A casual observance of society reveals loyalty is a lost art. In earlier days, sports fans could expect professional athletes to remain with one team for the life of their career. Now loyalty yields to a “show me the money” mentality. My grandparents believed, to guarantee a long marriage they should leave the word “divorce”…
While teaching a class on Prayer at the Hong Kong Baptist Seminary, I quoted Isaiah 30:15 to illustrate prayerful meditation, “In quietness and confidence shall be your strength.” The blank look of the faces of the students told me I needed to stay on this subject a bit longer. Facing me was a classroom of…
Bellmead, Texas – the home of my early childhood. Thomas Wolfe was correct, you can’t go home again, but you can go through what’s left of home again. I did that recently. The house where we lived is no longer livable. Many of the houses my grandfather built are gone. The family grocery story is…
I’ve had more than my share of introductions in life. From the Pastor who read the entire Seminary produced Biographical Information – both pages, to the man who said, “This man needs no introduction to us. So, here he is.” Some times I’ve had to live up to my introductions, other times I’ve had to…
What causes people not to finish well? The question lodged in my mind following an illustration used by my pastor in a recent sermon. Noah, served God faithfully, followed God’s instructions to the letter (or maybe to the cubit), saved his family, then ended in a drunken stupor (Genesis 9:20-21). Jacob dreamed of God’s promise…
In a group meeting we were discussing the negative features of a recent experience. One member blurted out, “It was a God thing!” When reminded of still other negative features, the self-appointed super-saint insisted, “Everything is a God thing!” I am aware of God’s sovereignty, omniscience, omnipresence, and even the fact that it can be…
In my many years of attending faculty meetings, I found them to be both informative and boring. Every so often something would happen that enlivened the meeting. In one such meeting during a curriculum discussion a favorite colleague of mine said, “What we really need is a course in common sense.” Unaware of how such…
Last week we celebrated Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. I remembered that in June of 1964 the Southern Baptist Convention met jointly in Atlantic City with several other Baptist Conventions. I attended with my Pastor/Father as a college graduation present/trip. One afternoon, I made a decision to slip away from the SBC meeting, and attend…
During my teaching years I often wondered why those who were saved as college students or older, were often more aggressive with their evangelistic witness than those who were “born in church” and became believers as a child. Then later I suffered sciatic pain stemming from bulging disks in my lower back. For nine months…
I confess that sometimes I fall asleep while praying on my bed at night. I have often felt guilty of this, especially when I wonder how excited God is about my prayer, when I can’t even stay awake to complete it. On other occasions, I feel OK with it, since sometimes God responds to my…