A sojourn is a relatively short period of time when a person stays somewhere other than home. It’s a temporary stay or visit that’s usually associated with a specific purpose. During a sojourn, people are outside of their natural environment. They adjust to their new place of residence to some degree, but it never becomes [...]
Every story worth telling begins with an “inciting incident” … something that upsets the balance in a person’s life and drives them forward in an unpredictable and sometimes scary direction. As they react to the incident—trying to restore balance and regain control—their lives are forever altered. Their decisions and subsequent actions either help or hinder [...]
My son Sky has always liked machines and big challenges. One vivid memory I have is of him driving our tractor across the field as Tony and I threw bales onto the hay wagon. Sky was only six or seven years old, so his feet barely reached the pedals. But he was grinning from ear [...]
When Mel Gibson’s movie came out (The Passion of the Christ) some might have been confused by the title, because the word passion is used today mostly to describe sex or something else we especially enjoy. “He has a passion for sailing,” we hear, or “she’s passionate about her work with kids.” But for centuries [...]
Vow renewal ceremonies have been around for a while, but only became popular in the 1970s. Now, in the U.S, they make up from 25 to 30% of all wedding ceremonies being booked. Some are elaborate and costly. TV star Rachel Ray and her husband treated their friends and family to a weekend in a [...]
I grew up in the turbulent 60s, graduating from high school in 1964. Sometimes we look back at this time in our history and giggle, thinking it was mostly about hippies and “flower power”, the Beatles, and miniskirts. But much deeper issues were brewing, bringing profound change. Civil rights protests were shaking the South, drugs [...]
Nothing hurts us like betrayal. It’s hard enough when an enemy turns on us, upending our lives with cruel sabotage. But when we’re betrayed by someone close to us, someone who’s shared life with us for some time, we’re stunned by the enormity of the pain it brings. As a quote I found online expressed [...]
February is the month we acknowledge and celebrate love. People have written a lot about the wonder of love. Some of the quotations we’ve memorized, we’ve heard them so much: “Love is blind” (Geoffrey Chauncer); “Love conquers all” (Virgil); and “’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all” (Alfred [...]
The Baby Boomers among us will remember the old Phil Spector song (1958) that declares: “To know, know, know him is to love, love, love him; Just to see him smile makes my life worthwhile. To know, know, know him is to love, love, love him. And I do. And I do.” Of course, he [...]
When I was a young Christian we used to crack jokes about 1 Timothy 4:8, thinking it was justification for not staying in good physical shape. Here’s how it reads in the KJV (the version we read back then): “For bodily exercise profiteth little, but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the [...]
Adventuring with God 