I’ve seen sunshine, rain, and snow, but in all my years I have never seen the wind. While I was hiking through the woods recently, a huge gust of wind picked up bunches of dry leaves along the trail and threw them swirling into the air. I’ve felt the wind and I’ve seen its influence; […]
Anyone who has ever read through the Bible will have come upon some deeply disturbing passages. Some of them are historical in nature—simply recording the horrible atrocities committed by one group of people against another. But there are several other passages, such as 1 Samuel 15:3, that can leave a person wondering about the true […]
I saw recently that a local school district must spend more than $60,000 to relocate bats before they can build a new school. Many of the locals think it is a senseless waste of money but I disagree. In spite of their ugliness, bats are our friends. Did you know that one bat can eat […]
I for one am more than ready for this election to be over. However, it is not so much the election that bothers me—I consider voting to be a genuine privilege—as it is the low level to which political campaigning has now sunk. The continuous onslaught of vicious ads (filled with lies and half-truths) that […]
Heartbreaking is probably the best word I can use to describe the aftermath of superstorm Sandy that ravaged the eastern coast of the U.S. this week. But the use of this word is by no means limited to recent events. We could also speak of what seems like a relentless assault of hurricanes, monsoons, tornadoes, droughts, […]
Trafficking in persons (TIP) is an international crime that involves the acquisition of a human being through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purposes of exploiting the individual for profit through forced labor or prostitution. A modern form of slavery, trafficking constitutes a violation of human rights in which individual victims are […]
Every now and again I find myself shaking my head in disbelief over some of the things that are done in the name of love. In England, for example, one school district recently banned children from having best friends because of the potential for hurt feelings. With no best friends, the cliquish nature of school […]
The other day I happened to catch a short television interview with Robert Ballard, the man primarily responsible for discovering the wreckage of the Titanic in 1985. I was struck by Ballard’s opinion that the ocean is becoming increasingly unfriendly. His comments quickly brought to mind the experience of a co-worker several years back. Herb […]
For over 200 years the Thomas Nelson Company has held its goal to “honor God and serve people.” This made the publisher’s actions last week all the more interesting as they bowed to public pressure and pulled conservative author David Barton’s book The Jefferson Lies from their publication. I know people who have followed Barton’s […]
Living in the state of Pennsylvania has always carried a rich legacy of history. We’ve long held the nickname of The Keystone State, due in part to the abundance of old stone arch railroad bridges built with keystones to anchor them together. William Penn, Valley Forge, the Liberty Bell, the signing of the Declaration of […]
