But I Am Guilty! (Hebrews 9: 24-28) Back when I practiced criminal defense one of the first things I told my new clients after I patiently listened to their side of the story was that they had three options. Their first option was to enter a plea of not guilty and demand a jury [...]
If You Had Been Here (John 11: 32-44) It was last year in December that my younger brother passed away suddenly. He had mentioned to my mother that he wasn’t feeling well and noticed blood in his urine. She urged him to see a doctor, but he declined reasoning that it was probably [...]
I Want to See (Mark 10: 46-52) One of the good things about Facebook is that occasionally you see a post worth seeing, one that makes you feel good, one that makes you smile. I saw one some time ago that was really heartwarming and made me smile. It was a video of an [...]
Ask Not (Mark 10: 35-45) On January 20, 1961, newly elected President John F. Kennedy delivered his inaugural address in which he announced that “we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and success of liberty.” He wanted his address to [...]
Too Much To Ask (Mark 10: 17-31) In 1789 John Wesley, the founder of our Methodist denomination, preached one of his more famous sermons entitled, “The Use of Money” in which he emphasized one of his most well-known mantras: Earn all you can, save all you can, and give all you can. He noted [...]
Bridge Over Troubled Water (Hebrews 1: 1-4; 2: 5-12) The song Bridge Over Troubled Water was written in 1969 by Paul Simon and it came to him so quickly he wondered where it came from and even acknowledged that it didn’t even sound like something he would write. The title concept was inspired by [...]
I appreciated Diane's sermon on the Power of Prayer as we wrap up our five week sermon series on the Book of James. I agree that prayer is powerful, a lot more powerful than we give it credit for and our prayers, when answered, are answered in several different ways. Sometimes God says yes, sometimes [...]
A Word to the Wise (James 3: 13-4, 7-8) I believed that the basic function of my role as an attorney was to counsel people, people who sought me out for advice or whom I had been appointed by the courts to represent in a criminal matter. And, as a prosecutor, I also counseled [...]
A Slip of the Tongue (James 3: 1-12) If election cycles are nothing else, they are entertaining, especially in the age of the internet where nothing, NOTHING, is forgotten or goes away. A slip of the tongue, if recorded, lives on in perpetuity. Let’s say that you aspire to run for some sort of [...]
What Cost Mercy? (James 2: 1-17) My friend Richard Kennedy was fond of saying that the milk of human kindness was not to be found in the Smith County courthouse. Richard, like me, had at one time been an assistant district attorney for the same elected prosecutor who operated under the belief that if [...]