dio Player If we could, let’s just sit together and take a few deep breaths. This will help me, and I hope it will help you… My friends, I am not even going to pretend that I can stand in the pulpit like it is any other Sunday. I going...
May our eyes be open to see You– because we are seen by You. May our ears be open to hear You– because we are heard by You. May our hearts be open to know You– because we are known by You. May our hands be open to share You–...
“Go, tell his disciples and Peter.” Ordinarily, I don’t put much weight in rumors. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not that righteous. I listen to rumors as much as the next person, but I don’t count on them. I do, however, hold them in my mind with some degree of curiosity,...
“He is not here. Come see the place where he lay. Then, go quickly and tell the good news to the others.” My good friend Leslie told me about sitting by her sister’s bedside in the last days of a long battle with cancer. She said her sister talked about...
This time last week I was still pinching myself, having just left a brief tour at my university of a new arrival of cultural artifacts from Iraq and Syria. A generous donor had gifted them to the university, entrusting our linguists to translate and catalogue these few remaining tokens of...
We have a lot of incredible kids here at Grace, and Charlotte Schoening is one of them. She goes by Lottie sometimes, and every time I see her she waves at me and runs over for a quick hug. A couple weeks ago, on Wednesday night at dinner, she came...
“Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say: ‘Father, save me from this hour?’ No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.” Two weeks ago, the Youth had a party to celebrate something called “Purim.” Purim refers to ancient dice used in high...
When Lisa and I got married, one of our weddings gifts was this cookbook from my maternal grandmother, who just turned 80. Grandy made note of many of my favorite recipes as a child, and she hand-wrote them into a journal, added photos of me from my first birthday party...
It is one of my favorite images from the genuine imitation leather Bible I received on my seventh birthday — the image of Jesus with his “whip of cords” driving the merchants out of the Temple. I think it is because in all of the other illustrations Jesus was sitting...
I have vivid memories of being in kindergarten playing with my friends at recess. Our school classrooms were a series of cottages with a playground behind them. Years later, two of those cottages became a restaurant on the main highway called “The Little Pig,” but that is another story for...