The Kingdom of God Drawn Near

I love when a book that I’m reading includes an epilogue. In the last chapter of Louisa May Alcott’s novel, Little Women , the March sisters are reunited, minus dear Beth who had recently passed away. Amy, the youngest, had married their wealthy neighbor, Laurie, while in Paris and had arrived home uncertain of how this news would affect Jo. Jo, or Josephine March, had left New York City and retur...

Can you believe it? Easter is finally here! Our Lenten practice and fast over the last 40 days has built up to this day. There is no more sacrificing or giving something up in order to identify more fully with Christ’s sufferings! Hallelujah! Today, as you celebrate Resurrection Sunday with family, friends and your church family, you may hear people say, “He is Risen!” The appropriate response is,...

Day 40 The Seven I AM’s Each Sunday of #LentenDaily 2026 we focused on a specific I AM statement made by Jesus to His followers. I realize that today is Saturday, but I want to finish our I AM study today instead of tomorrow, Resurrection Day. Physical imagery and symbolism is often an important part of our worship and understanding of God; it’s how we’re wired as humans. And in Jesus’ seventh and...

Day 39 In Walt Disney’s 1970 animated musical comedy , The Aristocats, a family of aristocratic cats are set to gain their mistress’s fortune, much to the dismay of her butler, Edgar. He concocts what he deems a flawless plan; he drugs and kidnaps mother, Duchess, and her three kittens, Berlioz, Toulouse and Marie and drives them out to the Parisian countryside, in hopes of never seeing them again...

Day 38 The courtroom is filled to capacity for a criminal jury trial. A woman’s name is called to the witness stand. Before sitting down, she is asked to place her right hand on the Bible held by the bailiff and asked to repeat the following, “ I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth , so help me God.” This courtroom oath is used in common law jurisdictions to compel...

Day 37 “ After the closing supper, his public preaching work being ended, and nothing remaining to be done but to die, he gave himself wholly unto prayer. He was not again to instruct the multitude, nor to heal the sick, and in the interval which remained, before he should lay down his life, he girded himself for special intercession. He poured out his soul in life before he poured it out unto dea...

Day 36 In A Little While It was the summer of 1982, between my freshman and sophomore years in high school. I was very involved in my church, Roswell Street Baptist, in both the youth group and choir and that summer we had been on a two-week long camp and choir tour across several southern states, ending with a week at Covenant College on Lookout Mountain in Tennessee. I remember stepping onto the...

Day 35 A friend or an adult child feels rejected. You know something has gone sideways in the relationship, but can’t quite put your finger on when or why. A client is angry. Angry that he is in this position with his wife, once again. Angry that he has to seek out and pay for professional counseling just to live peaceably with her. A neighbor’s spouse is terminally ill. You want to help, but wher...

I AM - The Way, The Truth and The Life Happy Palm Sunday! Today marks our sixth and final Lenten Feast Day!! On this Lord’s Day, enjoy worshiping with your church family through songs and hymns, through the reading and teaching of God’s Word, through giving cheerfully, through waving those palm branches and enjoying the blessed gift of food, chocolate, social media, or anything you may have set as...

Day 34 The cross of Christ and the stars and stripes of the American flag, when paired together, make a clear statement, triggering debate and unleashing a tension between faith and national identity. While many view this blend as a patriotic celebration of faith, others believe the clash of these two symbols as an improper merger of the sacred with political nationalism. While the cross signifies...

Day 33 Taylor Swift - Shake It Off from 2:42-end “I hear what people are saying about me, that I can’t dance, that I’m super awkward. My response? Write a song about it.” Released in 2014 as the lead single from her album 1989 , Taylor Swift’s “Shake It Off” was written as a direct, empowering response to intense media scrutiny, gossip, and public criticism regarding her life and music. Taylor kne...

Day 32 Horatio Spafford was a successful lawyer, businessman, and devout Christian who lived in Chicago in the late 19th century. However, his life was marked by tragedy and loss, including the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, which destroyed much of his real estate holdings, and the death of his only son shortly thereafter. Despite these setbacks, Spafford remained committed to his faith and continued...

Day 31 She knew she didn’t have much time left on this earth, in this body that was decaying at an accelerated rate. In the spring of 2020, my sweet mother knew that her life was coming to an end and she began to share important truths, memories, and requests with me. Things she needed me to remember and take care of once she was gone. One of those tasks involved her lovely and extensive collectio...

Day 30 Have you ever heard of Attachment Theory? While a secular psychological theory, I find Attachment Styles Theory to be an incredibly helpful tool in helping many of my clients understand better why they react to their closest friends and family the way they do. While in seminary, I was trained in reinterpreting secular theories through the lens of the gospel found throughout Scripture and ha...

Day 29 “For the past two weeks you have been reading about a bad break. Yet today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth. I have been in ballparks for seventeen years and have never received anything but kindness and encouragement from you fans.” The beloved New York Yankee baseball player, Henry Louis “Lou” Gehrig, had received a life altering diagnosis two weeks earlier, mak...

I AM - The Resurrection and The Life Yahoo! It is Sunday again and our fifth Feast Day!! On this Lord’s Day, enjoy worshiping with your church family, through songs and hymns, through the reading and teaching of God’s Word, through giving cheerfully, and enjoying the blessed gift of food, chocolate, social media, or anything you may have set aside for your Lenten promise. The Seven I AM’s Each Sun...

Day 28 March Madness is here, and I’m not referring to the crazy weather we experienced this past week in the southeast. Of course I’m talking about the annual, single-elimination NCAA Division I basketball tournament, affectionately known as “March Madness” featuring 68 men’s and 68 women’s teams competing in March and early April to determine the national college basketball champion. Known for c...

Day 27 “Maria” - The Sound of Music (1965) “How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?” This question is asked and comically answered in the 1965 musical, The Sound of Music by the nuns at Nonnberg Abbey in Salzberg, Austria. They express their exasperation over postulant Maria’s free-spirited and undisciplined nature. While she possesses so many wonderful qualities, and exudes joy in all her observat...

Day 26 After 400 years in Egypt, followed by decades in the wilderness, Israel is readying to come into the Promised Land. It will be many years more before they are able to enter, but In Numbers 22, we read of the Israelites traveling through the plains of Moab to camp along the Jordan River, east of Canaan, at the northern end of the Dead Sea. Here they prepare to cross the Jordan and enter Cana...

Day 25 “Where’s Lucky?” my dad asked. Lucky was our darling black lab mix and everyone in the family loved him, but he was most definitely Daddy’s dog. Once Lucky found and killed a field mouse and left it on the sidewalk out back. My dad praised that dog incessantly for protecting our family from those dangerous vermin. After that, we regularly found dead field mice on the back porch steps! No on...

Day 24 When was the last time you heard news about a dear friend in need? Regardless of the cause, whether an unexpected diagnosis, difficult divorce, crippling accident, financial hit, or devastating loss, I imagine you had a similar internal response as I often do, “I wish there was something I could do.” Perhaps that’s where your thoughts of care stalled out. All too often, we let our discomfor...

Day 23 “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me” (or so the playground adage wants us to believe). While this proverb may have initially been shared to build resiliency in children and adults, the fact is that words do hurt and the shame that those words can instill in us have a way of lingering in our minds and our bodies long after. Anyone with access to social media h...

I AM - The Good Shepherd Yahoo! It is Sunday again and our fourth Feast Day!! On this Lord’s Day, enjoy worshiping with your church family, through songs and hymns, through the reading and teaching of God’s Word, through giving cheerfully, and enjoying the blessed gift of food, chocolate, social media, or anything you may have set aside for your Lenten promise. The Seven I AM’s Each Sunday of #Len...

Day 22 In 2003, then 2-year-old Brandon Connor was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, one of the deadliest forms of childhood cancer, with a tumor growing near his spine. The tumor was supposed to be removed in a dangerous surgery that risked paralysis. However, according to an Associated Press report by Alicia Chang, on the eve of the surgery a scan showed the tumor had essentially vanished, replaced...

Day 21 I had just lost a second baby to miscarriage. Genetic testing revealed that she was a girl. While I experienced a total of four miscarriages in addition to the four beautiful babies that have grown into amazing adult children, that second one was earth shattering for me. Up to that point in my life, I hadn’t truly experienced loss or significant suffering. My theology on God’s sovereignty w...