Things You Never Wanted To Know

Just for kicks, here is a list of things you never knew about me and never wanted to. Since we got married, Aileen and I have lived in four different houses. Our current home is the only one we have owned as the previous ones were all rentals. The first vehicle I ever owned was a Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck. Since then I’ve owned two Toyota Corollas, one Ford Windstar and one Dodge Grand Caravan. I was raised on a …

Friday Ramblings

Sovereign Grace Music is offering a free song written by Steve and Vikki Cook and sung by Vikki. It is from the Everlasting recording that was released in 1999. “I Bow Down” is a slow, meditative song that reflects on the holiness of God. Here is a sample of the lyrics: You saved me the sinner With crimson red You washed me White as snow How I love You Lord You loved me the mocker With kindness You won my …

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Friday Ramblings

Ping! That’s the sound of a pin dropping in the blogosphere. My RSS reader has been awfully quiet this week as I suppose the majority of bloggers are taking a break from the usual commitments. Good for them! Most people outside of the retail world are doing little if any work this week, and those of my friends and family who are working keep mentioning that they seem to be the only ones in their offices this week. I’ve been …

Friday Ramblings

Amazon likes to send me recommendations for books I may enjoy. They obviously check my account to see what I have purchased recently and run some kind of a script to determine what other books I may like based on what I have bought in the past. A couple of days ago I received a tremendously helpful recommendation. “We’ve noticed that customers who have expressed interest in The Bible or the Axe: One Man’s Dramatic Escape From Persecution in the …

Friday Ramblings

William Wilberforce In February of 2007 a film titled Amazing Grace will hit theatres, though only in limited release (and I’d be surprised if it makes it to Canada at all). The movie deals with the life of “the world’s greatest reformer,” William Wilberforce. Ioan Gruffudd plays Wilberforce, who, as a Member of Parliament, navigated the world of 18th Century backroom politics to end the slave trade in the British Empire. Albert Finney plays John Newton, a confidante of Wilberforce …

Friday Ramblings

I feel I should apologize about the relatively low quality of the articles I’ve posted this week. I decided to take a week’s “sabbatical” to focus on writing the book. I thought of calling this a vacation, but that didn’t seem quite right. In the end I settled on sabbatical since I like the sound of the word and since it makes me feel very professional. I wish I had had the opportunity to take more than a week, but …

Tuesday Ramblings: Thabiti Edition

I had great plans for the site for today, but real life very rudely interrupted those plans. Hence I’ll haul out a ramblings column I had hoped to post on Friday. Ramblings are, of course, things I have wanted to say but things that haven’t seemed worthy of a post all their own. I also hadn’t planned on this being an unofficial celebration of Thabiti Anyabwile, and yet somehow, events have conspired to make his name figure prominently around here …

Friday Ramblings

Tomorrow is Remembrance Day here in Canada, the day we remember veterans and those who sacrificed their lives to protect our nation. My son’s school is honoring this day today in the way many schools do: they are inviting veterans to the school and will hold an assembly. I hope my son looks in awe at the veterans as I did when I was his age, though there are fewer and fewer veterans still alive. Yesterday my son’s class made …

Saturday Ramblings

I got a laugh out of Phil Johnson’s post this morning on Pyromaniacs. He wrote “I have part 3 of Gary Johnson’s review queued up and ready to go, but I’m holding it till Monday because weekend traffic at the blog is sometimes low, and I don’t want the end of that series to get overlooked.” I have to admit to doing the same thing, namely, writing an article and figuring that it’s just too good to post on the …

Teach Me To Live What You Say

Some time ago, my pastor posted on his blog asking if anyone could identify the author of a song called “Teach Me To Love What You Say.” We sang the song in church this morning and I noted that it is still marked with “Author and copyright information unknown.” So I guess he never tracked it down. It is a sweet song and one the children seem to enjoy singing a great deal. Do you happen to know who wrote …