PROVIDENCE Cooling down after practice, Daniel had taken one last dive and his neck struck the bottom of the concrete pool. Daniel sustained damage to C-3, C-4, and C-5 vertebrae of his spine. Two fusion operations followed and the surgeon was successful in preventing paralysis, but Daniel's parents…

GRATITUDE/THANKSGIVING Gratitude springs out of our faith. We can only be grateful when we know that we do not deserve our blessings and we did not create them. And to some degree, gratitude is a suspension of cynicism—a faith in the person doing the good deed. As gratitude relates to our relationship…

FATHER’S DAY In the Disney/Pixar animated feature Finding Nemo, Nemo is a little clownfish who is in big trouble. In an act of rebellion against his father, Nemo defiantly swam away from the safety of the oceanic reef where he lived to touch a boat anchored in the open ocean. Before he can return to…

A new app for the iPhone is now available to help Bible readers pronounce some the most difficult names, places and terms found in the pages of scripture. The Bible Audio Pronunciations app offer assistance on over 1,000 of the Bible’s toughest words. It allows users to search or browse through a database…

SMALL THINGS Herb Kelleher of Southwest Airlines recently said, “We’ve never been focused on gigantism. We’ve focused on being the best.” Though it is only the seventh largest airline, Allan Sloan, Newsweek’s Wall Street editor calls Southwest Airlines “the nation’s most successful [airline].” —Newsweek,…

One night a house caught fire and a young boy was forced to flee to the roof. The father stood on the ground below with outstretched arms, calling to his son, "Jump! I'll catch you." He knew the boy had to jump to save his life. All the boy could see, however, was flame, smoke, and blackness. As can…

COMMUNITY In Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell writes, “Successful people don't do it alone. Where they come from matters. They're products of particular places and environments.” -- Outliers: The Story of Success, 119 Illustration by Jim L. Wilson For more information on Outliers go to:…

The service of God is the element in which alone we can fully live. If you had a fish here upon dry land, supposing it possible that it could exist, yet it would lead a very unhappy life. It would scarcely be a fish at all! You could not tell of what it was capable; it would be deprived of the opportunity…

SPIRITUAL GIFTS Though clearly taught in the pages the Bible, a recent study by the Barna organization found there is still confusion surrounding the topic of Spiritual gifts among Christians. Overall, the recent update found slightly fewer Christians reported an awareness of spiritual gifts. Just above…

When President Jimmy Carter announced on Meet the Press, January 20, 1980 that he intended to boycott the Moscow Olympic Games, it altered the lives of many American athletes, like Bob Bugg. He had qualified for the U.S. Olympic trials already, unlike many others, and could have earned a place on the…

A high school football team in California was forced to forfeit their game recently because they no longer had enough player to field a team. The Capistrano Valley Christian school team was leading the team from Hope Center by a score of 8 to 6. Two players were injured on one play, and those injuries…

SERVICE In his book, 360 Degree Leader, John Maxwell writes, “The true measure of leaders is not the number of people who serve them but the number of people they serve.” --360 Degree Leader, 289. Illustration by Jim L. Wilson Philippians 2:3 (NKJV) “Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit,…

There was a great king who once employed a merchant in his service as an ambassador to foreign courts. Now the merchant, before he went away, said to the king, “My own business requires all my care, and though I am always willing to be your majesty’s servant, yet if I attend to your business as I ought,…

Hiroo Onoda died in January 2014. Onoda was a lieutenant in the Japanese army stationed on the Philippine island of Lubang during World War II. When his commander left the island he ordered Onoda to stay and fight. He carried out those orders faithfully for the next 29 years. The Japanese government…

INFLUENCE In their book, "Lead Like Jesus", Blanchard and Hodges write, "Leadership is a process of influence. Anytime you seek to influence the thinking, behavior, or development of people toward accomplishing a goal in their personal or professional lives, you are taking on the role of a leader." —"Lead…

SERVANT LEADERSHIP In his book, "The Top Ten Mistakes Leaders Make", Hans Finzel writes, "...everyone in our organization rests on my shoulders and I am at the bottom of an inverted pyramid. I spend countless hours helping others be effective by providing them the facts, the energy, the resources, the…

Mark Titus holds the record for the most individual career wins in Ohio State basketball history. He was teammates with seven future NBA players. In his four years he scored a total of nine points, had five rebounds, and three assists while playing only 48 minutes. After his days on the team were over…

Caroline Gowan from Bonaire, Georgia began Loads of Love for her Girl Scout Gold Award project. Today Gowan and volunteers from Bonaire United Methodist Church offer to wash loads of laundry for anyone in need of clean clothes. They do the ministry at a local Laundromat one evening each month and plenty…

VISION Max is a dreamer. He has a fertile imagination and a journal filled with stories of superheroes he invented, including Sharkboy and Lavagirl. Though Max holds tightly to his dreams, his life is headed in the opposite direction. His parents are having problems, and are threatening to split up.…

It would be easy to help every person in need and always save the day, if we had super hero powers. In the Disney motion picture Bolt, Bolt is a dog who believes he has super powers, which he uses to keep his human, Penny, safe from evil. Bolt does not know that his powers are special effects in a television…

In the animated feature Mega Mind, the main character is a conflicted man. He faintly remembers his father’s admonitions. Though mega Mind knows he is destined for something, he is not sure what it is. Early in his life, Mega Mind fell in with the wrong crowd. His great intellectual power was used for…

Emptied Philip. 2:5-11 NASB "Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, [6] who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, [7] but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. [8]…

The man that has seen affliction, when he is blessed of God, has the disposition to cheer those that are afflicted. I have heard speak of a lady who was out in the snow one night, and was so very cold that she cried out, “Oh, those poor people that have such a little money! How little fuel they have,…

In Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy, Eric Metaxas writes, “The authority of a servant leader, as opposed to the authoritarianism of the mis-leader, came from God and was a leadership of serving those below oneself.” —Jim L. Wilson Metaxas, Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy, 269. Mark 10:42–45…