Days of Our Lives

A friend in California reminded me this week of a quote from Mark Twain: “The two most important days of your life are the day you were born, and the day you find out why.”

A Good Talking-To

In a sermon I heard on Sunday a good friend of mine spoke some about the biblical idea of talking to yourself. I thought of his words just an hour or so ago when I had misplaced my mobile phone and found myself talking to myself as I tried to retrace my path and locate that most indispensable of all items.

“Alaxamenos Worships His God”

In 1857 workers were unearthing a building in Rome on the Palatine Hill which was once used by the infamous Caligula possibly as an imperial palace. As the work proceeded they came to a room where they found what may have been the first known depiction of the crucifixion in Christian worship. But the graffiti artist was no fan of Jesus.

Taming the Tongue

News out of the Netherlands is that the Dutch National Police force has begun training eagles to intercept small drones during an emergency, when another capture device might put people below at risk. Working with a raptor-training company called Guard from Above, they are teaching eagles to recognize small drones and swoop in and grab them with their powerful talons. The belief is that eagles might be used when rouge drones or those being intentionally used for nefarious purposes are presenting a security risk. (See video) .

Hanging on His Words

This week’s post was written by my wife, Sheila.

When I picked up my Bible today, my eyes fell on the following passage:

“Yet they [the chief priest, the teachers of the law and the leaders of the people] couldn’t find any way to do it [kill Jesus] because all the people hung on his words.” (Luke 19:48)

The statement that “all the people hung on his words” hit me. It seemed like a modern day idiom. I doubted that this is what it literally said. So, I asked my husband, Tom, “Is this an exact translation of the phrase ‘hung on his words’”? He looked it up and said, “Yes it is.”

Lottery Fever

Last week the nationwide “Powerball” lottery in the U.S. was offering a jackpot that had grown to $1.5 billion.  That is $999 million plus another $501 million. That is a staggering number of millions. This largest jackpot in history drew tremendous publicity and sometimes long lines made up of ticket buyers.  If you live in the States, no doubt you heard about it.

Wonderfully Made and Full of Purpose

Every 60 seconds, 258 babies are born across the globe.  In the next hour that means there will be 15,480 new lives on earth. A year ago those would have just been interesting statistics. However, in one of those seconds and in one of those hours in November, one of those babies was our first grandchild. Most of our peers already have quite a collection, but this little girl was our first.