A song of ascents. I lift up my eyes to the hills– where does my help come from?  2 My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.  3 He will not let your foot slip– he who watches over you will not slumber;  4 indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.  5 The LORD watches over you– the LORD is your shade at your right hand;  6 the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night.  7 The LORD will keep you from all harm– he will watch over your life;  8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore. (Psalm 121:1-8)

As many of you know, I am the father of three young children – Ryan (5), Will (3), and Nate (1).  When each of them was a baby, I used to put them down for bed at night by standing near the crib, holding them in my arms, and singing quietly to them before laying them down.  If you have children of your own, you know that it can be a challenge getting little ones to go to bed without crying for a parent to come and pick them up again.  One question that often went through my head during the nighttime routine was which approach would help them go to sleep more peacefully:  keeping my eyes closed while I sang to them, or keeping my eyes open.  For a time, I went with the eyes closed approach.  By closing my eyes, I reasoned that I was showing them by example that it was time for sleep. 

Ultimately, however, I settled on the latter approach – putting them down with my eyes open, looking them in the eyes as I sang to them.  And every time I did that, I was reminded of Psalm 121, Read more »

Two Sundays after preaching on how The Church as it was Meant to Be is made up of fearless and bold Christians who are full of conviction, check out this real-life illustration of fearlessness in the face of opposition: 

SAN ANTONIO — A man said he had a heart-to-heart conversation with an armed burglar over a cup of coffee after he found him stealing his belongings from his home on Sept. 11, KSAT-TV in San Antonio reported.
Steve Swanson said he found a man, whom police suspect is Armando Hernandez, stealing items from his home.
“I said, ‘What are you doing here?’” Swanson said. “He said, ‘I’m taking your stuff, and it’s too bad you showed up.’”
Swanson said the man was carrying a knife in one hand and a gun in the other, but he didn’t panic.

“I said, ‘You don’t want to do this. First of all, if you harm me or kill me, I’m just going to go to heaven. You’re going to go to prison forever,’” Swanson said.
Swanson said he gave the burglar all the money in his wallet and offered to listen to his problems over breakfast.
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Why are teenagers so scary?

Why do I feel like I shrunk back in cowardice every time a pack of teens slouched by our AppleFest booth this past Saturday??? Was it their unkempt hair? Their “cooler-than-thou” attitudes? Their complete lack of interest in stopping by a church’s booth (or was it slight interest completely annihilated by the crushing peer pressure not to be seen stopping by a church booth?)?

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