What Changes Do You Plan to Make? Happy New Year! From my family to yours, I hope that you have a safe, healthy, and prosperous year. The new year is a time when many people make New Year’s resolutions. Common ones include losing weight, saving money, going back to school, finding a better job, improving or […]
Take Time to Tell God What You’re Thankful For on Thanksgiving and Every Other Day Too The church I attended several years ago had a Thanksgiving practice of having members stand to share what they were thankful for. From my perspective this never went well, with too much silence or too much forced sharing and […]
Remembering Those Who Gave Their Lives This Monday will be Memorial Day in the USA. It is a national holiday set aside in memory of military personnel who died while serving their country. As such it should be a solemn day of remembrance, attending parades and visiting the graves of loved ones. Memorial Day is […]
Happy Mother’s Day In honor of Mother’s Day, I give my praise to all mothers. I want to salute all moms by commending one mom in particular. The Bible simply says she was the wife of Manoah. Though we don’t know her name, we know her son’s name: Samson. God promised to give a child […]
We’ve Lost Christmas as a Spiritual Celebration. Let’s Not Lose Easter Too Recently some groups have banned Easter egg hunts—not the activity but the name. Concerned pundits decry this as political correctness gone awry or the timid majority kowtowing to the vocal minority. Although “spring egg hunt” sounds lame, this new label doesn’t dismay me. […]
Without Good Friday, There Would be No Easter At one time, my dad received his paycheck every other week, on the last day of the workweek. With a smile, he called each of these paydays good Friday. (And he called the other Fridays Passover!) Dad enjoyed good Friday twenty-six times a year. Some years the […]
Let’s play word association. I say “St Patrick” and you might say “March 17,” “shamrock” (three leaf clovers), “Ireland,” “leprechaun,” or “green beverages.” To be cute, you might even answer with an Irish brogue. Just like Christmas and Easter, St. Patrick’s Day is a celebration of religious origin, of which the original meaning has been […]
Moving Toward Good Friday and Easter This week, many in the Christian community will observe Ash Wednesday, which marks the beginning of the season known as Lent, a solemn journey towards Easter. For some followers of Jesus, Ash Wednesday is little more than a notation on their calendar, whereas, for others, it is a meaningful spiritual […]
Remember to Celebrate Jesus’s Birthday As You Give and Receive Presents From my family to yours, we wish you a safe and happy Christmas as you celebrate Jesus’s birthday. As you spend this season with family and friends, may your celebrations be joyous and your time together be uplifting. May you receive the gifts given […]
Today is the fourth of July. Everywhere in the world, it’s the fourth of July. In the United States of America, however, it’s a special one. It’s the Fourth of July, a national holiday, officially known as Independence Day. It’s the day we celebrate our freedom as a country. Freedom is important to Jesus too. […]