Mark Palenske, pastor of Greers Ferry First Assembly of God Church in Arkansas, and his wife, Dena, were sick with Covid-19 for two weeks. Dena was hospitalized for several days but is recovering at home as of March 25. Even before the virus struck him and 34 members of his congregation, Palenske took the warnings seriously and suspended services at the church. Even so, the virus spread. Tuesday, March 24, one of their beloved members,…
When the coronavirus began to spread and churches joined their communities in reluctantly “social distancing,” we all shuddered just a bit with Easter just a few weeks away. Would we be able to enter our sanctuaries again for Easter Sunday? Even President Trump acknowledged this critical benchmark. Tuesday, March 24, during a Fox News virtual townhall, Trump affirmed that he “would love to have the country opened up and just raring to go by Easter.”…
The tragic death of 2-year-old Olive Heiligenthal on December 14 rattled the Christian community of Bethel Church in Redding, CA. And their prayers for her resurrection ignited a national conversation. At the time, blogs, news reports, and the church’s own social media provided exhaustive coverage. And as I read these reports and blogs, I noticed that in the clamor to condemn or condone something critical was either brushed past too quickly or ignored altogether. So,…
Despite government requests for churches to participate in “social distancing,” Florida Pastor Rodney Howard-Browne declined to suspend services at his church, The River. Howard-Browne encouraged his congregants to greet one another at the March 15 service. “Well I know they don’t want us to do this, but just turn around and greet two, three people,” he said. “Tell them you love them, Jesus loves them.” He asserted that he had no intention of closing his…
April has been designated Stress Awareness Month since 1992, a result of research on the effects of stress that dates back to the 1970s. Good to know. But if there were ever an April that we didn’t need to be reminded of our stress, this would be it. The good news is that this month you can find lots of practical advice to help you cope with stress, and much of it will help while…
People panic. It’s what we do. And, well, if the Covid-19 pandemic is any indication, we’re pretty good at it. To us, every crisis seems devastating and frightening. Like a fresh wound, it’s a focused, fervent time that consumes our attention. So sometimes we forget that the first crisis happened almost as soon as the sun had risen on human history. Adam and Eve had it good. Real good. If there had been a stock…
In college, it was the class everyone needed, but nobody wanted. “Public Speaking.” We studied great orators and their styles, the basics of preparing a speech, and those all-important points of speaking etiquette that would help us engage our audience while always respecting them, even when we disagreed. And we collected up little 3×5 cards, engraved them with tiny notes, and steeled ourselves for that day that we knew was coming. It was the reason…
Remember that day in January 2018 when Hawaiians were notified to “seek immediate shelter” from an incoming ballistic missile? The event caused mass panic on the islands and alarmed friends and family members all over the world. And actor Jim Carrey was there. In a recent interview with Graham Norton, Carrey was pitching his book Memoirs and Misinformation, and he explained to Norton the odd photo on the front of the book. “There was a…
In the brisk autumn of 1992, a couple of months before his inauguration, Bill Clinton’s motorcade pulled up to the Century City skyscraper in Los Angeles where Ronald Reagan had his post-presidential office. Clinton was spending a few days in town with friends and had sent word to Reagan, now eighty-one years old, that he wanted to stop by and chat. A meeting was quickly arranged. The two men were thirty-four years apart in age…
February 5 legendary actor Kirk Douglas passed away at 103 years old. His movie roles spanned more than six decades, and actors and filmmakers today are still shaped by some of his iconic roles. But Douglas himself was impacted by a much different, and more traumatic, event. One that would forever shape his life. Just over 29 years before a helicopter crash took the life of Kobe Bryant, Douglas was in a similar crash. But…