life on planet earth from luke 14

My wife is a big fan of an advice column called “Ask a Manager.” The articles offer a variety of subjects, many of which are serious, but some are downright hilarious. They often capture the absurditi...

When singer John Davidson was learning to drive, his father, a Baptist minister, offered him a deal: he could have a car if he earned straight “B’s” on his report card, read the Bible more, and got a ...

Loving Father, You receive all who come humbly before You. Yet we approach You far too often with much satisfaction and inappropriate pride. We think more highly of ourselves than we ought to think. W...

In the midst of all you are facing Your burdens Your responsibilities Your hustle Hear the invitation “Come to the Table” In the midst of all you are facing Your longing Your ambition Your distractio...

Kevin Blue has spent much of his ministry career serving the poor in inner-city Los Angeles. In this excerpt he describes working with a war vet named Clarence: Richard, Tim, Caroline and Ellen move...

Man must eat in order to live; he must take the world into his body and transform it into himself, into flesh and blood. He is indeed that which he eats, and the whole world is presented as one all-em...

Salt and light are indispensable household commodities. Several commentators quote Pliny’s dictum that nothing is more useful than ‘salt and sunshine’ (sale et sole). The need for light is obvious. Sa...

The kingdom of heaven is worth infinitely more than the cost of discipleship, and those who know where the treasure lies joyfully abandon everything else to secure it.

Kevin Blue has spent much of his ministry career serving the poor in inner-city Los Angeles. This reflection show how the investment in the poor can pay big dividends: Loving the poor has cost me so...

George Bush Sr. (41) enjoyed the game of golf, even if he wasn’t necessarily very good at it. Following his presidency and his return to private life, he began to notice something: It’s amazing how ma...

I have a neighbor who is obsessively neat. He lives on ten forested acres, and every time he drove up his long, winding driveway, the disorderly dead branches on the Ponderosa pine trees bothered him....

So he took the paint brush and went out back. She forgot about it until sometime later when there was another knock at the door. It was him. He obviously had been painting because there was paint spla...

In his helpful book Peace Catalysts , Rick Love shares a poignant example of how sharing a meal can break down the familiar walls of status, power, and economics: In 2011, my wife, Fran, and I we...

A man who was fishing one day noticed that the fisherman next to him threw the big fish he caught back into the water, while keeping the small ones. This went on all day until the first man couldn’t h...

I would like to buy about three dollars worth of gospel, please. Not too much– just enough to make me happy, but not so much that I get addicted. I don’t want so much gospel that I learn to really hat...

To decide requires a death, a dying to a thousand options, the putting aside of a legion of possibilities in order to choose just one. De- cide . Homo- cide . Sui- cide . Patri- cide . The root word d...

Early in the 20th century a London newspaper carried an advertisement that read: “Men wanted for hazardous darkness, and constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success...

The politician Helen Violet Asquith (later Bonham Carter) was once attending a dinner with Winston Churchill, who initially seemed lost in abstraction for an awkwardly long period of time. Abruptly he...

He loves Thee too little, who loves anything together with Thee, which he loves not for Thy sake.

A proud man is always looking down on things and people; and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you.

Tom Clegg, a consultant with Church Growth Institute, states, "When visitors walk through the door, they will decide in 3 to 8 minutes whether they will take you seriously and whether they will r...