What do you say we all agree to put a period in the creeds immediately after professing our belief in the Holy Spirit? Wouldn’t that make life easier? Since many of us in mainline Protestant churches don’t know what to say about the third person...
Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish-American industrialist who led the expansion of the American Steel industry in the late 19th century. He became one of the wealthiest and most philanthropic Americans in history. When a journalist asked him the secret of his success Carnegie replied, “I...
It is another sad time in the world. Names like Newtown, Charleston, and Columbine ring in our minds as we hear the name Manchester. Twenty-two people were killed in Manchester, last week and another fifty-nine wounded as a bomb exploded just as young people were...
Our grandson Nathan graduated from high school this past week. I can’t believe it! During the graduation festivities, our son Ryan, our daughter-in-law Holly, and her parents, Rick and Pat Bollinger were remembering the day Nathan was born…it seems like only yesterday! We remembered that...
This week I’m on a retreat with some of the best friends I’ve ever had. These brothers from Birmingham have given me a sense of what Jesus meant when he redefined family as those who do the will of the father, a family that exhibits...
In her best-selling book, Team of Rivals, author Doris Kearns Goodwin describes the day that Abraham Lincoln took office as President of the United States. Unlike his predecessor, James Buchanan, who limited his Cabinet to “like-minded” people from the same political party, Lincoln shocked the...
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and...
Abraham Lincoln described the inestimable value of mothers when he said, “no one is poor who had a Godly mother.” Despite Lincoln’s words, maternal relationships can be complicated. For many of us, Mother’s Day can be a joyful day centering on the baptism of...
I was leading a seminar for a group of pastors and lay leaders serving local congregations when a pastor asked me a provocative question. She said, “You work with pastors all over America and Scotland now, instead of serving one congregation. From your experience with...