Serve by Design

“Dad, you know how a child’s voice can carry!” That’s how Matt started his recap of last week’s early morning flight from a recent work assignment at the D.C. office. He continued to relate how something humorous had occurred on the connecting flight from Atlanta to home. The plane had just reached its optimum elevation, and the attendants were beginning to ask the passengers about their preferences for drinks and snacks. Iconic PB&J Sandwich! Credit: AdobeStock When I used to fly recreationally, I remember the choices for snacks to be limited to a single packet of peanuts or pretzels! According to their website, Delta Airlines offers four choices with fancy names: Lotus Biscoff cookies, MadeGood Chocolate Chip Chewy Granola Bars, SunChips Garden Salsa, and Cheez-It Original Baked Snack Crackers.  Matt estimated that the little person, with a big voice, was about three or four years old. After the flight attendant engaged her about the multiple snack choices, s...

Last Sunday, Monique and I were guests in another church. I preached at a pastor friend’s retirement celebration service. We also attended a small group study for seniors before worship. It was a blessing to look around the table during that Sunday School class and see so many open Bibles and even a few digital tablets placed in front of those participants. While they used a denominational booklet as the curriculum, the Bible was still their primary focus during the lesson. "By your words I can see where I'm going." Clip Art: stock.adobe.com The Message: Psalm 119:105a I have heard two good sermons lately where the subject of the Bible has come up. One was at our church recently during the Iron Sharpens Iron conference. It looked to me that the crowd was at full capacity on the ground floor and balcony that accommodates well over a thousand people not counting the platform musicians. There were ninety churches represented, and forty-eight of those churches brought ten ...

I recently attended a regional equipping conference for men, titled "Iron Sharpens Iron". Ministers and laity were present. During the opening session, Dan Hyun, a church planter specialist and founding pastor of the Village Church in Baltimore, Maryland spoke about success. Hyun believes that success is measured by what comes behind us, our legacy. Therefore, he made this compelling appeal to join in the endeavor of mentoring the next generation of Christian leaders by simply saying, “Be who you needed when you were young!” Teaching and Mentoring Image credit: depositphotos.com Hyun’s comment about the lasting legacy of mentoring the next generation resonates with me. I have been committed to mentoring relationships for more than 20 years now. I didn’t plan on being a mentor when I was younger, but in my maturing, middle adult years, some of my younger peers started introducing me as their mentor. It sounded surreal at first and certainly made me feel older, but I could see ...

I love hero stories! I grew up with a lot of guys who inspired and entertained me as a kid living in a small town. Jim Carter lived next door to me and was my dad’s age. He taught me how to use a rifle and 410 shot gun to hunt (and yes, clean!) small game. Jim also played catch with me after school when Dad was busy servicing cars in our backyard auto repair shop. It was perfect for a kid to have so much attention! One of my favorite summer past times was to walk the half mile down the “old shoe factory hill” where we lived to the park next to the town branch. The park had two ball diamonds which drew some large crowds of sport’s enthusiasts during the evenings. I’d hustle down there to watch Jim and a couple of my uncles play softball for their respective teams.  Many evenings, Jim would be pitching in one of the games and my uncles in another. Uncle Charlie and Kenny (Junior) Keppler, drew some considerable attention as they formed a family battery of pitcher and catcher. Both Ch...

Most of us would concur that hornets and other insects with stingers are not our favorites, and we usually can avoid and ignore them. Except perhaps when there is a new "Super Stinger" that poses an imminent threat to us and our food supply. Last fall. a menacing variety of the Asian Hornet was discovered in the Pacific Northwest. Swift action was taken by the Washington State Department of Agriculture in October to address this problem.  A group of scientists was dispatched to Blaine, Washington, to deal with a nest inhabited by 500 live specimens of the world's largest hornet growing to 2 inches long and nicknamed, the "murder hornet!" Its toxic venom can cause organ failure and death. These highly trained specialists also found 200 queens in the nest who were capable of mating and multiplying this threat and quickly it spreading to additional areas. This threatening species was first detected in the United States in December of 2019 and since then, scientists...

It always helps me to try to quantify or graphically measure what I'm thinking about. I guess this is because I am a visual person and need to diagram, conceptualize, or even try to sketch the thoughts I'm thinking in order to understand them. The other day in a small group setting, we were discussing how to grow in our capacity to love others, especially those who are different from us. I suggested that we first needed to identify the recipients of that love. Taking a marker in hand, I began drawing on the whiteboard several concentric circles like the ripples made from a pebble dropped into a body of water and then titled this simple image, "Quantifying Our Relationships!" Each circle became a way to specifically show the levels of our relationships in life. The inner core represented ourselves. Then going outward, we segmented other relations like our immediate family, relatives, close friends, next door neighbors, fellow workers, the many acquaintances we have...

Leon Kilbreth, “Mr. Sunday School” to many of us serving in educational ministry in the midwest, shared a surprising statement years ago: “90% of teaching is the life and personality of the teacher!” He did not want any of the conference attendees to misunderstand. Kilbreth wasn’t saying that we only teach the Bible 10% of the time in our lessons. Instead, he was emphasizing by hyperbole that the Bible others see and hear comes from the life and personality of the teacher. If we aren’t “practicing what we are teaching,” we aren’t completely teaching the Bible. We may be sharing some useful truths, but we aren’t teaching with maximum influence. Who doesn't love a surprise?! Bernice Littleford of the First Baptist Church in Vandalia was my fifth and sixth grade Sunday School department director and teacher. She had a winsome spirit about her. Mrs. Littleford cared about older children. She was an experienced parent. When I was in seventh grade, her son, Jim would be my basket...