Life is filled with perplexities, puzzlements of various sorts. It has odd turns: seemingly insignificant things sometimes turn out to be terribly significant; things that aren’t supposed to work out, but sometimes do; and things that seemingly should work out, but don’t. Life is a tangled web, a knotty, mostly inexplicable web. Man seeks to describe it, to explain it, and he can’t. All he can do is live it.

We are assured that trials will come. “All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tim. 3:12). There is no loophole or exemption clause; there is no way around it. In fact, Peter says not to be surprised when they come upon us, “as though some strange thing were happening” (1 Pet. 4:12). And James prepares us not for “if” they hap

It seems to me significant that our English word “prayer” indicates, by its very nature, someone who does it. A prayer is something prayed by a pray-er.

Have you ever stopped to think about what prayer does for us? It’s interesting.

2007 is off to a good start. People seem excited about the freshness of a new year and a the opportunity to begin all over again. The services have been well attended and reverent, the perfect combination of spirit and dignity. The new adult Bible classes began last week, and the early reviews are both encouraging and enthusiastic. Long after the closing prayer is over, folks are staying and visiting and enjoying the company of their spiritual family. Come to think of it, 2007 is picking up right where 2006 left off.

Deciding is what man is all about. Free moral agency, in the purest sense, is deciding what to do. Man is blessed above all others of God’s creatures in that he is given the right of choice. It’s perhaps a bit simplistic to say it this way, but this coming year will be basically composed of a series of choices you will make. Some will be simple, some complicated. Some will produce happiness, some will bring sorrow. Some will have dire consequences, others little at all. But, all in all, the year will be a series of choices. Your choices.

Have you noticed how our society just accepts sin as an ordinary occurrence? It’s astounding how television is running commercial announcements that consider single parents as one of the normal things in life, how the sitcoms openly accept homosexuality as common, and how the cartoons depict lying when necessary as a customary action of life.

In many ways, this is “the most wonderful time of the year.” There are so many special things that are peculiar to this season—the weather, the music, the decorations. I love them all. I love spending time with my family, I love open house at the Bowman’s, I love drinking hot chocolate and getting to a light the fireplace every now and then.

“If Christianity would go back to its origins, cleanse itself resolutely from the silt of time, and take its stand with fresh sincerity from the personality and ideals of its founder, who could resist it?”

That’s a observation from Will Durant from an article written for the Saturday Evening Post, in August of 1939. Isn’t it amazing how things don’t change? The statement is as relevant to our needs today as it was when Mr. Durant wrote it. It speaks of restoration. It is a call for restoration.

Giving is a part of who and what we are. Your father gave the seed and your mother gave you life. The rains fall and give life to the trees, plants, vegetables; the tree, plants, vegetables give bear fruit and give seed. We came into being by it and we are sustained in it. It is part of the human psyche.

Sometimes, Morgan isn’t ready to go to bed. She stalls when it’s time to brush her teeth. She lingers long picking out a book to read. She asks for a drink of water…again. Finally, when all other tactics are exhausted, as I’m tucking her under the covers, she’ll make her last minute plea. “Daddy, tell me a story.”