My Journal

Pretend you're a kid and lay down by the Christmas tree, scoot your head over until you're looking up into the branches.  Isn't it amazing the perspective from the inside?  Christmas isn't always what it seems from the outside. There is amazing beauty when...

Very few nights are truly silent.  We love the words of the carol, and the night of Jesus' birth was very still and quiet in a sacred sense.  But, in God's ears, there is no silent night as far as earth is concerned.  Every evening, He hears the soft...

What was it like for Mary to see the infant eyes of Emmanuel open on the world He came to save?  The One who watched as the universe came into being now stared into the darkness of a winter night. And in that sacred moment, Jehovah God loved us...

Can I celebrate Christmas without the traditional accompaniments? Can you?Personally, I'd rather not. There is something comforting about the cookies, the shopping excursions, the festive meals, the decorations.  Indeed, to avoid being a Scrooge, we delight...

It seems the way to ensure you will experience complications is to declare you will do a certain thing in a certain way.  It has indeed been that way for me this week. Setting myself a goal to do a daily Christmas post for 12 days unleashed myriad...

Apparently, for some with a vendetta against God, Christmas or the church, or who are merely obsessed with mischief, nativity scenes are of special interest. They come not to gaze at the simple beauty of the holy birth, but to confiscate the infant Savior. A...

Not Mine"Lo, children are an heritage from the Lord . . . . "  (Psalm 127:3)My children?No, not mine;Gifts unearned, undeserved they've been from birth.My flesh and blood?Yes, of earth;and yet, like me, their souls belong to Him.My possession?No, but His;Who lets...

In the Kingdom of God the alternatives are not boundless, not so long as we live in this mortal coil. You can't have it all.  You are not there to do yourself a favor. You many not have it your way.  You opted out of all that when you made up your mind to...

God works in a mysterious way.  That's a line from the old song by William Cowper. The divine operates so much differently than the human.  If it were me, I would fix things before they worsened.  But God does His work on a scale that we don't usually...

Recently, I was reading a bit of David Kinnaman's thought-provoking book unChristian. (Baker Books, reprint 2007.)  It deals with the younger generation's prevailing perception both of the evangelical church and of the gospel message we present.The purpose of the...