“Will you be all right by yourself, Mother?” Frau Jasmin Strauss-Vogel tucked the blue and white blanket around the aged dame. Mother was even more wrinkled, more white-haired, more achy, and more saggy-bodied than herself. Mother moaned as she lay on the slate blue daybed in the living room. Their one-bedroom apartment had cozy white walls, slick hardwood floors, and was located in the section of Bamberg, Germany built in the Middle Ages. At last, Mother’s weary eyes fluttered open. She whispered in a flutter of a voice, “Please shut me down, dearest. I know you are lonely, but this awful digital skin never letsRead More →

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35) So many commentaries have been written on this verse. Here we learn the love Paul talked about in 1 Cor 13 is commanded, not merely nice thoughts. It is to be our trademark. But what kind of love? Jesus illustrates the love he means in this chapter when he takes off his outer garment and, confident in his knowledge heRead More →

“Whoever pursues righteousness and kindness will find life, righteousness, and honor.” (Proverbs 21:21) So pursuing righteousness gets me righteousness and life. Pursuing kindness gets me honor? Interesting. The Church today has a hard time pursuing both righteousness and kindness. The devil fights us because either one  isn’t enough. We need both to find life righteousness, and honor. So all he has to do is keep us from being one or the other–and we can be more easily tricked into thinking we’re following Jesus properly in either half way state. The devil also likes to get us focused on the opposite problem than the one weRead More →

Gentle readers, The following is my notes, as taken down, from a workshop I attended at the 2010 Booktoberfest here in Idaho. Love in Christ, Andrea Graham Getting it Done Workshop by Todd Bennett (90% right can be 100% wrong) Getting anything done that you think is important. An author may write different books different ways. Sprinter Plodder (take two years) Secluders, lock themselves away for a week. We don’t get things done because we don’t define why we are doing this. If we don’t attach a greater value to something, it will get deprioritized. What is the reason this is important? Increase platform? ReachRead More →

Dear Andrea, What’s the difference between Christianity and Christendom? I thought they were synonyms. Signed, Arthur Author Dear Author, Let’s consult merriam-webster.com: Christianity–1 : the religion derived from Jesus Christ, based on the Bible as sacred scripture, and professed by Eastern, Roman Catholic, and Protestant bodies 2 : conformity to the Christian religion 3 : the practice of Christianity Christendom: 1 : Christianity 2 : the part of the world in which Christianity prevails So, unless the person was using the word Christendom geographically, if they made a distinction between Christianity and Christendom, it is one they made up, most likely to distinguish between their concept of a “good” Christian and Christians they consider it acceptable to hate. Mind you, anyone whoRead More →