Whispers of Truth

The atmosphere was alive, humming with eager anticipation as the builders neared the point of laying the foundation of the temple of the LORD. The money had been given according to people’s ability to give for the work. The altar had been restored, burnt offerings in place, feasts kept, freewill offerings given, food for the workers provided. All the people shouted praises to God upon the return of the people to Israel and the rebuilding of the temple after the Babylonian exile, and as the foundation was completed, they were singing and praising responsively with some of the priests and Levites: “For He is good, for His lovingkindness is upon Israel forever” (Ez. 3:11). But many of the priests and Levites, the ones who had seen the glory of Solomon’s temple before its destruction wept loudly, having “despised the day of small things” (Zech. 4:10).  The contrast is not only startling—the praise being the background for the extreme sorrow—but it is telling. The foundation of the ...

I had a unique opportunity this weekend to watch a friend open her bee hives and to take some pictures. In order to do this without getting stung, I had to be up close and personal with the bees, which meant I needed to take some precautions. First, having already been around people and having put scent on that morning, I came home and carefully scrubbed clean, even rewashing my hair with a product with no strong scent, making sure not to apply anything when I got ready again. I had also consulted Carol about what to wear, and she told me to make sure to wear light colored pants as bees do not like dark colors—I carefully selected the lightest colored pair of pants I own that were tight fitting at the bottom. I also carefully pulled up my socks and made sure I had sturdy shoes on that were tightly tied. Then, when I arrived at her house, she had me pull on her spare bee-keeping suit on the upper half of my body.  She cinched down the bottom parts making sure it fit snugly against m...

When I was teaching at LSA, my seniors read C.S. Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters each spring and struggled through the hard questions it makes the reader face. Chief among them is the existence of THE devil and his minions, devils or demons, in this world and their abilities to interfere with our lives. In Letter VII, “Uncle” Screwtape mentions humankind’s perception of Satan: I do not think you will have much difficulty in keeping the patient in the dark. The fact that ‘devils’ are predominately comic figures in the modern imagination will help you. If any faint suspicion of your existence begins to arise in his mind, suggest to him a picture of something in red tights, and persuade him that since he cannot believe in that (it is an old textbook method of confusing them) he therefore cannot believe in you. (32) “Keep ‘em laughing,” is the idea here. If they don’t truly believe that Satan is real, if he’s ajoke, that there is no Adversary stirring mayhem and tempting humans, then when...

Yesterday, when I went out to water my plants, I saw the condition of my patio, littered with puppy debris and decided to hose off my side of the steps. It was filthy. But I couldn’t see just how filthy the step was until I washed it with the water. Then the filth became apparent as brown, muddy water gushed down toward the concrete below. Each step became a little dirtier until the last one, which created a mud bath fit for a small pig. All the clean water rushing down collected the mud at the bottom, and I had to work extra hard on it. Patiently drilling it with the water from my hose until it finally quit delivering mud onto the carport beyond. I stood there with a hose in my hand thinking how much that is like my life after I came to Christ as a child. My life was dirty even then, but I didn’t realize how much it needed cleaning at the time. As the Word has washed me over the years, my life has changed. I would read the scripture and it would reveal dirt. The Holy Spirit would...