The worship to which we are called in our renewed state is far too important to be left to personal preferences, to whims, or to marketing strategies. It is the pleasing of God that is at the heart of worship. Therefore, our worship must be informed ...
When kids made a decision for themselves they have a vested interest in showing they were right. Lee wanted to prove to me that he had made the right choice so he worked hard and did well. If we'd forced him to go to college somewhere else all the in...
Every Sunday I nudge Sam in her direction, and he walks to where she is sitting and hugs her. She smells him behind the ears, where he most smells like sweet unwashed new potatoes. This is in fact what I think God may smell like, a young child's slig...
A stream of light shot out of her lips, it wasn't blinding though, it was luminescent. It stopped abruptly and Aaron saw the light leave her eyes before she fell, and he swept in to catch her crumpling form. Eric was right beside them in a flash. "Wh...
Bones didn’t share any of my qualms about suddenly holding an arm that wasn’t attached to a body anymore. He just grabbed the ghoul by his other arm and began thumping him over the head with the loose limb. I’d heard Bones threaten to beat some...
"What the hell was THAT?" I gasped. "Premature inflamulation," he replied. "Happens sometimes. Very embarrassing, I don't like to talk about it." A snort of amusement came from my right. I swung in that direction to see Bones bestow the most appro...
Every day is important for us because it is a day ordained by God. If we are bored with life there is something wrong with our concept of God and His involvement in our daily lives. Even the most dull and tedious days of our lives are ordained by God...
Supporting God's Scriptural ability to give or restrain man's desires, Jerry Bridges points to an amazing verse tucked away in Exodus 34:24. As Israel's people abandon their defense entirely to have a feast before Him three times per year, God says t...
I shall expect my husband to have no pleasures but what he shares with me; and if his greatest pleasure of all is not the enjoyment of my company - why - it will be the worse for him - that's all.' 'If such are your expectations of matrimony, Esther,...
Things you'd never even seen with Finn could remind you of him, because he was the one person you'd want to show. "Look at that," you'd want to say, because you knew he would find a way to think it was wonderful. To make you feel like the most observ...
No matter how much he talked, she never answered him, but he knew she was still there. He knew it was like the soldiers he had read about. They would have an arm or a leg blown off, and for days, even weeks after it happened, they could still feel th...
If she’d thought cutting ties with Galen would help her get on with her life, Harper knew that after today, she’d never, ever get him out of her system. He was a drug she couldn’t kick, an addiction she was willing to die for. And as he drew he...
How did you know I was different?” “You mean besides the obvious obsidian, the alien entourage, and the branch?” He laughed. “You’re full of electricity. See?” He reached between the seats and placed his hand over mine. Static crackled, j...
Hey, Kelsey." He squinted at her. "I knew the water in Charlotte was a problem, but I didn't know it made hair turn purple," he joked. Kelsey smiled at him, a mischievous glint in her eye. "Well, it looks like the water here makes your hair fall out,...
If our life is ever really as beautiful as a fairy tale, we shall have to remember that all the beauty of a fairy tale lies in this: that the prince has a wonder which just stops short of being fear. If he is afraid of the giant, there is an end of h...
I was the worst kind of fool. When I look back on that August night, changed forever by all my wounds and all my suffering, that undamaged Odd Thomas seems like a different human being from me, immeasurably more confident than I am now, still able to...
I stepped closer to him and lowered my voice. 'If you could change one thing, what would it be?' He pulled the sheep pendant from his pocket. A question filled his eyes. I held out my hand. Riley placed it in my palm and I curled my finger around the...
Good name in man and woman, dear my lord, Is the immediate jewel of their souls: Who steals my purse steals trash; ’tis something, nothing; ’twas mine, ’tis his, and has been slave to thousands; But he that filches from me my good name Robs me ...
We have very little faith in the Lord, very little trust. If we trusted the Lord as much as we trust a friend when we ask him to do something for us, neither we as individuals nor our whole country would suffer so much.
But a slow, deeply satisfied smile came over him, and his breath quickened. 'So softly it starts,' he whispered. 'Foolishly clever and with an unsurvivable trust. It just saved your miserable life, that questionable show of thought, my itchy-witch.' ...
I’m making a list of when it’s acceptable for a pirate to cry. […] So far I’ve got: one - when holding a seagull covered in oil. Two - when singing a shanty that reminds him of orphans. Three - when confronted with the unremitting loneliness ...
