Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice... (Eph. 4:31) Let me call her Eleanor. She was in her seventies. I visited her every month. We would read scripture, pray, share communion together, and then she would launch into bitterly complaining about her mother. During …
Tag: pain
Singing the Lord’s Song
'How could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?' (Ps. 137:4) The Jews cried these words while they were being deported to Babylon. They had just witnessed their army being defeated, their Temple being destroyed, and God’s city being sacked. On their long march to Babylon, they worried about whether they would …
God’s Love in Christ Jesus
For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers…nor anything else will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:37 passim) I recently attended a funeral. It was a sad funeral for many reasons, one of which is that the man …
Encouraging One Another
Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed you are doing. (1 Thess. 5:11) She was a world-class athlete, who had competed at the Iron Man championship in Hawaii—which is 2.4 miles swimming, 112 miles biking, and 26.2 miles running. I had met her at the gym. If you sweat in close …
Our Struggles With Faith
But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, ‘We have seen the Lord.’ But he said to them, ‘Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails …
Jesus Sets Our Feet Upon a Rock
I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry. He drew me up from the desolate pit, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure. He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. (Is. 40:1-3) …
Sharing the Love of Jesus
Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins. (1 Pt. 4:8) He was a difficult man. Everywhere he went he was disruptive and disrespectful. People tried to avoid him. One day he burst into my office and said, “Today I’m going to tell you my story.” I didn’t know …
God’s Wondrous Love
But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. (Rom. 5:8) Three weeks after my son John was born we had to rush him to the hospital. He had a virus and his whole system was shutting down. Every night I stayed with him—touching his little …
Jesus’ Living Water
Come see a man who told me everything I have ever done! (Jn. 4:29) The woman had been married five times. She was currently living with a man without being married. Did her neighbors talk about her, judge her, and condemn her? Did she feel marked, shunned, and ostracized? One day she meets a …
Compassion, Acceptance, Understanding, Forgiveness
For with the judgment you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. (Mt. 7:3) My mother had been ill for a long time. When I became worried that she could die with only a minor cold, I decided to visit her so that we could …
Continue reading Compassion, Acceptance, Understanding, Forgiveness