Somewhere, on a Sunday morning, people are filing out of a chapel after the service and the pastor spots a teenage boy, waiting by himself for his parents to finish socializing. There’s an exchange that goes something like this: Pastor: “How are you, Jeff?” Jeff: “Fine.” The young man fidgets, looks off in the..
The deck outside our kitchen window is newly finished, and it aches for teak furniture of some sort, and striped cotton pillows, and iced buckets of chardonnay and the barbecue simmer of steak and green peppers in olive oil. Music would be nice–and friends, of course–and one of those well-buttered conversations that sizzles on..
A Facebook friend was a bit surprised, recently, when I availed myself of the term “golly.” I can certainly understand her concern, and I was flattered to think I had somehow projected the sort of image that would have been blemished by its indiscriminate use. It’s really one of the nicest things you can..
Have you ever attempted a long chat with someone who doesn’t appear to be living on this planet? I have. I could say many things about them, but it’s clear they see no heaven in the here and now. The kingdom is not “at hand,” for them. It’s somewhere else. Somewhere far away. They wish..
iChurch? There’s a new gold rush on in California, and it comes with its own praise music. According to confidential industry insiders, three of Silicon Valley’s biggest technology firms are in bidding wars to buy up the nation’s largest churches. “Not many pastors are truly entertaining,” said a stock market analyst close to the acquisition..
Humphrey Bogart once said ” Acting is like sex: you either do it and don’t talk about it, or you talk about it and don’t do it.” Well, there may be a few Tahitians out there — the sort Margaret Meade never actually met — who just kind of fall into sex the way other..
The Bill Gothard Mess.. Somewhere, out on the prairie, a weary, broad-shouldered rancher settles down on a log by the fire. His wife is nearby. She’s gorgeous. She wears cowgirl denim and a blouse tight enough to reveal the Almighty’s blessings without causing pandemonium amongst the hired hands. She slides down onto..
My wife is a heart-mender. She’s strong but tender; she proposed a get-away week-ender, sort of a tension-ender. So, wenders we, freeway bound, we were brought to a complete stop by traffic and the bender of a fender some miles away, or so we conjecture. She’s driving. So off the freeway I send her, in..
My remarks at mom’s funeral Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. She seeketh wool, and flax,..
Someone very close to me, one of the hardest working young men I know, is just now finding out what the “Affordable” Care Act will mean for him: the private plan he pays for, currently at $380 a month, will go to $580 a month, and he will receive fewer benefits and endure higher deductibles…