In this season of graduation speeches, I thought it would be good to revisit three important words which we rarely hear in public use, and whose original meanings are therefore fast disappearing. I will start with tolerance, defined as a fair, objective, and permissive attitude toward those whose opinions, beliefs, practices, racial or ethnic origins, etc., differ from one's own. Notice that tolerance requires me to give others the right to believe and to say what they want, though I am not...
This month’s post is written primarily to believers. It will make little sense to others, and even believers don’t typically spend much time focused on Spiritual Warfare, which is exactly what Satan wants, and makes his destructive mission much easier. Satan particularly hates believers because we will spend eternity where he began but can never return: in Heaven with God. He does everything he can to lie and to confuse, insuring that as few people as possible accept Christ’s free gift of...
This Saturday I spent the first part of the day on two unrelated but connected events. In the morning I assisted my talented wife as she visited several Estate Sales on their second days, looking for bargains from the belongings of those who moved to a different place, either to a different home or to the life beyond. And then we attended the Memorial Celebration for a mother, grandmother and thirty-year-career elementary school teacher who I’m sure left behind many physical things, but...
After a season of grand political events, this month’s post will be more narrowly focused and personal. Last week I had my first-ever battle with kidney stones, from Saturday afternoon thru Thursday evening, when a surgeon at Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta removed one stone and pulverized the other. In between there was quite a bit of constant pain. As I reflect on this week of unexpected events, I have the following offerings: Our American healthcare system is amazing, and we tamper with it at...
We have just returned from two extended family events: our 38th year at a conference center’s Guest Period in the North Carolina mountains, and the celebration of a great aunt’s long and remarkable life in Vermont. The purpose of this short post is to extol families, and to encourage all of us to do everything we can to hold fast to every family member. Before there were tribes, governments, or churches, there were families. The family is the basic building block of every society and...
This is a very personal post, offering some perspectives to those who have been watching both political conventions, and who are led to worry that we live in an extraordinarily tough time. I attended the 1968 DNC in Chicago as a young, disenfranchised Challenge Delegate from Georgia, where the government was really only the Democratic Party, which, by the way, systematically disenfranchised Blacks all across the South and our state, while the Governor sold ax handles at his restaurant to...
Most believers have experienced friends or family members who tell them “I used to be a Christian, until I studied the Bible.” Or some variation on the “I’m too intelligent to believe in a Mesopotamian myth” theme. I heard that again this week from a wonderful, talented person. There are many robust responses to this assertion. For those who enjoy intellectual engagement, two excellent resources are Tim Keller’s The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, and Ken Boa’s I’m Glad You...
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