Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
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Grace and Peace to you from God our Father. Amen. The Bible. I'm sure the vast majority of homes in the area have at least one. That's good. Unfortunately, in too many homes, we're not quite sure where it is. If asked, is your answer some place in the bookcase, or maybe in a drawer somewhere? Here is another question. Did you receive one as a gift many years ago, and it still has that “new car” smell and not even the title page has been read? I wish there weren't so many people who would agree with those answers. However, the good news is that...
Grace and Peace to you from God our Father. Amen. It is getting to be about that time of year. Halloween is over and retail outfits, big and small alike, are skimming over Thanksgiving and marching right into the Christmas season. It seems a shame, but if I were in retail, it is likely I would be doing the same thing. After all, how hard it must be to put a really big sales push into a season in which we are to be thankful for what we already have. Along with this season comes the hustle and bustle of getting ready for the Christmas season....
Change, transition, whatever name you wish to put on it, we are experiencing it right now. I've been known to repeat this a number of times so bear with me if you have heard me say this before. When I was young, I would hear grown-ups say that the older they got, the faster time went by. I would think to myself, how dumb is that? It made no sense to me at all. Time did not go fast. It went too slow. The things I wanted to happen took forever to get here. However, now as I get older, I am finding that the grown-ups knew what they were talking...
Human beings are created for relationships. We need touch, a place to belong, and to be loved. There is no doubt that modern psychology has claimed this, as well as each of the world’s religions/philosophies. It’s such a basic truth for every person, it almost seems silly to claim, yet profound to admit. Loving and healthy relationships are where you can be yourself, which also always includes your darkest side. The gospel of John includes many encounters of Jesus with a variety of people: insiders, outsiders, outcasts, religious leade...
For those who try to live for the Lord and want to please Him, I’m sure you know what I mean when I say there are times when the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. When it comes to maintaining a red-hot enthusiasm for the Christian life, we are not robots, but rather we are emotional humans who have good days along with other times that are clouded with feelings of melancholy. It does the heart good to quietly sit alone as we search within our soul trying to figure out what is wrong. I...
The John Tesh radio show told me about an experiment done on competitive bicyclists. All the participants started by competing in a hot-weather bike ride. Then they were split in half, one group continued to train physically in the hot-weather conditions, and the other group focused their training on mental health, including positive affirmations, and learning how to deal with uncomfortable situations while racing. In the follow-up competition, the group who focused on mental training improved their speed and duration by 25%. We’ve all heard s...
“Wherever [Jesus] went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.” (Mark 6:56) So much of Jesus' ministry, his miracles and healing, involved touch. The loving touch that gives life, that heals, that restores. Father Jairus wants his daughter “to be made well, and live”, and to be made well, the hemorrhaging woman simply touched Jesus’s cloak. (Read Mark 5:21-43.) Jesus’ life is full of stories about him t...
The Bible refers to a joy that is unspeakable and full of glory, but what does this mean? I believe one answer would be the contentment of the conscience for those who know God and have decided to live in the awareness of His presence. How can we do this? We can train our minds to think about God the same as we learn and become skilled to do anything else. Repetition and commitment are the building blocks of being proficient and in the Christian faith, self-discipline is the path to spiritual...
Hope is one of those dynamic words that deserves the title of catalyst when it comes to change. It is a spiritual attribute that God’s people should use regularly as it is filled with life, excitement, and positive energy. Your first reaction to the idea of hope may be one of skepticism because you are thinking, it’s easy for someone to talk about hope when they do not understand what a terrible condition my life is in. Well, I may not have walked in your shoes, but I know that being neg...
We’ve had a heavy and difficult year, and I still feel that in my frequent, deep sighs. The pandemic, the political fighting, the polarization of our world just feels too much to add to our already busy lives, filled with just normal ups and downs. Jesus sighed too. And I think we can see why. When we see Him in Mark 7:24-37, He’s traveling the countryside, performing miracles, gaining popularity and status, well-liked, getting all the accolades anyone would want. But He knows this won’t last. He knows this whole ministry thing ends in His s...
Who am I? The world, culture and politicians will give me plenty of answers. They’ll tell me who gets to identify me, how they can identify me, and which identities are acceptable and which ones are not. While the world has many answers for identity, to get the true answers we must turn to God and His Word. We are created by God. We are created in God’s image. In every one of us, there is a bit of the divine. This, however, isn’t always obvious because it’s usually buried beneath our sin and the effects of our sin. Part of being human is bein...
Outdoor notes: *Be aware of proper waterfowl identification with most ducks not in full fall plumage yet. *HIP registration and Federal Waterfowl Duck Stamp required for waterfowl hunting. *Go to the N.D. Game and Fish Dept. website, (gf.nd.gov) for information regarding North Dakota’s new electronic posting regulations and assistance. *East Totten Recreation Area boat ramp is the only available ramp on Lake Audubon during a lake draw-down to allow for facility maintenance work along the U.S. H...
Who am I? In a world that puts stock in how we identify, we must ignore the temptation to allow us to identify ourselves, and turn to the Bible. The answer to the question “who am I?” isn’t on social media, and the politicians certainly don’t have it; it is only found in our creator and in our creator’s words. Over the past two weeks, we’ve seen the first two ways to identify ourselves. First, we are created by God. We’re not accidents, experiments, or the result of random chance. We are intelligently designed. Second, we’re designed in God’s i...
The idea of not being spiritually prepared to trust Christ because of a lack of interest is like being told that you have been scheduled to box a champion fighter this coming Friday night, even though you have no boxing experience, and are in terrible physical condition. It’s too late to start training and you will easily be knocked out with one punch. Another scenario would be that you have been given one week to compete in a body-building contest against other contenders that have been l...
For the month of September, we’re looking at our identity. While the world seeks to tell us who we are and how we identify ourselves, we’re going to look to the Bible. What does God have to say about who we are? Last week, we began at the beginning. Above all else, we are created. We didn’t happen by chance, but by careful intentionality. That being said, there is another fundamental aspect to God creating us that must be addressed. When God stated His intention to create us, He gave it a specific description: “in our image.” Presumabl...
Identity Politics. It’s a major “conversation” in our culture right now. The youngest generations have spurned labels, and yet continue to create new labels. Whether it’s in regard to their political affiliation, religion, gender or even race, who we identify ourselves as continues to grow as an issue. This conversation has the potential to be encouraging and enlightening, except for the fact that politicians (who, ironically, tend to be of the older generations), continue to use these labels and identities for their own gain. Thus, weaponi...
Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and He desires to spend quiet time with us. Our heavenly Father beckons us to draw near to Him, as He longs to be with His children. As we go about our busy day, many times we do not realize His presence but nevertheless, He is there. May we listen with our ears, watch with our eyes, and be aware of our thoughts, as God is always trying to communicate with us. The Lord of compassion gives us breath, and every heartbeat as a gift of His endless mercy and grace. He...
Greetings dear brothers and sisters in Christ. Beginnings. Something new, or perhaps returning to something, to again begin anew… a new city, new job, new school, or a new baby in the house. Even in rural communities such as ours, where things never seem to change, there is usually something new. Of course the biggest thing that is new now is that once again, we are saying good bye to summer vacation and school has started. For some, it truly is a new beginning. The kindergarten children, the first graders, and perhaps the freshmen are all e...
Grace and Peace to you from God our Father. Amen Joshua 24:1-2, 14-18 Joshua speaks of choices in this little bit of scripture. When we think about it, the whole Bible is about choices we make. Some of them are good choices; others, not so much. God chose to give us mortals the ability to think, to reason, and to make choices. From the very beginning this ability has been our downfall. The deceiver, my name for satan, talked to Eve in the garden. Through deception, he talked Eve into making the wrong choice. She could have stuck to her guns...
Greetings to you dear brothers and sisters in Christ. I love sports. I can watch almost any sport at any level. Whenever possible, I enjoy watching our students here play. Particularly, I enjoy going to the volleyball matches and basketball games, girls and boys. I try to get there for the very first game and I stay until the last game is over. It is fun to watch the growth of these young athletes and see the progression of the kids’ abilities of each succeeding game to the next higher level, from 5th graders all the way up to the seniors in h...
In the name of our Father, greetings to one and all. “Hot enough for you”? How many times have we said or heard that this year? Quite a few I imagine. Perhaps for many of us, and I include myself, who are too young to remember the 1930's, this recent spate of high temperatures and accompanying lack of rain seems ominous. Just a few weeks ago, I heard a farmer mention that this is the worst crop he's ever had. We can see from the road as we drive around the area, pastures never really greened up this year and there is little hay to be had. Alt...
I hope you all are having a restful month! As we come to the end of the month, I want to focus on one more subject before I turn it over to someone else. As people who love and follow God, the Bible tells us to try and be more like Jesus each day. (1 John 2:6) We can read the Gospels to see how Jesus lived. As we do this, we observe Jesus prioritized rest, even though he was literally saving the world (His to-do list was way more important than yours, sorry to break it to you). If Jesus, the Son of God, rested then why do we think we are the...
When it comes to finding our place in this world, let’s consider two categories. The first one let’s call, floating down the river. Imagine someone napping in a small boat without a compass or a paddle and not caring about where they are going. Having a spectator mentality, they have no map or intentional direction, but rather are just hoping for the best. It’s also common for these individuals to throw pity parties from time to time, as their happy-go-lucky lifestyle includes serious disappoint...
Now that we’ve dug into what rest is, why we should rest, and how we start to do that—I want to look at the Sabbath. You may have a lot of ideas associated with the word Sabbath, but we are going to look at what the Bible says about the Sabbath, and how we can incorporate it in our everyday lives. In doing this, I hope to break down and rid us of the false ideas we have toward the subject. First let’s look at scripture. The Bible talks a lot about the Sabbath—especially in the Old Testament, but Jesus also talks about it in the Gospels...
I spend a lot of time writing, and I try to present a balance of optimism and reality. This is becoming more difficult as we are constantly bombarded with so many things we do not understand. Even more disturbing is to consider how much negativity is going on that we are not aware of. I’m not implying that we anticipate evil behind every bush or under every rock, but my convictions accept our need to pray for spiritual discernment. I’ve had conversations with individuals who believe that mor...
