Blog
We live with a hope that is a certainty. God links us to eternity and immortality with Him. Jan and I have been pondering what it will be like to pierce that veil. We’ve processed the loss of our parents and dear friends. We have been part of multiple families who...
Many of us have a growing awareness of the need and desire to stand firm in the shaking, planting seeds for the future to grow. What can we endure and succeed under pressure? How can we bear fruit, and even be ever blessed, ever prosperous for the following...
I wonder what my response would be if I heard Jesus tell me what He told all the disciples: “Garris, you will desert me.” Even thinking about those words hits me in the pit of my soul. I know that whether in thought, word, or deed, I am capable of doing just that....
When I started in pastoral ministry many years ago, most of us wore jackets and ties to preach on Sunday morning. Some even wore suits. Recently, I looked at some old pictures of me from the early 1980s, and by the fashion standards of the day, I looked just fine....
As I was rummaging through a storage drawer, I found an old patch from my days as a cop. The patch was a recognition gift for the participants on our pistol team at the CHP Combat Match in Sacramento in 1975. That event was over 50 years ago. It wasn’t by...
Our lives, our words, and actions should interfere with hell’s agenda. Yet, all the trappings of religion are roadblocks to experiencing or demonstrating God’s power. It is easy to hide behind the prison bars of religion. We can meet for Bible study, prayer meeting,...
No matter how great some leaders are, they can’t save us. They are just mortals who fail, fall, and one day will die. Our help can come only from the Lord. Only those who hope in Him experience what the Psalmist wrote about some 3,400 years ago. Despite anything...
We have a saying in our home: “We are created in love, by Love, for love.” Each one of us was formed by the hands of our Creator. He is the protector of the most vulnerable among us, and no one is more vulnerable than a baby in a mother’s womb. Recently, the...
Psalm 120 is described as a song for pilgrims. The first verse declares, “I took my troubles to the Lord.” Their cry of distress is for deliverance from deceitful, lying people full of treachery and false accusations. Though the pilgrims spoke words of peace, they...
There is a blessing associated with having discernment. The Psalmist prayed: “O Lord, listen to my cry: give me the discerning mind that you promised. Listen to my prayer; rescue me as you promised” (Psalm 119:169-170). The Spirit-Filled Life Bible says: “Let my cry...
I have been talking with friends who are in a major transition. The fact is, while we have been going through our own personal transitions, the whole world also entered a major transition. It adds a weightiness to what we are personally processing, and sometimes we...
Why does God allow evil? And doesn’t that make Him complicit to some degree? The better question: Why did God allow His beloved family free will, and why do we allow evil? Why have atrocities been committed down through history by every tribe and nation? Even the...
To remember God’s goodness is an act of worship. We start to actually experience His goodness and are being changed in the process. Remembering moves Him to do again in us, in our time, what He did in the past. As a reminder to myself, I turned the words of the...
The Psalmist writes to those who are living under the weight of deferred hope that speaks louder than God’s promise. The delay has been years. Doubts fill your mind, and you are pressed to give up the good fight of faith: “Unless the Lord had helped me, I would soon...
Of late, I have been watching videos describing the life of coal miners in Appalachia. It's a secluded and isolated way of life. Some families lived in a “holler,” meaning “at the end of a road.” It is a simple, rugged life with its drawbacks. But the people...