A White Stone Gems from Scripture, Gifts from God's Classroom

My Hope and Vision

I thought this would be a good time to take the opportunity to share a little of what has been growing in my heart over the last few months of writing. First, a little background.

My general interest in writing was discovered back in 8th grade, when we were learning about racism and prejudice in our combined Social Studies and English class. We were given the assignment to write about something we were prejudiced about. I thought hard for several days, trying to think of a topic. I saw myself as a person who viewed things at face value for the most part, a person who seldom allowed myself to make judgements about people based on the group to which they belonged.

As my search for a topic continued, I had a sense of the assignment being unfair, or perhaps too difficult. The thought that eventually came to my mind was this: If only I could come up with a topic, and get my first sentence written, the rest would be easy! It was then that it struck me that I was prejudiced against writing! I had entertained negative thoughts about it before I had given it a chance. This became the topic of my paper, and it was then that I recognized the enjoyment that I have when I express myself in the written word.

A number of years later, I found myself asking questions about life, and finding the answers in Scripture, or in the experiences of life itself. I discovered that there were a lot of answers in the Bible that aren’t lying on the surface, so to speak, and I began to enjoy the process of discovery, followed by sharing my discoveries. Obviously I wasn’t the first to make these discoveries, but there was a sense of richness that grew out of digging deeper. At this point, I thought it would be great to collect some gems in the form of a book, but for many years I talked about writing more than I wrote.

In the fall of 2010, I had the conviction that it was time for me to stop “not writing”. I gave myself the goal of posting one new article a week on this site. At first, I mixed new material with the few articles that I had written in the past, but it wasn’t long before I reached the point where there was no more material in reserve, and I had to write if I was going to post.

This has been a new challenge, with new difficulties, and new blessings. I have been forced to go to God’s word on a regular basis with more focus than has been my habit in the past.

Along with this, God has brought many people into my life in recent months and years, and there has been a pattern emerging. God has allowed me to see a little bit of the damage done in homes where the father is missing, either through death, divorce, or through emotional distance from his wife and children. While I am not claiming to be the perfect example of fatherhood, I have found myself growing in my focus and passion in this regard, and have grieved and prayed for those who did not receive a healthy dose of fatherly love during their childhoods. I have recognized that some of the damage done by this problem may be difficult at best, to repair in this lifetime. What is possible in some cases, however, is prevention.

Because of the challenges that I have grappled with in my relationship with my family, I have found that there appears to be one thing that has emerged as a key principle in making me more of the husband and father that God wants me to be. This principle is for me to understand and practice what it truly means to love. I know personally that I’ve had misconceptions about love, and have found that as my understanding has grown, my effectiveness in my role as husband and father has grown as well.

So the goal I have is to study God’s Word with regard to love, with regard to Christ’s example as one who loves, and our calling as disciples to imitate His love in our relationship with others. It is my hope that at least one man will be challenged by what is written, and begin to search for himself. In pointing others to the transforming power of Scripture, it is my hope that God will rescue at least one child who would otherwise have been, in some sense, an orphan.

Perhaps what is written here will become a book some day, and perhaps not. Without regard to that, I expect to be continuing to write on this and other topics for some time. My request to those who read this, whether you know me or not, is that you will pray for God to give me the words of the Spirit, and that I will also reflect the truths that I share in my own life.