What is the result of prayer? Does it make the pray-er feel better? Yes, but it does more than that. Does it fulfill biblical instructions? Yes, but it does more than that. Does it follow the model of Jesus? Yes, but it does more than that. Prayer opens heaven. Jesus lived with an open heaven….
I don’t have many known enemies, an enemy being one “who is actively opposed or hostile to someone.” As a matter of fact, I may have more unknown enemies than known ones. Part of the reason may be because I basically like people – even those with whom I disagree. I find it easier to…
In recent years I have posted serious prayer requests on social media – twice for my wife’s surgeries, related to her fractured pelvis, and hip replacement, and once for my brother’s multiple bypass surgery. Friends replied in large numbers, many with encouraging, and supportive comments. Some however, simply responded with the word, ‘praying.” Perhaps I’m…
Imagine this. The children of Israel wandering about in the wilderness, thinking back to the Egyptian food they missed. “We remember the fish which we ate freely in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic” (Numbers 11:5). What if someone had delivered this bit of news to them — “University…
I don’t remember laughing so hard and so long as I did last week in the Vanderbilt Medical Center Cardio Vascular ICU. My brother Breakfast Bob had endured triple bypass surgery and was in the recovery area, still very much under the influence of multiple medications. It was time to move him from the bed…
We’ve just celebrated Resurrection Sunday, so what do we do now? One of the first things Jesus said to His followers after His resurrection was in the form of a command. He told them to go and tell others what had happened and what they had experienced (Matthew 28:10, 19; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:47; John…
I once had a person who disliked me very much and tried to discredit my every action. In fact, at times, they were quite proactive in their attacks on my family and on me. How should I have prayed for such a person? The human side of me wanted to pray evil on them, to…
Why do I repeat the same frustrating experience every March? Sixty-four college basketball games lure me (and thousands of others), to predict the winner. I’m not sure exactly what temptation faced Amos when he replied to Amaziah, “I was no prophet, nor was I a son of a prophet” (Amos 7:14), but I should repeat…
It is Spring Break time in Texas. It may freeze again on Easter weekend, but this week the sun is shining, the flowers are blooming, and the grass is turning green again. What to do with such a time when you are too old to go to the beach, and too broke to go to…
In the spring of 1952, Billy Graham preached a crusade in Rice Stadium, on the campus of Rice University in Houston, Texas. I was eleven years old and lived only blocks away from that 70,000 seat football stadium. My father was on one of the committees that served the crusade, and I attended the meetings. …