Tuesday, July 24, 2012 at 15:55 
The summer draws rapidly to a close. School supplies are in abundance at the stores. New clothes bought for a new school year. Summer reading not finished; maybe not begun. Band camps, sport camps, orientations, and teacher meetings come faster than the pages of the calendar flip. And, yet, I’m happy.
Why happy? Summer’s ending brings a time of reflection and hopefulness.
Tuesday, July 17, 2012 at 9:05 
Last week, I was given a gift. I got to spend four days with eleven kids from our church and three other chaperones at PassportKids! Camp at Mercer. The parents of the kids I take to camp all look at me like I’m crazy when I say that children’s camp is one of my favorite weeks of the year. When we show up for the week with sleeping bags, a bag full of kickballs and board games, a well-stocked first aid kit and a bunch of high-energy, squealing kids, I often hear, “Are you sure you want to do this for four days?”
But when the truth is told, I must admit that I get just as excited about camp as the kids. I can’t wait to see whose act makes it into the talent show this year, or which kid (or adult) will win bragging rights for the biggest cannonball splash. Most of all, I enjoy the change of pace – the chance to close the laptop, get out of the office, put on the sunscreen, and play.
Wednesday, July 11, 2012 at 15:05 
This past week, nuclear physicists at the CERN laboratory, home of the Large Hadron Collider, in Geneva, Switzerland announced that they had found ‘the God particle.” The what particle? Yes, it was actually reported as “the God particle.”
I went to the Google search engine on my computer to find out what this discovery was about. I knew I would soon be in over my head for I am neither a scientist nor the son of a scientist.
Wednesday, June 27, 2012 at 9:19 
On next Wednesday, July 4th, we will celebrate the 236th birthday of American independence from England. This national holiday will be remembered with parades, picnics, patriotic ceremonies galore, and rounds of evening fireworks to commemorate the establishment of freedom in America.
Many of the celebrations will focus on the freedoms earned though the Revolutionary War, the Declaration of Independence, and the United States Constitution. All of these actions have provided the basic political and security structure in which we enjoy the multiple freedoms of our day.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012 at 9:57 
Each year, the week of Vacation Bible School is preceded by months of preparation. Then it seems to pass in a flash, leaving behind a swirling sea of images and memories from the week.
Scuba gear, edible arks, Ocho the octopus, a miraculous pond full of fish, pledges to flags, water bottle fish, Namaan with oatmeal covered arms, faith insights from science experiments, children shouting,“Dive in!”at the top of their lungs.
. . . And dive in they did! This year’s theme was Operation Overboard: Dare to Go Deep with God. The goal of the week was to challenge our kids to dive into the waters of God’s Word in order to discover what it means to have deep faith.