Monday FBC hosted the annual MLK Interfaith Prayer Breakfast, with several hundred people in attendance. I jotted down a couple of comments made by the keynote speaker, Rev. Dr. Kenneth Monroe, who is the Presiding Prelate of the South Atlantic Episcopal District of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. After briefly recognizing the progress that… Read More »
Critics
Recently I was discussing with a few friends the tendency of a certain individual whose attempts at humor are usually put downs of one form or another. This person does not intend to be hurtful…they’re just trying to be funny. The problem is that instead of being funny, more often than not this person either… Read More »
Reading the Bible
It was a very basic edition of the Bible featuring the King James translation. The cover was black and there were no study helps. It was the only copy of the Bible in our house and I don’t remember ever seeing anyone read it. As a kid I was intrigued by it. Occasionally I would… Read More »
The Christmas Clock
A battery powered clock hangs on the wall in our kitchen. It briefly chimes musical tunes each hour. We hung it two years ago when decorating for Christmas because it plays Christmas tunes. We liked it so well, we left it up. I don’t think we planned to leave it up permanently, but it still… Read More »
Pleasing People…Pleasing God
Young kids like to please their parents, loving wives look for ways to please their husbands, wise husbands learn what pleases their wives, and good employees want to please their boss. Not everyone cares about pleasing others. On one level we understand that. We can’t live our life always worried about what other people think… Read More »
Concerts and Worship
Friday night Monieca and I enjoyed a nice meal at Steven W’s Bistro in Newberry, SC and then attended a Loretta Lynn concert at the Newberry Opera House, one of my favorite venues for concerts. It’s small, seating about 500 people and there’s not a bad seat in the house. At age 77, Lynn’s stamina… Read More »
A Sad Christmas Story
I once listened as the Pastor of a small church preached about the Holy Spirit. He described the scene when his family got together for Christmas. The kids quickly tore into their packages, leaving the room overflowing with wrapping paper. Even his parents got into the act…but not his grandfather. His grandfather would sit in… Read More »
The Holy Spirit
It was a typical Sunday night in my home church. Attendance was normal, the music was normal…nothing was out of the ordinary. It was one of many occasions when my pastor asked me to preach and the sermon was about the crucified life as described in Galatians 2:20. Yet something was different. I still remember… Read More »
Uncomfortable
A pastor serving in another denomination wrote the following: “When I was a college student, I participated in a program where I spent my junior year abroad in Europe. I remember the experience of exploring for the first time the city where I would spend a year. At first, everything appeared to be different: the… Read More »
Winners and Losers
The Kentucky, Syracuse, North Carolina, and Kansas basketball teams all have things in common this season. They each won their conference regular season championship, but lost in their respective conference tournaments. From a basketball perspective, those losses don’t mean a whole lot. The first three received number one seeds in the upcoming NCAA national championship… Read More »