Posts from 2022 (Page 15)

  DISCUSSION                                                                Last month thousands of 18-year-olds walked across the stage and graduated from high school.  In a couple more months, thousands of those same 18-year-olds will be dropped off at college with moms and dads choking back tears as they drive back home.   Every day in hospitals across America new babies are born to nervous…

  DISCUSSION                                                   No one can doubt that Proverbs is a hard book to study.  Most of the chapters are collections of wise sayings and good advice.  This means chapters are hard to characterize with one line of thought.  With this in mind, looking at an outline of the chapters might help us glean the wisdom intended. Chapter 27- Taste Follows Appetite More advice piles up: don’t boast about what will happen tomorrow, because…

  DISCUSSION                                                                            You can make many plans, but the Lord’s purpose will prevail. –Proverbs 19:21 Daily planners, calendars, date books, to-do lists, grocery lists. However you organize it, we often spend a lot of our days planning our time as much as we do spending our time. We plan our errands, dinner, workload…all the things! Do we ask God for help in the planning? We may think that these menial tasks don’t…

  DISCUSSION                                                      A scoundrel   plots evil, and on their lips it is like a scorching fire. A perverse person stirs up conflict, and a gossip separates close friends. A violent person entices their neighbor and leads them down a path that is not good. Whoever winks   with their eye is plotting perversity; whoever purses their lips is bent on evil. –Proverbs 16:27-30 (NIV) Proverbs 16:27-30 is disturbingly accurate. There are…

  DISCUSSION                                                                We’ve all been there… Your teenager asks to stay out past midnight and you say no. Nothing good happens after midnight you say. But, all of my friends are staying late and their parents trust them says the teen.  Back and forth the discussion goes until you have had enough and raise your voice loud enough for the next county to hear when you say,…

  DISCUSSION                                                                Over the last several years, it seems that America is facing an epidemic; an epidemic of anxiety.  I would venture to say that all of us know someone well that is dealing with this weight.   According to those suffering, the word “weight” is a truly accurate description of anxiety.  Most describe their anxiety as heaviness in their chest along with several other symptoms.  In Proverbs…

  DISCUSSION                                                                               One of the most difficult things to do in life is to receive criticism.  If you’ve ever had any experience teaching children, or coaching little league teams, you know exactly what I’m writing about.  Every child (and every adult) takes criticism differently.  Some are very good at it, and “take it in stride.”  Others begin crying on the baseball field as the next play begins and you wonder if they…

  DISCUSSION                                                                                         If you’re an Andy Griffith Show fan, you may remember Asa Breeney.  Asa was the security guard at the local bank.  If you remember Asa, you remember what his demeanor was like.  Every time Andy or Barney would go inside at the bank, Asa was in the corner, asleep on his chair, just snoring away.  This wasn’t an occasional thing.  He was snoring in the corner on…

  DISCUSSION                                                   As God was wrapping up the creation, he saw that it was not good for man to be alone, so he created man’s perfect counterpart; woman.  We find in the Garden of Eden the origin and example of sexual intimacy as God designed it.    We have within our God given genetic makeup a longing for physical contact and fulfillment. Sexuality has, and will always be, a hot…

  DISCUSSION                                                       Psalms 119 tells us that if we study the Word of God, we will be “wiser than our enemies” (119.98), we will have “more understanding than all our teachers” (119.99) and we will have more understanding than “the aged”.    David later explains that he “loves your commandments, above gold, above fine gold” (119.127).  David trust so much in the power of the Word of God…

  DISCUSSION                                                            I want you to imagine that you are walking on the beach and you stumble across an odd looking bottle.  To your surprise when you pick it up, smoke begins to come out of the top of the bottle.  An unusual looking man suddenly appears in front of you in a most unusually looking outfit.  In shock, you ask the man, “Who are you?”  “I…

  DISCUSSION                                                           Have you ever had a computer virus?  I hate those things!  They slow your computer, cause you to lose important information and they make your life less efficient.  One of the reasons we get those pesky viruses is that we fail to update our virus protection software.  It only takes a few moments to do and your computer usually reminds you every so often to do so,…