I discovered this verse earlier this year. Since then, it has become my call to arms. I often write about prayer, how the God who created the world wants to hear from us and answers when we call. Sometimes those answers are immediate, even as we are praying, like...

This Psalm contains many repetitive themes, to the point I made a table to outline them. My prayer is that others may learn from and enjoy this Psalm of David as much as I do. 1 I will praise the Lord at all times.I will constantly speak his praises.2 I will boast only...

I did not have a Facebook account yet. Facebook opened to the general public in September 2006, and I joined (to keep up with my still in college/grad school friends and family). To be fair, I didn’t blog much back then either. I had a “real” job, with a...

This week, a friend posted the latest in the Planned Parenthood scandal. This article has a video (I didn’t watch the video, but there is a graphic warning). However, the still image is clearly not a “lump of cells.” The Facebook preview of the article showed the still image,...

Being a child of the Eighties, I grew up with Sesame Street (I believe older episodes were better). Jim Henson’s Muppets made the show, in my opinion. Kermit the Frog was among my favorite characters. The Muppet Movie (the original) remains my favorite of all Muppet movies. I’m surprised...

Esther is the only book in the Bible that does not mention God by name, yet his providence is seen throughout these short ten chapters. The book takes place during the time of exile and the reign of Persia. The book opens with King Xerxes giving a feast. Everyone...

Nehemiah and Ezra worked on the Temple and the city wall together. Their stories overlap yet present different information and points of view (like the four gospel accounts). In the past, I paid little attention to the return of the captives, skimming over the story in a rush to...

The book of Ezra opens with Cyrus releasing a portion of the remnant to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the Temple of God. He returns the items taken by King Nebuchadnezzar and offers the Israelites everything needed for the task. Soon, his edict is forgotten. Lesson 1: People forget...

I enjoy watching lightning flashes and listening to thunderstorms. I marvel at the differences in storms between the flat plains of Texas, the mountains of Colorado, or the countryside of Germany. On occasion, I gazed over the horizon as a wall cloud formed, unable to look away. This seemed...

When we moved into our apartment, Madilynn refused to come down the stairs by herself. After about a week, with some assistance and modeling by Big Brother Dietrich, she started to scoot down the stairs on her bottom. This past week, she began walking both up and down the...