love and fear

I am teaching right now through a Sunday Series called "Living Without Fear". There is a verse of Scripture that never fails to amaze me. (1 John 1:18) says, “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”

It's hard to wrap my mind around how significant this really is. The Bible says that

the opposite of love is fear and
the opposite of fear is love

In other words, love and fear can't operate at the same time in your life. Love and fear can’t be in the same room. Here’s what happens: when love comes in the front door of your life, fear goes out the back door. Love chases fear away.

And no matter what anybody tries to tell you, the truth is this: You ARE loved! God has loved you ever second, of every minute, of every hour, of every day, of every week, of every month, of every year. There has never been a time that God has not loved you. And his PERFECT love can drive away our fears.

high school memories

A woman was sitting in the waiting room for her first appointment with a new dentist. She noticed his DDS diploma, which bore his full name. Suddenly, she remembered that a tall, handsome, dark-haired boy with the same name had been in her high school class so many years ago. Could this be the same guy I had a crush on way back then? she wondered.

She quickly discarded any such thought when she met the balding, gray-haired man with the deeply lined face. He's way too old to have been my classmate, she thought to herself.

Still, after he examined her teeth, she asked, "Did you happen to attend Morgan Park High School?"

"Yes! I'm a Mustang," he gleamed with pride.

"When did you graduate?" she asked.

"1975," he replied. "Why do you ask?"

"You were in my class!" she exclaimed.

"Really?" he said, looking at her closely. "What did you teach?"

human history

All that we call human history--money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery--[is] the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.

C.S. Lewis

seth's comedy debut

Today our 7 year old son took the stage for his first time at a Senior's gathering. I helped him pick jokes and get ready, but the style and delivery is ALL Seth!

Sorry about the video being sideways. But I'm sure you'll enjoy it :-)