This past week, when I was at Target, I noticed a line of men about ten or fifteen deep snaking towards the back of the store. Without obviously staring, I assessed that they all seemed to be somewhere in their twenties and thirties. I looked around to try to figure out what they were waiting for. Finally, my curiosity got the best of me and I asked a store clerk who stood nearby. “Oh, some new Pokémon cards or something are coming out today.” Wait. What? Grown men waiting for Pokémon cards? Are you kidding me? The clerk at the check-out counter elaborated further. Pointing over to the lady wh ..read more

Movement caught my eye as I sat on the porch. I looked up a bit to the right and saw a robin sitting in the “y” of a branch. She had something in her mouth and was busily moving around. I realized that I was watching her build a nest right then and there. It was the coolest thing. She would take the longest time to get the bit of string or grass in her mouth situated at the right place and then fly off to find another one. Sometimes it would fall from her mouth and she would have to fly down and pick it back up again and start the process all over again. Sometimes she would put a piece of fuzz ..read more

Once again, there it was on Instagram for the whole world to see. A scantily clad young lady in a provocative pose. I knew that girl once, back when she was a little girl. I see so many kind and loving Christian girls that have never been taught the harm they are doing to both themselves and to the young men around them. Not only through dressing so immodestly but also by broadcasting it to the whole world via social media. You see, as a woman when you dress immodestly and then pose in a seductive way, you receive attention. Men look at you appreciatively and often give much desired attention ..read more

I’ll never forget that moment I realized he was gone. Mom thought he was with Dad. Dad thought he was with Mom. And then there was that awful moment when we realized that no one knew where their two-year-old was. In a panic, most of us started running towards the beach where we had last seen him. Our grandson isn’t a wanderer so we knew he hadn’t gone off on purpose and that definitely helped calm us a bit. When we got to the edge of the beach, we looked all around and finally spotted him a ways down to the left, standing in a tidal pool. My youngest daughter took after him (I didn’t even kno ..read more

Oftentimes, we evaluate our lives as we approach the end of the year. We examine our life in regards to health, career, education. We consider our bank accounts and we reflect on our relationships. We ask: What could we do better next year? The most important questions we can ever ask ourselves as we evaluate our past year are: Do I look more like Christ? and Did I learn any spiritual lessons? After all, these are the only things of lasting and eternal value. Education, good jobs, making money, and beautiful homes are nice, but they aren’t the heart of a Christian’s life. Popularity, fame, an ..read more

Worldliness in Parenting and Education If we are in the Word, we know that God hates when we love the world. We know that we are to remain unspotted from the world (James 1:27) and that to be friends with the world is to be God’s enemy (James 4:4). But what exactly does worldliness look like? In the first part of this series we defined worldliness according to scripture and then we looked at a few areas where worldliness creeps in. In that post we talked about entertainment, networking, and language. Today, starting with #4, I’d like to continue to look at areas where we are so prone to world ..read more

“The reason Social Justice is attractive to the church is because it doesn’t invite criticism.” My brother (Pastor Dean) said these words as we talked on the phone yesterday. I immediately realized just how profound his words were. Perhaps they are words each and every one of us should reflect upon. There are many good things the church does that all people love. It matters not if they are Christian or not Christian. Nothing matters as we work hard with our fellow man to make the world a better place. This includes things like– Feeding the hungry  Adopting orphans  Caring for the homeless Pr ..read more

We have become a people that responds to issues. Whether it’s our own emotional health (anxiety and depression) or our kids well-being (ADHD, anger issues, rebellion), our situations at work and church (relationship problems), or our marriages (struggles and strife) we work hard to find an escape hatch very quickly. We want to be free of the hassle, inconvenience, grief, and pain that these things bring. And so we quickly medicate, change jobs or churches, or leave our spouse. Before I continue on, let me be clear about something. I am not judging you individually. I know that some people leg ..read more

We dropped our youngest daughter off at college last week. Thirty-four years ago, I was the one being dropped off at college. I remember my dad loading everything in our red and white van and then our whole family, along with a favorite aunt and uncle, climbing into that van and heading west. As a freshman, I was both nervous and excited. Mostly, if I am honest, I was excited about meeting some new guys and possibly (hopefully) meeting “Mr. Right”. In that era, girls were teased about going to school for their M.R.S. degree. While that wasn’t why I was there, I have to admit that I was harbor ..read more

I heard someone ask Ray Comfort the other day if he stills gets scared when he witnesses to people. If you don’t know who Ray Comfort is, you will find him at Living Waters teaching people how to share the Gospel and doing a lot of that himself. After all these years you would think he’d be super comfortable sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with others, but he actually said he is still terrified. And then he said he has learned how to hold that terror and gave a little analogy that I wanted to share here– If you had a pool filled with floating ice cubes and the coldest water you could im ..read more