Month: July 1994

Living Close to God

Over the years I have known people whose lives manifested a unique sense of God’s presence and power. Some are now in heaven. Some are still serving the Lord.

A Stone or Bread?

No loving father would give a stone or a snake to his hungry son if he asked him for a piece of bread or a fish. Jesus used the absurdity of that analogy in Matthew 7 to underscore God’s readiness to give good things to His disciples when they asked Him. He wanted them to have complete confidence in the heavenly Father’s provision for their spiritual needs.

Ascended and Enthroned

Call the roll of some of the states men and dictators who for a brief time dominated the global stage in this century: Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Kaiser Wilhelm II, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin. Where are they now? Dead and buried! But where is Jesus Christ, the rejected and crucified first-century Galilean? He is alive forevermore, enthroned in celestial glory.

Fish Hard

Okay, I admit it. I like to fish. No, I’m not the buy-the-latest-bass-boat, get-out-every-weekend kind of guy. But I enjoy fishing for walleyes at a nearby dam in the summer or catching perch through the ice on one of Michigan’s many lakes in winter.

A Born Atheist?

All of us have an innate sense of God’s existence (Rom. 1:18-21). But some may suppress that deep-down awareness of God and may even convince themselves that He is not real—until a moment of crisis.

The Lord and You

In her book Lincoln’s Daughters of Mercy, Marjorie Greenbie tells about Mother Bickerdyke, who worked with General Sherman during the Civil War. She brought relief to thousands of wounded and dying Union soldiers.

Real Help When We Do Wrong

When an unmarried girl who had become pregnant walked across the platform to receive her high school diploma, the audience gave her a standing ovation.

The Best News Ever!

I knew immediately that the person on the other end of the phone was feeling defeated. It was evident in her voice. She had called to tell me that a verse of Scripture was bothering her. After quoting Jesus’ words, “What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” (Mark 8:36), she said she felt that the verse described her.

The Truth About Truth

When Harvard University was founded, its motto was Veritas Christo et Ecclesiae—“Truth for Christ and the Church.” Its crest showed three books, one face down to symbolize the limitation of human knowledge. But in recent decades that book has been turned face up to represent the unlimited capacity of the human mind. And the motto has been changed to Veritas—“Truth.”