FIRST PRESBYTERIAN

But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days.  2 Timothy 3:1 As Paul pointed out, people are the problem, but in his closing remarks to the self-doubting young pastor, he mentioned only two. In marked contrast, his letter to the Romans concluded with him naming thirty-four as valued fellow workers. To his beloved son in the faith he wrote, “Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me.” A hymn written in 1787 comes to mind, since Paul had also told

But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days.  2 Timothy 3:1 After listing twenty specifics, the veteran missionary instructs his young son in the faith, “Have nothing to do with such…” How? The cartoonist Harry Bliss has a young woman sit on a rock high up in a remote area and while hugging her dog tightly, she cries out, “Please, meteor, come and just end it.” The Apostle Paul wrote his second pastoral letter from a dungeon in Rome, and his last days were ne

And Othniel the son of Kenaz, the brother of Caleb, captured it; so he gave him Achsah…as his wife.   Joshua 15:17 Admittedly, “Othniel and Achsah” do not roll off the tongue as readily as Abraham and Sarah, or Boaz and Ruth. The latter’s equally widowed sister-in-law, Orpah, went back to her Moabite people at Naomi’s urging. On Miss Winfrey’s birth certificate the name chosen by her parents was misspelled, so the name Oprah stuck for the talk show host. People doing memory d

And Othniel the son of Kenaz, the brother of Caleb, captured it; so he gave him Achsah…as a wife.   Joshua 15:17 Debir was the name of the city that fell to Caleb’s nephew. Known also as Kiriath-sepher, “City of Books,” it was home to the Anakim, a race of giants. The spies sent by Moses ahead of the conquest, reported feeling like “grasshoppers” in comparison. He and Joshua famously opted for an immediate invasion, but became subject also to the 38-year wilderness wanderings