I’m reading a book called “Everything happens for a reason and other lies I’ve loved”. The title alone is provocative enough but the rest of the book challenges the notion that God is this great cosmic conductor who orchestrates everything that happens both good and bad. The author (seminary
I’ve coached wrestling for many years. Advent reminds of the time I walked up to a wrestler lying on the bleachers before his match and said “It’s time for you to warm up, you have a match in a little bit.” The wrestler glanced up with a very sleepy
Circumcision is one of those topics I don’t remember ever learning about when I was in Sunday school. As a matter of fact, not only did my Sunday school teachers avoid this topic but so did my parents, the pastors in the churches I've attended; even my religion teachers
In the story of creation we’re told that God created everything, but then it tells us something very peculiar. The text says "God saw all that he had made and it was very good." Gen 1:31 What a strange thing to say. Doesn’t it seem a little odd to
(This devotional was written in the midst of the Covid pandemic 2020 and yet I’m hopeful that the message applies even today) Every once in awhile something will happen in life that makes me see a passage in the Bible as never before. Acts chapter 2 had always seemed
A number of years ago a popular show on TV was called “Are you Smarter than a 5th Grader”. The show pitted adults against 5th graders to see who could answer a variety of questions typically taught to kids during the early years of school. I watched a number
Every year in an Old Testament class that I taught, I’d ask my students to think of the wisest person they know. It was almost always a parent, a grandparent or a teacher they’d had. They were typically older, grizzled veterans of a life well lived. When I asked them why
Every year around Halloween there is the annual replaying of scary movies on TV; Friday the 13th, Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street. These slasher films are part of our collective cultural consciousness. Most of us have seen at least one of these. They’re some of the highest grossing films
I want to share with you a list of some of the things I love: Pizza, mexican food, ice cream, running, my dogs Tate and Gracie, my wife, my kids, football on a Saturday afternoon, the show Survivor, Waffle House, classic rock and bourbon. If you think about it,
A friend once suggested I watch the Netflix series The Walking Dead. He acknowledged that it’s a show about Zombies but that I should give it a try because it has a number of themes that make it compelling drama. I hadn’t watched a Zombie movie since the days
