Family Life

I cut Debbie’s hair the other day, and I cut it way shorter than usual. Debbie has long hair, and every six months or so she complains about how unmanageable it’s getting. Then I cut off two or three inches and everybody’s happy. This time I took off about eight inches. That’s a lot. Her [...]

The Samaritan woman at the well wasn’t terribly popular with the other women of her town. She had a pretty colorful history and was probably tired of the gossip and slights of the others. So she came to draw water when nobody else would be there. When Jesus asked for water, she replied with an [...]

At bedtime prayers with the boys tonight, Joel asked me to pray for “keep me safe of dinosaurs, dragons, monsters and things like that.” So I did. A thunderstorm was passing by, and knowing how much Joel dislikes thunder I also prayed that God would protect the boys from thunder, lightning and the storm. Then [...]

Stephen Lawhead’s novel Byzantium opens with “I saw Byzantium in a dream, and knew that I would die there.” And so Aidan, a young Irish monk, goes through much of the book really stressed about his own demise upon reaching Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine empire. Despite his grave misgivings he sets sail from [...]

Today at church the speaker reminded me of an excellent example of what I posted yesterday. He spoke about Joseph, and how he endured hatred, injustice and suffering, and yet through it all maintained his integrity and faith. I remembered a Bible study series from many years ago that presented Joseph as a type of [...]