When Your Desires Are Thwarted
Spiritual retreats have significantly impacted my life. During a retreat, something shifts in my heart, like a ratchet rotates it one way and it won’t twist back. In a concentrated time of prayer and …
All the Way Through
One morning, in my Daily Bible, I read a long hammerfest by the prophet Amos against a collection of evil nations: the Syrians, Philistines, Tyre, Edomites, …
The Long Neglected Spiritual Gift
In many Christian circles there is
controversy over the use (or even the existence) of many spiritual gifts. But almost
everyone agrees that one gift has been overlooked for too long, and …
Desires of The Heart
I’ve used my Scripture Meditation Plan for decades. It begins with a psalm of the day, and last Thursday’s was Psalm 37. It is best known for this one sentence: “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he …
What Can I Learn from Cancer?
Four weeks ago, my doctor told me that recent
tests indicate a high likelihood I have kidney cancer. The tests were the result of an appointment I
made because I felt run down. I thought I …
Finding Meaning in Suffering
Elisabeth Elliot is best known for being
a widowed-missionary, speaker, adjunct professor, and author of over twenty
books. She is least known for her one and only novel, No Graven Image.
It’s …
Happy Further’s Day
I dislike Hallmark Holidays. Yet I love
to give flowers to my wife on Valentine’s day, and I like to honor my parents
on Mother’s and Father’s Day (after all, they put up with my innumerable …
Forty Ways to Keep Your Lover
Paul Simon sang, There must be fifty ways to leave your lover, which was a fun song in 1975, but turned out not to be the life I was interested in. I preferred Dan …
He Loves Me … He Loves Me Not
A friend of mine used to begin every prayer: “Father, I love you.” When I first heard him, I thought it was cool. After a couple years, something began to seem strange. I liked that he loved God, but …
Don’t Believe Your Own Headlines
In ninth grade, my brother Andy’s locker
partner (the school drug supplier) had a bad trip on LSD. The bad trip
continued in a small series of scary flashbacks, and Kevin asked Andy if God …
Walking the Pond
“I’m going to walk” was the first thing I said to a quiet room and sleeping Cyndi. I was still prone in bed, but my inclination was in the direction of getting up. …
What About That GTO?
When I grew up in Detroit, the
population was over 1,200,000 people. I spent the next forty years living in
Ann Arbor, population of about 120,000. Last summer, my wife and I moved to
Brooklyn MI, …