When William MacKay left for college, his mother gave him a Bible.  On the front page of the Bible, she did an inscription, "To W.P. [as he preferred to be called] from your mother" and wrote the date.

One of the amazing things about life is the fact that we know so little about some things which are very common, and we take those things for granted--not sensing how very important they are to our survival.

Second by second 2000 years have trickled through the hourglass of time since Jesus Christ walked the shores of ancient Galilee.

If you think that you have troubles, let me tell you about Albert Kruger.  He had one of those days that will haunt him for years.

Do you ever feel like the person who prayed, "God, give me patience, and give it to me right now"?

When you greet someone do you say, "Howdy!" "Hello," or just "Hi there"?  It may depend on your age or your culture, or the person to whom you are speaking; yet greetings and farewells are all-important.

"Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace..." prayed St. Francis of Assisi long ago.  How better to begin a day than by saying, "Lord, make me an instrument of peace today.""

Wise is the person who thinks ahead and plans for the future, right?  But at what point does planning become presumption?  Suppose you are a businessperson, and business has been brisk. Your warehouses are overflowing.  Would it not make sense to enlarge?

You think you have problems?  I suspect you would not trade your challenges for those confronting the Apostle Paul.  Of the 13 books that he wrote, none is more intimate or personal that his second letter to the Corinthians.  In this he wrote, "We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed" (2 Corinthians 4:8-9).  What Paul faced would have sent the average person either into deep depression or flight, but Paul not only took it in stride, he actually seemed to grow with it.