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25 Years
On the day this post is being released, Leah and I are celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary. Fittingly, we are going to wait until tomorrow to do anything to celebrate, because we are helping Central finish out this year’s VBS tonight. I say that’s “fitting” because, I pray, that’s the way people think of us: together and serving the Lord. We are nowhere near perfect, but we see our marriage as a reflection of God’s glory in the world, and we pray that all we do through our marriage honors Him. But, today, I want to share some thoughts about the godly woman whom the Lord has let me be…
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Spiritual Cataracts
The thoughts in this post are the results of a devotional presented recently by one of the men in our congregation. As I talked with him later, I learned that he had never before done anything like this. He also told me that he was very, very nervous. All of that may be true, but all of that did not keep him from presenting some very good thoughts. The short version of what he had to say is that he used a personal experience to make some great spiritual applications. He had recently had cataract surgery. What follows are some observations he made about cataracts (along with some I have…
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When Life Comes to an End
I have spent the last several weeks at the hospital sitting with my only living aunt on my dad’s side of the family while her husband was slowly dying. To say it was difficult would be an understatement. You see, any time you sit at a hospital for extended periods of time is very hard. It was hard to watch him losing his battle with illness, and it was hard to watch my aunt losing her husband of 64 years. They never had any children and were totally devoted to one another. As we watched his life slipping away day after day we began to talk about what he had done in…
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How to Frustrate Church Leaders on a Sunday Night
By “Sunday night,” I am not talking about the Sunday evening worship assembly. In fact, the term “Sunday night” is meant as a placeholder for anytime after worship services are finished for the day. It stands for the next time one of those faithful men who serve a congregation as an elder or as a preacher jumps on social media. Maybe they are just scrolling through Facebook to kill a few minutes before going to bed on Sunday night. Maybe they are checking their feed as part of their Monday morning routine. But it’s whenever they are on again and just seeing how things are going. Want to frustrate them?…
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Another Look at Being Blinded by the (Wrong) Light
Some who read this may have read a previous post of mine that dealt with what I believe may be a danger for those of us who preach and teach God’s word. The short version of what I wrote then is that there is the possibility that the fact that we are often “in the spotlight” can distort our message, our lives, and our eternal destiny. This post is intended to “shed some light” (pun intended) on another dangerous issue. There are those who attempt to influence others by dazzling them with their personalities, their oratorical skills, impressive Hollywood style productions, and a host of other things. Those who experience their…
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Episode 170: Central Diggers: The Nuts and Bolts [Podcast]
https://media.blubrry.com/faughnfamily/content.blubrry.com/faughnfamily/Central_Diggers_Classes_A_Legacy_of_Faith.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: RSS (Player not displaying or working? Click here.) This week, Leah and Mary Carol walk you through the ins and outs of Central Diggers.
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A Mother’s Memory
As part of my birthday joy, my oldest son let me preview his bulletin article that will be printed this coming Sunday. In it, he shares some memories he has of interactions in our backyard. This was precious to me as it let me know I did some things right as a young mother … definitely not everything, but some things. As special as his memories were to read, I couldn’t help but think of Mary and the verses in Luke 2, one of which reads, “But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart..” (v.19) That little boy, now a young man, has no idea how…
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The Last Day
On the day this post is being released, it will be the end of the academic year for our homeschool in 2023-2024. This one, though, is one we have seen coming from the beginning, because this is Mary Carol’s final last day of high school. (It is also her last day of homeschool…there’s no way Leah is going to homeschool her through college!) I don’t write this post to be overly sentimental. I write it as a reminder to us all: when you are around people, remember that they all have things on their minds–things that are affecting them–that you may not know. I have noticed that, as this day…
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Blinded by the (Wrong) Light
Most who read this will be at least somewhat familiar with the experience that a man who was then known as Saul of Tarsus had as he traveled from Jerusalem to Damascus. If you are not familiar with this, you can read the original account recorded in the ninth chapter of Acts and recounted later by the man who was then known as Paul in the twenty-second and twenty-sixth chapter of that same book. Saul was making that trip in order to imprison and/or punish Christians. All of that began to change when Saul saw an extremely bright light. The light was so bright that Saul lost his eyesight for…
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Episode 169: Central Diggers Introduction [Podcast]
https://media.blubrry.com/faughnfamily/content.blubrry.com/faughnfamily/Central_Diggers_Introduction_A_Legacy_of_Faith.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: RSS (Player not displaying or working? Click here to listen.) A discussion with Adam and Mary Carol about Central Diggers, which was a program designed to teach children apologetics. This is the first of a two-part series on this great work.
