People ask me about horrible atrocities committed in the name of Christ. How do you as a religious person account for it? "Look," I tell them. "Healthy people use faith in the right way; unhealthy people abuse it in the wrong way." Wesley Kenneth...
When Rosemary was three years old, she was given a rag doll as a gift. It became her inseparable companion. Over time, the doll became more and more ragged and less and less doll. There was no use trying to clean it; washing would only make it more...
I had a flashback as I researched today’s prayer. I was enamored with Superman as a boy, this “Man of Steel” who was “more powerful than a locomotive and able to bend steel in his bare hands.” Today’s prayer was offered by the original “Man of...
The preacher chosen to give the prestigious Lyman Beecher Lectures at Yale University in 1907 created quite a stir. Peter Taylor (P. T.) Forsyth (1848-1921) gained a reputation early in pastoral ministry for his unpredictable pulpit utterances and...
Researchers call it "Facebook Envy." Looking at your friends' exotic vacations, beautiful children, and fabulous social lives can leave us feeling lonely, self-critical, and depressed. Social media-induced envy is but a new twist on an old human...
They certainly qualify as a power couple. Anicia Fortunia Proba was born in AD 357 into an aristocratic family in Rome and married Sextus Probus, a high-ranking Roman proconsul. Together, they became the wealthiest family in the Roman Empire. They...
Entering an arranged marriage seems inconceivable to me. I'll choose my own wife, thank you very much. Yet, in twelfth century Europe, the practice of arranged marriages was common, especially among nobles. In 1203, the King of Castile (now part of...
One challenge in prayer is becoming attached to what we want God to do for us. While we dutifully pray "Thy will be done," in truth, we have our hearts set on predetermined outcomes. We want all people to be healed and all circumstances to break in...
Napoleon Bonaparte entered his palace accompanied by an assortment of military officers. As they made their way through the gallery, a fourteen-year-old girl rushed forward, fell at the emperor's feet, and clung to his legs from behind. "Mercy,...
If you were a woman in the thirteenth century who wanted to devote your life to God, you joined a convent. No other options were open to you. A group of women defied convention by choosing to live for God while rejecting the cloistered life. They...
Henry van Dyke (1852-1933) was a guest at the home of Augustus Garfield, president of Williams College in western Massachusetts, nestled in the foothills of the Berkshire Mountains. Henry was pastor of Brick Presbyterian Church in New York who...
I've often wondered how the Song of Songs made it into the biblical canon. For starters, God's name is never mentioned. It also happens to be the most sexually explicit book in Scripture. I'll be honest. I become embarrassed reading portions of it...
Illiteracy was widespread in medieval Europe among peasants and nobility alike. Monasteries were one of the few places where reading was taught and flourished. The mass of society depended on learned priests and monks to read the Bible for them and...
He was known around campus as Doctor Profundis (the Profound Doctor). Little wonder. He was one of the ablest theologians of his day, along with being a skilled mathematician and brilliant physicist. Thomas Bradwardine (1300-1349) came to saving...
When Chuck Colson (1931-2012) went to see his friend Tom Phillips in 1973, his life was imploding. He was under investigation for his role in the Watergate scandal and a plot to discredit Daniel Ellsberg for leaking the Pentagon Papers. As a new...
The Bodleian Library is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. As the main research library for the University of Oxford, it contains thirteen million printed items. Its special collection archive includes a tenth century document of manuscripts...
Aloneness gets a bad rap in our day. We equate aloneness with loneliness, yet it's possible to be alone without being lonely. Aloneness is not loneliness when we are in the company of God. One danger of so much online connectivity is the temptation...
Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) was the most celebrated painter and sculptor of the Renaissance period, but he's also the one who authors today's prayer. His first commissioned sculptor at twenty-three, the Pieta, depicts Jesus' body as it was...