My wife and I recently enjoyed a two-week visit, from the USA, by our favourite granddaughter (the other grandchildren are male) and her daughter – our first great-grandchild. Miss P is referred to as our “miracle baby” as she was born at 24 weeks weighing only 14.5 ounces. Now approaching her fourth birthday she has…

Several years ago, I was a guest of another church at a Christian Conference Centre and one speaker’s subject was Why Witness? He started with this challenging statement. “The problem today is that too many preachers are trying to do the work of the Holy Spirit by trying to convict their listeners of sin”.  This…

In a recent daily Bible reading, I was intrigued by the opening words of the comment. “In church, we like to talk about what we were saved from. We were saved from sin and God’s judgement. But we don’t often ask, “What were we saved for?”. One of my favourite Bible books is Ephesians and…

I derive considerable pleasure from listening to YouTube Christian music from several American pianists and a church choir in Texas. I was interested in a spiritual song I heard recently that included the phrase, “I’m ready when you call me Lord, but give me just a little more time”.  That, of course, is not the…

The beautiful sight of daffodils at this time of the year reminds me of the first of two separate Easter Day sermons I heard many years ago. Possibly a reader of this contribution may have heard the same stories, from the same speakers, as they are well worth repeating. The first speaker related how he…

A cashier in a bank related how in the early years of his employment he had experienced a wide range of challenges.  Part of his role was to accept cash credits from all sorts of businesses and though many were easily dealt with, some were not so pleasant.  These included notes paid in by fishmongers…

With my Norfolk pen pal, I stayed at a local Christian Guest House where we met a lovely Irish couple. They were engaged but took the phrase, “Owe no man anything” from Romans 13 verse 8 literally as they didn’t believe in having a mortgage so were saving to buy their first home before getting…

In a recent Bible daily reading, I came across this definition of prayer by the 19th century preacher F.W. Robertson (and no, I hadn’t heard of him either!).  “It is to connect every thought with the thought of God, to look on everything as His work and His appointment, to submit every thought, wish, and resolve…

Many years ago, I heard a Christian stating that “Video recorders were invented for the benefit of Christians who didn’t believe you should watch TV on a Sunday!”  Presumably, this would enable the Christian to watch a Sunday programme on another day without any sense of guilt.  I find the record facility helpful for a…

An earlier article by Liz Cope included the following comments and if you want to read them in context look at 31 October 2022. “We do this every day – make assumptions, consciously and unconsciously. It is not something we can prevent, but what we can do is recognise when it is happening and try…