Dear Friends, This year as I read through the Christmas story, something jumped out at me that I hadn’t paid much attention to before. The angel gave Mary and Joseph two names for the baby: Jesus, meaning “savior” - and Emmanuel, meaning “God with us” (Matthew 1:18-25). If I had been in Mary and Joseph’s situation, I might have been slightly confused by these two names together because usually we tend to view salvation as being saved from whatever difficult situation we’re in

Dear Friends, Next week is Christmas. It’s the day we celebrate the moment when the world was introduced to Jesus Christ. As I've been thinking about that, I've been pondering what life was like for God's people before Jesus came. I imagine that in many ways, God seemed distant to His followers. He was kept in the Holy of Holies in the temple, accessible only to the high priests. That meant worshipers had to make their offerings and then leave, wondering whether or not their

Dear Friends, Tomorrow is Thanksgiving - and if you’ve known me for any length of time, then I’m sure you’ve heard me say that this is my favorite holiday of the year. That’s because Thanksgiving combines three of my all-time favorite things - family, food, and football. But I also love Thanksgiving because it’s a chance to stop all of the activity of life, and take time to be thankful - to intentionally focus on all that God has done throughout the year. However, I also sort