Time For War?
February 23, 2025 by Julie Cosgrove
Filed under Christian Life, For Her
By Julie Cosgrove
Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning hooks into spears; let the weak say, “I am a warrior.” Joel 3:10
The prophet Joel is reversing what Isaiah once said in 2:4- the more familiar verse that is often stated on greeting cards along with Peace on Earth near Christmas and into the New Year. We think of our Lord as a peaceful God, one that wants us to turn the other cheek, who told Peter to put away his sword in the Garden, who wouldn’t fight to defend himself from execution on the cross, and told His disciples after the resurrection “Peace I bring to You.” In fact, we call Christ the Prince of Peace.
Are You a Whiny Wimp?
February 22, 2025 by Sharon Autry
Filed under Daily Devotions, Personal Growth
By Sharon Autry
I am officially a wimp! I whine and complain about the most ridiculous things. Dried out leftovers. Missing the two-hour sale by five minutes. The smell of wet sneakers. Having to backtrack an aisle in the grocery store.
The Apostle Paul, on the other hand, was not a wimp. His “light and momentary struggles” included things like beatings, traumatic shipwrecks, and spending days, months, even years chained to a guard. Those things seem anything but “light” to me. But compared to the joy of offering people the hope of Jesus, Paul saw these persecutions as the temporary situations that they were.
Football Highlights
February 21, 2025 by Emily Chase
Filed under Stories
By Emily Chase
Every New Year’s Day, my father and my three older brothers SuperGlued themselves to the couch in order to watch football for eight or ten hours straight. They’d tune in to the Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, Gator Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, one after another all through the afternoon and into the evening with only brief time-outs to reach for the chips bowl. I didn’t share their passion for pigskin but I could get excited about the occasional touchdown.
My mother had even less interest in football yet she always looked forward to this sports marathon. An hour before game time, she would retrieve all the family silver and pile it at one end of the couch. Serving dishes, flatware, vases, teapots and trays were all about to get their annual polishing. On the coffee table in front of the couch, she’d set out the polish, a plastic basin filled with warm soapy water, and a pile of soft rags.
God’s Bus
February 20, 2025 by Marty Norman
Filed under Family Focus
By Marty Norman
It’s 2010, a time for one of my favorite activities – making New Year’s resolutions – the time of year when we wipe the slate clean. In other words, we get back on the bus and begin the ride all over again.
I love wiping the slate clean. You’d think that after doing so for more than my share of years, I’d not be surprised my resolutions have such a short life span. I guess the New Year just comes around too often. Every time I look up it’s time to re-evaluate and take stock again. Does this bus never arrive at graduation?
God-Incidents
February 19, 2025 by James Watkins
Filed under Daily Devotions, Humorous
By James N. Watkins
“The first girl you meet when you return to Marion College will become your wife.” No, this wasn’t the prediction of a fortune teller or a 900-number “psychic friend.” My pastor’s wife was trying to console me after a break-up of an engagement and the feeling that I’d never, ever find true love.
“I just feel that’s what the Lord is telling me,” she said confidently. I was skeptical, but I did go back to school with a sense of fear that the “Bride of Frankenstein” would be waiting for me.
