My initial experiences with Ramadan years ago in West Africa were at times confusing to say the least. I will never forget getting caught in an awful traffic jam in the main thoroughfare of one of the most congested neighborhood…
Christians and capital punishment
By Roger Olson To this day, the majority of Americans favor capital punishment for certain crimes, in spite of — or perhaps because of — the almost overwhelming negative judgment about it on the parts of intellectuals and writers. I…
Why Jesus and God follow baseball
Baseball is America’s favorite pastime . . . and God’s! Not really, but maybe. Who really knows? It’s a game of anticipation, strategy and skill. It’s a game that can’t be won by one player, but a lot can be…
Third-pig thinking
By Bill Wilson Remember the story of the Three Little Pigs? Sent out by their mother to make their way in the world, they live in fear of the Big Bad Wolf. Their first order of business is to build…
iPhones and paper Bibles
He stuck his head in the classroom door like a substitute English teacher on the biology hall, looked at the well-dressed occupants and stepped back into the hall. His Sunday School class of 30-somethings was to begin meeting with this group of…
Celebrating the Ninth of July
By Leroy Seat Yesterday was Independence Day in the United States, but the Fourth of July is not one of my favorite holidays — for various reasons — but partly because the original Declaration of Independence, ratified on July 4,…
Airplane evangelism
The young woman who sat down next to me on the Southwest Airlines flight volunteered that she was a student at a certain Baptist university, where I also had attended 30 years earlier. Intrigued, I asked more about what she…
A pastor’s Independence Day prayer
God of all grace and mercy, as we celebrate our nation’s Independence Day, we are grateful for our heritage and concerned for our future. We are thankful, Lord. We are grateful for the privilege of living in “the land of…
Faithful apologies
By Bill Leonard Perhaps St. Paul initiated it, punctuating his apostolic CV with an apology for behaving as one who was “in pious zeal, a persecutor of the church” (Phil 3:6) — “breathing out threats,” Acts says, against Jesus’ followers….