waited for over a year and we were so excited that this special reunion was now here. The first weekend in August my wife Deb and I got together with eight other couples, some of whom we had not seen in many years. It had been 35 years since we had all started seminary together at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth TX, and I must say all the couples looked a lot older...
18 Months Later a Good Report - But no guarantee
January 20th 2010, I got the surprise of my life when coming out of the fog of a multiple hour surgery, the doctor told me I had lung cancer. Six surgeries and surgical procedures later they told me they got it all and I was clear, for the moment. The problem, as I¹m sure you know, is that cancer has a way of coming back. So far every check up since then has been good, but I knew that the 18 month...
“Unbroken”
– A book worth reading
July 2011
2 posts
Don't cause God pain
Far too many people have a childlike and poor concept of who God is. While God calls for us to have a simple childlike faith that is not the same as a childish faith. The stereotypical picture of an old man with a white beard and a long white robe is a poor image of God who is actually a spirit. Others think they have graduated to an image of God as some spirit or force way out there somewhere who...
Surprised in Berkeley
I was not sure what to expect when we pulled up at my son¹s new apartment in what is in my mind the liberal capital of the world, Berkeley California. My middle son Dave and his wife are both starting graduate school there this fall and after an awesome, yet long 3000 mile road trip we drove through the quiet neighborhood just north of campus that will be their home for the next two years. There...
June 2011
3 posts
Christ is for everyone in the world
Just 20 years after the resurrection of Christ some Christians were wondering if they had missed the second coming of Christ. The Christians in the city of Thessalonica asked the apostle Paul all about it. They wondered if the Christians who had died had missed the second coming and they were not sure how to be prepared for the return of Christ. Paul taught them a basic philosophy of life that I...
The Smart Way to Live
Throughout history people have been trying to figure out what is the best way to live. It is interesting that each generation of young people seems to think they have discovered some new cool way of living involving partying, drinking, and sexual freedom but the truth is this way of life have been around a long time. Thousands of years ago King Solomon tried the full extent of experimentation with...
Thank God for the Spider Catchers in Your Life
Sometimes my wife thinks I¹m nuts, which I can assure you is usually completely unfounded. When it comes to my choice of vacation, however, many seem to agree with her. When I need to get away one of my favorite activities is to go backpacking. There is something very challenging and refreshing about hiking 70 or so miles on the Appalachian Trail, which is what I got to do last week. The...
May 2011
4 posts
Be Prepared for Hard Times - And Good Times Too
It seems like folks are pretty upset these days about a lot of difficult things going on in our world, and one group even called for the rapture last Saturday. Whether it is gas near $4 a gallon, crazy weather patterns that bring killer tornadoes and hurricanes, or all the unrest in the Arab world, many are worried about how all this is going to impact our lives. One of the many things I love...
Religious People to Watch Out For
After today Harold Camping and his followers will have figured out they got the date of Jesus¹ return wrong once again. You might think they would learn, but I stand by my prediction he will recalculate and come up with another date. You watch. Actually the Bible warns us to watch out for certain types of religious people. False teachers like Camping are just one flavor of those we need to be on...
Be Ready for Christ¹s Return May 21, and Sometime...
Harold Camping is a preacher who claims that Jesus Christ is coming for his church next Saturday, May 21. I hope you are ready, but not because Camping is right. As the president of Family Radio, a so-called Christian radio station that has 150 outlets, and his exposure on the Internet and numerous billboards throughout the nation he has caused quite a stir with his predictions. Unfortunately this...
There Is Something Special About a Mother's Love
This has been a very hard week for us. My wife Deb lost her mother on Thursday morning. Just because we all have moms does not mean we understand a mother¹s love. It is a privilege to honor our mothers, and we need to do so far more than once a year. If your mom is still alive, and you forgot that tomorrow is Mother¹s Day, stop reading this and go get something now. It may not seem like a big deal...
April 2011
2 posts
Christian Atheists Believe in Easter
Tom and Martha are not skeptics. They are folks just like most of the people from around here. They were raised around church, but they don¹t go very often. They know the Easter story. They believe in Jesus and the resurrection. If you asked them they would tell you they are Christians but they would admit they are not very serious about living a ³religious² life. They would agree with the old...
Billy Ray Cyrus says he was a great friend, but a...
Several months ago Billy Ray Cyrus, father of superstar daughter Miley Cyrus, gave a telling interview with GQ magazine where he admitted he would do things very differently as dad if he could do it all over again. According to numerous interviews Billy Ray bought into the popular notion that the most important thing a parent can be is a good friend to their children. He said, “You know...
March 2011
4 posts
Brother, Pastor, Rev., Dr., Bishop, Apostle
Brother, Pastor, Rev., Dr, Bishop, Apostle Right out of college and just before I entered seminary I served as the youth pastor in a small church in the bustling metropolis of Hartwell, Georgia. At that time Hartwell had a Dairy Queen and the sum total of one traffic light that they turned off at 6pm because it was not needed after that. This was quite an adjustment for a boy raised in downtown...
Protect your marriage any way you can
Irene (not her real name) was a leader in my church in Virginia. She struck up a relationship on a social networking site with a man she had never known. After months of sending messages they started talking by phone. You probably already have guessed the tragic end of this story. This married mother with several young children left her husband, moved to a different city, and moved in with her new...
How to Understand the Bible
When I was a kid growing up I was told to read the Bible and God would speak to my heart through his Scriptures. While that is good advice, I had a hard time. First of all I don¹t remember anyone telling me how to read the Bible. Maybe they did and I was just a distracted kid but I sure felt I was on my own. The Bible I had back then was an ancient translation that was full of archaic words that...
Will Suicide Send You to Hell?
Often after the tragedy of a friend or loved one committing suicide I get the question, if someone commits suicide does that condemn him or her to hell? It is amazing to me how widespread this belief is. What distresses me greatly is the pain this question causes for grieving family members. The belief that suicide will automatically send one to hell is an indication of our lack of biblical...
February 2011
2 posts
Charlie Sheen's Great Advice to Lindsay Lohan
Charlie Sheen has never been one accused of having much wisdom. Most agree he is a good actor, currently evidenced by his ongoing role in the top rated comedy, ³Two and a Half Men.² He is in fact, as of 2010, the highest paid TV actor earning $1.8 million for every episode of ³Two and a Half Men.² Unfortunately being a great actor does not guarantee that you have even a lick of sense. His personal...
Couple in Trouble Over Sex
We live in a messed up world, especially when it comes to sex, and we are paying a high price for it. According to a new study by Oregon State University many young couples are not even in basic agreement about whether or not they have agreed to have sex just with one another or to have an open relationship. The researchers studied the responses from 434 heterosexual married and un-married couples...
January 2011
3 posts
Sharpening Our Memory
Eons ago when I was in college at Georgia Tech studying economics we had to memorize a lot of stuff for tests. Now that was back in the dark ages where you had to actually go to a place called the library to find written resources like magazines, books, and journal articles. A basic Texas Instruments calculator cost $120, and now you can buy a scientific calculator that can almost do your homework...
Good News!
Hi friends, I just got back from my one year checkup at Duke and the doctors said my CT scan looked the same, nothing has changed since last time, which is good news indeed. I was told to come back in 6 months for my next CT scan. Dr. Tong said congratulations, and that she was cautiously optimistic. Thanks so much for all your prayers! I’m so grateful, and excited about what the Lord has in...
Help for the Hurting
Maybe it is just my imagination, but it seems that many of my friends and acquaintances are going through especially difficult times. One friend has been diagnosed with stage four lung cancer, and he is fighting for his life. Several friends are going through major struggles in their marriage, and others are working through how to handle children who are rebelling and it¹s breaking their hearts....
December 2010
3 posts
Soak up Christmas Day
Merry Christmas! There is no other day in the year like Christmas. The lights, decorations, sounds and music, food, gifts, and family all make this a once in a year experience. I hope this will be a great Christmas, even if this has been a hard year for you and your family. Unfortunately many will miss the special joy and fullness God has for us in this season, but you don’t have to. This is a...
Christmas Gifts that Include Other Gifts
The wrapping paper was torn and thrown from one end of our den to the other. When you have three young boys opening presents on Christmas morning saving the wrapping paper is one of those nice ideas that does not have a chance. Each child had waited patiently for their turn to open their presents. We always start with the youngest child opening all their presents first, then the next oldest, all...
Lessons from Tiger Woods
Can you imagine getting a golf lesson from Tiger Woods? If you ever saw my golf game you would know that I could certainly use his help. However the most important lesson I could receive from Tiger has little to do with golf. It has been about one year since Tiger Wood’s infamous car wreck. We have seen a parade of women come and go, and watched as his golf game and marriage fell apart....
November 2010
3 posts
Black Friday Gone Wild
When will it end? I heard on the news today that opening up super early the Friday after Thanksgiving is not good enough for some stores. There is a growing race to get the shoppers out on “Black Friday” so stores that used to open at 9am, opened at 7am. Then other stores decided to beat them out and opened at 6am, 5am, or even 4am. Who in the world wants to get up at 3am to be some...
“Our kids are doing fine, they are handling things great.”
– George and Susan (names changed for obvious reasons) were going through some hard times in their marriage and they were trying to protect their kids from the stress and conflict. They were looking me in the eye and seemed sincere, but I wonder if they actually believed what they were saying or if...
Be careful where you give this Christmas
One of the most telling episodes of the Seinfeld TV show was the one where George decides to make up his own charity for Christmas. He creates the fake “Human Fund” charity and then proceeds to give Christmas cards to everyone telling them he made a donation in their name. His deception was exposed, however, when his boss tried to make a donation to the fund and found out George was a...
October 2010
3 posts
Common Sense about Halloween Major on the majors, minor on the minors. This was a struggle for Christians in the first century and it is still a struggle for Christians today. First century believers had different convictions about matters such as whether to eat meat sacrificed to idols or what day one should worship. Paul tells us to major on the majors, and not to “pass judgment on...
Love and Sex - Yes; Marriage - No
According to recent studies there has been another interesting impact of our latest recession. The percentage of couples living together outside of marriage has gone up dramatically in the last two years. A growing number of folks have given up on marriage all together and are saying yes to love and sex, but no to ever getting married. Most of the couples who have moved in together, however, plan...