The word “incline” means “to slant; to cause to lean or bend in a particular direction.”  While “incline your ear” is an idiomatic expression that simply means “to listen willingly or favorably,” I love the visual impact of this phrase, picturing one who tilts his head, leans in closer and perhaps cups his hand behind the ear to catch everything that is…

When you evaluate your spiritual life and where you are in your relationship with God, finish this thought, “By this time I ought to be…” Where should you be?  How far down the path of spiritual growth ought you to be?  The writer of Hebrews uses this wording to discuss his readers’ spiritual immaturity.  “…You have become dull of hearing.  For though…

What time do you get to work in the morning?  What time do you get off from work every evening?  What time is curfew in your house?  What time is your next doctor appointment? We live by the clock.  Everything has to have a time.  Everything has to have a time. So, isn’t it interesting that when discussing the time of the…

It is fascinating how vastly different our taste buds can be from person to person.  Some people like their food spicy, some don’t.  Some people like nuts in their cookies, some don’t.  Some people like sushi, some don’t.  Some people like their steak almost raw, some like it well-done, some don’t like it at all.  What is gross to one person in…

Next month Traci and I will celebrate 13 years of marital bliss.  Dan and Judie are celebrating their 50th Anniversary this week.  Ed and Ella Archer celebrate their 69th next month.  In a day and age when the average marriage, according to some studies, lasts only seven years (and seemingly much shorter for many couples), these examples above are beyond our society’s…

What a miserable life! Paul described the Christian’s former life, when “we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another” (Titus 3:3, ESV).  Can you imagine (or perhaps, can you remember?) going through every day filled with hate—hate directed toward you and hate…

While addressing the children of Israel before they took possession of the Promised Land, Moses pleaded with them to not forget the Lord who brought them out of Egypt.  He foretold of the land into which the Lord would bring them—“to give you large and beautiful cities which you did not build, houses…which you did not fill, …wells which you did not…

The power of a word is most impressively illustrated in Genesis 1.  Peter sums it up by saying, “By the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water…” (2 Peter 3:5).  “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” by His word.  Peter continues in verse 7 by affirming,…