When Play Becomes Work

A few years ago my wife and I decided that we would invest in sets of toys, rather than buying seemingly random pieces of various sets. We learned this lesson the hard way, actually, as when my son was young, we would buy him toys based on criteria little more advanced than simply purchasing what caught our eyes in the toy story as we shopped a day or two before his birthday. But as he got older, and as we …

Rants, Raves and Photographs

I am exceptionally busy today (again). I have, quite literally, ten or twelve different web design projects underway. One of them is particularly massive and has a deadline of October 31, so the rest of the month is likely to be just as busy. So rather than try to focus my mind on one topic for any length of time this morning, I though I’d post about a variety of things that have been bouncing around my brain. Halloween and …

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Reflections on the Desiring God Conference

I returned safely from Minneapolis last night. The journey home was quick and uneventful. While I had a wonderful time at the conference, I am always glad to return to the comforts of home and family. Today is Thanksgiving Day (yes, we celebrate it on a Monday unlike our American neighbors who prefer Thursday) so I intend to spend the day with my family. But first I thought I’d provide a few topical reflections on my weekend at the Desiring …

Desiring God Conference – Session Two

Just an update for anyone who is attending the conference and looking for Doug or myself. We’re the guys with the laptops (but you already knew that). We’re sitting by the sound table in the back of the auditorium. Whenever there is a break we’ll be out in the lobby uploading our stories. Drop by and make your presence known! The final session of the opening day features John Piper and Justin Taylor sitting in armchairs on the stage before …

Desiring God Conference – Session One

As you know, I was asked to live-blog the Desiring God National Conference. This evening, Saturday and Sunday morning I will bring to you updates from this conference. You can also check coffeeswirls.com as Doug is blogging right beside me. I apologize in advance for spelling errors, grammatical errors, and the like. Because of the pace of the sessions I will have little opportunity, at least initially, to proof-read my entries. So here we are. Doug and I are sitting …

Peter’s Disappointment

At the conference I attended this weekend, I heard the powerful testimony of Richard Ganz as he gave his reflections on thirty years of Jewish evangelism. Richard is Jewish, and was at one time not only a practicing Jew, but a very strictly practicing Jew. His testimony caused me to think about some verses from the book of Acts. But first, the relevant parts of Ganz’s testimony which I found here. The next few days were interesting. They were full …

Most-Read Articles

Someone recently asked me which articles on this site are the ones that get read the most. I consulted my site statistics and found out that some helpful soul at Verio’s technical support center had decided to erase all statistics from 2002 to February 2004 so I have to rely on memory and post-February statistics. Based on that, these are the most popular articles: The Passion of the Christ According to Emmerich. I believe it has been read 7000 times …

Sunday Reflection

This week’s Sunday Reflection comes courtesy of John Newton and his hymn, Safely Through Another Week. It is a song of thanks for another week of safety and a song of petition, that we may feel God’s presence near to us during the upcoming week. Safely through another week God has brought us on our way; Let us now a blessing seek, on th’approaching Sabbath day; Day of all the week the best, emblem of eternal rest, Day of all …

Day Thirty Five – God’s Power In Your Weakness

God loves to use weak people. In reality if He wishes to use people to do His work on earth He does not have much choice, for we all have imperfections: physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual. The important thing is not whether or not we have weaknesses, but what we do with them. If we deny, excuse or hide them, we prevent God from doing what He desires in and through us. As he wants to use our strengths for …