Rod and I will celebrate 30 years of marriage the 6th of September.  This year it happens to fall on Labor Day.  Funny.  In a day when many people think so little about separating or divorcing, including Christians, and for reasons such as: “we’ve grown apart,”  ”you don’t meet my needs,”  ”I don’t want to be in this relationship anymore,” and yes, legitimate reasons too, like unfaithfulness, Rod and I are still married to each other.  Do you want to know why?  I love Rod.  Rod loves me.  God has put that love in our hearts.  It’s as simple as that.

What can I tell you?  Are we perfect?  No.  Are we special?  No.  I am very weary (that sounds nicer than SICK AND TIRED!) of hearing people tell each other that they are special.  Jesus is the only one who is special.  So, could it be that we are together because we are too scared to walk away from each other?  No. We simply love each other, we thank God for each other, and we want to be with each other.  Is that so hard to believe?  I guess it is.  It’s as hard to believe as the gospel is to so many.

People have heard the words of John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life,” and yet they choose to believe that that is not true.  How sad because it really is that simple.  God loves us.

The Apostle Paul writes in his second letter to the Corinthians that he promised them to one husband, Jesus Christ.  Rod and I are not only married to each other, we are married to Christ, and that is why we are still married.  I love Rod.  Rod loves me.  Why?  The beloved Apostle John said it best, “We love because He first loved us.”

 Trust me, you have never heard anyone like Nicky Cruz.  He was the head of the Mau Mau gang in NYC fifty years ago, and his thrills were to see people beg him for their life.  A very unlikely preacher from Pennsylvania, David Wilkerson came to the city to preach in the street, and Nicky gave his heart to Christ.  Dámaris’s mother was at that service.

Damaris and I were at Word of Life on Fri, 7/30/10.  The staff do a weekly Christian rodeo for the community.  That night, a terrible accident occurred where a horse lost its footing and fell on its rider, Graham Stump, while roping a calf.  The horse and rider were both on the ground for what seemed like a long time.  The horse got up, the rider did not.  He received a severe concussion, but no broken bones, miraculously.

Now, 11 days later, the doctors are saying that his brain injury is “very bad,” although he squeezed the therapist’s hand on command today.  The doctors have braced his wife, Randi, for the worst:  he may never “wake up.”  She is asking everyone to pray and believe God for a full recovery, and thanking the Lord for every small step that she is seeing.  She is keeping up a Facebook page with updates.

Graham and Randi have been married for 7 years, have two small boys (1 just now turning one) and love the Lord, serving in ministry at WOL full-time.

Facebook | Praying for Graham Stump

What Do We Do As We Get Older?(Psalm 92)

The wicked come and go, but the righteous man will flourish! The psalmist says that we should yield fruit, even as we get old. What is our purpose? To declare that the Lord is upright, our Rock and that there is no unrighteousness in Him. Be encouraged as Dámaris takes us through Psalm 92 verse by verse.

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This last spring, our daughter, Ashley (27), was able to go with us to Word of Life Argentina (Palabra de Vida) and fell in love.

Not like that… with the people there.

They loved her, too, and invited her to come and teach jr. high and high school math for their next semester in the bilingual missionary school.  Click “more” and let her tell you in her own words: (more…)

It doesn’t take much to throw a website out of whack.  Now, five hours later, we’re back up, thanks to some Powweb engineering and some HTML editing.

If something can be out of whack, what is “in whack”?