I don't know how I've lived 27 years and not read Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man Is Hard to Find." I'm still reflecting on the meaning of it all, but in the mean time here are two quotations that have me off kilter. It's certainly worth a read. "If He [Jesus] did what He said,…
Why Sports May be a Last Bastion for the Merits of Conservatism
I'm not a sports fan. Recently, however, I have thought about how hard it will be for liberals to conquer the sports arena with their ideologies.Why? Let me point out a few things about sports that you know but you don't know that you know.1) Men and Women are DifferentThis is perhaps the most obvious…
Death and Life
Death and life, life and death; mortal enemies, no common breath. To breathe for both the one, the other, 'tis for Cain to claim, "I loved my brother." Both can't live, not side-by-side; death must kill or death must die. Heed: the end's been writ from sin's first lie; how grave to live with Death complied.…
Wedding Dress
You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God?James 4:4Regarding this text, here is an excerpt from a sermon I preached this past Sunday on James 4:1-12:When God led the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt, he took them to Mount Sinai where he gave them…
In Spite of the Patent Absurdity
We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept…
God’s Word as Seed
There are two ways of treating the seed. The botanist splits it up, and discourses on its curious characteristics; the simple husbandman eats and sows; sows and eats. Similarly there are two ways of treating the gospel. A critic dissects it, raises a mountain of debate about the structure of the whole, and relation of…
The Tongue in Proverbs
In preparation to preach on James 3, I read through the Book of Proverbs looking for all of the verses that referred to either the vices or the virtues of the tongue. I identified 149.There are a total of 915 verses in Proverbs, which means that a little over 16% of Proverbs is devoted to speech…
The Next-to-Last Supper
On the night of his betrayal, Jesus gathered with his disciples to break bread and share a meal in celebration of the Passover. It was at this meal that Jesus instituted the Lord's Supper, an ordinance of the Church that is celebrated in remembrance of him: in remembrance of his broken body, symbolized by the…
St. Patrick: Missionary to the Irish
As an adolescent, Patrick was captured by marauding Irish pirates and taken to Ireland. In Ireland, Patrick was a slave serving as a shepherd amongst debased and wicked barbarians known for their immoral behavior. It was during this time that he was converted, and, after six years, he managed to escape back to Britain. Back…
What should be the nature of government?: A parable
The following is an excerpt from a sermon preached by John Leland (1754-1841) titled The Rights of Conscience inalienable; and therefore Religious Opinions not cognizable by LawSuppose a man to remove to a desolate island and take a peaceable possession of it without injuring any, so that he should be the honest inheritor of the…
Anchored 